Early Risers.

[TheQ]

Moved 1/2 ton of the cheap bargain coal in bags, a reorganisation to make getting coal in, in the evenings, easier. Then it will be onto the normal coal for which we have about 2 years supply stacked up bought pre Putin's stupidity... That should see us past the current crisis on fuel prices.

 

Got an old big trailer cover out of the shed, marked up and cut to size to make a cover, for the back of the unmentionables trailer to keep the rain out. SWMBO will sew up new edging seams at her leisure, then I'll put in eyelets for turnbuttons. 

 

While out there a passenger jet flew over unusually low, heading for Norwich... Then top gun started above it and continued for some time... Ben hid in his safe place in the workshop.

 

Muggacoffee being enjoyed, before taking Ben on long a patrol..

Then bath before aortic examination...

[BoD]

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Perhaps the law should be changed so that whenever a pedestrian NOT on a pedestrian crossing walks out in front of a car and is injured or killed, the driver would be rewarded for “aiding and abetting Darwinian selection”

 

Quite frankly I can’t see any downside: either pedestrians stop walking in front of cars or the species looses a number of its more (ahem) “disposable” members. 🤣

 

Any way you look at it it’s a win-win solution.

… and give the mobile phone they were using at the time to a charity.

 

Win-win-win.

[The White Rabbit]

Morning all,

 

There was some frost here too, 'twas a cold night and not one for loitering in the bathroom when visiting on 'urgent personal business'. Clear blue sky and sunshine at the moment. The blue-tit was pecking away ferociously this morning, perhaps he's on consultant's rates? 

 

Groceries gathered in. Several shortages/absences, both of the usual unobtainables and others. 

 

Some activity is needed in a moment to do some chasing of doctors and complaint handlers. After that, hopefully a quiet day. 

[polybear]

3 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

It was a number chosen at random.
 

But with the average UK salary being about £31000 (https://standout-cv.com/pages/average-uk-salary) this equates to about £16 an hour, so £100 an hour would be good going. One source I quickly reviewed, gave an hourly IT consultant rate of between £50 and £105. Another source gave a top executive consultant rate at about £400,000 a year – which equates to about £210 an hour.

According to the source for the executive consultant rate, (a) hourly fees are highly confidential (and are kept so by the contracts made) and (b) they can charge whatever they can get away with…

Nice work if you can get it.

 

It seems that getting the sack was rather a good move for a certain Bojo after all.....

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/uk-news/boris-johnson-earns-315000-30-25249272

 

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

To be blunt (and unpopular) I think vaccinations - of all kinds - should be mandatory unless contraindicated by a valid and verifiable medical reason (e.g. impaired immune system). Failure to comply would be met by heavy fines and/or jail time. The overall health of the nation is more important than the individual. National health is the one area that is more important than individual “rights”

 

 

And anyone who requires treatment on the NHS cos' they were too f.stupid to have a vaccination gets the bill - the whole bill.....

 

[polybear]

14 hours ago, polybear said:

Bear's Tip of The Day:

Get to Duxford nice n' early - it's a big place with loads to see.

 

Bear was talking to buddy earlier - who I went to Duxford with last weekend (he's a member there) - it seems we only saw about half of what's actually there; you could easily spend two full days there without trying.  They have some really nice stuff there too - Concorde, Victor, B-52, Vulcan, SR-71 Blackbird, Armoured Vehicles.

 

In other news...

Painting done. Tick.  Ladder shifted.  Tick.  Chassis Jig base primed.  Tick.  Other gumpf sorted.  Tick.

And finally...

Bear is signed up to the local OWL Neighbourhood Watch Group (they send out emails regarding crimes and prevention etc.) - it seems the scrotes are getting much more brazen with their house-breaking; Bear gets regular emails mentioning burglaries in the very local area - one yesterday was at 11am in the morning.  B'sterds.

[polybear]

Bear has just taken delivery of the replacement (shorter) loft ladder - and the courier came prepared with a sticky label so he could collect the old ladder.  Big Tick - with a point lost cos' I'd no idea the delivery/collection was happening today.

 

Din dins scoffed - with 'arry the air fryer being used for the sixth time.  Today was a slice of Quiche - 160C for 15m (plus 3m pre-heating) in a 1700W oven volume of 5.5L; doing it in the Miele 3500W fan oven would've been 180C for 20-25m - plus pre heating the 71L volume.

Opinion of AF so far?  Everything cooked has been as good as/better than if it'd been cooked in the fan oven, only quicker and cheaper.  Seems like a result to this Bear.

Any downsides?  Well I discovered yesterday that fitting a full-size pizza into an AF doesn't work......

[Tony_S]

40 minutes ago, polybear said:

Today was a slice of Quiche - 160C for 15m (plus 3m pre-heating) in a 1700W oven volume of 5.5L; doing it in the Miele 3500W fan oven would've been 180C

I believe some care needs to be taken with the comparison. The big oven may not have continually used 3.5kW for the 25minutes. On our Miele, the fan oven is a 2.1kw element with a thermostat.  The other elements aren’t used in that setting, apart from the grill for a short time to rapid heat the oven. The air fryer probably did have its 1.7kW heater on continuously. It probably was a bit cheaper but not as much as one may think. 
Tony. 
 

Edited October 13, 2022 by Tony_S

[BSW01]

Happy anniversary to Simon and Mrs T

[jjb1970]

I have made a happy discovery, the hawker centres near the new place are superb. 

I think I have spoken of this before but hawker centres are one of the defining aspects of Singaporean culture. They are one of those classless things because everyone eats in hawker centres, or at least buys takeaway food. You can have someone struggling to stay above water on one side and a CEO of a large company on the other. As you can see below (taken as I waited for a takeaway order) the environment is as basic as it gets and service is canteen style with very little service, it's all about the food. Something I found was that while initially me or my clients would book nice restaurants for lunch appointment or dinner, as people get comfortable with eachother they as often as not agree they'd rather just go to their preferred hawker centre to talk over food.

There's no street food here, hawker centres are food courts where people rent a stall to hawk their food. The competition means mediocre stalls don't last long.

I always feel sorry for the kitchen staff. This evening was about 30C, very humid and there's no air conditioning, the kitchen people are cooped up in small kitchens over woks and stuff. And they use a lot of heat, one of the secrets of much SE Asian food is it is cooked quickly but at extremely high temperature, imagine juggling three or four super hot woks in these conditions.....I'd rather not.

For anyone visiting, I'd urge you to make the effort to eat in these places. You'll get terrific food and it's cheap. It can be a little intimidating as out of the central area they can feel quite alien but it is well worth it.

 

[Barry O]

Visited one of the hawker centres many years ago choice was enormous..allwas very edible. May try to visit again during our next visit.

 

Happy Anniversary to @simontaylor484 and his good lady!

 

Visit to sister Drac. My new, weekly jabs start.. tonight.

 

Need to test my sugars twice a day and note down the levels. Drac  will all me in 4 weeks before we up the dose...

 

Baz

[J. S. Bach]

Yes, HAPPY ANNIVERSARY to the Simon Taylors!

[Ian Abel]

Happy Anniversary to @simontaylor484 and the Mrs.

 

BIN day, very full BINs for no accountable reason! All sorted and the BIN vans seem to be running in silent mode today, hardly heard them.

 

Today will be busy!

 

Somehow, I have to punctuate work with an 11Am visit to discuss more water mitigation between us and the neighbors, probably a French drain.

Later, afternoon visit/meeting with our lawn/shrub maintenance guy to discuss tree/shrub trimming at the rental place.

THEN!! Whitney returns around 4pm as both Jemma and Brendan are off on trips.

Finally, I'll head to the pre-rehearsal happy hour for a cider and pizza followed by choir rehearsal. <phew>.

 

Bit nippy first thing, 3C, breezy and overcast, chance of showers later and a high pushing..... 8C WOW! 

 

Later.

[polybear]

2 hours ago, Tony_S said:

I believe some care needs to be taken with the comparison. The big oven may not have continually used 3.5kW for the 25minutes. On our Miele, the fan oven is a 2.1kw element with a thermostat.  The other elements aren’t used in that setting, apart from the grill for a short time to rapid heat the oven. The air fryer probably did have its 1.7kW heater on continuously. It probably was a bit cheaper but not as much as one may think. 
Tony. 
 

 

Bear would love to do a test, reading the IHD before n' after to see what the oven costs vs. the AF costs to cook the same thing.  Only problem is they haven't sent Bear an IHD cos' they say it'll not work with the smart meters.....

Ar5ebadgers.

Yep, that's a Rant.

[45156]

Happy anniversary Simon and Missus.

 

Afternoon All

 

Much skippng due to laptop being used for more "serious" matters - generic greetings are on offer.

 

Plumber came last week, plumber rendered bill last night - bill paid at bank this morning, as I refuse to do online banking or use the app!!!  Bank is, of course, now in Leominster, as Ludlow is closed!

 

Not a lot more to report.

 

Regards to All

Stewart

 

 

 

 

[Tony_S]

45 minutes ago, 45156 said:

I refuse to do online banking or use the app!!!

I try very very hard to only use online banking. The only problem we had is that our bank was a bit slow in setting up a method to pay in cheques at home. Anyway it now seems to work for those people who insist on still using cheques to pay us. As the treasurer of the French group Aditi is in won’t contemplate online banking they have to use PayPal for transactions. Aditi has pointed out that anyone who has received a cheque from the society will know the sort code and account number and can pay into the account if they wish to. 

Edited October 13, 2022 by Tony_S

[J. S. Bach]

1 hour ago, polybear said:

 

Bear would love to do a test, reading the IHD before n' after to see what the oven costs vs. the AF costs to cook the same thing.  Only problem is they haven't sent Bear an IHD cos' they say it'll not work with the smart meters.....

Ar5ebadgers.

Yep, that's a Rant.

Can't you just read the meter itself?

[PhilJ W]

Happy anniversary @simontaylor484 and his other half.

[DaveF]

I've been enjoyably busy today hence the late post about yesterday.  As foe what was enjoyable today you'll have to wait until tomorrow to find out.

 

On Wednesday morning I made some fine adjustments to the height of the new chair, it now feels just right.  Then I decided to go to the local Country Park at Plessey Woods for a walk, it's just under 15 minutes away by car and once again the first hour's parking is free.  As the name suggests it is mainly woodland with a number of paths which lead down a quite steep wooded valley to the River Blyth.  The leaves were just beginning to turn but I don't think the autumn colours are as good as some years, a lot of dull brown leaves are falling making a carpet to walk on.  The river was quite low, nowhere near as much water as in some years.  There were a few fungi including the remains of a tree with many large bracket fungi.  On the way back I did a detour to a small pond which this year has become quite overgrown with reeds and rushes, I hope it is cleared soon or it will become a small marshy area and not a pond.

 

After my walk I drove home in nice time for coffee and a biscuit after which I sorted out the photos I'd taken.

 

In the afternoon I looked at the travelling rugs which had been on the old chair and decided to wash them, even though they said 100% wool, dry clean only.  They came out fine, no shrinkage or felting and a lot cheaper than finding a dry cleaners - they seem to be an endangered species now.

 

Then there was time to do a bit more in the garden before tea, music, TV and reading - at the moment one of Winston Graham's Poldark novels.  Then bedtime, I always read a different book in bed, this time it was one of Max Hennessey's (John Harris) WW1 flying novels.

 

Plessey Woods

 

 

Stream in Plessey Woods

 

 

Plessey Woods early autumn

 

David

Edited October 13, 2022 by DaveF

[iL Dottore]

Indeed, Happy Anniversary to @simontaylor484 and his SWMBO.

 

I hope that Rollo and Pebbles will be joining in the festivities

[iL Dottore]

Impressive Turnaround!

 

This morning I rocked up to the Corona Test Centre in Pratteln and provided a sputum sample for a PCR test. This afternoon I got an SMS and link - I tested positive!  😱😲

 

This means that I have now joined the shambling hordes of the undead, known as the

 

Be afraid, be very afraid....

 

So...

...don't go out...

...after dark.....

...alone...

...in your pajamas...

...armed with just a butter knife...

[PhilJ W]

Afternoon all from Estuary-Land. Nipped down to Tess Coes for a few essentials and I noticed that the price of petrol has gone up 1p per litre. Not surprised the way the £ is going.

4 hours ago, polybear said:

Din dins scoffed - with 'arry the air fryer being used for the sixth time.  Today was a slice of Quiche - 160C for 15m (plus 3m pre-heating) in a 1700W oven volume of 5.5L; doing it in the Miele 3500W fan oven would've been 180C for 20-25m - plus pre heating the 71L volume.

Opinion of AF so far?  Everything cooked has been as good as/better than if it'd been cooked in the fan oven, only quicker and cheaper.  Seems like a result to this Bear.

Any downsides?  Well I discovered yesterday that fitting a full-size pizza into an AF doesn't work......

 

3 hours ago, Tony_S said:

I believe some care needs to be taken with the comparison. The big oven may not have continually used 3.5kW for the 25minutes. On our Miele, the fan oven is a 2.1kw element with a thermostat.  The other elements aren’t used in that setting, apart from the grill for a short time to rapid heat the oven. The air fryer probably did have its 1.7kW heater on continuously. It probably was a bit cheaper but not as much as one may think. 
Tony. 
 

 Most air fryers are fitted with a thermostat like a fan oven. I use my conventional oven so little nowadays that its not possible to compare. But compared to the microwave it uses about the same amount of power. Speaking of air fryers the liners arrived the other day, to all intents and purposes they look like paper plates. For people like myself and @polybear who live alone the air fryer is very useful if you use it as a compact fan oven.

[BoD]

10 hours ago, Barry O said:

@BoD I was hoping to get to the show in monkey hanger land but I may have to go to Seaton Sluice on a cricket mission tomorrow.  Enjoy the show and send my best regards to @Two_sugars if you see him.

That’s a pity Baz.  As you know Paul usually puts a darn good show on.

 

Strangely enough, even though we have certainly attended the same shows, I have never actually met John.  So, @Two_sugars if you are reading this, wear a  Pom-Pom hat and stick a red carnation in it and I will say hello.

[southern42]

' evening all from red dragon land.

I have not been on for a few days. 's alright, no-one has upset me 🤣 - just been doing some online shopping for the unmentionable day for offspring's little girls. I was actually looking for a flute playing figure for myself,  inspired by this little chap on a friends garden railway...

and ended up looking for other little families for the girls, too! So that has taken a few days this week.

 

Other matters included getting the jab.  Only response has been a couple of days (so far) of feeling rather sluggish and a bit dizzzzy

A bit of mudding reforming a garden gauge 1920's dressed figure's hat to correspond more to the one my grandmother is wearing in a photo not long before she died. A way of keeping her in heart and mind, I saw the figure in the museum shop in Betws and eventually decided to buy not one but both of them - one for sis.

Small bit of blutack (I learnt that trick modifying hats on Camel Quay) and a first dab of Model Color chocolate brown. I may add a bit of a mauvey colour to tone it down a bit. The cannons behind were my Dad's so more family connections. 

   

 

Not a lot of energy for tooting on the flute, but the last twiddly bit for the refrain fell into place in the short session I had today, so that cheered me up! Short as in 10 minutes!  I just want to get the refrain settled into the verses then I will start on the twiddly bits for the verses themselves but I am in no hurry at the moment. I just want to enjoy playing, unlike the days of having piano lessons when I rarely felt I got to know anything properly before I was being pushed onto something else! 

 

Time for a mugadecaf before doing dinner. Then a night in front of the tv. Judge John Deed tonight.

Polly

Edited October 13, 2022 by southern42

[Tony_S]

4 hours ago, J. S. Bach said:

Can't you just read the meter itself?

One of the oddities of housing here is the odd location of electricity and gas meters. Perhaps Bear had to crawl into a cupboard or even pop outside with a torch. We have a smart meter connected to an in house display which is much nicer than going out to the garage for electricity readings or to the outside wall of the house for the gas meter. The electricity meter does have a screen from which it is possible to get readings but it takes ages cycling between items of information. I just have the IHD set to cost of energy used. Definite increase in cost after 1st October but at least the electric cost increase is mainly standing charge. It is still sunny enough for our solar panels to meet our electric power needs and even export a bit. 

Edited October 13, 2022 by Tony_S

[grandadbob]

Evenin' each,

Belated Anniversary greetings to Simon and Mrs.T.

A short walk was undertaken via Asda this morning but had to cut it short as The Hip complained.... a lot.  Picked up a couple of bottles of Three Barrels Brandy for £13 each (often £17-£19 elsewhere) which is a bit of a bargain.  They frequently do it at that price and it's not bad for a cheap brandy.  Spoke to a couple of neighbours en route but nobody knows what the kerfuffle and blue lights were about last night.

I've been using online banking for several years now with no problems whatsoever.   Also use the phone app which is brilliant for paying cheques in - on the rare occasions I get one. The only thing I've had to visit the bank for in the past couple of years is to deposit cash.

 

Stewart's mention of his plumber has just reminded me that I need to chase up our boiler man for the annual service on our appliance.  I phoned him last week and he said give him a reminder as he's bound to forget and then I forgot.  He's a great guy and terrific worker but sometimes is a bit laid back about making firm appointments but if it was an emergency he would come immediately.  He's from a Spanish/ Italian family so a touch of the manyana/domani coupled with Cornish dreckly maybe?

 

 

 

Edited October 13, 2022 by grandadbob