M6

3 and 3/4 hours. That's how long it takes to travel from Ashby de la Zouch to Blackburn if they close two lanes between junction 15 and 16.

Normally it's about 2 hours.

The peeps at the Highways Agency over-ran and it caused mayhem back to junction 19 - cars were driving along the hard shoulder/nipping into the services and back out the other side just to gain a few hundred yards (and about 30 minutes).

There was a football match on which made the traffic worse but I can't remember which one - lots of scarves hanging (not fluttering) out of car windows.

I saved 15 minutes because I got into the outside lane and kept there (insider knowledge - Amanda) and just kept there until the lanes disappeared. Just after I drove past a lorry it moved over to block both lanes to stop anybody else doing the same. I can understand why too. A little pang of guilt but then I've got a schedule..

Happy days, emulsion living room, hanging vertical blinds (I will show the steps to put them up next time as my phone battery died trying to use Wayfinder to avoid the jam), destroying the bathroom and inhaling loads of plaster dust and finally laying the tile flooring in the kitchen. Cheated by not taking up the vinyl tiles so hoping that next week they stay stuck down.

Tile laying whilst playing hopscotch - that's what it seems like when you try to get around the nicely laid tiles to the other side of the room. Leave gaps - thanks Martin.

Oh, and somebody decided to key Amanda's car. Vengeance and cold dishes...that person is going to regret it eventually.

Monday 8.30am (not in a bigbrother accent) and it's Redbush tea time. Stef Kunneke drank this stuff all the time at HRL in sunny Morecambe (that's MORE RE CAM BAY to a South African who didn't know how it was pronounced). The tea is vile but it's supposed to do you good.