Lockdown lifting

Riverhill Himalayan Gardens, September 2020

There has been lots of vaccinating, lots and lots. For one whole shift, six hours, I did nothing else. Usually we each swap around to do at least two roles, but that's not how it worked out on that occasion. There have been no particular highlights - I meet a variety of people who work in all sorts of different places, but now that second vaccines have started there really isn't time to chat - we're working flat out. One tip if you're planning to get vaccinated any time soon - don't wear a tight-fitting long-sleeved shirt. It's surprising how many people end up having to get half-undressed, and it's not just the men.

Nothing notable to report at the moment. A bit of brain stretch with Mr MXF, a bit of meditation and study with the Buddhists, and we've managed to start walking together now that restrictions allow up to six of us to gather outside. The variable weather makes scheduling a walk a bit of a gamble, though, especially the day after it snowed. I met Lola II and Mr M at mum and dad's and made a splendid trifle for the occasion, and Mr M brought a garden plant for mum, and Lola II cut my hair at least as well as the salon without any of the fuss. 

I have been watching many films, doing some cooking, cleaning, sorting out the house, but no specific LTRP projects completed although I noticed a growing stain on the ceiling in the hall upstairs. I finally got round to going up into the loft to see what was there, and unfortunately the stain is growing under a water tank, so it's back to Olf's mate - the plumber who helped out after Flf left me in the lurch. And I've been in touch with a new builder to help repair the render on the wall next to the pub, and he's coming round to have a look at it next week.

Luckier than some

Munich Botanical Garden, December 2019

It's been more than a week and I feel the pressure to report in, but also resistance to writing a whole post about what I've been doing. It hasn't included anything that I imagine would interest anyone but me. Really, look away, there's nothing here, move on. But for the sake of my dedicated readers, who remind me how much they look forward to what I write, I feel bound to put something down.

I was on leave from the diabetes job for two weeks, and so had a bit of time for Mr MXF. In my first week I did some work that would actually affect one of his customers - not a real paying customer, but an organisation that Mr MXF supports on the side with website and email management. And it was successful! It still feels as though any success is more by luck and educated guesswork than knowledge and judgement, but still, it worked. Mr MXF reported back that I had received a vote of thanks at the Trustees meeting, which makes me feel even more of an imposter. In the second week I carried on my efforts to understand email hosting and servers, without noticeable success, which makes my triumph with the real customer even more surprising. 

I did another vaccination shift, where we had to use up 90 doses before 11 a.m. to avoid having to throw them away. So I contacted my diabetes team, and they all trooped over to help out. Which means that everyone except me has had their second dose - mine is due after Easter, but I might ask nicely at the end of my next shift and I should be able to have it then.

I had a big day of Sorting Out Stuff like renewing home insurance, reviewing my broadband contract (which ends in June), having an argument with my mobile provider about itemised billing, then investigating alternatives to find I could halve the monthly cost with a different mobile supplier on a month's rolling contract. Halving the cost only means saving £3 a month, but I'm giving it a try anyway - if it doesn't suit I don't have to wait more than a month to move to a different contract. The supplier I'm leaving got in touch, as they do when you threaten to move on, and told me that I'd been with them for 21 years. I was amazed. Can you believe mobile phones have existed for 21 years?

There's lots going on with the Buddhists, as always. I now have a meditation mentor who I chat to about twice a month, and so far has given me some good advice that I'm finding very difficult to follow. (Sounds familiar? I have managed to do the physiotherapy exercises more regularly, but it's still a struggle for motivation.) My regular Monday study group has finished the first whole year of the course in just a little more than a year, and we have settled down to a regular group of nine women via Zoom. The Tuesday group is still going and has maintained its Thursday study by choosing another book to work through together.

And as well as all that, I'm still pushing for expansion to our local group. We've managed to maintain our attendance for the last year despite not meeting in person, but without continually attracting more people the group is always at risk as people drift away over time. The difficulty is that we don't have an experienced practitioner to lead us on a regular basis, and for a number of reasons it's difficult to find one. I have some ideas, but I need to take the other members of the team along with me. So that's what I'm trying to do at the moment, which is occupying much time and thinking space.

I was very hopeful of finding a better venue to meet when we are ready to do so, and one of the group did make contact with somewhere that looked perfect. Unfortunately, when we were ready to get back to them we had lost the Tuesday evening slot. So unless something unexpected happens we'll probably have to go back to where we were meeting before, where there isn't WiFi. It's not an insurmountable problem, just a bit of a challenge.

And that's it for now. There's the exciting prospect of being able to do more and go places and meet people soon, but I'm trying not to raise my hopes because all this can be snatched away at a moment's notice if infection rates rise. But going out to work in two places, and having access to Lateral Flow testing, and seeing mum and dad a couple of times a month means I'm much luckier than some.

Annoyed

Munich Botanical Gardens, December 2019

When I'm about to moan about some aspect of my life, there's always a voice in my head reminding me that it could be so much worse. Of course it could, but still, I'm allowed to get annoyed about stuff. Even if the annoyances are very definitely in the 'First World Problems' category.

My colleagues at work are still very annoying. My wet room still lacks a fully working shower, a screen, a fan that comes on together with the light, and I have a whole lot of other water-related problems. A surfeit of food - that shouldn't be annoying of course, but I almost ran out of fridge/freezer space.

The food surfeit started with something that was entirely my own fault - I mentioned a while ago that I bought some groceries for mum and dad and forgot to take them when I visited. What contributed to this situation was that before Christmas I ordered some delicious vegan ready meals which come in 12 different varieties in a large box. Normally they deliver next day, but I asked for a date in January, which passed without any delivery. When I queried this on Monday they were quick to make amends and announced that I would receive my box on Tuesday. I responded very quickly to ask for it to be delayed until Wednesday because I wouldn't be at home on Tuesday, and was told that this change had been done.

Despite this, the box was left on my doorstep on Tuesday morning, and by the time I got home it was gone. The company was quick to arrange another delivery which came early next morning - and then my neighbour turned up at the door, with my box from the previous day which he had rescued from the doorstep. So I have had to find fridge/freezer space for 24 delicious vegan ready meals, which is no hardship really as they are very tasty.

The wet room situation continues. I find it quite difficult to go through the process of finding someone suitable, arranging for them to visit then deciding what to do when they do or don't respond with a quote. Olf recommended a reliable plumber, and I also had a visit from the company who service my boiler. It's a tricky situation for anyone to come in and finish a job started by someone else, especially now that most of the problems are not about plumbing - the light switch, the ceiling, the drains, water penetration through the wall. I had a chat with Olf as well, but he is shielding at the moment, and retiring soon.

The shower itself has been faulty all along, and I found a guarantee card and phoned the manufacturer. We have arranged for someone to come out and have a look, but if it is a fault due to installation, which it probably is, then there will be a fee. They will fix it at no charge only if it is a manufacturing fault. But since I owe Flf a good deal more than the call out fee I don't think I can lose. I've set a date for the call out that's a little way off, so if Olf's mate fixes it first I can cancel.

In between all these annoyances I spent some time on Zoom with Mr MXF, who shoved so much more stuff into my brain that I couldn't cope. We have started to record our Zoom sessions so that I can go back and replay them in short sections, which makes it easier to take everything on board. It's quite interesting and I like a challenge, but I had to take the rest of the day off.

And the most annoying thing - the pandemic. Or maybe it's Brexit. Or the state of affairs in the USA. Or the cold weather, or the rain. Almost nothing in the world is how I would like it to be, and it makes me sad. While I am cosy in my house (despite all my wet room woes) and have enough to eat and enough money to live on and no sign of plague, I am missing the life I used to lead, with badminton, and restaurants, and holidays, and festivals, and visiting people, and weekends away with Lola II and Mr M, and friends that I could hug. Not that I wanted to hug them back then before all this started, but I could have, and not being allowed to is annoying.

Bah humbug

Munich Botanical Gardens, December 2019

After I'd been to the bank and the supermarket I shut my front door on Wednesday 23rd December confident that I would not be in the physical presence of another human until Tuesday 29th December. On that day I have to go to work, then I'll go shopping again, and then it will be another period of isolation until, wait for it, Monday 11th January. I might need supplies before then, so my isolation may be broken by an encounter with a supermarket checkout person. And there's just a chance of a socially distanced walk on Monday 28th, or an Amazon delivery of a new umbrella and a floor squeegee for the wet room.

It is looking very likely that Flf has walked away from my wet room without so much as an apology, explanation, or invoice. I have been awarded a free wet room! except for the bits that haven't been done. Once I have found someone new to finish the job I will invite him to submit an invoice, but not yet, I'm still cross. As a celebration for my unfinished wet room Lola II and Mr M dropped by, Santa-style, and gave me one of my two Christmas presents - some shower gel! I now smell quite unlike my usual soap. They also brought trifle to share, and they saw my wet room, and we got quite cold, and it was lovely to see them but not like it should be. Damn you, Coronavirus.

In case you were wondering, the other Christmas present was from Mr MXF, and comprised a large number of different flavours of Chai - he deduced rightly that alcohol would not be all that welcome. Unfortunately they all contain caffeine so it may take me a year or two to get through them - the one I have tried was delicious, though. I suppose I should also mention the gifts I've been getting from generous companies who have donated them to the NHS - mostly toiletries, but on 21st December I received a Lindt chocolate advent calendar (along with Nivea and hand cream). I accepted (invented) the challenge of catching up to align the little window-opening and the calendar date, bearing in mind that the chocolates are incredibly small.

Both of my employers staged Christmas get togethers on the same day. At the Diabetes Centre there was to be a buffet lunch where each of us bring a component such as bread, cheese, fizzy pop etc. Historically I have attended in order to promote team spirit, but this year it was on a day when I don't work there and on the same day as Mr MXF's party, which took place in the evening via Zoom. Earlier in the week Lola Towers had taken delivery of a small bottle of Prosecco via Amazon, and a frozen meal from Wiltshire Farm Food, which we Dietitians tend to recommend mainly to older people who have had upper GI surgery or a brain injury and can no longer chew or swallow safely.

I wasn't going to mention this during the Zoom call, but it turns out the Mr MXF was aware of the situation but he had left the order so late that WFF was the only supplier still offering Christmas dinners for delivery (and it turns out that by the time the orders were placed, these were no longer available). Other employees joining the festivities were the entire MXF family plus a girlfriend, and two young people who do web coding and accounts. Mr MXF had also arranged a quiz where I achieved a score no better than chance, but I contributed to the fun by embarrassing him with ancient pictures of him as a twenty-something shared via Zoom.

My plan to join a three-household Christmas get-together in Nottingham was scuppered only days before it was due to happen. One of the party is more of an introvert than I am, and even she was disappointed that we're now meeting on Zoom instead of in person. All my progress towards welcoming human contact has evaporated, so when we start being able to meet people again I'll have to start at square one. This has certainly been a year like no other. 

Tier 3 lockdown shower

Munich, December 2019

The electrician came! And wired up the shower and the extractor fan, but couldn't hook the fan in with the light switch because of the tiling. If Flanders and Swann hadn't written their famous song I would have thought I'm the first to encounter this sort of difficulty. The electrician also told me a very interesting fact that Flf had neglected to mention: the cable to the shower was not incorrect and hadn't been replaced after all, because it was only powering the pump and not heating the water because the hot water comes from the tank upstairs.

There's no shower screen yet, but I had a careful shower and it was wonderful, but while the water is coming through OK, the knob that ought to adjust the power of the stream isn't working. Now all that needs to happen is for Flf to come back, sort out the power setting, the screen, the ceiling, the drains outside, and the tiling (which the electrician could probably have done himself but didn't) so that the electrician can come back and finish that bit of the job. But now that I can have a proper shower standing up he can take his time and finish up whenever he wants to be paid.

Doors & Windows Ulf came! With a sidekick, and we all climbed up to the roof of the kitchen, managed to avoid falling off despite the frost, and discovered that the leak is probably caused by moss prising apart plastic layers that oughtn't to be prised apart. So I'm going to need to get up there once or twice a year to scrape off the moss, which means I'm going to need some better ladders. But with luck, no more indoor rain.

I have done some more work for Mr MXF at last, and it is still as mind-stretching as before. But I can detect some progress in my understanding of how email works, and managed to send and receive email from an address using a domain that belongs to Mr MXF. If this makes no sense to you, and there's no reason why it should, then all I can say is that I have achieved something quite difficult and am rather pleased with myself.

It has definitely been a problem-solving week: the next problem to be solved is in connection with the bank switching service which failed to switch an account that I've been helping mum with. We think we may have tracked down the problem, but that is a long way from solving it. 

And the long confinement of Covid-19 continues, with Leamington in tier 3 lockdown, and nobody knowing exactly what that means, and the weather turning proper chilly. I keep myself pretty busy with the Buddhism (Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Thursday in the past week) and watching films and writing blogs and family Zoom meetings and cooking and cleaning and 'gardening'. 'Gardening' means chopping everything down to shoulder or waist level and leaving it all on the lawn until I can be bothered to cut it up small enough to pack into sacks and take to the tip. Running has had to stop for the moment because my knee has started to complain.

Working at the hospital has been a bit hectic as I have been allocated a student for two weeks in succession during all-day busy clinics. I have also been given some 'instant' Covid testing kits that work a bit like pregnancy tests but with nasal swabs, but I haven't had the chance to try one out yet. Apparently a negative test can be accepted at face value, but after a positive outcome you have to go and get a proper test to confirm the result. I'll have a go next week.

Tantalising

Adhisthana, July 2019

Flf the plumber did offer to continue work on the wet room during the week that I was away helping Lola II, but I'm not comfortable with that, not because I don't trust him with my house but because I don't trust him with my wet room. He has a tendency (as I have noticed with most of the tradesmen) to make decisions on my behalf without properly consulting me. So far I have put things right, but who knows what I would come home to if I were not constantly popping my head round the door offering tea and checking on progress.

Then he stopped responding. I sent a text at the weekend, then left a voicemail message, then another text, and a little bit of me wondered if he'd decided to cut his losses and not come back. At last I did get a message, and he was there with another Flf on Thursday, and he was spectacularly grumpy. I ignored the scowl and cheerily engaged in chit-chat and offered the usual tea, and I could see in his face the competing desires for tea but also to turn me down because of how cross he was. He accepted in the end and relaxed a bit, and I discovered that he's had a bad back, and sympathised.

So together the two Flfs installed the new towel rail, and put back the sink with new taps and the toilet with new innards and put the shower up on the wall and connected it to the water supply, and left me tantalisingly close to being able to shower standing up for the first time since July. But not quite, because he'd forgotten to arrange for the electrician to be there.

So now I have to wait again for what I hope will be the last visit for all of the wet room bits to be completed. And in the meantime Lola Towers is continuing to have small tantrums when it rains particularly hard and lets water drip into the new kitchen. Ulf would rather I didn't get an independent person in so I have invited him to come and view the scene of the crime himself. We are both being very reasonable at the moment and I hope it stays that way. 

And to add to the stress of the LTRP there are the three bank accounts that I'm switching (with one more to come) - not all mine, but each is going to a different place and they all have different requirements for activating cards and online banking and mobile apps and how much has to be paid in per month to get the full benefits on offer. And Mr MXF has been tied up with other matters for a while but is now back, and I had another hour of mind-stretching conversation which has left me limp yet enthused. Until I tried to put into practice what we had discussed, and it was mighty difficult. So I'm off for a cup of tea and a sit down, and maybe have another look soon.

Brain strain #2 - Mr MXF

A calming picture of Ozzy at the bottom of my stairs, September 2019

When I've mentioned that I'm doing some work for Mr MXF, it's not surprising that people have asked what it is that I'm doing. They have had to make do with very scanty information up to now, including the phrase "it's complicated." Well, I'm going to put that right, here and now.

So, let me see. It's complicated.

Mr MXF did the same engineering degree as me 35 years ago, and he must have enjoyed it more than I did, and understood quite a lot more than I did, because unlike me he then went on to apply what he had learned to the world of the electronics and technology standards that sit behind our broadcast services. Back then it was the BBC. Nowadays it's Netflix, Amazon, Disney, Fox, YouTube, IMAX, TV, and the little screen on the back of the plane seat in front of you.

MXF stands for Material eXchange Format, and it is one of those technology standards. From what I understand, Mr MXF had quite a key role in creating the standard, and I think it's quite an important standard, and now I'm guessing that it would be a good thing if all these different media and film people told their technologists to use the standard. 

The standard relates to the fact that broadcast media, let's just say movies to make things a bit simpler, are predominantly distributed in digital format. Their destination is the cinema, or your television, or your desktop, laptop or tablet computer, or your smartphone, or the little screen on the back of the plane seat in front of you. All of those different devices have to know how to deliver the digital information contained in the film in a way that your device can display on its screen. So the same film content may need to be encoded in a different way for all of these platforms.

Then there are different soundtracks and languages and subtitles and audio description. Different countries may demand certain material to be cut, or added - the actual content and running time of a movie on a plane may be different from the same movie shown in a cinema which may be different again from the version you stream or download from the Internet. 

Putting all this together, there may be a hundred different versions of a movie. And what you don't want is to have to digitally store each of those versions in their entirety. Digital storage costs money, and some versions may never be needed, and 90% or more of the digital content will be the same, it's only the language, or that 3 minute scene in the middle that had to be cut for the China market, or the Netflix anti-theft coding (now I'm making things up) that will be different.

So what I think the MXF standard does is to allow the core content of the movie to be stored once, and all the adjustments and differences to be stored once, and when a particular version is needed, all the right pieces are put together to make the version that is delivered. And Mr MXF is the Standards Vice President for the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (a voluntary, unpaid post), and at the same time sells his consultancy - a unique blend of knowledge, creativity, enthusiasm, silliness and wisdom. And you also need to know that everything I have written in this post so far may be completely wrong. We didn't even do the same engineering degree - our choices in the third year were very different.

So what am I doing for Mr MXF?

It all boils down to the fact that Mr MXF is very good at what he does and probably has even more ideas than I do (and I have a lot of ideas) but only a certain amount of time to do things. However, I have time to do some of the things that Mr MXF does not have time to do but are within the scope of someone who has no broadcast technology knowledge or experience but quite a lot of brain that isn't being used to its fullest extent. And he only has a certain amount of money to spare, and I only have a certain amount of time to spare, and at the moment those two match up quite nicely.

So Mr MXF came up with a long list of things that he wants to do but doesn't have time for, and we skimmed through them together with me making notes like my life depended upon it, because while I have a lot of brain that isn't being used to its fullest extent, actually using it to its fullest extent is a challenge all of a sudden. And I chose a few different tasks to have a go at, and it's been incredibly satisfying to stretch my brain.

We have had some follow up conversations, and Mr MXF is quite good at supplying as much information as my brain can take, and then shoves a bit more in. I get a particular sensation at the point of overload which I tend to describe as my brain melting out of my ears (although that's not what the sensation is like). Then I go away and try to make sense of it, and send some stuff over for Mr MXF to have a look at, and I'm pleased to report that so far it has turned out to be what he was hoping for.

I've had a go at three projects so far. One was around a set of short educational films, three to four minutes long, which need to be advertised and then delivered to a number of platforms (e.g. YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter). After I'd rummaged around the equivalent of the back of the bins in Instagram alone I'd already lost the will to live, and we decided that perhaps this job wasn't for me. But the other two are going well.

One project is essentially a database of everything relating to the MXF standard - other standards, conference papers, journal articles, talks, everything. The idea is that not only will I assemble and collate all this stuff, but it will form a searchable resource, and to do this I have had to learn new things - JSON coding and Visual Code Studio and Github for starters. You don't need to know what they are, and I'm pretty sure most people would find it as uninteresting as I found Instagram, but I like it.

I've only just started on the other project, which involves Mail Hosting. On the face of it this is terrifying - having had to dig under the surface of Outlook mail for mum and dad I have met some of the deranged horrors that lurk in that abode. One misplaced digit and your email initiates a nuclear explosion in a poverty-stricken third world country instead of being delivered to the room next door. Or, more likely, your email just stops working.

Anyway, I dipped my toe very gently into a package called Postmark, which has the most comprehensive and well-written tutorials I have ever encountered, so I have a good feeling so far. What this package does is help you with 'transactional email' - messages that are sent to an individual that the individual is expecting. Like confirmation of a password reset, or an order confirmation, or a welcome email when you sign up for something. Mr MXF hosts a number of different websites, and getting the transactional email set up more robustly is a pressing need.

Then there is mail forwarding, which allows a message sent to a generic mailbox to be forwarded automatically to the people who need to see it - imagine what happens to the message addressed to 'sales@company.com' or 'info@company.com'. I have started to investigate Pobox, whose tutorials and FAQs are not as good as Postmark, but it's early days.

So that's where I am so far, and to be honest I'd like to spend more time on this part of my busy life, but what with camping and my Buddhist retreat and supervising the plumbers (update: still no wet room) and my diabetes work I haven't had as much time as I thought I would. So I'm going to stop writing this blog and give my brain a little more exercise now.

The wet room

Flfs 2 and 1

This is turning out to be a classic example of the Lola Towers Renovation Project genre. You open the lid on a bit of house that hasn't been touched for 20 years or more, and the job turns into something a whole lot bigger than expected.

I had an inkling that all was not well in the corner of the house where the shower room is. My idea was to replace the shower and all the tiling on the walls and floor and create a wet room. When I estimated the job budget in order to find a contractor, the firm that got the job told me they expected it to be less than I'd suggested. At the end of the first day's work Flf admitted that I might have been nearer the mark.

Flfs 1 and 2 arrived in the morning to start ripping out the contents of the shower room, and in no time the toilet and sink were out in the hall and nothing remained of the shower enclosure. However, at the base of the wall the bricks had turned to sand. Wet sand. And when Flf had chipped off all the tiles and some of the render, there was quite a lot more brick missing.

Just the previous day I had arranged a visit from Dlf, a damp expert, who turned out to live in the next road. He had come up with a plan to treat another separate patch of damp on the same wall in the porch, so I phoned the company to see if he would be available to drop in and see this extra bit of work, which he did, and agreed to include it in the quote. Which was pretty enormous.

Flf 2 continued the work of destruction: the wall tiles disappeared, then the floor tiles too. When it came to ripping out the shower, Flf 1 conveyed the bad news that the electrical supply was wholly inadequate and a new cable would need to be run from the fuse box. He showed me where the current cable showed signs of heat damage, and didn't say what he was probably thinking about fire and electrocution. Meanwhile, the other Flf had been pondering the pattern of the damp and traced it back to a possible cause on the outside of the wall. There was discussion, sucking of teeth, poking of fingers into gaps between crumbling bricks, and a plan was devised for the following day, given that the main project is held up until the damp issue is addressed.

[While all this was going on, I had a Zoom call with Mr MXF to try and establish what I might be doing as part of the employment Revelation. There were many complex notions which I had to grapple with, and it was not helped by being called away two or three times to have a look at the latest finding in the ex-shower room. I got to grips with the task a little better in the evening, and although I understand only about a quarter of the work that Mr MXF has scoped out for me, I have a good feeling.]

Next day the electrician turned up to have a look at the electrical issues: extractor fan, shaver point and now the power to the shower itself, and he will bring back a quote for the extra not included in the original plan. The Flfs returned to work on the outside of the wall in the pub 'garden', where they are installing a gully and repairing a bit of render as well as chopping down a coping stone. I got in touch with the pub management company again to make sure they were aware that we would be on their territory for a few days, and made some not-so-subtle enquiries about the future of the pub. While the guy wouldn't tell me exactly what was going on, he did suggest that if current legal processes are completed satisfactorily, a new tenant would be opening up the pub for business by the end of August.

So the outside work continues, the damp treatment is scheduled, so is the electrical work and the shower refurbishment last of all. I'll be washing using the shower attachment in the bath for at least a month, but as with everything involving the LTRP, it will be worth it in the end.

A Revelation while camping

Beech Estate campsite, July 2020

So I gave you all the news from work last time, now here's the rest of it.

I went to the dentist, routine appointment, but nothing is routine at the moment. The door's closed, ring the bell, my temperature is checked before I come in, I have to wear a face covering and so does everyone there, all possessions put in a plastic tub, no magazines or water in the waiting room, perspex screen in front of reception. Once I'm in the chair and the hygienist and assistant are fully covered up I can take my face covering off. My usual hygienist has had a baby so I've got one who's never met me before, and I get the usual furrowed brows at the state of my gums with some new proposal about how things might be improved - non-surgical suggestions this time. Many things have been tried and failed to help, but it's nice of them to keep coming up with new ideas.

On Saturday morning there was a very exciting incident at home, when I heard crashing and thumping noises in the house, suggestive of an intruder. With hindsight I didn't treat this with the degree of wariness that perhaps I should, but luckily for me it turned out to be a burly woodpigeon in the living room which must have entered via the chimney as all the doors and windows were shut. Again, luckily for me, the chimney hadn't been used much since it was last swept so there wasn't much soot, and the crash was due to an ornamental pot knocked off the windowsill onto the floor. I opened the French doors and burly pigeon exited without any fuss, and hadn't left all that much mess behind it, and I set up the shards of the shattered pot in an artistic manner and reflected on the impermanence of all things.

Last thing before going on holiday was that as I was driving away, I noticed that the pub door was open and there seemed to be some work going on. The workmen were not all that forthcoming about who was ultimately in charge, but it's encouraging to know that the building won't become derelict. It's a very attractive location and I'm sure someone will see the potential, so I just hope it will be a sympathetic operator.

There! We've made it as far as the holiday, which was camping in Sussex near Battle, with Lola II and Mr M, via mum and dad, who are well (all things considered). It was a woodland campsite, some of the indoor facilities were closed but there were flush toilets as well as compost toilets, outdoor bucket showers if you were interested, and lots of hand sanitiser and disinfectant sprays. Lola II and Mr M like a nice fire so they cooked on that while I stuck to the less exciting camping stove for what I consider to be more appetising results. And I saw my first glow worm! I had no idea we had glow worms in this country.

The next day was a bit wet and windy but we went to see what Battle was like, and ended up inside the Abbey, wandering about and listening to a talk all about the years leading up to the famous Battle of Hastings. Then, for the first time in many months, we went INSIDE a cafe and had lunch. There was hand sanitiser, contact details had to be given, there were screens, and there was also... cheese. I haven't bought proper cheese since starting the diet because it simply has too many calories to be worth it, but this was a holiday and the portion wasn't too big and it was truly delicious. We went inside a cafe on the next day too, and I had more cheese.

We also went to Great Dixter gardens, which was beautiful and will provide flower portraits for the blog for a few months. But the significant event of the camping trip was when I went for a walk with Mr M, and he asked about work, and I said that on the whole it wasn't brilliant, and in that moment I had a Revelation: I decided that I didn't have to keep doing the same job, and I could probably find something else for two days a week that would use more of my brain and require me to spend no more time with my current colleagues.

My plan was to ask all my friends in different walks of life whether they were aware of any jobs at all, and follow leads, and generally take a few months to see if anything useful came up. It wasn't going to be much fun but if I could cobble together something that worked it would be worth it, and I felt vaguely optimistic as I headed off for the next bit of holiday, which was to stay with friends in Surrey: Mr MXF and Bee Lady 2 (BL2), for now I have another friend with a hive. And the name sounds better than Chicken Lady or Mrs MXF.

Mr MXF and BL2 and their two grown-up children are always full of schemes and activities: running, swimming, cycling, tending their small woodland, ecology and sustainability, village activities such as the huge November 5th village bonfire, keeping chickens and now bees, and hosting the 'Run Forest Run' annual running and obstacle course event. My friendship with Mr MXF goes back to university days; BL2 was my companion in 2016 when we went skiing in Bulgaria.

Their acquisition of a small patch of woodland has brought about much wood-related activity and consequent machinery. As a result of a too-tall eucalypt in their garden being taken out during the week there was a vast amount of wood to be cleared, but many neighbours willing to wield an axe and take a barrow-full. A three-meter length of trunk with a diameter of about a meter lay in the garden, and the plan was to use an enormous chainsaw in a rig to cut slabs of it which would be dried and seasoned and eventually turned into table tops. I mostly watched and photographed, but also had a go on the rig for one cut, just because I'll try anything once.

But as I arrived I was still full of the Revelation, and as I described to Mr MXF my idea about finding something else to do for two days a week, his eyes kind of opened wide, and lit up, and he said "You could work for me!" So that's what we're going to explore, and it might not work - my brain might not be right for the sort of work he is thinking of - but it might work and that is really very exciting. But it has made it much more difficult for me to face my current two days at the Diabetes Centre, imagining how I might not have to do it for much longer.

Water and mud

November 2019

Last week we endured lashing rain, which caused flooding in more unfortunate parts of the country. Here it only caused my Thursday badminton to be cancelled because the roads around the school were impassable. But on Wednesday it started to rain inside the kitchen again.

This has happened before. The dripping came from around the roof light, so when I phoned Ulf the builder the first time he sent Doors and Windows Ulf round, who couldn't find anything obvious but added some sealant. It happened a second time, and even though Doors and Windows Ulf came round again, he declared it wasn't his problem and it stopped raining so the dripping had stopped. At that time I hadn't worked out how to connect my hosepipe to the outside tap (don't ask) so I just left it. One can only worry about a certain number of things at a time.

This rainstorm was different. The dripping came from the edge of the roof light again, but this time the flow was faster and it was clear from staining on the ceiling that the roof light wasn't the problem. I contacted Ulf and he sent Son of Ulf and his mate to see what was going on. They arrived looking as though they had been swimming - they had been working outside - and finally agreed that the problem must be their responsibility. Those poor boys spent another hour on the roof. I offered them refuge inside and a hot drink, but they refused despite their teeth actually chattering as they spoke. They have added some more sealant - I must get up there and have a look some time - and I must also get back in touch to see where we go from here. Wait for another rainstorm, or play a hose on it and see what happens? (I have very recently worked out how to connect my hosepipe to the outside tap - still don't ask.)

Random Run Forest Runner

In other (slightly) weather-related news, I went along with Lola II and Mr M to support Run Forest Run, the 10k run + obstacle course event that is staged by our friends in Surrey. Highlights included the family friend (with the lovely photogenic dog pictured above) who I would like to adopt as my son (the friend not the dog - although I wouldn't rule out the option of the dog not the friend), Lola II being given a flashing yellow light to put on the top of her car (her life is now complete), and the returning runners who told me (as I supervised the kitchen activities producing hot drinks, cake and bacon butties) that it was the most fun event they had ever participated in.

Kitchen Goddess and Mega Marshal

Run Forest Run, November 2018

My last trip to London combined a study day for work, staying with Lola II and Mr M, and a gathering for mum's birthday. I'm writing about the study day separately, and because it's taking ages and I've been rather busy, I'll do a quick round of other news in this post.

Mum's birthday gathering was slightly marred by Lola II losing her handbag, but the story ended happily when it was handed in without loss. The following day I accompanied Lola II and Mr M to a Games Cafe in Richmond where we tried out three new games: Quirkle, Exploding Kittens, and Sushi Go! We liked Quirkle best.

Between then and now I had a busy week with the usual work, a District Council meeting on Monday evening, a car mini-service, chimney sweep visit and meditation on Tuesday, a trip to Birmingham on Wednesday evening, badminton club on Thursday evening and a match on Friday evening (we lost, but it was good fun with friendly opposition, which isn't always the case).

The Council meeting was about the proposed replacement of a decaying car park combined with the relocation of elderly Council offices. Many local businesses are dismayed at the 'parking displacement plan' and feel that shoppers will be put off by a potential reduction in car parking spaces in the town. Residents are also up in arms at the loss of 42 mature trees (although more saplings will be planted in their place) plus the failure of their planning proposal to follow the Council's own guidelines of including 40% affordable housing. By attending the meeting I achieved my aim of understanding what all the fuss is about while being depressed by the poor standard of debate and the attitudes and arrogance of the Council leader and officers.

The trip to Birmingham was much more fun: I went to a meeting of 'Skeptics in the Pub' at which The Angry Chef was speaking. As the name suggests he is a chef, and I have been following and been hugely entertained by his profanity-filled blog for some time. He writes very eloquently and at length about the rubbish that is promoted by celebrities and others aimed at telling people how and what to eat, or 'nutribollocks' as he terms it. I enjoyed the meeting a great deal - he talks a lot of sense backed up by proper levels of evidence, and I bought his book and he signed it for me.

This weekend was the fifth annual 'Run, Forest, Run' event in Surrey, where this year there were more runners than ever. Lola II and Mr M were marshalling out in the forest along with J from Family JJL&J, and another two J's actually did the 10k plus obstacle course. I was again put in charge of the kitchen, and apart from running out of bacon and teabags it all went very well. I was very proud to be awarded the 'Mega Marshal' trophy for services rendered to mass catering.

Weight loss has stalled, but it has remained 4kg below what it started at (rather than the 5kg I was aiming for), so I'm going to take that as a win. Nothing new with the LTRP except that I briefly went into a carpet shop and now I need to decide who to invite to estimate for the job and whether to choose wool or synthetic fibre (any opinions from readers would be very welcome).

The television saga continues - the price of the TV I am after did drop to a level where I was happy to buy, but by the time I got to the website in a secure WiFi zone there were no more in stock. Stock suddenly appeared a week or so later, but the website claimed that delivery was not possible to my postcode, and when I followed that up with the retailer we agreed that there was actually no stock and it was a website error. However, I guessed that the American phenomenon of Black Friday might influence prices, and so it did. The television appeared on the website at an even lower price on Thursday evening, I placed an order successfully, and all being well it will be delivered today.

A long and tedious post about modern audiovisual technology

October 2017

Since the visit from Mr and Mrs MXF and the Revelation of what technology is capable of, I am now experiencing it in real life.

Before The Revelation

Broadband brings the internet to Lola Towers along wires as far as the router, and from there onwards we have wifi, which nowadays forms the backbone linking everything together. Some of my gadgets were already making use of the wifi - the laptop I'm typing on, the tablet I mainly used to play my chosen radio programmes on BBC iPlayer, and my phone.

In contrast, my old iPod has to hook up to the laptop to suck up all my music, podcasts and audiobooks through a wire. I can listen to the iPod through earphones, but I also have a speaker for it in the kitchen. I love the iPod because its battery lasts for ever, and it fits in my pocket, and as well as listening on the kitchen speaker I can plug it into the car stereo and listen to my music and podcasts and audiobooks, and it remembers what I've listened to and starts up exactly where I stopped, and it holds every single CD and audiobook I've ever bought and is still very much less than half full. But neither the iPod nor its speaker is wifi enabled, and neither was the television, and neither is my ancient hifi system in the living room which can play records, CDs, analogue radio and cassettes (except I found out last week it can't play cassettes any more).

Then the television expired, and it was time to think about what the modern world can offer. I'm not actually interested in broadcast TV - the few programmes that interest me might be available via the Internet, and I don't care if they aren't. What I wanted in the kitchen and living room was the option to play audio directly from the Internet as well as all the stuff I've bought over the years, and I wanted a new television in my future 'Screening Room' where I hope to stage the Gulloebl Film Festival (Midlands franchise).

After The Revelation:

1. Spotify - brilliant
2. Chromecast Audio - not a success so far
3. What you can do with a television these days - amazing
4. Sound bar - magic
5. Wifi extender - does what it says on the tin
6. What's next?

1. Spotify

Spotify is an Internet repository for all the music in the world. Actually, as I have delved deeper I have discovered some of the more obscure music that I have acquired over the years is not to be found in Spotify, but 99.9% of all the music in the world is there. Using the phone app or the web player I can play individual tracks and albums, and create playlists of my own or listen to those compiled by other people. If I want, Spotify will play me music that it thinks I will like based on my previous choices, and so far it has been broadly correct in its assumptions. And all of this can be sucked off the Internet to my wifi-enabled speaker of choice, for free if I'm prepared to listen to a 30-second advert every half an hour or for a monthly subscription if not. I don't have to own any of the music to listen to it as long as my speakers can hook up to the Internet via wifi. I may never have to buy music ever again. I hope the artists get a cut from Spotify or we will have no more musicians able to make a living.

2. Chromecast Audio

I bought a gadget from Google whose function is 'Chromecast Audio'. When plugged into the old kitchen speaker and configured via a website it connected the speaker to my wifi, so I could play anything from Spotify on my kitchen speaker. Unfortunately the ancient living room hifi didn't have a spare line-in socket, although now I plan to investigate whether I can make use of the line-in socket so recently vacated by the cassette player. Then (see below) I installed a wifi extender and the kitchen speaker option disappeared. Then I switched broadband supplier and eventually I bullied it into appearing on the network but I can't use it as a speaker. To be honest I almost lost the will to live with the Chromecast Audio and ended up actually shouting at it and then I broke the tablet by hitting it in frustration. So I'll save that problem for later.

3. Television

Television used to be delivered by a broadcaster via an analogue aerial plugged into the back of a large cathode ray tube that allowed you to watch what they chose to broadcast at the time they chose to broadcast it. Then the number of channels increased dramatically, satellite and cable transmission options were introduced, everything went digital, and now you can watch all sorts of things any time you like within certain constraints. Despite all this flexibility, or perhaps because of it, I stopped watching television programmes some time ago. But I carried on using my old cathode ray tube to watch DVDs until it died.

Mr MXF helped me choose a suitable TV which arrived a couple of weeks ago. It is enormous, but weighs less than the set that it replaces. The most interesting thing I have realised is that the fundamental function of a television in the 'olden days' (to watch television programmes as they are broadcast) is the only function that I can no longer use it for, because it isn't connected to an aerial, satellite dish or cable. My new 65-inch television screen is, in reality, a huge but stupid computer screen without a keyboard. It connects to my wifi and will play music from Spotify as well as television programmes and other stuff streamed from the Internet, most of the time. There are still a few things I haven't managed to stream, such as BBC radio.

Many people don't even use a DVD player any more because they watch films streamed or downloaded from the Internet, but I am still using the DVD subscription service because they have the films I want and Netflix and Amazon don't. But this new television will play Blu-Ray and Ultra High Definition movies, which Mr MXF wholeheartedly endorses. My DVD player can cope with Blu-Ray, but I'd need a new one for UHD. Due to 'heritage' issues I haven't yet watched a Blu-Ray film, but one should arrive pretty soon.

4. Sound bar

This is a bit of kit that hooks up to the TV and/or wifi to produce directional sound, i.e. makes your ears think there is sound coming from all around. It comes with a nice sub-woofer for super bass noise too. I got it for films really, and it will sit in front of the TV most of the time, but I've also tried it out separately in the living room for streamed music (e.g. Spotify) and it works OK as long as the music is actually being picked up by the TV and sent to the sound bar via an HDMI cable or wifi. It's just a bit of a nuisance having to carry the bar and speaker from room to room.

5. Wifi extender

While Mr and Mrs MXF were here it became clearer that the kitchen is a bit far from the router and the wifi signal was quite weak. The gadget to fix this plugs into an ordinary power socket and boosts the signal, and should be as straightforward as that, but it seemed to disrupt the connection to the Chromecast Audio gadget until the new broadband came into play, and maybe it doesn't now. More investigation is needed. But the kitchen wifi signal is now excellent.

6. What's next?

So now I have a super huge high definition screen, great sound from DVDs or streamed from the Internet on the TV in the Screening Room, or in the living room if I physically move the sound bar and sub-woofer (which aren't intended to be portable), and the old hi-fi in the living room to listen to CDs (and analogue radio and vinyl but not digital radio or cassettes). I'm still able to use the iPod for music, podcasts and audiobooks but only on the kitchen speaker. It would be nice to be able to listen to all those things through the sound bar, but it looks as though I need one more item to connect my laptop to the TV (an HDMI to DVI cable). Then I could think about either trying to link the old hifi to the Chromecast Audio gadget so I can play digital sounds through my old amp, or I could get new wifi speakers.

But first, I really ought to finish the kitchen. Just the tiling left to do.

Visitors

Spain, November 2016

Another step has been taken towards the finished kitchen - Ilf has done all the required paintwork of kitchen and utility room walls, ceilings, doors, sills and skirting, put up a shelf and added a doorstop. He even reproached me for a mark I'd accidentally made on one of the freshly-painted doors, and repainted it for me. Now there's only tiling left to do, and I've started measuring and photographing so I'll be more prepared when I go to the tile shops. I also need to clean the windows now that everything inside is so clean and fresh. It is beautiful, and the sun came out and the kitchen is the brightest room in the house.

Lola II and Mr M visited just before the final wall colour went on. Those who know Lola II will be aware that she is, how can I put this, not altogether comfortable in low temperatures. She tends to avoid Lola Towers between the months of November and February. But mid-March, that should be fine, shouldn't it? Unfortunately no, the Second Coming of the Beast from the East meant sub-zero temperatures and many duvets and hot water bottles. She managed, just.

Due to the demise of the television we went out to the cinema on Saturday night to see 'The Shape of Water', which I think I liked more than Lola II or Mr M did. We took hot water bottles with us. Other activities included visiting a wool and accessories shop to feed Lola II's current obsession with crochet, and playing a new game that we were shown at New Year called 'Codenames'. It was lovely to be able to play in comfort in the kitchen.

Mr and Mrs MXF have also visited. Mr MXF is my multimedia consultant (and friend), and was very patient and repeated all the information many times until I worked out what it all meant. As far as modern technology is concerned I am apparently living in the Stone Age, which doesn't surprise me because in order to stay up to date one needs to own a teenager or work in the TV and Movie Bizniss like Mr MXF does.

Mr and Mrs MXF are very keen on voice activation, which I am resisting at the moment. There was an amusing interlude at Currys when a poor employee who looked about 15 years old tried to tell us that the voice activation devices do not store the conversation that they hear, and was very much put right on that matter. I now have many options to equip my house with the modern audio and video systems I crave. Mrs MXF is in a similar position to myself not only vis-a-vis modern technology but also in the way that she loves the work she does but not the people with whom she does it.

There has been lots of badminton, and work provides unusable blog material from the usual clinics and education sessions that I can't write about. We are, however, expecting a visit from the Care Quality Commission, which is the body that oversees good practice in healthcare institutions. Our last inspection revealed some flaws so we are being brainwashed with messages about Values, Pride, Safeguards, the Mental Capacity Act and rather a lot of other issues that don't apply in the outpatient department where I work.

As part of this focus on quality there was a three-line whip for all dietitians to attend a very important meeting about an issue arising from the death of a patient and subsequent investigation where nutrition played a part. I couldn't get out of a prior commitment, which turned out to be lucky because while it is true that lessons could be learned from the investigation, they were not lessons that had any relevance at all to my role.

Run, Forest, Run

The River 'Jump', Run Forest Run, November 2015

It feels as though I've been building up to this for ever, because it has been a year since the idea of taking part in this event occurred to me. A year ago I was part of the support team, serving bacon butties and cake to around 40 runners who had run 5k from the village of Chiddingfold to a nearby bit of woodland, then gone round an obstacle course before running 5k back to the start. This event was named 'Run, Forest, Run' which is a reference to the classic movie Forrest Gump - you'll have to look it up if you haven't seen the film. At that time, as you can read in my contemporaneous report, I dismissed the idea almost immediately.

Run Director Bruce
and Timekeeper Freya

Back then I hadn't been running for very long, but as I continued to surprise myself by keeping up with the running program I decided it would be a challenging but achievable target to work up to. Also, because the organisers are my friends, it would be less daunting than a public event run by strangers. So at the weekend I packed a wide range of clothes to address as many types of weather as I could imagine, and took myself down to Surrey (stopping en route for a quick visit to mum and dad, who are remarkably well at the moment).

Lola II and Mr M were there too - naively I thought it was for the social aspect and as a public-spirited gesture to our organising friends. In fact, I found out it was only in order to support me, so I am very grateful. They were allocated marshalling duties in the forest obstacle course at the log pickup and deposit.

Log pickup marshal Lola II

Race Relations Officer Mr M

The weather this autumn has been unseasonably mild - until the weekend arrived and forecasts were for plummeting temperatures. Knowing how Lola II fares in the cold (hint - not very well) I was slightly concerned for her, and also for myself, not wanting to freeze during the running either. In the end we were both fine, and it was the mud rather than the cold that slowed me down. Although it didn't actually rain, the going was 'soft' underfoot. At the point where the mud came over the top of my shoes I decided that I would focus on remaining upright rather than clocking a fast time.

The Forest Marshalling Team

So now I've done a competitive 10k plus obstacle course race, and in fact my time was perfectly decent especially taking into account the sections where it was so slippery that I could barely walk let alone run. We had a good laugh about the obstacles afterwards - my short stature put me at a significant disadvantage when it came to climbing over bars and jumping across streams. I'm planning to carry on running, but I think I'll stick to 5k Parkruns for the time being.

Race report and news of Lola Towers

Groombridge Place, June 2013

The trip last weekend was to the darkest depths of Surrey, to assist at a 10k forest race organised by our friends. The race consisted of running 5k on road and forest tracks, then round an obstacle course including a river jump, then 5k back to the start. For a fleeting moment when it was first announced I considered actually working towards running the course, but I came to my senses and dropped that idea pretty quickly. I haven't been running recently - it's dark, it's cold, and I've got a lot of other stuff on my plate at the moment (as mentioned in one of my previous blog posts).

We headed south on Saturday and arrived in time to glimpse some of the immense amount of organisation that has been put into this little enterprise. Permission had to be gained from all sorts of different agencies including Highways, Forestry Commission, St Johns Ambulance and probably others, plus the advertising, timekeeping equipment, signage, clothing, T shirts, medals and prizes, catering and much, much more. Lists were very much in evidence - lists of runners, marshalls, equipment, tasks, schedules, phone numbers. There was a slight relaxation of organisational duties for a period on Saturday night, but the day of the race started at 6am with signage being put up.

Unfortunately it turned out to be one of the wettest days of the year, and didn't stop raining heavily for the whole of the race. The part of the obstacle course when runners had to jump across the river was usually just a bit more than a step over a bit of a stream, but the water level rose by at least a foot during the morning and runners were having to wade across a torrent up to their knees. When they returned to the start it truly looked as though they had been swimming rather than running, and some of the marshalls were in a similar condition.

Mr A and I had volunteered to be marshalls, and Mr A was put in charge of car parking while I was dealing with catering at race HQ. Mr A was clad head to toe in weatherproof motorcycle gear but I was thankfully indoors, serving up bacon butties, tea and cake. It all went very well, the St John's team weren't needed, and the home-made lemon drizzle cake went down particularly well - home-made by the organisers, not by me. They put such a lot of work into the event, but the turnout was good and despite the saturating conditions the runners seemed to enjoy it. There's going to be another one next year too; maybe I'll volunteer again.

Then on Tuesday, back at Lola Towers, the long-awaited fuse box replacement started. The electrician turned up exactly when he said he would, which is always a good sign, especially as I'd taken the day off work. He thought the job would take a day and a half, but knowing how unpredictable Lola Towers can be I wasn't surprised when the timescale started to slip. The installation of the new box took the first half day as anticipated, but one of the new switches kept tripping, suggesting a fault somewhere on one of the circuits. Electrician Bill spent the rest of the day a) narrowing down the possible location of the fault while b) ensuring that the heating would be operational at the end of the day, which it was.

On Wednesday he returned, and managed to improve things to the extent that the switch stopped tripping, but was still not happy with the test results, plus he had to do the bit of the job that entails connecting the gas and water supplies to the electrical earth. I had to go back to work so I didn't see how he got on, but at the end of the day we had a chat on the phone and he admitted he'd have to be back on Thursday. This has been an expensive week - the electrical job is going to cost a bit more than what was quoted, plus the car had its service on Tuesday and needed a new battery and two new tyres.

On the plus side, I got a lot done on my day off work. After twenty years I'm having the living room curtains cleaned for probably the first (or possibly the second) time, and then after twelve years of being temporarily tacked up I'm getting them shortened properly. I'm not even doing it myself - they were cleaned at a launderette and taken to a shop for shortening. That's the kind of mood I'm in.

I also went to another 'Diabetes Education Club' lecture at Warwick University - this is a bi-monthly evening event for Diabetes Healthcare Professionals. Last time it was my colleagues talking and demonstrating low carb items, this time it was all about Sodium-Glucose Transporter (SGLT2) inhibition as a treatment for high blood glucose. Want to know more? All will be revealed shortly.