Sitting in the middle of nowhere

I love that we live in a rural location. We don’t have traffic issues or crowded supermarkets. We do have space; a large orchard, a potager and the walking and cycling possibilities available from the front door are almost endless. However there are downsides and one of them is ‘next day courier delivery’. This is something to think about if you crave an escape from civilisation.

The middle of nowhere

Ade placed an order at the weekend for a product that was showing an estimated delivery from Leeds, UK to France of Tuesday 18^th June. I assured him I could be at home on Tuesday, no problem. Within a day of placing the order I had a call from a friend (who also happens to be my yoga teacher) who has broken her toe (nothing to do with yoga) asking if I could drive her to class on Tuesday morning, meaning an extra class for me this week. Thankfully the delivery date had moved to Wednesday 19^th June, so I was able to say yes.

Wednesday arrived and via the DHL tracking website we could see that on Monday our package had left Leeds and arrived in Gatwick. Tuesday it made it’s way to Paris and on Wednesday it arrived in Nantes in the wee small hours. By 11.07am it was showing as ‘With delivery courier’ and I was waiting. The sun was shining, but I didn’t want to stray into the potager for fear of missing either the courier or the phone call we often get to say they are close by. I pottered with the pots, doing a bit of deadheading and then tackled the ironing mountain, all the time trying to ignore the dogs who really couldn’t understand why we hadn’t gone out for a walk especially as the weather was perfect. Toffee tried talking to me, Mini tried to get my attention with her ball and they even tried jangling their leads in the hope of getting out. Nothing, all was quiet (except the dogs), which if I’m honest was to be expected as Nantes is a two-hour drive from us and that is direct via the autoroute. By six o’clock yesterday evening the DHL site was updated with the status ‘scheduled for delivery as agreed’, location – Nantes. Not entirely sure what this means as agreed delivery date was Wednesday 19th, but we guessed it meant ‘it went out on the van, but you were too far to get to today, we’ll try again tomorrow’. It was nine o’clock before I got chance to walk the dogs, but it was a lovely evening with the setting sun glinting off the rolls of hay and the increased hare and rabbit activity made for extra excitement and very happy doggies indeed.

This morning I was hopeful that the van would set off bright and early and as we are likely to be the furthest point from depot, a quick blast to get to us as first drop and then make their way back towards Nantes with other deliveries seemed a possibility. I could visualise myself signing for it wearing my yoga leggings and with my yoga mat in my other hand ready to dash off to my 10 o’clock class. However, the class has now started, the phone hasn’t rung, the village is quiet and I’m sitting here waiting, even the dogs are sulking in their beds. To make matters more frustrating the DHL site hasn’t been updated since six o’clock yesterday evening. Quote from DHL site “our online results give you real-time, detailed progress as your shipment speeds through the DHL network.” Hmmm, I may never get to leave the house again!