At the time of the storm we were neighbours to Kev, Liz & James in Liddington. 

The terrible storm of 1987 left the village of Liddington without electricity for 3/4 days.  Adrian is not known for his patience. On the 2nd day we went out to buy more storm lanterns. To no avail of course as everyone else in the country was doing the same. Adrian was in a foul mood on the journey home.

We returned to the house, after dark as it was November, to see the Turner's house next door, ablaze with light!  Great we thought - we're back on!

On entering our house - still no electricity!  You can imagine!!  Adrian really. really was not a happy bunny!

On the door mat was a handwritten note from one of Southern Electric's engineers explaining all had been sorted, but they had to route the whole village's power supply through our house as an emergency measure.  The engineer said the bill would be sorted at a later date.

Adrian immediately picked up the phone, which was by the front door (landlines of course back then).  He had just got through to Southern Electricity, physically jumping up & down  - why we still had no electricity when the rest of the village & our neighbours were all connected? What was all this about the supply being routed via our feed?  Incandescent doesn't come close!

At this point Kev appeared on the doorstep, tears of laughter rolling down his cheeks. He would have heard Adrian on the phone as he approached the house - the door was still open from our arrival!

How he escaped injury I really don't know!  The poor person on the other end of the phone already had an earful from Adrian, but quickly received an apology!  It took a while for Adrian to calm down - helped by very kind offers of warm showers & glasses of wine on behalf of Kev.

btw - Ashtree Cottage remained without power for another day or so - unknown to Kev - we were on a separate power link. He really thought we would have been connected same time as everyone else when he left the note on behalf of Southern Electricity!

Adrian never really got his own back, & no-one has ever stitched him up quite the same- well it would be difficult.  This cemented our friendship from there on & is typical of Kev's endless sense of fun. 

Our move, first to Highworth & then to Yorkshire meant that we couldn't see each other as often, but were able to spend longer times together when we did & we have so very, very happy memories.

Nothing comes close to to the power cut though!