Fencing in better weather

13th & 14th August

It's Bruce again.

Yesterday was a red letter day, my very own scaff spanner arrived. For those not initiated into the arcane art of temporary fencing, you need a scaffolding spanner to tighten the standard fencing clip that holds it all together. We always have a stock in the Tardis, but naturally there's never enough to go round, and the cry you hear ringing across site from time to time is "Who's got a scaff spanner?).

Sunday, I finally got round to ordering one from ScrewFix, together with a pair of high vis vests for Sheila and I, and they came just 24 hours later. One of the useful aspects of being at the National is that we have access to a postal address for the duration.

I spent yesterday and today with the fencing team again. We've made a start on fencing the exhibitors' campsite, leaving the fence stabilised with triangles, and gaps in it so that the public can continue to have access to their park. We also took down a bit of the perimeter fence where it hadn't left room in a bay for the intended activity.

Having taken a section down, the tree work contractors went in and cleared the undergrowth back, and we returned after lunch to re-erect the fence with rather more space inside.

I thought I had detected a similar problem at the far end of the main site, where the fairground will be, but a discussion with Site 1 today revealed that the plan has been modified since the main drawings were done, and the line is fine.

The fencing team have also been used as general muscle. The most serious task yesterday of this type was to move the cages for storing gas cylinders to their proper positions. They didn't have to move far, but they are remarkably heavy; it took six of us, with poles through convenient slots ,to carry them.

Today we took down the section of perimeter fence where the pay booths were to go, as the cabin was due for delivery. Once more we went back after lunch and redesigned the fence around the new cabin..

We've also sorted a problem with the fence next to the Tardis. Every year we put the fence up quite quickly, because of the need to protect the Tardis immediately, and then when we go back to do a better job, others have unloaded masses of stuff from the Tardis and leaned it on the fence.

We'd deliberately waited until a lot of this had been used, then went in and shifted the rest out of the way, installed some more props to pull the fence back upright, and then put the stuff back tidily.

Further general work was helping to unload the fire extinguisher stock from the Tardis so that it can be tested, and shifting a plant trailer full of cookers and fridges and freezers into the wrg kitchen cabin and brew hut.

Sheila has been beavering away in the admin cabin meanwhile, doing stuff like making badges and signs. Next time she's doing this blog I'll try and persuade her to give more detail about that.

Last night was a joint fish and chips session for the blue shirts – we all gathered in the marquee by the worker's boats, drank some beer, ate fish and chips, and generally had a quite raucous time of it.

The weather today has been much more promising, sunny and a bit breezy. We are just praying for a continuation of it. We've filled the ruts around the site before they set hard, and a big roller has been hired in to start pressing the ground flat again.

Tonight we are having a quiet one on the boat; the wrgies will start reappearing tomorrow, so that we move into wrg camp mode. I probably only have a couple more meals to provide before I get my break from cooking for a couple of weeks.