Drove across to one of the county's cathedral cities today, to hand over a couple of laptops and a projector to colleagues who give talks on us beaks' unsung efforts to suitably appreciative audiences. Seemed a good idea to fire up the laptops before I left - glad I did! One, like my computer chair, had gone flop-bot, but sorted itself out while I was fixing my lunchtime sandwich. Trying to run them on the built-in touch pads was not easy, so I was glad to arrive in said Cathedral city in time to visit one of its outer dwellings and buy a brace of the cheapest possible mice. What a difference an inorganic murine makes!
The 100+ mile drive has me ready to turn into a vigilante. Shit-headed disregard for speed limits (even as adjusted - see last post). Beer cans and sandwich wrappings thrown out of muddy white vans ahead of me on the motorway. Person in red 206 trying to take me out while I was overtaking (I had to use the horn, dammit!). Vast 4x4s barging in front at regular intervals. OK: I'm adding to my Bünzli credentials. But where the devil are civic pride and community spirit? Completely subordinated to Thatcherian 'I'm all right, Jack!'. Discuss.
We set to and cleared a lot of junk out of the big garage yesterday. Countless cans of paint that the previous administration had left behind, plus some tired garden furniture that we haven't used for years. Oh, and the fridge that we'd planned to take south. It was already rather tired, and the light switch had broken. The extent of the corrosion on the drip catcher was enough to persuade us that, if we really need a wine cooler on the top floor, maybe we could just buy one. But I did remember to recover the fridge light bulb - old habits die hard, particularly in those of us who espouse the parsimonious persuasion. Meanwhile, out in the garage, the infrequently-used tumble dryer now stands on top of the long-term freezer, and we have far less rubbish lying about on the floor.
Our property-porn day-time TV shows talk of 'magnificent magnolia', a sort of pale-vomit, pinkish off-white paint that has no place in the civilised world. We bought a 2.5 litre can thereof when we'd polyfilla'd after taking down the hideous pelmet in the dining room, but never got round to painting over the scars. Said room having been somewhat more radically altered in the meantime (and painted in a colour of our choosing), the unopened can had to go. Posted on Freecycle at teatime, there were eight potential takers by bedtime, and a few more today. And muckle guid may it dae the lucky taker.
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