Bill the locksmith

Krakow Botanical Gardens, July 2016

At last something blogworthy has happened. Not only do I have an invoice and a date for the start of kitchen works (which I shall not reveal in case of further delay), but I had the pleasure of a visit from another locksmith. Remember Dennis? It wasn't him, but a similarly delightful man called Bill who fixed the main problem in seconds (the key wouldn't turn in the front door Yale lock) and also installed an unobtrusive 'keysafe' box on the wall next to the garage door.

The key not turning in the lock was fixed with the very simple treatment of lock lubricant ("Some people use WD40" said Bill). I was very glad that I'd asked for the keysafe too because a call-out fee for literally two minutes of effort would have hurt. Then he was kind enough to help me move my dining table out of the kitchen to its new location in the living room, and then phoned a colleague to check how much he should charge me, and effectively negotiated the fee down on my behalf.

On the way out Bill mentioned that my Yale lock could also function as a deadlock. He then proceeded to demonstrate, and found that actually, it couldn't. This turned out to be a professional challenge, and he spent the next few minutes taking it apart it to find out why it wasn't working, then showed me what was wrong, fixed it, and gave me some really useful advice.

It wasn't until I was writing this that I looked back at the previous post about Dennis the locksmith, and I slightly regret that I went to a different company. Never mind, Bill was another treasure.

In the subsequent days my main preoccupation was with choosing the code for the keysafe box, which could be any number of digits from 0-9 (the manual suggests between 4 and 6 digits) without repeats. It turned out to be surprisingly difficult to choose this number - Bill suggested using the four corner digits of the box plus another random two. Anyway, I've done it now, and I don't have to worry any more either about locking myself out of the house or giving multiple sets of keys to different tradesmen.

Health and Wellbeing and a camping holiday

Worthing pier, September 2017

What with being away on holiday for a few days, and Thursday badminton starting up again, and also just not wanting to sit at the computer when I'm at home, I've got a bit behind with my online life. I've only watched the first episode of the Great British Bake Off, and it's the only TV programme I watch all year. LTRP update - no, just joking, nothing's happened.

There was the Leamington Food & Drink Festival, which was delightful as usual and attended by Lola II and Mr M as well as cousin Y and one of Mr M's friends from Nottingham and another of Mr M's friends from Wolverhampton. We started early on the Saturday and this turned out to be a good idea because at about noon the rain came down in torrents. It cleared up for brief periods thereafter so the event wasn't a total washout.

At work, I created a Dietetics stand for the Trust's Health and Wellbeing event for staff. It was in the dining room of the hospital along with other stands: Stop Smoking, Join UNISON, Physiotherapy, the Chaplain, the local Sports Centre, Neyber (something to do with cheap loans), and the Occupational Health team offering blood pressure, blood glucose and cholesterol tests. On my stand were free leaflets from CASH (Consensus Action on Salt and Health), BHF (British Heart Foundation) and the World Cancer Research Fund, and I wheeled my scales over and brought a tape measure and stadiometer for measuring height.

The only stand that really attracted any traffic was the Occy Health one, which had queues lined up most of the time. Neyber and UNISON had free pens, and the physio offered to time you sitting and standing as many times as you could in a minute, but most people were really only interested in their blood pressure, blood glucose and cholesterol. Including me. My cholesterol level was even higher than it was when I went for my over 50's Health Check.at my GP.

The Occy Health team sent a few people over to me to have their weight and height measured, including one teeny tiny Asian lady whom I dutifully measured even though it was obvious that she wasn't even close to being overweight, but who seemed relieved to be told this fact. They also sent over someone with high blood glucose to have a chat, but she'd been diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes some time ago, didn't really seem at all bothered and wasn't particularly interested in doing anything about it.

I spoke to no more than about ten people in the four hours I was there, not counting people on the other stands who were similarly idle - I don't think the Chaplain had any customers at all. But it was a nice change of scenery, and despite not having much to do it was a great deal more interesting than the day at the ante-natal clinic.

Shipley Church, September 2017

The main event recently was an epic camping trip with Lola II to a beautiful campsite in West Sussex. It was one of the best campsites I've ever been to, mainly because of the facilities. These include covered areas for sitting, eating and washing up (and for cooking if you'd hired one of their tents), delightful composting toilets, open air showers and baths (we didn't try these) but also properly plumbed indoor toilets and showers and a wood stove and sofas in a communal area which was very welcome when the cold and rain arrived one evening.

We were the only campers on Thursday night, although there were a few inhabitants of the fixed cabins and tents. When a single chap arrived on Friday we went over to offer help him put up his tent, and found out that it was his wedding anniversary and he was going to surprise his wife with a couple of nights away from their three-year-old. When we were sitting on the sofa in front of the wood stove we got chatting to another couple of campers who were a nurse and a carpenter, and then another couple wandered in and they had just got engaged. They had put up two tents, and it seems that there are still people in the world who do not share a tent until they are married.

Knepp Wildlife, September 2017

This was a great deal more interaction than is usual at a campsite, and enhanced the experience no end. But it wasn't all chat - we went for a long walk and saw a herd of deer, we ate a really good meal at the local pub, had a couple of similarly good meals in the tent, and went to Worthing Food Festival which is about a quarter of the size of Leamington's. But there were some good pastries and pies and we made the most of the opportunity. They also had some activities, and while we were there an American guy was overseeing children constructing structures out of wine gums and cocktail sticks, which were then tested to see how many bags of sugar they could support. His commentary was highly amusing, including a section where he forced his audience to pronounce various words as Americans do: To-MAY-to! YOH-gurt! Say it! YOH-gurt!

Lola II was due to blow the ram's horn ('shofar') at mum's synagogue where she has a regular annual booking, and following a bit of a disaster one year when she didn't practise in advance, she had brought the shofar with her. Back in the tent I took a photo of her in mis-matched pyjamas with a tea towel for a prayer shawl and a sock on her head and put it on Facebook for a laugh, expecting it to attract no attention whatever, as is usual for my posts. Over the next few days I had more Facebook 'Likes' for this appalling spectacle than for anything I've posted before. Lola's horror was most entertaining (for me) as she writhed in embarrassment at each new visitor.

On the way home we stopped at Watts Gallery and Artists' Village in Surrey, where George Frederic Watts and his wife Mary set up home and did their art - painting and sculpture (him) and pottery (her). I'm not great with art galleries, but I really liked this one. We also went up the road to the chapel that they built and saw his grave as well as that of the Huxley family - one of the gallery staff told us that the actor Patricia Hayes was also buried there.

The weather was very variable - clear skies full of stars the first night, pouring rain, hot sunshine, just what you'd expect of September in England. That was the last camping trip of the year, I think.

Watts Gallery, September 2017

LTRP update

Borough Market, May 2016

Displacement activity is my friend. My BFF, as the yoof would have it. I am SO on top of the LTRP, with only a week/a fortnight/a month (stick a pin in the timescale you prefer) before the first brick of the kitchen wall is dislodged by the wrecking ball, and all my ducks in a row, waiting for the off. Except that Ulf the builder has hurt his knee and has not so far responded to my query about how it's going, and Ylf the kitchen guy has asked if I want him to get the paperwork over to me for signing (I don't know, do I?) and the latest flooring guy (so far unnamed) constructed his quote on the back of an envelope (literally not metaphorically) and seemingly will lay the floor for a very reasonable price but I have to buy the tiles myself. Although he got quite confused about which wall of the kitchen was going to be knocked down. Oh yes, it's all going swimmingly and the only tricky job on my list for today was my tax return. So I'm blogging in between watching the new Great British Bake Off on Channel 4 catch up.

One day I'll look back on this and think "What was I thinking? The kitchen was perfectly good before, all it needed was to change the cupboard doors, although yes the tap wasn't really very good, and the tiles had started to fall off the walls, and the paint colour was too dark except where there was bare plaster because of the damp, and Ilf did warn me that the wiring was going to kill me if I didn't get an electrician in, and the oven grill wasn't working any more, and I didn't need two fridges and two freezers or the 30-bottle wine rack, and the stopcock was completely jammed, and it was really dark most of the time especially in winter, and the outside tap didn't work. But apart from that..."

Speaking of Ilf, he has been on loan to the Lola II/Mr M household and has been painting. From the sound of it, and knowing what he's like, he's painted everything they've asked him to and then painted a bit more, because he likes to do a good job and a good job is when everything is completely painted. I don't have any imminent trips to see the results but the photos look good. [Update: I did have an imminent trip after all and the results are beautiful.] Anyway, Ilf came round to my house on Sunday partly because I'd asked him if he wouldn't mind being a second pair of eyes when it came to the building work. I think he expected it to have started by now, but we looked at the plans and he made a couple of very useful suggestions, the main ones being to keep a detailed daily record of who comes round and does what, and to ask lots of questions about materials and what's going on.

After the visit from the flooring guy, it is looking more and more like I'm going to have to be the project manager that I didn't want to be, and it will all take a very long time because of tradesmen needing at least six weeks notice all over the place. Ulf will knock down and rebuild the wall and the roof, installing the roof lantern, stud partition, doors, windows, radiator and lighting, and arranging plumbing, gas and electrical supplies and plastering, and replacing the stairs. I think that will be all for him, because next is the kitchen units. worktops, appliances, sinks and taps from Ylf, and the flooring after that. Then at some point I'll have to consider painting and tiling the walls, but I'm not thinking about that because if the Apocalypse happens first I'll have saved myself some effort. After the work starts I'm not expecting to have a working kitchen for three or four months, perhaps longer.

But that's OK, there's a splendid pub next door, I know how to make soup and sandwiches, and I know of two launderettes in Leamington. I'll have a microwave and possibly the loan of a steamer. I can anticipate that there will be a staged improvement when I have running water and a sink. The wine rack was collected (thank you eBay - the buyers came all the way from Yorkshire!) but I still haven't got rid of the built-in fridge and the cupboard doors and I don't really think I will. There's a chance someone will want the gas hob but I don't want to lose that until the very last minute.

I haven't come close to completing the tax return. But the kitchen is going to be great.

Festival

The East Pointers, August 2017

I had plenty to do during the Bank Holiday weekend what with the Shrewsbury Folk Festival, another dental appointment, a trip north and trying to grapple further with the LTRP. I disposed of the debris from the garden before getting packed and ready to go to Shrewsbury. I arrived there around noon, thinking I would be among the early birds, but the steward at the festival campsite said "We've already been open for five hours - you'll probably have to camp over there."

'Over there' was a little bit further from the action, but still very close by. In the past my preferred festival has been in Cambridge, which I first attended more than 30 years ago. Cambridge Folk Festival has grown and grown, from a couple of stages and a bit of camping to a huge event sponsored by Radio 2 where tickets are sold out within days (or sometimes hours). The last time I was there was for my 50th birthday, and it was crowded and difficult to navigate about the site, and overflow camping (which is where I would normally go) is a bus ride or a very long walk away.

Compared with that experience, Shrewsbury was amazing. The overflow camping being very close was a bonus, so I pitched the tent and wandered over to the main site to get my wristband and a programme and check out the layout. The stages are inside marquees which weren't yet open, but I caught a glimpse and was surprised and slightly disappointed to see it laid out with seating! Although I don't like sitting on the ground, I do like dancing. How would this work?

Anyway, there was enough time to wander into Shrewsbury town centre (again, much closer than Cambridge) before coming back to the start of the music at about 5pm. Despite my scepticism, the seating was the perfect arrangement - I didn't have to sit on the ground, but there was a section at the front in the main tent specifically for those who wanted to get closer to the bands and dance. So there I was, for my favourite Oysterband, right at the front in the middle when the lead singer came out into the crowd. I happened to meet him later in the weekend, carrying a pint. I didn't realise it until the close of the festival, but he is a local resident and a patron and supporter of the event.

So it was altogether a great improvement on the Cambridge experience, the weather was fine, and the bands were (mostly) wonderful too. I saw a few Canadian and French bands as well as home-grown talent, nearly all unfamiliar but I'd go and see them again if they happened to be touring. Particular highlights were La Machine, The East Pointers, Le Vent du Nord and Daphne's Flight. And, of course, Oysterband. I'll definitely be going back next year.

The following weekend I went to High Wycombe to see the English National Badminton competition. Unfortunately none of the big name players was there, perhaps because the World Championships had taken place just the previous week, but there was enough to see to keep me occupied for the day. I saw the quarter- and semi-finals on Saturday, but didn't go back for the finals on Sunday.

At work I covered the ante-natal clinic for a colleague who was on holiday. I think there were twelve appointments altogether (one DNA), up to 30 minutes each, for women who have been diagnosed in the past week. This was their first appointment about the diagnosis of gestational diabetes, so they each saw the nurse first. She explained the diagnosis and its consequences and gave them a blood glucose meter and lots of paperwork, then passed them on to me where I said pretty much the same thing eleven times. By the end I had completely lost track of what I had said to whom, but I think it went OK. I don't quite know how my colleague copes with this every week - once was enough for me.

The only other item of note is that my iron count was too low to donate blood this week - oh dear, but also, hooray! All the virtuous smugness of doing a good deed without actually having to go through with it, and my haemoglobin level was low but still within the normal range so I'm not anaemic. I was also given a leaflet giving me all the advice that I am used to giving out to patients...