Things are gradually becoming more habitable at Sloggers’ Roost. And as the work proceeds, there are some happy by-products. One of these is that the cellar here has been cleared of 150 years of stored crap, and is now open to receive bottles of wine with a desire to be stored in a civilised manner.

Laying down wine is all very well, but the central problem with the laying-down idea is that the knocking back experience tends to get in the way. Thus the wine laying-down process can all too easily be torpedoed by the Slog falling down as a result of the over-imbibing lush issue.

However, with the vast area of new space created by underground demolition, it has become possible to have, à droite, the copious wine for drinking now of little long-term potential….and à gauche, the serious stuff that should be retained for the appreciation of special guests, family, and those who know a gassy Gattinara from veritable Vosne Romanée. I am that man busy installing an electronic Pavlog-dog system designed to hit me with 20 volts every time I veer unnecessarily to the left on entering la cave. I am very doubtful as to whether it will work.

I didn’t blog before now today because I’ve been busy at honest work. Some of you may have spotted me having a Chance the Gardener moment yesterday, but this time no allegories were involved: today I have been mainly cutting grass, painting furniture, making decisions in French for the benefit of Polish blokes, choosing interior doors with my builder, constructing a raised bed for herbs, and dunking in the pool with a view to remaining reasonably cool. I do realise, by the way, that this is a lifestyle 93% of the world’s population would kill to have:  but as I’ve written many times before, it is the 4% of us who are awake who may well, in the end, triumph over the 3% trying to administer Huxleyesque mind-numbing drugs to everyone else.

Injections of such drugs include David Cameron calling for an end to female genital mutilation; fisherman Daniel Bennett, 26, from Whitby, North Yorkshire, catching a 208lb skate; and an image purportedly showing a Russian separatist fighter stealing a ring from a victim of the MH17 plane crash.

I mean, c’mon.