Mundane News

[Reynard]

I have had a very fruitful evening untangling and finally completing chapter 29. Leaving it for a while, and then coming back to it fresh, has worked wonders.

Time for a celebratory

 

[rockyroller]

pulled down the storm windows, brought in the glass patio table, sealed the bulkhead, removed the accessory basement window fan & shut that window for the next 3 months

 

[rockyroller]

Alas, I'm a one-woman-band, and I have to keep the heating fed. At this time of year I like to take advantage of the good weather days and keep on top of the firewood situation. I've actually got about a month's worth of wood in advance put away - temperature dependent, of course.

we have 1 small wood burning fireplace on our top floor, we call the loft. I keep a wood pile near the forest. in winter time I bring a big box of clean dry wood near the house, in case we want it, it won't be buried in snow. usually we also keep a cpl prefab / pressed paper? logs from the grocery store. we haven't lost heat in almost 30 years, but if it happens again, we'll have a day's worth of heat all ready to go, but only for way upstairs. good if we get snowed in. also, no longer likely

I used to harvest fallen trees in the forest out back, drag them to the house & cut them w/ an electric saw & split it w/ various axes or maul. made a small 2 wheeled single axle w/ wood plank cart of sorts to carry one end of a log while I dragged it from the other end w/ a rope thru the woods back to our house. made a nice big saw horse for cutting the logs & had a nice big flat level stump I chopped on. it was a good time, probably because it was all voluntary & not necessary

 

[Reynard]

we have 1 small wood burning fireplace on our top floor, we call the loft. I keep a wood pile near the forest. in winter time I bring a big box of clean dry wood near the house, in case we want it, it won't be buried in snow. usually we also keep a cpl prefab / pressed paper? logs from the grocery store. we haven't lost heat in almost 30 years, but if it happens again, we'll have a day's worth of heat all ready to go, but only for way upstairs. good if we get snowed in. also, no longer likely

I used to harvest fallen trees in the forest out back, drag them to the house & cut them w/ an electric saw & split it w/ various axes or maul. made a small 2 wheeled single axle w/ wood plank cart of sorts to carry one end of a log while I dragged it from the other end w/ a rope thru the woods back to our house. made a nice big saw horse for cutting the logs & had a nice big flat level stump I chopped on. it was a good time, probably because it was all voluntary & not necessary

I have solid fuel heating here - a fireplace that has a back boiler for the radiators and hot water. The latter is augmented by a night-time electric heater.

We have no mains gas out here in the boonies, and I've no secure space to put an oil tank. OK, I could have an underground one, but on fen soil (rich in peat), that's more trouble than what it's worth, as the pipes are prone to breakage due to the soil expanding and contracting according to the weather. Ergo solid fuel was the sensible choice.

Yes, I could buy coal / smokeless fuel, but seeings I have a steady supply of wood and a good petrol-powered chainsaw, I'm happy with that. It just requires a bit of forward planning. Besides, I enjoy the exercise. It only becomes a real drag if the weather is bad and I'm running low on fuel. Though that doesn't happen very often, and I keep an "iron reserve" stashed away precisely for that purpose.

 

[Reynard]

Anyways, time to bank the fire for the night and trot off upstairs to bed via a nice hot bath.

Nunnight one and all xxx

 

[tom73]

Breakfast been had now sat working my way though 2rd of the morning.

 

[PeteXXX]

I'm nearly up.

 

[biggs682]

Time for a dark exercise
Busy day today, heating engineer, window cleaner and shopping delivery all due this am

 

[Illaveago]

Morning.
It is dark out. I haven't looked outside yet.

 

[Illaveago]

Oh! Another realisation at just how out of touch TV presenters are. The government say that 1 in 15 cars have illegal number plates so probably that is more like 1 in 7. The presenters said that if caught they should be banned. Most likely the reason why they have an illegal number plate is that they are already banned.
Am I the only devious person to think that?

 

[biggs682]

On my morning walk I saw an ex service man walking his dog and 10 steps behind is the family cat .

It's a lovely sight to see and he always talks to me about the weather before we get to the cat going for a walk.

 

[Illaveago]

Bl**dy cars are a nuisance! My son managed to immobilise their car last night. They thought that fitting a new battery because the old one was flat would solve the problem! Wrong! It now needs programming in! I think my Jag has a similar problem. If I needed to do it I would connect up a slave battery, there are 2 contacts for doing jump starts so once connected the flat battery could be replaced without the system realising. You have to be careful as the battery leads would still be live.

 

[biggs682]

First cuppa brewing
Very dark outside still
Another yoghurt based breakfast

 

[mistyoptic]

Tha can't fit a town in a box, lad.

Might fit in the tunnel

 

[biggs682]

First cuppa left too long as it was cool 😎 rather than hot .