Strange noises in the night

Charlie, Spike and I have settled into our new house together and it is all set up rather nicely except for the fact we have no curtains (which Spike rather likes, him being of the photosynthetic persuasion and I can't stand, being of the have to wear an eyemask to sleep in at the bottom of a coalmine persuasion) or bookshelves.

Spike enjoying the natural light.

Then there is the strange noise whenever it rains. I have a habit of moving into houses which make strange noises. I'm sure you all remember how I solved the mystery of the singing freezer using the methods of Karl Popper. Well the new noise is a kind of a cross between a  doink and a thrum. It has the characteristic random pattern that you might associate with windchimes or rather a single wind chime because it has a non-musical but sequential structure to it. Oh and it only happens when it rains.

We've been through and eliminated all the usual explanations: pipework, neighbours, poltergeists etc. Why would pipework be affected by the weather? Why would neighbours make a strange sound when it was raining? Why posit a supernatural entity when reason and experience would indicate that there are natural explanations for most phenomena?

Then I happened to leave the house one day when it was raining. (I know, crazy life, huh?) Some guttering has developed a crack and when it rains the water makes an intermittent waterfall that falls directly onto a hanging basket support that is insufficiently tightly screwed to the wall. Doink and indeed thrum! Mystery solved. Now all I have to do is purchase a screwdriver... (it can live in the drawer with my hammer)

For those of you who are following my new career writing the internet for money, here is a link to the latest uncredited Finnginn blog to go online. You can tell it was me because of how I manage to shoehorn Johann Walter von Goethe into an advert for a printing firm.