So, I’ve engaged the services of Jon-The-Builder, who is wonderfully classically, old yorkshire. He’s a 60 year old experienced builder for whom belt and braces are not enough. You accept that when you engage his services, you just have to step back and watch the force of nature in action.
In my head, I wanted a few concrete pads set at ground level, and where the ground drops off, I would box in the concrete laying to take it above ground level. Simple, or so I thought.

Then, along comes Jon. He’s wonderfully old-Yorkshire. To quote (ish):

Tha’ don’t want pads, we need do level it, dig down, 2ft square concrete pads, brick pillars. Then, young’un, tha’ll have a solid foundation. T’shed won’t blow away.

Jon is brilliant and I’ve learned not to second guess him.

Here he is, about to get started.

Then, more or less straight away, he let me know I had a problem. This wasn’t a normal ‘air sucked through the teeth’ kind of problem, nor was it a dead king with an identity crisis. It turns out the people (or landscapers) who landscaped the house (before we bought it) had the soil tipped in up to the damp-course level. Looking at it, one can see the moss blooming up the wall.

So, we agreed and he went digger-tastic and took 6″ off the top-soil. It meant we could level-out the soil and I now don’t have a problem emerging in 5 years time.

The shed wins again.