. . . _ _ _ . . . (SOS)

One of the reasons we moved to the Suffolk countryside was to escape the hustle and bustle of town life. To enjoy the simple things in life, including the peace and quiet. I’ve mentioned before that you could hear a pin drop here it’s so quiet, especially at night. If there is no wind then all around is quiet and still.

Owls and bats as we know, like to fly around at night. This is all lovely until they fly past the security light sensors, as they trigger them to come on. During the night the outside lights can sometimes flash on and off like the owls are communicating through Morse Code!

To add to the array of security features on our house, Mr G has bought an outdoor security camera kit. This is great, but considering we get on average about three cars a day down our lane – the likelihood of one of them being a burglar is slim. But, it’s better to be safe than sorry!

He has been busy setting it all up and getting very excited about being able to watch the pitch black of night on the TV in the lounge. To be fair it can be a welcome relief to the trash telly we sometimes sit and watch! Of course, the kit comes with a little booklet full of all sorts of interesting facts and settings for the camera kit. One of which is if the cameras pick up movement outside it will ‘helpfully’ send Mr G an email to alert him.

Let me just explain a little about Mr G’s mobile phone. He has many a useful App on there, all of which come with their own little noises and alerts. If there is a setting for a noise to type, to give an alert, a reminder, or to just open the App Mr G will turn that on. He is also a person who has kissed the pen and paper goodbye and literally does everything on his phone/tablet. I on the other hand have a love/hate relationship with technology. It’s great when it works but without a doubt it will let you down when you most need it. Like when I’m lost (daily) somewhere in the countryside and need to call someone who can tell me where to go. This is why I still use my trusted paper diary and notebook on a daily basis. All of my To-Do lists are on paper – from my house admin, work tasks, Christmas lists and the general daily To-Dos. Crossing tasks off on paper is much more satisfying than deleting them on your mobile phone/tablet. You can cross them off with much more of a flourish on paper.

As Mr G’s life is on his phone, it is constantly binging, bonging, ringing, whistling and screaming reminders and alerts all day and all night. I swear it happens that often I think it’s reminding him to breathe in and out. He’s like a one-man band with that phone. So when he reads me the helpful little feature that the camera kit will send him an email (which will have it’s own little ‘binging’ noise) to alert him of movement outside the house, I am less than overjoyed. As well as the lights flashing on and off through the night, I’m also going to have his phone binging every time an owl or bat flies past the cameras!

So yes, apparently we moved here for the peace and quiet!!!