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Bloody monday

 It's always something, today it was a lorry in the new farm yard that decided that a wall which we installed to protect electrical and other mechanical services was not really in a place of his liking.  Our master electrician was called (he was not far, as he was inspecting the work of his crew in our house).  We shut down electricity to the new warehouse for nearly two hours, while the electrician began inspecting and fixing the damage.  We have three-phase 480-volt service to the new warehouses.   While the master electrician started taking everything apart, one of his apprentices was sent on a parts scavenger hunt.  From initial break to fully repaired took three hours, during which we could not open a single freezer or refrigerator because of health and safety rules on maximum temperature.  A lot of waiting around.  By noon, not only was the electrical service repaired, the gas line inspected and both re-certified, but the protection wall had been rebuilt with additional reinforcement.  

It was the driver's third solo driving day.  He was so focused on backing up in the loading bay that he lost focus on the front of his truck.  The total cost of the accident was £ 12,512.62  which is a lot, but 95% of that was material.  The cost of wire shields, connection boxes and connectors for 480V is astronomical.  The truck company and I agreed on a 60/40 split of the insurance deductibles, the wall should have been re-enforced, and his driver needed more training.

In other news, our second team of pigs was moved from the training pen to a second forested area.  We have 38 small forests on the farm, the two teams of pigs have their work cut out for the next few years.  We now have almost 60 pigs/piglets on the farm.  Our ecologist inspected the first forest under "pig management" and said that in about four weeks, we could move the pigs out and start the undergrowth cleaning process (mostly removing rubbish and clearing old collapsed buildings).  Two British universities' anthropology and archeology departments have asked to inspect the cleared forest giving their students a real site to explore.  Our land is specifically mentioned in the 1086 Little Domesday Book (an audit of the lands of England so that the new King could asses taxes).  Yes, 1086 refers to the date of publication... So the students may get lucky and find a 1,000-year-old rubbish dump, that would tell them a lot about the daily lives of Saxon farmers, or maybe where the old farmers dumped their 1950 and '60s rubbish.  Only time will tell.

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