Dwr Cymru and Essays, oh the essays

A belated welcome to Two-Thousand and Nine!

A strange opening to the new year then as I spent more of it drunk than I intended, but well on track now to being a productive member of the studentosphere again.

Alongside the annoyance of having a temperamental laptop, which sometimes decides that though the power button has been pressed, it is going to stay resolutely 'Off', I was also taken by another suspicious happenstance.

Though it was common knowledge that there was to be an amount of work undertaken in the area with regards to the Water, I had no idea of the exact nature of the work.  In fact, I had foolishly assumed that the water would merely be unavailable for an amount of time, and my oh so precious time would not be affected in any other way.

However, I was put upon by a man, whose pleasingly Welsh name I shall not provide, who showed me a card and asked to be allowed into the house to potter around doing Water-based work.  At the start I confess I thought this was a wonderful and convenient reason to take a lengthy break from working on essays (and it was), but after awhile I begun to be slightly suspicious about the nature of the work being undertaken.

Though the man had successfully shut off the water, which did a lot to put me at my ease as to the genuine nature of his employment in said Water, both his general manner and the words which he insisted upon saying with his mouth led me to become ever-so-very suspicious.

Firstly, and without casting too prejudicial an aspersion on the working class of London, this man was as close to a Del-boy style geezer as it is possible for a South Walean to be.  After claiming, probably truthfully, that one sluice provides water through several houses, he then further tested my faith in him by spryly clearing the dividing wall in my back garden to poke around in next-door's garden.

Now it's not the fact that a middle aged man so gleefully jumped over the wall that is in itself suspicious, however I doubt trespass is encouraged by Dwr Cymru, so if this man was the genuine article, he is at the very least a rogue agent.

The final nail in the ever-so-suspicious coffin he was sanding for himself, (the analogy doesn't work because he wouldn't be hammering in the nails if he was only just sanding it off), came when he pulled out what I heard him describe as a 'Brazilian Stick'.

Now.

If I had to describe this stick, which I have to since I cannot find a satisfyingly accurate picture of one, I would describe it as a metal rod, roughly 3 feet in length and probably about two inches in diameter, topped with what looked like a wooden knob that had been ripped off a door and spliced onto the top of the pole with prit-stick.

He placed the end of the pole that wasn't tipped by a knob on the floor.  He then placed the end with the knob, to his ear.  I have since told people that I would pay money to be allowed back in time in order to look at my own face when he then proceeded to say:

"Do you want a listen?"

Obviously I listened.  Sparing only a brief second of thought for the hidden cameras whose existence I momentarily entertained, I listened.

And I heard nothing.

With my suspicion going haywire he once more left to adventure in both my own and my next door neighbour's garden.  Upon returning to the house, he said his bit and soon left.  Later in the day we received a letter from Dwr Cymru detailing the work etc.

I have since taken the time to research what I had heard as a 'Brazilian Stick', and have since learned that it is indeed a legitimate and genuine tool, though it is called, rather cleverly, a 'Listening Stick'.  To be completely honest I'm glad I didn't hear him say 'Listening Stick' because that would have only made me think he was an insane yet cunning homeless person who's slyly managed to get his hands on a Dwr Cymru uniform, car and relevant stationery with Dwr Cymru watermarks on, just in order to freak lazy students out of their solipsistic worlds.  Basically this man could only have freaked me out more if he's pulled out a divining rod and had attempted to discover water in that way.

Turns out there's a leak in the pipe somewhere along the street.

The moral of this story is: Never judge a man who has a suspicious rod with a knob on the end, because it's more than likely they are legitimately qualified in wielding it.

And the essays I hear you ask?

Oh, the essays...