Why oh why oh why would anyone have a fitted kitchen installed a) without a washing machine (it’s in the garage accessed only by going outside and back in again) and b) with an AGA. I mean it certainly matches the country kitchen style but good lord it’s a ridiculous piece of equipment.

So far it’s taken over 2.5 hours to roast sausages and sweet potatoes, 1.5 hours to boil new potatoes and the same, wait for it, to cook pizza and chips! Who has the time required in 2019 to cook this slowly?

When we arrived in our lovely new home we were pleased to see we’d been left an AGA kettle and a toasting device. Never again would we need to use the toaster. The first time we tried it produced slowish, crisp, chequered toast. The second time it produced very slow rock hard toast with no clear discernible reason for the difference.

We were also left a number of tiny books containing “AGA Tips”. These tips included such gems as :

‘If you have cereals that have lost their crispness, dry them out by spreading them out on a tray in the simmering own for a few hours.’ I mean it may work but why for the love of god why?

‘Toasted sandwiches  can be made most successfully cooked slowly on the simmering plate’. Paul tried to do this and it immediately adhered itself to the underside of the hotplate lid.

‘Keep a supply of post-it notes by your AGA. If you think you might forget something cooking in an oven’ (perfectly possible since everything takes a week to cook) ‘place one on the oven door as a visual reminder’. Because a cooker which cost £6000 can only be improved by the addition of post it notes.

Anyway I sort of tried but I failed. It’s a stupid lump of metal. We arranged for someone to buy it and the fantastic tidy workmen dismantled and took it away this morning. Now I’m left with a gap not the right size for a regular cooker, electric and gas in the wrong places and a whacking great breeze block plinth to remove. And it’s still better than having an AGA. Good riddance.