We've done it now.

Regular followers of this blog will be aware that Terry and I have been hunting for the last couple of years for a decent mini-digger. We've made all kinds of enquiries but the end result always was that we could never find anything that we wanted.

In the end we decided that we would have to pay more than we wanted and buy something newer, but that never worked either. That is, until today. I went to Bacup to see a digger, a 2007 Tamaguchi and while it was dearer than we were ever expecting to pay, in the end we've bitten the bullet and gone for it. The cash has been transferred over and I'm picking it up on Wednesday night after I collect my trailer.

And so last night was spent up on the moors between Burnley and Bacup in a nice windswept hilltop situation with a glorious view. And then this digger guy took me to see it in Accrington where it was digging out someone's footings.

After that I went to Preston to see Sandra and we had a really good chat about one thing and another. It's nice to know that in OUSA things are carrying on just as I left them. Chaos, panic, disorder - it's all still going on.

This evening I'm on the M1 at Tibshelf Services. I'm moving off in a minute to find somewhere to bed down for the night as I need to be in Ilkeston in the morning.