Got off to a flying start yesterday: by ten I'd taken the bottles for recycling, taken a big quilt to the laundry, put a small quilt in the washing machine, donated various soft toys and a couple of dozen paperbacks to the local hospice shop, and bought dinner. So I was ready to don the wellies and get my new plants planted.
So back to the process of dealing with what fell out when we moved the furniture: two quilts washed and dried, and another couple of pillows into the machine. Back to routine laundry today, and in the meantime the grass has not refrained from growing. Ain't life a breeze?
Wednesday 29 September 2010
Monday 27 September 2010
Of cars, buses and lawnmowers
Not a day when we celebrate our relationship with the motor vehicle. The new car went to the garage again for further investigation of the Funny Noise it makes under load. They can’t do anything until they have listened to a car of the same specification, so it looks as if I’ll be back and forth to the VW shop for some time. They did at least have the good grace to wash the car before handing it back.
Better luck with house fettling: the carpet fitters came and went, and we’ve got the furniture back into the back bedroom, slightly re-disorganised. After all the exertion, we decided we deserved our occasional treat of fish and chips. Unfortunately, as Martyn returned to the car bearing hot fish and chips, a passer-by told him that a bus had just hit the side of the car. M duly gave chase, and collared the driver at the terminus a few hundred yards away. The scars on both vehicles were pretty obvious, so the driver didn’t contest it. So, the fish and chips were cold by the time M got home, and pretty dried up by the time he’d told his story three times to various departments and agents of his insurers.
Still, not a wholly fruitless day: our friend Jane, who hopes to move house soon, had asked me round to help myself to any plants I fancied from her garden, so I shall be planting out tomorrow: hosta, astrantia, alliums, Canterbury Bells and other bits and pieces. Good-oh. And she’s flogging me her nearly new motor mower, which she won’t need at her new place. Just hope the house deal goes through!
Better luck with house fettling: the carpet fitters came and went, and we’ve got the furniture back into the back bedroom, slightly re-disorganised. After all the exertion, we decided we deserved our occasional treat of fish and chips. Unfortunately, as Martyn returned to the car bearing hot fish and chips, a passer-by told him that a bus had just hit the side of the car. M duly gave chase, and collared the driver at the terminus a few hundred yards away. The scars on both vehicles were pretty obvious, so the driver didn’t contest it. So, the fish and chips were cold by the time M got home, and pretty dried up by the time he’d told his story three times to various departments and agents of his insurers.
Still, not a wholly fruitless day: our friend Jane, who hopes to move house soon, had asked me round to help myself to any plants I fancied from her garden, so I shall be planting out tomorrow: hosta, astrantia, alliums, Canterbury Bells and other bits and pieces. Good-oh. And she’s flogging me her nearly new motor mower, which she won’t need at her new place. Just hope the house deal goes through!
Sunday 19 September 2010
A good weekend
Hedge trimmed, grass cut, Saturday lunch at a favourite pub. Well, the smallest of the hedges is done, and I'll probably tackle a couple of the others, but the green wall of leylandii across the back is somewhat more daunting. With an eye to avoiding litigation, I've hacked back some branches of trees and shrubs that overhang the (unlit) footpath. Imbued with all this energy, we've made another advance in our campaign against Magnolia: there's a first coat of pale blue paint on the spare bedroom walls. Hall, stairs, landing and the bedroom remain to be tackled, however. I can't imagine why people use the wretched colour. The property-porn TV shows describe it as 'magnificent magnolia'. The version currently being sold is a rather pallid flesh colour: when our walls had it inflicted on them, it was a dirty white. Neither bears any resemblance to the colour of any living magnolia I've met, so I'll stick with my qualifier: Miserable Magnolia.
Splendid lunch at Barbara's today: salad with smoked salmon and big shrimps, followed by bangers and mash, all helped along with a Corbières from the reliable boys at the Celliers du Mont Tauch in Tuchan. Not a lovely drive to Brighton, though: a mix of ditherers and racing motorbikers taking dreadful risks. Overtaking at 90 in a 50 limit across double white lines. I suspect a percentage of them won't make old bones, and hope they don't take any innocent road users with them. Where are the police when you want them?
Splendid lunch at Barbara's today: salad with smoked salmon and big shrimps, followed by bangers and mash, all helped along with a Corbières from the reliable boys at the Celliers du Mont Tauch in Tuchan. Not a lovely drive to Brighton, though: a mix of ditherers and racing motorbikers taking dreadful risks. Overtaking at 90 in a 50 limit across double white lines. I suspect a percentage of them won't make old bones, and hope they don't take any innocent road users with them. Where are the police when you want them?
Saturday 18 September 2010
finies, les vacances
Slightly less clumsy in the garden, I hope. I've planted up some pots with a couple of layers of tulips each, plus some pansies on the top row for winter colour. I've slapped in a few bits and pieces from the staging - the last remaining lavatera, a gaillardia grown on from a friend's seedlings, and a couple of freebie violas we were given by an ever grateful and highly solvent local garden centre. I've spread last spring's daffodil and muscari bulbs across two hanging baskets, also with some pansies on top, so ought to be set up with colour for autumn, winter and spring.
I might get out and do a spot of hedge trimming at the front today. The ghastly leylandii have been growing like mad things, and are making manoeuvring the new, wider car a bit tricky. I'm not sure whether I'll tackle the big hedge at the back myself, but we certainly won't be bringing in the firm we've used in past years. Last year they didn't quote before doing the work, and I almost fainted when the bill arrived. Costly business, home ownership. We had to Get Someone In to unstop the kitchen gully again yesterday: second time this year. The fall on the drain is obviously not steep enough, and one quickly forgets to be careful what one sends down the sink. Tempting to seek out the architect and send him down...
Oh, and the best mixed metaphor since 'barking up a dead horse' at the AGM the other night. 'They'll find it's a poisoned chalice that comes back and bites them in the backside'. Visualise, using one side of the paper only.
Saturday 11 September 2010
Retired, eh?
My feet have scarcely touched the ground this week, and when they have, it has tended to be beneath the computer desk preparing prior to dashing off to the next meeting.
Nevertheless, I've squeezed in a token amount of gardening: a hurtle round with the mower, and planting the herbaceous plants I bought last week. At Thursday's art class I dashed off a very quick watercolour landscape of blocks of autumn colour, and had a final fiddle with the landscape (acrylics) that has been work-in-progress for four months.
The new motor is certainly no looker, but is good in other respects: thrifty, solid, refined and easy to operate, though I'm still trying to learn how to use the automatic parking contraption. It's one of those cars (a bit like the good old 405) that is easy to place on the road, even though the nose slopes away quite sharply. It lacks the darkened windows of Egg2, and the huge C-post blind spots seem less awkwardly placed, so it's easier to back into parking spaces. Just writing that is obviously tempting fate - expect anguished reports of scraped sides and dented corners.
Nevertheless, I've squeezed in a token amount of gardening: a hurtle round with the mower, and planting the herbaceous plants I bought last week. At Thursday's art class I dashed off a very quick watercolour landscape of blocks of autumn colour, and had a final fiddle with the landscape (acrylics) that has been work-in-progress for four months.
The new motor is certainly no looker, but is good in other respects: thrifty, solid, refined and easy to operate, though I'm still trying to learn how to use the automatic parking contraption. It's one of those cars (a bit like the good old 405) that is easy to place on the road, even though the nose slopes away quite sharply. It lacks the darkened windows of Egg2, and the huge C-post blind spots seem less awkwardly placed, so it's easier to back into parking spaces. Just writing that is obviously tempting fate - expect anguished reports of scraped sides and dented corners.
Friday 3 September 2010
Modern times
Gone are the days when one could draw a cheque and get goods or services without much more than flashing a guarantee card. Or maybe a phone call to the manager: ‘Jimmy, I’m getting the new car tomorrow, so there’ll be a cheque coming through for £1000’. ‘Och, that’ll be fine, David: I’ll tell the lassies. Whit are ye gettin?’ This time the garage insisted on payment by debit card, so I duly switched the funds across (from a hotel room in the Loire valley equipped with a free wifie), following up with a call to the bank’s call centre ‘you’re through to Yassir this morning, can I have your name please?’ Said I was calling to give advance notice of a big transaction on the debit card: he wasn’t interested enough to take any action – or, more likely, wasn’t empowered to do anything that wasn’t on his scripted screen – saying that the merchant’s clearing service would sort it out with the bank. Delightful Edinburgh-Indian accent, though.
Turned up at appointed hour at the car shop to do the biz. Bank insisted on speaking to me. Wanted to know two characters from my memorable word ‘maybe your mother’s maiden name?’ Well, it wasn’t that or any of the other usual suspects. Cutting a long and stressful story short, I’d to go to a branch of the bank with ID and change the by now notoriously unmemorable word. 24 hours and a further list of questions later, eg middle name, postcode and address, what accounts I held at the bank (one of them for 38 years, btw), and what direct debits I had on my personal current account, I was finally allowed to complete the business. It’s bad enough dealing with the motor trade at the best of times, and when I finally left in my shiny new car, I was feeling really quite negative about the whole experience, and wondering whether it was worth the aggro and expense. I suppose one should be grateful for all the security measures. It would be nice, though, to think that they were there to help customers rather than to satisfy the bank’s lawyers and insurers.
Fortunately, the first few hours with the car were satisfactory. It feels very robust, it doesn’t rattle, and it goes where it’s pointed – including, fortunately, into the garage: I’d thought I might first have to take off the wireless aerial. It lacks a few of the toys fitted as standard to Egg2 like the rain-sensing wipers (which I didn’t really like) and the light-sensing gear for the headlamps (which I did). It has very peculiar arrangements in lieu of a handbrake, and it’ll take time to get the hang of the park-assist gizmo, which I may learn to love. I have it only because I wouldn’t get parking sensors in the back bumper otherwise, such being VW’s rapacious extras policy. (Funny that you get so much more as standard on their subsidiary brands, SEAT and Škoda.) We’ve gone for the no-nonsense version of the Tiguan that will actually go up and down bumpy hills, so it lacks the acres of chrome and poncey spoilers of the Chelsea Tractor versions. Can’t wait to get it into the Pyrenees! I wonder what’ll become of Egg1 – the auction ring, I expect. Although it drives better and far more economically than Egg2, it has a history of puzzling (is there any other sort?) electrical faults. And it rattles.
First art class of the new term yesterday. Miss had brought in a heap of fiendish objects to draw – sea shells, twigs, rat skulls, dried seaweed – so I did as I was told, sketching a couple of pieces, and using water colours for the first time in years. Absolute shite results of course, but quite fun to do. Then as usual I rebelled and slapped a bit more acrylic on the current work in progress, and think I’ve found a way to rescue it. Otherwise, it’s the bin, or a couple of coats of gesso prior to re-using the canvas for something else.
A bit of gardening this weekend, I think: I have three unexpected purchases to plant. I took Egg2 for a wash after getting it sorted on Tuesday (the 800-bomber sound effects from the a/c turned out to have been caused by a six-inch length of masking tape in the works: I suspect it has been in there since the car left the factory, but I coughed up for half an hour’s labour with relief and without demur). The car wash boys couldn’t change a £20 note, so I’d to go into the adjacent garden centre, where I found a lovely penstemon in a colour we hadn’t already got. I was so busy enthusing about penstemons with the cashier that I’d paid for it with a credit card before I remembered that that primary reason for going in there was to get change… Back in for a birthday card, and I was on my way. Yesterday I ran the new car down over the frontier to our nearest Lidl, and found they were selling phlox plants at interesting prices. Good news, because one of our flower beds is a bit short of late summer colour, and phloxes seem to do OK in our dreadful soil. So a spot of gentle gardening in prospect to help dispel the grumpy old thoughts of the last couple of days. Usually does the trick!
Turned up at appointed hour at the car shop to do the biz. Bank insisted on speaking to me. Wanted to know two characters from my memorable word ‘maybe your mother’s maiden name?’ Well, it wasn’t that or any of the other usual suspects. Cutting a long and stressful story short, I’d to go to a branch of the bank with ID and change the by now notoriously unmemorable word. 24 hours and a further list of questions later, eg middle name, postcode and address, what accounts I held at the bank (one of them for 38 years, btw), and what direct debits I had on my personal current account, I was finally allowed to complete the business. It’s bad enough dealing with the motor trade at the best of times, and when I finally left in my shiny new car, I was feeling really quite negative about the whole experience, and wondering whether it was worth the aggro and expense. I suppose one should be grateful for all the security measures. It would be nice, though, to think that they were there to help customers rather than to satisfy the bank’s lawyers and insurers.
Fortunately, the first few hours with the car were satisfactory. It feels very robust, it doesn’t rattle, and it goes where it’s pointed – including, fortunately, into the garage: I’d thought I might first have to take off the wireless aerial. It lacks a few of the toys fitted as standard to Egg2 like the rain-sensing wipers (which I didn’t really like) and the light-sensing gear for the headlamps (which I did). It has very peculiar arrangements in lieu of a handbrake, and it’ll take time to get the hang of the park-assist gizmo, which I may learn to love. I have it only because I wouldn’t get parking sensors in the back bumper otherwise, such being VW’s rapacious extras policy. (Funny that you get so much more as standard on their subsidiary brands, SEAT and Škoda.) We’ve gone for the no-nonsense version of the Tiguan that will actually go up and down bumpy hills, so it lacks the acres of chrome and poncey spoilers of the Chelsea Tractor versions. Can’t wait to get it into the Pyrenees! I wonder what’ll become of Egg1 – the auction ring, I expect. Although it drives better and far more economically than Egg2, it has a history of puzzling (is there any other sort?) electrical faults. And it rattles.
First art class of the new term yesterday. Miss had brought in a heap of fiendish objects to draw – sea shells, twigs, rat skulls, dried seaweed – so I did as I was told, sketching a couple of pieces, and using water colours for the first time in years. Absolute shite results of course, but quite fun to do. Then as usual I rebelled and slapped a bit more acrylic on the current work in progress, and think I’ve found a way to rescue it. Otherwise, it’s the bin, or a couple of coats of gesso prior to re-using the canvas for something else.
A bit of gardening this weekend, I think: I have three unexpected purchases to plant. I took Egg2 for a wash after getting it sorted on Tuesday (the 800-bomber sound effects from the a/c turned out to have been caused by a six-inch length of masking tape in the works: I suspect it has been in there since the car left the factory, but I coughed up for half an hour’s labour with relief and without demur). The car wash boys couldn’t change a £20 note, so I’d to go into the adjacent garden centre, where I found a lovely penstemon in a colour we hadn’t already got. I was so busy enthusing about penstemons with the cashier that I’d paid for it with a credit card before I remembered that that primary reason for going in there was to get change… Back in for a birthday card, and I was on my way. Yesterday I ran the new car down over the frontier to our nearest Lidl, and found they were selling phlox plants at interesting prices. Good news, because one of our flower beds is a bit short of late summer colour, and phloxes seem to do OK in our dreadful soil. So a spot of gentle gardening in prospect to help dispel the grumpy old thoughts of the last couple of days. Usually does the trick!
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