Regular readers will recall my previous adventures in DIY, and even those with not-so-long memories might remember last week’s burblings about breaking the swing seat in the garden.

They will also have surmised from past columns that our house tends to work on the principle that if something is broken, the responsibility lies with the person who last touched it. And that someone – as the swing seat episode proved – is generally me. We don’t operate a blame culture as such, but if we did, then it would usually be my fault.

I have always found this a little unfair, though my protestations that just because I was the person who tried to turn on a thing that didn’t turn on doesn’t logically mean that I was the person who broke it have usually fallen upon deaf ears.

You may want to read that sentence again. I appear to have broken the English language, by dint of being the last person to use it. Never mind.

So, the boiler. Oh yes, the boiler. The selfsame boiler which a year or so ago found itself in pieces on the kitchen floor, its entrails spread out as though a dead thing prepped for divination by some ancient shaman. The boiler which didn’t work and I tried to fix with the aid of some stuff printed off the internet and eventually had to get a professional in.

As Summer (wet) turned to Autumn (still wet) with barely a visible seam, my wife decided to try the boiler to avoid a repeat of last year’s problems which saw us without hot water or central heating during a vicious cold snap. Needless to say, it worked perfectly.

The next time we decided to put the heating on for a little bit, it was my turn to press the button. Naturally, nothing happened. Therefore, by the law of the house, I had broken the boiler. This time, no messing about, I was going straight to the expert.

I telephoned Brian just as he was about to go on holiday, which set me into a bit of a panic. I breathlessly explained the problem – the boiler wasn’t firing for the central heating, but it was for hot water. What could be the doubtlessly brain-achingly expensive solution to all this?

“Put a new battery in the remote control,” said Brian.

Yes, that sounded as patently ridiculous to me as it does to you. But Brian was going on holiday, and though he said he’d put me in touch with another boiler man (Barry? Bob? Bill?) he was as sure as sure could be that a new battery would do the job.

And you know what? He was right. In these days of rogue traders who’ll take your granny to the bank to draw out her life savings to put a bit of WD40 on a gate joint, it’s nice to know you can still trust some people not to rip you off.