Maybe the village will be sad to see us go after all

‘You certainly gave us a run for our money,’ said the village elder, serving us with what appeared to be the official goodbye statement.

The builder boyfriend was flabbergasted. He had been walking across the green with the spaniels when this gentleman, a leading light in the community, came towards him. He braced for impact because the last time they engaged outside the house it had not gone well. The builder b had, on that occasion, been wearing his old navy-blue towelling dressing gown and was putting out the bins. No doubt I shouted at him to go and do it when I heard the beeping of the reversing garbage trucks.

Poor BB was just doing as he was told when this pillar of committeedom walked past with his wife and dog and unceremoniously informed him that he looked like a tramp.

To be fair to the couple, the BB had furnished them with a mouthful before that, because while he was wheeling the bins into place it appears that they rather unwisely set about enquiring of him why he and I did not like living in their village, and why we did not, therefore, just leave.

‘On the contrary,’ said the BB, ‘we like our village very much, thank you.’ And I suppose it was the conversion of ‘their’ village to ‘our’ village that pushed the gentleman over the edge, prompting him to point out that the builder b looked like a tramp.

I did not disagree with his analysis, because I was growing thoroughly sick of that old navy dressing gown myself. Shortly after, I finally got around to buying him a new one from Sainsbury’s.

‘So embarrassing,’ I kept muttering, after he told me, although the BB was adamant that no embarrassment should be taken on board by us.