A normal Saturday

Well the day off was nice for me, but it was a usual Friday night round here. When we got back last night the police riot van is out again and I'm earwigging in the local Co-op waiting with my two pints of milk about the bloke reported with a knife. Mick says he wasn't peeling his apple with it.

Then at 6am this morning some git tried to break into the house, so Mr Pod says, who comes in as Burglar Bill is trying the front door we all share to our flats here.

I'm not sure by Mr Pod's account whether Burglar Bill had already smashed up the lobby by then, but it was certainly smashed up when I got down at 8 for the newspaper. The large mirror's all over the floor in sharp jagged pieces and my lily vase is smashed. Burglar Bill's stood on the children's basket where they keep their cloth bags for the Co-op and he's broken that too. The bottles for the recycling are rolling about the floor, and the cushions from the seat are soaked in something which might be a wine spillage from a near-empty. Or it might not be. The door handle's been pulled off and rubbish is scattered over the front garden. Mr Pod says Burglar Bill was rat-arsed, and probably won't remember anything. So I won't expect a tenner through the letter box then, by way of apology and the price of a new vase.

This is one of the penalties for living in Smalltown. We get a beautiful big house, a secret garden, the full Victorian grand scale of high ceilings, delicate fireplaces and wide wooden floorboards, and for it we pay with Burglar Bill, the riot van, and a monthly visit to the police station.

Now Grit's depressed, and about to hit the police website again to report another small incident of vandalism in just another day in Smalltown.