02/01/2026
“I’m so happy to hear your voice and not a machine - are you working today?”
“Yes, or course.”
"I am so pleased, I’ve been trying to clear our drains and lost my drain rods down the line, we’re still blocked up, I’ve told all the neighbours not to flush their toilets …. Could you possibly come and help us?
“No problem, we’ll be with you in an hour or so.”
On arrival I asked him, how many drain rods he’d lost and what he had on the end…
“I had 12 and I’ve got 8 left, so I think 4 and the ‘curly prodder’ is on the end”
“I don’t suppose you know where the nearest manhole is?”
“Yes, it’s under the conservatory floor, we concreted over it as the builder said we’d never need to be in it…. We shouldn’t have done that should we?”
Needless to say, we soon had the drains clear and his rods retrieved .. not just 4, not 5, not 6 or 7, not 12 …. but 19. But no ‘curly prodder’ – that was still attached to one of the rods he hadn’t used!
