3 January 2010 (Sunday) - New Fence, Old Photos

This long weekend for the New Year’s holiday has (for me) been pretty much wasted days. What with the snow and cold, I’ve barely left the house and have spent far too long in NeverWinter. I loathe and detest sitting round doing nothing, so today I was determined to go out and do something. If it was only a dull wander round some garden centres.

Last year our front garden fence collapsed. I’ve been meaning to replace it for some time. Next door’s got iron railings which look good, but are rather tall for my liking. I’d like shorter ones. And the length of railing I want is “non-standard” (nine feet seven inches), so I’d have to have them custom-made I’ve tried to contact wrought iron suppliers, but they don’t reply. Which is exactly what next door found when they tried to get bespoke railings. For all this talk of recession and credit crunch, some people don’t want the work.

I’ve come to the conclusion that since I’m not a blacksmith, a wooden fence would be easier. I can buy fence panels in various places, and I can cut them to size. (Oh, how easy it is to type these words. I expect in the weeks to come I shall regret this foolish boast.)

So, together with ‘er indoors ^TM , we set off through the snow to B&Q to have a look at their fencing. Rather disappointing, really. But they did have a decking balustrade which gave me an idea. Two balustrades and a bit of rope might look quite fetching. Or rather awful, depending on your views on rope fencing.

Homebase didn’t have much at all in the way of fencing. To make up for this, they did have a nice lady who was telling anyone who’d listen that “it’s not as cold already as it used to be now”. I smiled sweetly and made a hasty retreat before she decided to be my friend.

WyeVale was a disappointment. Some things never change. And then to Bybrook Barn which had something that I might be able to cut and hammer into shape. I just need to persuade one or other of the fruits of my loin to chip in and help with the donkey work (i.e. do it for me) once it gets warmer.

I then spent the afternoon archiving my photos. Anyone who knows me will realise that I photograph absolutely everything. And with my current camera, every photo I have takes up about 2Mb of disk space. So I went through my photos for the last two years. I didn’t realise that it had been that long since I’d had a cull. I lost count of the events at which I had a dozen (pretty much) identical photos. I did some serious deleting, managing to claw back over 2Gb worth of disk space. I got the last two years of photos onto three compact disks, which I thought wasn’t bad. I just need to discipline myself to chuck out the rubbish photos every time I unload my camera from now on….