with a litte help from my friends (and family)...

well it's been an interesting few days here in Gloucestershire. luckily we've been spared any damage to the house, although many people have not been so lucky and people less than a few streets away from us have suffered.

I was actually in a meeting outside of Nottingham on Friday oblivious to the chaos nd unable to access my phone, so when was somewhat suprised to have a voicemail from Paul left at 2pm telling me he'd had to abandon his car and walk home and that I may not want to try and get home that evening because it was unlikely to make it back. So, at his suggestion I called Sally and arranged to head for her house in Redditch as it seemed more reasonable and at least I would have a decent evening (and a glass of wine) with her rather than get stuck on the M5.

then, listening to the radio, it became clear that things were worse than they originally seemed, so I laid a plan of options - based on friends and family en-route that I could bail out at (Trevor and Nicola.... Rob and Fi... Karen and Craig....). Then I heard that it would take me probably near 3 hours to get along the M42 to to even the M40 junction so decided to abandon the option of going south, looked at the map and considered what friends I had in that part of the country! So... call into mad and rob and therefore spent a lovely evening with them catching up over an indian takeaway. God bless Sagga for providing a list of possible friends in need...

Sat morning I woke up early and at 5.45am decided to try and head off to hopefully miss any traffic. Got as far as Bromsgrove then all went pearshaped as the M5 was closed and I was forced to head north on the M42. So, as fate was clearly telling me something I went to sally's for a cuppa. Sally was due to take Laura and Adam down south that morning, to meet with mum halfway so mum could bring them to chetlenham for the week. so to save them from both getting stuck too, I offered to take the kids. We stocked up on "emergency" stuff, wellies, twix bars, macs (and Gameboy/Nintendo DS - obviously) and set off in optomism...! By this time the M5 was completely clsoed so we tried Evesham (no chance), then tried a few back roads, but all roads led to the Avon river, which wasn't having any of it, basically we were cut off from south fo the Avon. All the smaller routes across the Avon were completely impassable, with some swept away. We saw one car completely submerged and stopped in Bidford just to take a look at the gobsmaking views in front of us.

so we gave up, went back home to Redditch, watched a DVD, had some lunch then at 1.30pm tried again and headed for the M5 prepared to sit and wait it out on the motorway. Finally got home at 4pm, a mere 23 hours later than planned, but hey at least my waiting time was done in the warmth and dry.

Cheltenham has recovered suprisingly quickly, it now seems to be the areas with direct rivers on them that are still suffereing, Gloucester is now bearing itself for the banks to burst. As I write this we're being told that our water supply is about to run out and probably will remain off until Wedesday, so now the focus has shifted to people filling up their baths unecessarily and panic buying. Me, I'm just going to take the opportunity to smell....