Boss Radio

Tea time. Time to make tea. Welsh Rarebit maybe? Or a salad perhaps? Well first things first, put the kettle on.

I go to the kettle, it needs water, kettles are like that, they're thirsty little barbarians. So I take a jug to the water supply because it's easier than unplugging the electric kettle and I fill it from the fresh water tap. The fresh water tap is the one where the water comes direct from the mains rather than from one of the tanks upstairs, both of which are filled from the mains, but it's the principal of the thing.

The water is the wrong colour. It looks sort of milky. With horror I realise that there must have been milk in the jug. Augh, what a waste - I throw it away and refill the jug.

It's still the wrong colour. Its whitewater. I've heard of this stuff, people go rafting in it and have all sorts of merry fun bouncing off rocks and risking their lives for pleasure. I've just never heard if its actually fit to drink.

As I stare at the water it gradually turns transparent. Right. So the sediment settles, that's probably a good thing, now all I have to do is empty the water away, wash the sediment out of the jug, and... wash it out with more white water? I stir it up a bit to see what the sediment actually looks like, but it refuses to be stirred. I empty the water away and try to scrape the sediment out of the jug, but I can't see it, it must be the same colour as the jug.

OK. let's be scientific. I refill the jug and sniff it. I can't smell anything, but that proves nothing, I take it in to mum and ask her to sniff it, she says it smells vaguely medicinal. Oh good grief. Surely the water from the swimming baths up the top of the hill can't have leached into the water supply? One thing's for sure, we're not drinking the stuff. I'm telephoning the water authority.

They're not easy to contact but I find a number and ring it. I'm given a choice of three keys to press. I press what sounds like the right one, and am given another choice, this time of 5 keys to press. This time it's easier, I press 'Other' - I have a choice of 5 more keys I can press. I'm getting impatient now, I'm paying for this call, whatever happened to pools of people answering the telephone and putting you through to whoever you needed to speak to? Another mechanical voice comes on, but fortunately it's interupted by a real person before I have a chance to have a fit.

The guy's already half guessed what I'm calling about, he's had a few calls on the subject all ready so he just takes my details and explains that what's happened is that air has got into the water somehow. It's completely harmless, but will I just do something for him?

I guess so. What?

He wants me to go and fill a glass with water and tell him if it clears from the bottom or the top. Very cunning. If it clears from the top it's sediment, but if it clears from the bottom then whatever it is must be exploding into the air. It clears from the bottom. He says what he needs me to do now is to leave it for a couple of hours while whatever it is works its way out of the water, then if I'd just go and run the water for a few minutes to clear the pipes and everything will be just fine. If I need drinking water before then I should fill a jug and put it in the refrigerator for half an hour and will be perfectly OK to drink.

Whatever happened to 'Completely harmless'?

Still, I'm not too bothered by it. Living in an old cottage we have to 'run the water' to clear the pipes every morning because they don't know what our pipes may be made of so it's best to clear them. As a further preventative measure I therefore bought a couple of filter jugs, which we keep permanently primed. I fill them up. That's nearly a gallon of drinking water once it's filtered. No worries.

Last thing last night I went to clear the pipes as asked, but they didn't clear. Oh well. Let's give it another 8 hours.

This morning the water is every bit as milky as it was yesterday. I left the tap running for over 10 minutes but the milkiness persists. In a moment of inspiration I filled a bottle and watched as the milkiness drifted up into the bottleneck, and sure enough, bubbles started appearing in the neck where they'd been trapped. I knew a lifetime of drinking fizzy stuff wasn't wasted. So there is something in the water, something lighter than water, something that smells vaguely medicinal. Better create some more drinking water then I thought, and filled up a couple of containers with the water from the filter jugs, then I refilled the jugs.

They're both on go-slow. One of them has almost come to a standstill with only half a jug filtered, the other is still filtering, but wa-a-ay slower than usual.

What is in our water???

Maybe it's connected with the explosions I heard the night before.

I must 'phone local radio and tell them that the aliens have landed.

Oh wait...

The aliens work for local radio.