Let's do the time warp...

Six months ago we moved from a central London flat to the suburbs. Don't get me wrong, we're still firmly in civilisation (we even have a tube station and everything) but the longer we have been here, the more I'm beginning to think we've been conned.

At first I thought we'd just been conned into thinking we'd moved to a London suburb. Sure, approach our house from the tube station and it's a built-up, suburban, terraced-house row of streets. Nothing unusual there. But turn the other way (as we only did - crucially once we'd moved in) and we're in the middle of Epping Forest. We accidentally moved to the country! A fox sleeps on the top of our shed and there's a sign for deer crossing at the bottom of the road. Conned!

But hey ho, a little bit of countryside never killed anyone. But a few things have been clicking into place recently and I've realised something. It's not the country we've moved to, but the 1920s.

"Now Laura," I can hear you say, "that doesn't make sense. We understand you're under a lot of stress what with the stupid cat and everything, and that you're watching Dr Who avidly since they put God* in charge but surely you don't believe in time travel."

Let me tell you this. For the last few Sunday mornings at about 10 a.m. I've heard a bell ringing outside the door. It goes up and down the street like a shit ice cream van where the chimes have been replaced by a hand bell. Today I finally got round to investigate it. It's a rag and bone man. Let me just say that again. On Sundays our street is visited by a rag and bone man. OK, he has a van rather than a horse-drawn carriage, but really. Rag and bone? Weird.

"OK Laura," you say, "we'll give you that it's a bit strange and definitely old fashioned. But one weirdy thing on a street does not a wibbly wobbly timey wimey thing make. Try again."

Fine. So today, being a Bank Holiday meant that at 10 a.m. I was cooking a health-giving breakfast of sausages, bacon and scrambled eggs. At which point the doorbell rang. I unlocked the door and a twelve year-old boy was standing there looking sheepish. I half-suspected he was playing a practical joke and had forgotten to run away quickly enough.

"Sharpening?" he asked.

"Sorry?" my befuddled morning brain replied.

An older man on the other side of the street, meanwhile, wielded a leather strop and a small grinder. "Sharpening!" he bellowed.

So there you have it Ploggers. I am residing in the 1920s when a rag and bone man calls weekly and the knife sharpener calls door to door. I was half expecting a chorus of "Who Will Buy" to break out. The other possibility is we've moved slap bang into a musical of "Oliver!". If anyone comes to the door selling sweet red roses, two blooms for a penny, I'll let you know.

* Steven Moffat