Hello and welcome to the jottings of a farmer in Suffolk who, despite his best efforts is still farming...
It was with no real expectation that I stepped onto the bathroom scales two weeks ago and looked down at the digital readout and with eyes closed already knew the worst, I had put on 2.4 kilos in weight over the festive period. I dressed with a heavy heart which was no doubt surrounded by fatty deposits and headed out to my office to begin looking through gym membership options. After some while I realized that I could buy 12 metres of ready mixed concrete for the same money as an annual membership of a local treadmill, but where to lay the cement?
Not being one to waste money and to try and keep pace with the ever increasing deluge of new regulations that seem to be heaped upon us, despite what I keep hearing in the press to the contrary, I decided to replace one of the diesel tanks. Although the old tank was technically legal, the regulations regarding storage of fuel mean that I was not practicing due diligence if a spillage happened, so it had to go.
The digging out of the site and removal of the old tank was easy enough and did little to reduce the excess body fat, as I had hired a tracked digger with a padded, soft suspension heated seat, but setting out the site and laying the cement proved more than an adequate workout for me thank you.
Shovelling concrete must surely be one of the hardest physical jobs, ever. However, it must be better mentally for me than learning to use all that complicated torture equipment in a gym. My wife did pop up during the day of the 'big pour' with a cup of coffee and felt so sorry for me that when I came in for lunch she had cooked me a wonderful full English breakfast with all the trimmings.
Things went well on the job except that we had a rain shower early evening after the event which was obviously not forecast, even on the lunchtime TV weather guesstimate, which meant I was power floating the finished area 25 hours after the pour the following day. Satisfied with my efforts having created a smooth surface you could skate on, I packed the gear away and returned it to the hire company, only to find on my return that the cat had also decided to take an interest my work and have a close inspection of my nice level smooth surface by walking on it.
The following morning I eagerly stepped onto the bathroom weigh scales to see that no excess fat had been lost! Too many cups of tea and biscuits, too much food all round in fact had been consumed during the work.
So having spent the budget of a gym membership on concrete and a new tank I can't afford to join. However I do have the new diesel tank, it only remains for me to have to pay to fill it with fuel.
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