TOOLS

Does anyone else get sentimental about tools? Aren’t they found in burial mounds? Of the six chisels my father gave me one Christmas there are three left. I did ask him why I needed six chisels, being only about six at the time. He said – you never know. One got squashed when the front section of the old bung collapsed rather earlier than anticipated – I was almost in tears.

I have found another brilliant place in Rye, tucked away out of reach of the health and safety inspector – a metal-working engineering firm. As soon as you walk in you know this is a good place where useful stuff is done. There is gentle hum of very heavy machinery and a smell of oil presiding over an overwhelming sense of procedural chaos. There is a reception but actually if you want to talk to anyone you have to make your way across a labyrinth of lathes to the hairy man in the corner. That will be an hours work - 40 quid - for the vital part for my 52-18=34 year old woodworking lathe (a child compared with this lot).