25 February 2017 (Saturday) - Fence Fixed



It was well after midnight before I got to bed last night. I slept like a log, and was pleasantly dozing when "Daddy’s Little Angel TM" woke me with a text saying how they’d hardly slept.
I made myself some toast and had a look at the Internet. I found myself looking at a geocaching-related group called “geocarping”. The whole idea of the group is that you go there to whinge and moan about all things Tupperware-related, but it is rather depressing. I have rarely read such a load of nastiness (and being on the Internet it is up against some rather stiff competition).
But on a more positive note I had a message from someone who’d been to Ashford to do some of my Wherigos. They sent a rather nice message. I really should see about making that Crystal Maze themed one I’ve been planning for months.

But "Daddy’s Little Angel TM" and "Stormageddon - Bringer of Destruction TM" were on the way, so I got dressed and made a start in the garden. Before long the most recent fruit of my loin (and her branch of the family tree) were with us. As "Daddy’s Little Angel TM" and "Stormageddon - Bringer of Destruction TM"  wreaked havoc inside, Sam and I fixed the fence. The old fence post had been cemented in place; over the years the post had rotted and Thursday’s storm had proved too much for it. The post had snapped at ground level. Fortunately, the fence panels were still intact so today’s job was dead simple. We had to move the fallen panels out of the way, dig out the concrete core in which the old fence post had been buried, replace the post with a new one, and put the fallen fence panels back in place. Dead simple to type out. Straightforward to do… To be honest it *was* a straightforward job. I’d moved the panels out of the way before anyone had arrived. Sam and I did struggle to get the old concrete core out. It took some digging, but after forty minutes we managed to get a rope around it and heaved it out. We then reviewed the situation. We knew we needed to go shopping for a new post. We decided to get a Metpost rather than concreting again, so we went to B&Q. We got the post (it was on clearance sale – result!) and we got a new club-hammer and a screwdriver set, but B&Q didn’t have a Metpost. We asked the staff but… Have you ever asked the staff anything in B&Q? They are all pleasant enough people, but know absolutely nothing about that which they are selling.
So we went to Wickes. Not only did Wickes have what we wanted, but the journey back home took us right past McDonalds. We paused briefly for a cheeky McBreakfast before coming home to finish the job. We stuck one of the fence panels in place, got the new post into the ground square to the fence panel, then put the final panel in place. So easy to type, not so easy to do. "Daddy’s Little Angel TM" came out to help and offer sage advice and film the operation. In retrospect, the job would have gone quicker had one of the dogs not fallen in the pond (about five minutes twenty seconds into the video).

After two hours the job was done. Sam worked wonders with me this morning. Replacing fence panels is something for which you need some help. By this time Cheryl, Lacey and Rolo had arrived, and we all took the dogs for a walk round the park, then had KFC for lunch before the family all went their various ways.

We went to Tesco for a little shopping, then came home and had a minor tidy-up. I then emailed the BBC… A nice lady from the BBC emailed the astro club a couple of days ago. They wondered if we might like to do help create an intro link for them which they would show between programs. You can see what they had in mind by clicking here. This idea was put to the membership last night and there was quite a bit of interest. So I emailed the nice lady from the BBC to discuss how we might proceed, and I immediately got an automated email reply saying “Hi there, I have now finished at the BBC. Many thanks”. I suspect the project is now dead in the water, but we shall see.

The door bell rang; Jose and Maria came for dinner. We had a rather good time…

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