Mundane facts about your day: Part Deux.

SketchyMagpie said:

Had to have the budgie put down today because he was so weak and poorly. Heartbroken, of course - I've worked from home for the entire 12.5 years I had him so he's been a constant companion and was very tame with me.

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So sorry x

It sounds like you gave him the most amazing life and I hope you can take comfort in that!

Sending hugs x

In the pub on Friday night, there was some discussion about what tactics people might use, should a raid by the squad occur, if we were caught, still on the premises after whenever closing time might actually be, however unlikely such an operation might be. One old boy declared that he would claim to be bona fide, this being a term from the days of the empire, when patrons, whose residence was three miles or more from the licensed premises on which they had been apprehended, could claim an unspecified extra leeway. I suggested that his place might not actually be three miles away, but he declared that it was - just. So, this morning, prior to reconvening the meeting tonight, I decided to check the matter, via the 'Directions' feature on Google Maps, which will give the journey distance, as well as the route. Of course, Google recognises that such archaic things as "miles" are defunct here for the last couple of decades, so I had to convert it from the metric dimension and it came to 2.9 miles, thus I will suggest that he parks down the road a bit from now on. By the same method, I established that I am clearly bona fide, at 3.3 miles. I am considering reporting him, in case there's a reward.

Anyway, a by-product of all this map-work was that I spotted an untraversed road in a zone that I had considered to be fully surveyed. It is a road through a wooded area, deep into the bog and then connecting with another bog road that I have previously traversed. I elected to 'collect' this road today, in case it ever does actually rain again. The Street View car has done a lot of the bog access lanes here, but this one was missed, for some reason, hence it didn't 'light up blue' when I was checking the area for roads.

The road was a bit rough, you would have little loose stuff on the trailer by the time you reached the main road. After about a kilometre, you reach the edge of the forest and it all gets a bit Blair Witch.




Here and there, there were tracks leading off to the side, but they seemed to be little-frequented by people from civilisation and I stayed on the main thoroughfare - the possibility of blundering into an uncontacted tribe did not appeal.



Occasionally, the tyres would fire a stone off into the vegetation, making a sound disturbingly like that which a blow-dart might make.

Eventually, I got as far as the other road that I had previously traversed and this reassuring solar-powered CCTV installation, some considerable distance from the nearest mains cable..



As an aside, this journey involved the ascent of my 'test hill' on the way out. Prior to Christmas, I had been getting steadily better at it, as the amount of cycling had improved matters, but, since the undefined plague that I had over Christmas, this is the first time that I have ascended it without having to drop to the 'smallest ring' on the way up.

I will never understand the sheer stupidity of the 11-16 age bracket.

Coming down Beaconside at 9pm, I see two bikes with 3 or 4 kids between them coming the other way and blocking about 5 cars behind them just because they can

And of course… I see a black shadow in the distance, and see 2 kids on a single bike hurtling the wrong way down the road towards me. They were far enough away that it wasn’t an issue slowing a bit and thankfully they didn’t feel like playing chicken with a 1700kg ball of metal so stopped at the site of the road for me to pass. They were wearing all black too… Idiots.

Would have a been a good test of the automatic emergency braking though.

Cue said:

I will never understand the sheer stupidity of the 11-16 age bracket.

Coming down Beaconside at 9pm, I see two bikes with 3 or 4 kids between them coming the other way and blocking about 5 cars behind them just because they can

And of course… I see a black shadow in the distance, and see 2 kids on a single bike hurtling the wrong way down the road towards me. They were far enough away that it wasn’t an issue slowing a bit and thankfully they didn’t feel like playing chicken with a 1700kg ball of metal so stopped at the site of the road for me to pass. They were wearing all black too… Idiots.

Would have a been a good test of the automatic emergency braking though.

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Brings back memories of a few little sh*ts on bikes bringing the Radford Bank traffic to a crawl years ago. Hubby was that bloody furious that he told me to stop when we got to them , jumped out with the intent of throwing them and their bikes over the bridge into the canal, but luckily for them (and us to save hubby ending up in the nick) they realised he was actually serious and scarpered. They almost went under the wheels of a car coming the other way in their panic , but hopefully it made them think twice before doing it again.

Waited in all day for nothing!

@BobClay I don't think even that giant asteroid heading my way ,with my name on it, would actually reach it's target successfully!

I could give Victor Mildrew a good run for his money ! "I Don't belieeeeeeeeve it!"

Sons ordered loads of his Prime parcels to be delivered to ours when he's been at work in the past. All gone smoothly.

I get him to order something for me , confirmation shows correct address for todays delivery. Then get a 3am update that courier has somehow F*cked up delivery address on their system , but now amended so should still be with me today. All day tracking has been saying should be here today , but don't know what time....

6pm now get message .....Aaaaaaaggghhhh....why does everyone f*ck up there end when it's something to do with us????

Apologies for the grief spam, but I swear to god this happened yesterday: we got stopped at a red light right outside the vet where I took Charlie and where he will still be and "Seasons In The Sun" was playing on the radio.

Have you ever listened to the lyrics of that song? "Goodbye my friend, it's hard to die when all the birds are singing in the sky".

I swear the only thing that stopped me blubbering was the sheer ridiculousness of that timing. It's like COME THE feck ON, universe!

Deffo jinxed ! When I rang docs saying no trace of my repeat meds in pharmacy, got a ...
"Well,thats a first! Got on system to go electronically, but for some reason got printed off. Then stuck in a printer."
Now in town getting reprinted & waiting for receptionist to get GP signature while I wait.

Seems yesterday's Amazon parcel has now gone AWOL ( I'm guessing with address being changed at 3am by depot, just after being booked into depot, its now in a depot workers home.....)

Second 6 day week on the trot, I really dont know what evil things I did in a previous life to deserve this.....

SketchyMagpie said:

Apologies for the grief spam, but I swear to god this happened yesterday: we got stopped at a red light right outside the vet where I took Charlie and where he will still be and "Seasons In The Sun" was playing on the radio.

Have you ever listened to the lyrics of that song? "Goodbye my friend, it's hard to die when all the birds are singing in the sky".

I swear the only thing that stopped me blubbering was the sheer ridiculousness of that timing. It's like COME THE feck ON, universe!

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Awwww I hope you are ok, loosing a pet is the same as loosing family ....I'm still devastated nearly 6 years on from our beautiful cat being run over.

SketchyMagpie said:

Apologies for the grief spam, but I swear to god this happened yesterday: we got stopped at a red light right outside the vet where I took Charlie and where he will still be and "Seasons In The Sun" was playing on the radio.

Have you ever listened to the lyrics of that song? "Goodbye my friend, it's hard to die when all the birds are singing in the sky".

I swear the only thing that stopped me blubbering was the sheer ridiculousness of that timing. It's like COME THE feck ON, universe!

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Big hugs from me , I'm gutted for you and in tears myself for you both .Still not got over our Piskie dog . Little Charlie sounds like he had the best life ever with you for all those years.

Thanks, he definitely had a long and happy life (I think most budgies live until 5-7 whereas he would have turned 13 in December) so I'm trying to take some comfort from that, especially as he was still very active and happy.

I had cause to call at a few places, so I lined them all up in a circular tour, also filling the car and topping up the garden machinery fuel stocks.

On the way back, I came through the amusingly named Castletown, on the old road, stopping on the old river bridge to get this view of the weir and the fish ladder - with the new (1978) bypass bridge in the distance.



In the slower, deeper water above the weir, I was surprised to see what I thought was the ripples of raindrops all over the surface, which seemed unlikely in the weather at the time. It turned out to be thousands of pond skaters having a regatta.



They seemed to have no need of the access ladders or the life-saving equipment that was on hand.

Gramaisc said:

I had cause to call at a few places, so I lined them all up in a circular tour, also filling the car and topping up the garden machinery fuel stocks.

On the way back, I came through the amusingly named Castletown, on the old road, stopping on the old river bridge to get this view of the weir and the fish ladder - with the new (1978) bypass bridge in the distance.

View attachment 12870

In the slower, deeper water above the weir, I was surprised to see what I thought was the ripples of raindrops all over the surface, which seemed unlikely in the weather at the time. It turned out to be thousands of pond skaters having a regatta.

View attachment 12871

They seemed to have no need of the access ladders or the life-saving equipment that was on hand.

View attachment 12872

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Can't be the one from Stafford, looks far too nice and peaceful!

Wasted 10 miles of petrol going to a hair appointment which didn't happen in the end . On the way there , just narrowly escaped having a car taking me out, who came speeding through red lights at about 50 mph . Luckily I always look , and managed to brake to leave enough gap between me and the car in front who had just set off on our green lights . Red light jumper then went on to swerve repeated across three lane and sped through the next set of red lights...

Got to hairdressers. who was obviously pissed off with me going in last week and changing original quiet monday booking to today. Standing there on his phone in an empty salon "Haven't got you in for a few hours yet.. go into town and get a coffee for an hour or so and come back" I cancelled and rang a salon near to home who got me in for Friday!

Got back home , noticed the duvet cover had fallen off the line. So made a dash through the patio windows , which we always leave open when home , to get out the conservatory.......hubby had closed the bloody things while he was working upstairs....... nearly knocked myself out bashing my head against the glass, and think I may have broken my finger

Now got 2 dream catchers stuck to the glass to stop it happening again.......

Someone has definitely put a curse on me!!!

staffordjas said:

Wasted 10 miles of petrol going to a hair appointment which didn't happen in the end . On the way there , just narrowly escaped having a car taking me out, who came speeding through red lights at about 50 mph . Luckily I always look , and managed to brake to leave enough gap between me and the car in front who had just set off on our green lights . Red light jumper then went on to swerve repeated across three lane and sped through the next set of red lights...

Got to hairdressers. who was obviously pissed off with me going in last week and changing original quiet monday booking to today. Standing there on his phone in an empty salon "Haven't got you in for a few hours yet.. go into town and get a coffee for an hour or so and come back" I cancelled and rang a salon near to home who got me in for Friday!

Got back home , noticed the duvet cover had fallen off the line. So made a dash through the patio windows , which we always leave open when home , to get out the conservatory.......hubby had closed the bloody things while he was working upstairs....... nearly knocked myself out bashing my head against the glass, and think I may have broken my finger

Now got 2 dream catchers stuck to the glass to stop it happening again.......

Someone has definitely put a curse on me!!!

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Oh dear @staffordjas you never have it easy, do you?
Actually, I thought of you yesterday. It was my day off and I headed to Lidl to get some flowers for the youngest sister, I'd been looking after her place for 2 weeks, in that time I had 8 fish die on me, a chicken go poorly and a dog with bad guts. Anyhows, I parked up on the car park opposite Lidl, where the Nurses home used be. Managed get a spot where the car was length ways against the wall. Ok so far.
I always have to use the clicker thing to lock Bobby (the car, Silver Focus estate) several times, so I know he's safe.
So I'm ready to cross over to Lidl, other side of the wall from where I'm parked, and I press the lock bit on the key, nothing happens. Did it several more times, even moving the key closer to the car, as if that will make a difference! Swearing my head off, f*%&"$g key's broken!!!
There was an identical Focus parked on the same side, except that 1 was way cleaner than my Bob. Poor Bobs lights were going on and off quicker than Blackpool Illuminations on a weekend! I blame covid brain, I was ok till I became ill.

staffordjas said:

Got back home , noticed the duvet cover had fallen off the line. So made a dash through the patio windows , which we always leave open when home , to get out the conservatory.......hubby had closed the bloody things while he was working upstairs....... nearly knocked myself out bashing my head against the glass, and think I may have broken my finger

Now got 2 dream catchers stuck to the glass to stop it happening again.......

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The same problem is available here, especially in the 'transitional weather', when the door may be open or closed, as the weather demands.

With a stencil and some masking tape, I sprayed on some 'etched glass' effect that I got from the Paper House. The flower design top and bottom, plus the bars across the centre. It's worked well for twenty years, but it could do with a top-up where the condensation has affected it - on the list of tasks...



It has also given the birds a chance to avoid it, although they just walk in when it's open, anyway.

After giving British Gas meter latest readings , it coming up saying 'are you sure? That seems an excessive usage'.... checked again. Yep. Rang them after saying one month's bill is 4762 kwh...
Now being sorted..

On our way to town in our own mini bus again Need a drink

Got back to Blighty last night. I'd like to say it's good to be back but after over 1000km of French autoroutes where everything ran smoothly, the contrast with the crap that passes for fast roads over here could not be starker. Shithole is the word that springs to mind.

Anyway we're staying in Oxford until Monday as I'm working again now and at the Salon Privé at Blenheim until Saturday. Lovely day there today and some chats with many interesting people, all of whom seemed particularly taken by the pups. Looking forward to the next few days.

staffordjas said:

After giving British Gas meter latest readings , it coming up saying 'are you sure? That seems an excessive usage'.... checked again. Yep. Rang them after saying one month's bill is 4762 kwh...
New never being sorted..

On our way to town in our own mini bus again Need a drink

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That's 150kWh per day, it hardly seems possible. It's 6kW running, 24 hours a day.

It's twenty times what I'm using.

Is this based on a previous reading from a month ago? Was it your reading, or the previous occupant's?

Gramaisc said:

That's 150kWh per day, it hardly seems possible. It's 6kW running, 24 hours a day.

It's twenty times what I'm using.

Is this based on a previous reading from a month ago? Was it your reading, or the previous occupant's?

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According to us we've only used 155 kwh so far, and they've agreed on our readings. A blip in the system between our meter and them shows we are using more than a large factory