31 October 2024 (Thursday) - Not At Work

Back in the day I used to work nine to five every Monday to Friday. The night and weekend shifts I did were overtime. I would regularly work seventy hours in a week, and there was one spell where I worked every weekend for six months.

Yesterday I came home knackered having worked two consecutive days and feeling that I needed a rest.

 

As I emptied the dishwasher this morning I found a pit of it had dropped off. Some rubber thingy. I emptied the dishwasher and left the thingy on the side in the hopes that “er indoors ^TM” might fix it.

I set the washing machine going and as I scoffed toast I peered into the Internet which told me that an old friend was having a birthday today. We went to school together where he once put a drawing pin on another child’s seat and I got the blame. Every Wednesday night we’d meet at the chip shop and lip the nice lady behind the counter (one night she set the chip shop dog on him). We’d go underage drinking regularly and his singing his home-made ballads got us thrown out of quite a few pubs. When aged fourteen we once found one of those inflatable sex dolls and he cycled round Hastings for a fortnight with the thing strapped to his bike’s rack. And we went to Boys Brigade and the associated church services together as well.

He’s sixty-one today. Where have the years gone?

 

I got the dogs into the car and we set off to the woods listening to the pundits on the radio as we went. They were talking about yesterday’s budget in which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has been incredibly clever. She’s kept the election pledges of not putting up taxes on working people. However she’s putting up all sorts of taxes on businesses. So the businesses have to find this money by either cutting their costs, cutting staff wages and putting up their prices. And with no wage increases and higher prices we will have just as much money in our pockets as we would have had if income tax and VAT had gone up.

But in putting up the taxes that she has, the Chancellor of the Exchequer has made businesses appear to be the villains of the piece and not the government.

Sneaky, eh?

 

We got to the woods and had a rather good walk. The forecast had been for a misty morning and I’d hoped to see deer. The mist had all but gone by the time we got there. We didn’t see any deer, but we did hear a crashing in the trees that might have been them. Mind you there were a load of squirrels about today. And an incredibly fat jogger. Even fatter than me. He was gasping for air but attempted a cheery wave as he came past.

 

We came home where I got the lawn mower out and gave the lawn a haircut, then tidied away the last of the soil I’d dug out for the new bog filter. As I worked I could hear our frog croaking, but couldn’t see him anywhere.

And then I cracked on with the ironing as I watched a couple of films. I.D. is an old favourite of mine but the sequel I.D.2 was a tad lame.

I made a cuppa, did some CPD and woke up a few hours later.

 

Oh – and “er indoors ^TM” has fixed the dishwasher…

30 October 2024 (Wednesday) - Something for Nothing

I had another restless night. I woke feeling refreshed and raring to go at quarter past two, and then lay awake for the rest of the night.

Over brekkie I watched another episode of “Everyone Else Burns”. Again on the one hand it was very funny and entertaining, and on the other hand I recognized a lot of characters from my past. I wonder whatever happened to the religious crackpots of Hastings of the late 1970s. Have they all (like me) seen the darkness?

 

With telly watched I sparked up my lap-top. The Munzee world was amazed at Munzee HQ’s announcement last night that you can now only buy their stuff from the USA now. Or that is those in the parts of the Munzee world outside the USA were amazed. Those in the USA were seemingly amazed that there were parts of the world outside the USA.

I got Wordle on my last attempt and got ready for work. Again taking care not to wake or squish anyone.

 

It was again dark as I set off to work, and again after a couple of minutes driving through a dark morning I remembered I'd not brought lunch. I stopped off at the co-op to get some and I met Martin who was having a bit of a disaster. His milk had gone off and he needed more, and so had gone shopping.

Back in the day we'd have milk delivered by a milkman. The bloke who used to live next door a few years ago had a milkman and paid a lot more for his milk than I did. I had a little look at the Internet this morning and saw that the local dairies would seem to have got cheaper since I last compared prices but when do they deliver? I can remember my gran's milkman never showed up until mid-morning, and on the summer mornings the milk had already turned before he'd delivered it. On the winter mornings the stuff used to arrive frozen.

 

I got my sandwich, told Martin he should get a co-op card, and set off to work. As always I listened to the pundits on the radio who today were in a speculative mood today. Who was going to win next week's presidential elections in America? What would be announced in the budget later today? Loads of guesswork this morning but absolutely no news at all.

 

Work was work. At lunch time one of the trainees came round with a load of Starbucks mugs that had been donated to us. A free mug can’t be bad... and hot on her heels was the works' well-being team with a free packet of vitamin tablets for anyone who wanted one. I had a mug and a packet of tablets - something for nothing is always worth having even if both will just sit in my locker never to see the light of day again.

It was a shame no one was giving out cake...

29 October 2024 (Tuesday) - Munzee R.I.P.

I didn't sleep very well last night; with an alarm set I was waking every twenty minutes or so. I eventually gave up trying to sleep and got up. I made toast and watched more of "Everyone Else Burns". It's a very good show. Most people would see it as a rather funny comedy about religious crackpots; I see the show as a documentary about my teenage years. In the late 1970s some bunch of religious nuts decided that Hastings was a den of iniquity and was ripe for missionaries. And like many of my mates at the time I fell for their hype.

Looking back, the religious fervour I had at their rallies was much the same feeling that you get at a pop concert or a football match, but I was young and didn't know.

And again looking back, "Everyone Else Burns" has got it spot on.

 

I got dressed in the dark taking care not to wake “er indoors ^TM” or the dogs. A tricky thing to do; if I turn the light on I wake everyone; if I leave the light off I might squish a dog as I put my socks on. Bailey particularly would be very easily squished.

I set off to work, and realising I'd forgotten lunch I popped in to the co-op. Isn't it daft that what with their meal deal, adding a bottle of pop to my lunch took twenty pence off the total price, and brandishing my co-op car gave me fifty pence off of a four-quid bill. But a small cheapo flimsy biodegradable carrier bag set me back sixty pence?

 

I drove up the dark motorway through pouring rain as the pundits on the radio wittered on about occasional passing showers. They also wittered on about more pub closures. They were interviewing the head honcho of the pub chain Greene King about the upcoming budget about which there are rumours of increases to taxes and to the minimum wage. The chap being interviewed made the observation that the cost to a pub of increases in staff wages and taxes can only be paid for out of pub takings (which is true - where else can they come from?). He went on to say that the profit margin on some pubs is so low that the rumoured tax and wage increases will turn them from making a profit into making a loss, and so they will close.  There was a lot of bleeding heart whinging from other people being interviewed, but the observation was made (correctly) that pubs are businesses, not charities. Sad, but true. I like a pint from time to time, but with a pint costing the thick end of a fiver the writing is on the wall for most, if not all, pubs.

The motorway was rather busy this morning. Traffic was moving very slowly for the two miles between junctions seven and six on the motorway, and the Running Horse Roundabout was horrendous. Quite a few people were bellowing road rage at the more timid drivers, and in all honesty I can't say I wasn't tempted to join in.

 

Having left home in darkness I got to work in daylight. A colleague was poorly and I'd been offered the early shift. I like early shifts. Particularly at the moment. If you aren't past the Running Horse roundabout by half past seven in the morning you are looking at sitting in a traffic jam for over an hour. And then getting to work to find everyone else has beaten you there and the car park is full to overflowing.  So on the days when I am working I get there silly early so as to avoid that nonsense. Earlies suit me!!

And having done my bit at work there was more road nonsense on my way home. There’s been notices up about Bond Road being closed overnight for some time now. And today when the closures are planned to start, some idiot has decided to close Christchurch Road. For those who don’t know the area this is akin to planning to deliberately close both the M2 and M20 at the same time.

Kent Highways have done some stupid things recently… Personally I don’t blame whoever made the decision to do this. I blame whoever put that person into a position or authority where they could do this.

 

And as I was typing this drivel so I’m (quite possibly) finding myself in need of a new hobby. Munzee HQ in America has announced that they are ending their reseller program. Up until now if I wanted to buy any bar codes to stick onto lamp posts I could buy them from a company in Lancashire who would send them on to me at second class post rates. From now on I can print my own (tried that – didn’t work) or have them posted from America at silly prices.

So I can Munz until supplies run out… and then I shall need another hobby.

28 October 2024 (Monday) - Gardening, Lego, Frog

Other than “er indoors ^TM” having a fight with Morgan in the small hours I slept well.  From time to time he licks his paws for no reason, and was doing so quite noisily last night. Apparently. I slept through any noise he might have been making. It was someone else that woke me.

 

I made toast, and had my usual root around the Internet. Today there was an argument on the Kent Geocachers page. Someone was whinging about why an ex-hunter of Tupperware wasn’t doing cache maintenance any more. And that whinge summed up all that is wrong with the noble and ancient art of hunting Tupperware. So many people want to go looking for film pots under rocks. But so few are prepared to put the things out themselves. It’s the old, old argument. It speaks volumes that I for one really don’t want to put them out, and I’m the county’s second most active hider.

If people would like to put out a series there’s plenty of space in the county. I’ve got cache locations of series I’ve archived in Bethersden, Great Chart, Sevington and Witchling that I’m willing to share. People wouldn’t have to work out routes to walk; all they’d have to do would be to stick a film pot under a rock and tell the geo-feds they’ve done it. I made the offer on-line.

So far no one has taken me up on it.

 

I took the dogs out. As we drove there was some dire drivel on the radio about some woman who was once queen of France but jacked it all in to become queen of Scotland. I suppose it could have been interesting, but the presenter was determined to kill the subject stone dead. I listened for a while; wondering why something so dull would be on national radio. I eventually gave up and sang along to Ivor Biggun as we drove up to the woods.

The woods were rather busy today. We met nine other groups with dogs, and every encounter passed off without episode. There was one dog who I thought Morgan was playing rather aggressively with but that dog wanted to walk with us and followed us as the rest of his group walked off..

One group we met was a young mother with two small children on bikes. And they were like every other group of young mothers with two small children on bikes that I’ve ever seen. Young mothers always demand that the children cycle at walking pace. It isn’t possible to cycle that slowly, and the children constantly wobble all over the place and fall off. If you are going to take small children out on bikes you either need to run or have a bike yourself. It ain’t rocket science.

 

We came home. I had a cuppa and cracked on in the garden. I trimmed back more of not-so-nice-next-door’s brambles, then cleaned out the pond’s filter and with that done had a general tidy-up.

And then we had a delivery. On Saturday I said “What I needed was some of those strips of stones glued to some sort of backing material”. I ordered some off of Amazon and they arrived today. It only took me a few minutes to realise they were shite (and that’s being generous). I opened the packaging to see that quite a few stones had already fallen off of the backing. And the backing material was so flimsy that it couldn’t hold its own weight, and whilst trying to put it into place it stretched and bent itself entirely out of shape.

Thankfully “er indoors ^TM” came up with an idea to sort out what those strips of stones would be covering. I ordered something else from Amazon, and hopefully I’ll get the current pond project finished in a few days.

 

I sat down with another cuppa and wrote up some CPD, then opened up my Lego plum blosson set and spent an hour or so building it. What with the rain starting and then hossing down it wasn’t as though I could do much else.

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up her version of plov, and we scoffed it whilst watching “Lego Masters: Australia”.

 With that watched Bailey asked to go into the garden. I went with her – she tends to play silly beggars in the dark. As I waved the torch around I saw movement. We’ve got a frog in our small pond. 

27 October 2024 (Sunday) - Late Shift

I had a rather good night’s sleep I suppose, but I did wake in a cold sweat in the small hours. My poor brain had concocted a nightmare in which Mark Lenard (the Star Trek actor) had sponsored one of my ex-cubs on a sponsored walk and hadn’t paid the two quid that was owed. For some reason it was up to me to reclaim the money, and the facts that he’d lived in America and had died nearly thirty years ago were utterly irrelevant. If I didn’t get the money I would go to prison.

 

I got up and zoomed round the house putting the clocks to the right time. Last night we had the stupidity of the clocks going back an hour. I’ve heard all sorts of reasons why this happens… It is claimed that it safer for schoolchildren to walk to school, and that it saves energy. Seriously? We have the same amount of daylight. Moving when we call midday changes nothing. Children walking to school in daylight walk home in the dark. Light bulbs not turned on in the mornings just get turned on in the evening.

Most of the world doesn’t bother with changing the clocks twice a year.

 

I made toast and had my usual rummage round the Internet. I sent out birthday wishes, reported spamming adverts and rolled my eyes at the inspirational memes. People who tell you that when life hands you lemons you should make lemonade boil my piss. They have clearly never been handed a lemon by life.

There was an interesting rant on The Original Hastings Nightlife Facebook group bemoaning the loss of all the night clubs in the area, and asking what young people do on Saturday nights. No end of people were chipping in about how there’s nowhere for the young to go out on the beer in Hastings; all of whom were ignoring the posts from doormen and taxi drivers who were saying that there are loads of places open until two or three o’clock in the morning and the town centre is as busy at night as it ever was. Some people just want to moan.

Bit like me, really.

There was a post on Facebook about people up our road moaning. It would seem that someone’s children are practicing musical instruments at all hours. Not-so-nice-next-door clangs her piano periodically, but it’s not really an issue. A noisy neighbour can be a two-edged sword in that having one means you can make as much noise as you like and they can’t complain.

The biggest issue we ever had with noise was the bloke next door over twenty years ago who regularly came home drunk and noisy at two o’clock in the morning. Eventually I banged on his door at five o’clock and told him that if he wakes me in the small hours I would wake him a couple of hours later. He swore and ranted, and when he was finished I told him that what he had to say was irrelevant – every time from then on if he came home making noise in the small hours he would be woken a couple of hours later.

We never heard anything more from him…

 

I did have a vague plan to take the dogs out this morning, but unless it’s a quick once round the park there’s never enough time before work. And being the weekend the normal people would have been out in force. And once dog brekkie was scoffed all three were soon snoring.

I had a little pootle in the garden. I gathered dog turds, voomed round with the Bionic Burner, and then got out the lawn feeding jollop. The yellow patches on the lawn where dog tiddle killed the grass seem to have cleared up.

 

I sulked as I set off to work. It's been rather wet recently. Yesterday was a bit dull and overcast, and I cut short farting about in the garden to avoid the rain.  This morning I drove off to work through glorious sunshine, and I spent much of the afternoon staring out the window at a rather good day. I've often said that I don't mind working at the weekend when it is dismal and raining. But I do mind working at the weekend when it is sunny and bright.

Work was work; I did my bit.  But as always when on a late shift the best part of the day is over and done with by mid-morning. And apart from capping six bouncers in one of my works tree houses (I have two!) today was on the dull side.

 

I again spent quite a while thinking about buying that house over the back of ours. It's a shame that “er indoors ^TM” isn't keen... I know it isn't really practical, but I might just have a look when it goes on the market. I knew having two puppies wasn't practical when I saw Morgan and Bailey's pictures on the Internet two and a half years ago, and I went to have a look at them...

26 October 2024 (Saturday) - Dog Club, Shopping, Gardening

No geocaches went live as I scoffed my toast this morning, so I didn’t go charging out on another wasted journey. But I had a message via the messaging service on geocaching dot com. Someone had specifically created a geocaching account to send me a message. The message was “I'd like to know more about your work on the river stour especially if you have any wildlife survey data in the fields behind Kingsnorth Surgery or flow data at the riverside Inn location. It’s a bit urgent as we have to respond to the EA regarding Kingsnorth Green WWTW discharge permit application.” This was deliberately intended for me as it came with one or two little snippets about me so that the sender could be sure he was messaging the right person.

What was that all about?

I peered into Facebook as I do. Yet another person had asked for recommendations for a good vet in the area. This question comes up at least once a week, and every surgery for miles around gets an equal amount of praise and criticism. There wasn’t much else on Facebook this morning… other than a myriad of adverts about things in which I had no interest whatsoever. I reported half a dozen as spam, and clicked the box to find out why I was being sent utter drivel. Apparently advertisers only need to specify a target audience that uses English and is over eighteen before being able to harass the masses.. I suppose that if only one person in a hundred thousand buys the rubbish they are peddling then they’ve made their money back.

 

Being Saturday we went to Dog Club. There was a rather good turn-out today – about fifteen dogs. It was difficult to count as they kept moving about. Morgan was surprisingly well behaved. He did get a little over-excited, but no need for any time-out and no need for his muzzle at all.

Again we were rather late out of Dog Club; as we drove off so Steve was on the radio announcing what the Mystery Year had been.

 

We came home and had a cuppa, then I set off on a little mission. The pond liner covering the bit of the sleeper near the waterfall doesn’t look quite what it might. What I needed was some of those strips of stones glued to some sort of backing material.

I went to Bybrook Barn garden centre who didn’t have any. The nice lady in Wickes said I might try Amazon. I tried B&M Bargains as I remembered seeing them in there (when I didn’t need them). There was no-one to ask. The only staff they had were on the tills looking harassed with queues seemingly half a mile long and growing. In desperation I tried B&Q. They’ve been difficult in the past, and today summed up what I’ve come to expect from them. As I walked in there was some chap strutting about the entrance as though he owned the place. I started to ask him … and he shut me up and said that if I wanted anything I should go ask one of the staff. I stared at his staff badge on the lanyard round his neck. He stared at me as though I was the shit on his shoe. I asked if he worked there. That confused him… he said he did. I told him I’d take my money elsewhere.

 

I came home and seeing the forecast rain hadn’t happened I cracked on in the garden. I rearranged rocks, pressure-washered our Neptune statue and pressure-washered paving slabs until both the pressure-washer’s batteries went flat.

As I fiddled about in the garden I kept looking over the back to the house at the end of the drive at the end of our garden. I’d got chatting to the bloke who lives there and he says he’s selling up. Do we want to move there? The house looks nice enough, but I’ve put so much time and effort into our back garden. I don’t want to start again from scratch. The bloke was asking if he could have some of my spare topsoil to bung up the holes in his garden through which the foxes get in. If foxes can get in, dogs could get out.

Moving would be a major upheaval… maybe I’ll pass on this one?

 

I came inside for a cuppa just as the rain started… and woke up two hours later and found I could hardly move. And after dinner and having put two loads into the washing machine it still hurts to move about.

“er indoors ^TM” is watching “Celebrity Weakest Link” in which several actors from TV soaps are bending over backwards to show how proud they are of their ignorance. Why do they do that?

25 October 2024 (Friday) - Another Busy Day

As I scoffed my toast I saw a new geocache had gone live near Lydd. Set by someone who sets fiendish puzzles I thought I’d just have a look. I immediately saw what this puzzle was all about, solved it, scoffed my toast, and leaving “er indoors ^TM” and the dogs in their pits I flew off in the hopes of a First to Find.

I didn’t get it.

I had a serious sulk…

 

As I drove home “Desert Island Discs” was on the radio. Today’s castaway was someone I’d never heard of. Shirley Collins is a folk singer who was a significant contributor to the British Folk Revival of the 1960s and 1970s (or so it says on Wikipedia). It turned out she was born in Hastings (where my mother was born) six months after my mother was born. Her early life sounded just like mum and dad described theirs - dodging bombs and being evacuated. But then this woman chose her music.

Oh dear…

I collected the dogs and carried on to the woods still listening to “Desert Island Discs”. This woman’s choice of music was so bad I felt I had to keep listening to hear what came next. You’ve never heard such a dreadful collection of caterwauled dirges.

 

We got to the woods; we walked our four miles. Once away from the car park we didn’t see anyone at all. It was only a shame that Bailey had to roll in quite so much fox poo.

As we drove home I saw the 666 bus from Ashford to Faversham come past. I always chuckle at the number – and there’s a picture of a devil on the back of the bus. Mind you the bus is rarely busy. The local bus company runs an hourly service. This morning’s one didn’t have anyone at all on it as it came past us.

Give it a year of so and the locals will be up in arms when the service gets cancelled because no one uses it. Like what happened with the Eurostar.

 

The dogs had a bath – some got scrubbed more than others. I made a cuppa and had a look at the Internet later than I usually do. I sent out birthday wishes, Munzed, got Wordle on the fifth attempt, then got on with the bog filter project.

So simple to type…

I re-plumbed the pressure filter’s output. That took half an hour. I then put some of the plants from the old bog filter into the new one. But only some – they had rather grown over the summer. I then upended the water and shingle out of the old filter tub. That made a mess so I ran out the hose pipe to wash away the mess. That made more mess.

Eventually I managed to wash away the worst of the muck, I got the excess pond plants to the green recycle bin, pressure-washed the old filter tub and the old splash pool. I looked at the dustbin full of the top soil I’d dug out a week or so ago to make space for this new filter, and took a deep breath. I eventually managed to heave it to the other end of the garden.

As I fiddled about so a squirrel trotted down the fence and quite happily walked across the garden. So much for ever vigilant dogs, eh?

After a couple of hours of heavy lifting and garden effort I was all in. There’s still some topsoil to shift and the rockery to rearrange properly, but they will keep for another day.

 

I spent a few minutes looking at the monthly accounts. Eventually I got them to balance, and seeing I was unusually flush we got “My Boy ^TM” and Cheryl to come round for a games and kebab evening. Games aren’t too pricey, but kebab isn’t the cheap option it once was…

 

I *really* ache. The weather forecast for tomorrow is rain. A day not being able to do heavy lifting in the garden probably wouldn’t be a bad thing.

24 October 2024 (Thursday) - Making Progress

Every morning I make toast and scoff it as I peer into the Internet. Occasionally there might be something interesting or inspiring. But usually it is just people quarrelling. It seems there was a particularly vicious squabble in real life at a local angling lake last night. Last night the owners got into an argument with someone who was night fishing, and the chap had the hump and went home. Straight through the locked gate.

I then took a deep breath and asked for advice on the Skoda Fabia Facebook page. My phone connects to my car by Bluetooth. I can make hands-free calls fine, and see text messages on the car’s screen. But there’s a problem with my phone’s sat-nav in that when I use the phone’s sat-nav in the car, the spoken directions don’t happen. If I turn off Bluetooth then the phone tells me where to turn. With Bluetooth on – nothing.

Presumably the spoken instructions are going to the car somewhere.

 

I put a load of washing in to scrub then took the dogs up to the woods where we had a good walk. As we walked a deer ran across the path. By the time I realized I wanted to take a photo of it, it was gone. Treacle and Bailey didn’t see it, but Morgan did and gave chase. I wish he wouldn’t.

We walked round the woods in peace, but there was some parent and toddler event going on just past the bottom of the slope leading from the car park. And there were loads of people there, and walking down from the car park, all carrying cups of coffee. Unless they’d boiled it up in the car park it would have been stone cold by the time they’d driven it to the woods.

 

We came home. I hung out the washing then mowed the lawn. As I mowed I remembered the nutty chap who used to live next door. No matter what the time of year, the time of day, or the weather, he would always insist that I shouldn’t be mowing my lawn. He always had the most absurd and ridiculous reason why I should have mowed the lawn the day before, and from the way he used to speak it was as though he really did think I could go back a day to mow the lawn.

I often wonder what happened to him.

And with lawn mowed I voomed round with the garden vacuum cleaner.

 

“er indoors ^TM” stopped for lunch so I put her to use. Together we got the liner into the bog filter, cut it roughly to shape. Then in a rather extreme act of faith I turned the pumps on. The bog filter filled with water, and the waterfall thingy worked and the rest of it didn’t overflow. Flushed with success I then spent an hour shifting rocks about the rockery. But only an hour. I deliberately stopped because I knew that if I carried on I wouldn’t be able to move for several days.

I took a few photos and added them to the pond album. I’ve got to sort the liner where it meets the main pond, rearrange the rockery and sort the plants, but I can start on that tomorrow.

 

I made us both a cuppa and had a look at the internet. This morning I’d asked on Facebook about getting my phone’s sat-nav to talk through the car. Someone had given me instructions on how to do it. I went out to the car, called up the audio menu… and the menu screen the chap was talking about wasn’t there.

Ho hum…

I had a look on Google and that had some suggestions which didn’t work ether…

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled a decent bit of dinner which we watched the first episode of the latest series of “Taskmaster”. Unusually I’d heard of two of the five contestants.

 

I ache a bit… hope I chirp up overnight. There’s quite a bit of work to do in the garden tomorrow…

23 October 2024 (Wednesday) - Late Shift

There was some bitter squabbling on one of the Facebook Lego pages I follow this morning. Someone was hoping to go on eBay to get a Lego set which they had as a child, and was asking for help in getting its set number. A reasonable request? Sadly all this chap could remember was that the set was from about forty years ago and had a house and a car in it. That narrowed it down to one out of thousands, and the keyboard warriors were out in force dripping their sarcasm. 

 

And an old schoolfriend of mine (who runs ghost walks in Rye) was posting on Facebook about a ghost detecting app.

I downloaded one which gave me the option to upgrade (for a price) to be able to ask ghosts questions and to see more ghosts. Presumably the amount of ghosts it detected was dependent on how much I was prepared to pay? I tried it; it just tried to play Candy Crush. I deleted it and tried another ghost detecting app. That one said there was a ghost not far away. Judging by the ghost radar I think it was in not-so-nice-next-door’s living room.

Mind you, the people who used to live on the other side of not-so-nice-next-door were convinced their house was haunted for years until the morning of their wedding when they are adamant they heard it clomp down the stairs, slam the door behind it, and they never had any ghost experiences since...

Or so they said.

 

What with not having as much time as usual I took the dogs to the park this morning. We got there and had a little mooch about. We met a few other dogs, and walked past them with no issues.

One young mother (in her pyjamas) told me that I was living her dream in that I had a pack of small dogs whereas she only had one.

Some elderly Nepalese people were picking fallen chestnuts out of the mud. When I told them there are still a few chestnuts on the trees in Kings Wood they smiled politely and hurried off as fast as they could; almost as though I’d threatened them with physical violence. What was that all about?

 

We came home and the dogs all went straight to sleep. As they snored I realized they hadn’t had their brekkie. Dogs are strange. In the evenings Treacle particularly is constantly begging for more biscuits. But in the morning they quite happily skip brekkie and don’t have it until mid-day.

 

As I set off to work I saw not-so-nice-next-door coming out of her house. I've been hoping to speak to her about the front fence for some time, and with no dogs to bother her I tried my luck. She was amazingly co-operative. To be honest the way things are between us, simply not saying f... off fatso is realistically amazingly co-operative. She tried to make out that the fence collapsed because I hadn't painted it. I politely pointed out that I had. She pointed out (quite rightly) that I hadn't painted her side of it. I smiled. I didn't like to say that I didn't dare go on her side of the fence. But she says she's happy for me to fix it. I see that as a result.

 

I drove off up the motorway as I do. With the motorway again closed between junctions six and five I took a detour in through Aylesford, and stopped off for a crafty geocache whilst I was at it.

I also stopped off for petrol. That stuff has dropped in price - today I paid the same price that I was paying three years ago.

I saw that as a result as well.

 

With a tank full of petrol I drove up to work... and sat in the car in the car park as the torrential rain crashed down. I took the opportunity to test out my ghost detecting app. There were no ghosts to be seen in the works car park, and later the works tea room proved devoid of spirits as well.

I had a go in the laboratory where it detected something... I think it got confused with everyone wearing white lab coats.

I know I do…

22 October 2024 (Tuesday) - Finally Stopped Raining

As I scoffed my toast my phone bleeped. The geocache I’d hidden on Sunday had gone live, so I set the associated Adventure Lab series live as well. And with that live I set about my next one and met total disaster.

In order to set an ad-lab live you need an ad-lab credit. I’d read on-line that you can just ask for one, but the place where you ask tells me that I have to wait until next January before they will give me another credit. It turns out that you have to wait ninety days between creating ad-labs so that people like me don’t go churning them out like a thing possessed. Which rather pisses on my chips bearing in mind I did all the leg-work for four more yesterday afternoon, and was planning to churn them out like a thing possessed.

Mind you a group of hunters of Tupperware logged the new ad-lab only thirty-six minutes after it went live and wrote rather nice things about it in their written logs. So my efforts are appreciated.

 

“er indoors ^TM” set off out. Her work was doing some volunteering day thingy today. I set a load of washing going and took the dogs up to the woods. The rain had finally stopped and unlike yesterday, today was glorious. We did our usual circuit of Kings Wood. We met several other groups of dog walkers and every meet passed off without incident. Mind you we did meet one idiot. She wasn’t paying attention and was on us before she realized. She started shouting “ohmygod ohmygod” and made a complete mess of trying to get her dog leads from round her neck. When she finally got them free she was almost hysterical; apologizing to me that the dogs were fighting and that she was so sorry. Eventually she calmed down and looked at what was actually happening.

One of her dogs had sat down with Treacle and both were watching Morgan, Bailey and her other dog. Those three were playing a game in which two chased the third for fifty yards at which point one of the two chasers became the chased, and they all then ran off in another direction for another fifty yards before again swapping chasers and chased. They were having a great time.

I had to explain to this woman that dogs playing chase *wasn’t* fighting, and that it was actually playing.

 

After four miles we were back at the car park and we came home. Once home I gave the dogs a scrub. Tummies get grubby in the woods.

I hung out the washing and put the undercrackers in to scrub, then popped over the shop and got the makings of dinner. As I scoffed a bit of lunch I watched telly. “Everyone Else Burns” is about a family who are members of a puritanical crackpot religious sect. It was both hilarious, and bittersweet in that it reminded me of a lot of the people from my religious days.

 

With telly watched I went into the garden. A little while ago I started the groundwork for the pond’s new bog filter and got everything vaguely into place. Rain stopped play for a week, but today I got on with it. I got done what I wanted to do; I screwed it all together. There was a minor (major) hiccup in that when I opened the new box of long screws I’d bought from Amazon specifically for this job I saw they didn’t have the traditional hole in the end where the screwdriver goes. These were “stick fit drive system” and with no way to screwdriver them, they were (as my brother once described a rather useless item) “sod all use to man nor beast”.

I swore a bit, and rummaged in the shed. I found I had just enough proper screws (screws as God intended) to do the job, so I got busy. I got all the sleepers together. The next job is to line the thing, but I shall wait until “er indoors ^TM” is home. It is the sort of job where you need help.

I tidied up. Just as I was picking up the stick fit drive system screws to send back to Amazon I saw something, and actually read the instructions on the box. Apparently they came with the bit that you need to attach to the electric screwdriver for screwing them in place. So I had a proper look. The tool was in the box. They do come with that fitting.

Ho hum…

 

By the time I’d tidied up and started dinner and sorted the tumble-dried undercrackers “er indoors ^TM” was home. She made a cuppa; I felt I deserved it. I thought about dragooning her into helping line the bog filter, but that will keep for a day or so.

Instead I cracked on with dinner. Plov MkIII was just chicken, apple and rice with half a bottle of red wine and Thai seasoning. I quite liked it, but “er indoors ^TM” wasn’t keen. The next version will be korma flavoured.

 

Now we’ve got a DVD player we played a DVD. We’ve been meaning to watch “Wonka” for some time. Despite an all-star cast I wasn’t impressed.

Perhaps I’d been looking forward to it so much it was never going to live up to expectations.

21 October 2024 (Monday) - Still Raining

One of this morning’s petty squabble on the internet was over a meme posted to Facebook about how medical care is given out free of charge in “Star Trek”. Non-Americans commenting pointed out that they don’t pay for healthcare (at the point of care). The Americans commenting fell into two groups. One group were saying what a wonderful idea free health care would be; seemingly oblivious to the fact that healthcare is given out free of charge in most of the world except America. The other group felt that free health care would be a terrible thing and that there was some merit in paying for it.

The other squabble was about a twee meme posted by some celebrity (from way back when) about how much nurses make. It was claimed that nurses make people better and make people smile, and you can’t put a price on that. I thought about pointing out the stupidity from the pandemic when everyone stood on the doorsteps and clapped the NHS. At the time I tried paying for my shopping (in Sainsburys) by clapping but they weren’t having that.

Perhaps if we in the UK adopted the American health care model then healthcare workers in te NHS might get better pay?

I also saw that ELO are going to play their last ever gig in Hyde Park next June. Do I want to go? I wouldn’t mind, but with tickets starting at about a hundred quid a go (or so the expert opinion reckons) it’s a lot of money to shell out.

 

Despite the rain I took the dogs to the woods. Sadly my idiot enthusiasm didn’t triumph over common sense today; the rain didn’t ease up until we were in the car on the way home. But the dogs seemed to like the walk. As we walked we saw a few other dog walkers braving the elements. I think a couple of them were professional dog walkers. They had a very random assortment of dogs, and we did see two vans in the car park bearing dog walker livery.

I wonder how lucrative professional dog walking is?

 

We came home where we saw not-so-nice-next-door taking a bag of rubbish to the public bin up the street. As she walked back she glared at me like I was the shit on her shoe. Treacle snarled at her; Treacle *really* doesn’t like her.

 

The dogs had a bath. No one had rolled in anything foul, but they were wet and muddy. A hot shower to warm up and shift mud was in order. And once showered, the dogs were all soon asleep.

I loaded up an assortment of old tat into the car and set off to the tip. The tip was quiet today – only two other cars were there. I unloaded, and got chatting with the chap at the tip about how much useful stuff gets dinged out. I mentioned the little shop at the tip in Hastings; the nice man said that pretty much every council-run tip in the country has little shops where they sell useable stuff… except those in Kent.

 

I came home to an email. The geo-feds had given me the thumbs-up for my adventure lab idea, and had scheduled it to go live tomorrow. So flushed with success I spent the afternoon preparing four more of the same sorts of thing.

And once “er indoors ^TM” had gone bowling I looked at four more for my old stomping ground in Hastings.

I’m really hoping this rain will stop soon.

20 October 2024 (Sunday) - Rainy Day

I slept for ten hours last night. I sleep so much better when I have no alarm set. I made toast and had a look at the Internet as I do every morning. It was there. Again no one really had seemed to have done very much. Some days it seems that either no one does anything with their lives, or if they do they don’t plaster it all over the Internet, or if they do my lap-top chooses not to tell me. Which is a shame for a very nosey person.

I munzed, got Wordle eventually, and then the dogs came downstairs. After a night in my pit I am desperate for a wazz. But the dogs are different. They get up and pootle about. They have to be chased into the garden and even then they fiddle about before eventually doing anything. I wish I had the same lack of urgency first thing in the morning – I’d stay in my pit longer.

 

I got dressed, put some washing in to scrub… and sulked. The forecast rain had started. Mind you I was very pleased that the rain didn’t come yesterday. We were very lucky with the weather for the CITO event and the geo-meet.

I pootled on-line, wrote up some CPD, and pondered my next geocaching Adventure Lab cache series. I’ve been given another five ad-labs. The idea is you find somewhere of local interest with five specific locations. At each location you set up a question to answer – the name on a sign, the distance on a milestone, something along those lines. You take GPS co-ordinates, and set it all up on-line, and it makes a little adventure for someone else to do. I’ve set up five of these already. One up the main street in Great Chart finding points of interest, one sight-seeing around Singleton Lake…

I’ve got another series of five, but I was rather at a loose end for where I might set them, and what I might have as a theme. Wherever it is needs Internet connection. I did have a plan for Kings Wood, but the mobile data up there is patchy at best.

… and then I had a stroke of genius. But I didn’t have time for it…

 

Despite the rain we took the dogs to the garden centre. We couldn’t spend all day stuck indoors; I’d go stir crazy. So we went to the pet section at Bybrook Barn garden centre to see if we could get Treacle a new lead. We lost hers yesterday whilst having a litter pick-up. Sadly we couldn’t find anything but we got a decent fruit cake.

We thought we might come home via Pets At Home to see if they had any decent leads. They didn’t, but we got some dog treats.

And we took a minor diversion on the way home to implement stage I of my stroke of genius.

 

One home we had a cuppa, and I carried out stages II and III my stroke of genius. Starting from up the road near the station you can walk down Beaver Road, along Denmark Road and into Torrington Road. A fifteen-minute walk passing the sites of five now-closed-and gone pubs; at each of which you answer a simple question.

That was stage II.

Having answered those simple questions at each stage you get given the location of a bonus geocache… that you’ve just walked past.

That was Stage III (Hiding it earlier was stage I)

Writing the cache page and ad-lab pages kept me quiet for a couple of hours. It’s now down to the geo-feds.

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up a very good bit of dinner which we scoffed whilst watching tonight’s episode of “Lego Masters: Australia”. Both were rather good…

 

Hope this rain lets up soon…

19 October 2024 (Saturday) - Dog Club, CITO, Geo-Meet, Dinner

The dogs took up an amazing amount of bed space last night. Eventually I got some space when they all followed “er indoors ^TM” to the loo in the small hours, but when they came back there was an altercation about why Bailey was so smelly. For a very small cute dog she can be quite disgusting sometimes.

I got a little more kip, but not much.

 

I made toast and had a look at the Internet. It was still there, and much the same as ever. More and more I’m seeing utter drivel of no interest to me on my Facebook feed, and less and less of that which is actually interesting.

I munzed, and have now done all that I need to for this month’s Munzee Clan War – it is now down to everyone else. There was a little consternation on one of the other clans in that someone who needs to Munz daily hasn’t been on-line in ten days. But as long as it isn’t out clan, all is well.

And I got Wordle on the fifth attempt when I finally realized to use the American spelling. 

 

Being Saturday we set off to Dog Cub. Yesterday when working the weather was glorious. This morning we had rain. Not as heavy as it might have been, but heavier than I would have liked. We arrived at Dog Club where I’d decided that we’d open up and if the weather was that bad we’d come home. But having arrived expecting the worst we had a rather good session. Despite the rain we had a dozen dogs along. Morgan played nicely to begin with. He did get rather excited so we popped his muzzle on as a precaution and all was well. The dog we thought he’d been trying to nip came up to him several times and (with play-bows) invited him to play.

 

As we came home we listened to Steve on the radio. The mystery year was easy – Enya’s “Orinoco Flow” was in 1981… or so I was convinced. It was actually 1988… It is strange how your memory plays tricks on you; I can distinctly remember listening to this when still living at my mum’s. Another reason why it is worth my while writing a diary. Clearly I remember wrong.

We got home and dried off. I put on dry trousers and looked out my waterproof leggings, then scared up a couple of prizes for later.

 

With the rain finally looking as though it was clearing up we drove up to Badlesmere where I was staging today’s geo-meet. We started off on a litter-pick around Badlesmere Village Green. There wasn’t a lot of litter to be had, but what there was we had. Prizes were awarded for most litter collected (quite a bit) and most unusual litter (perfectly useable garden fork).

Mind you it has to be said that for all we collected some litter, we left some. Treacle’s lead went missing whilst we were there.

And with litter gathered we retreated to the Red Lion for a pint and a chat.

Bearing in mind the frankly dreadful weather forecast I was very pleased with the amount of people who came – there must have been twenty people along to the event today. Some people were old hands at the geo-meet game; others had their first meet-up today. As always the event passed off rather well. And just as it began to get a tad nippy so people went their various ways, and together with Karl and Tracy we came inside and had a rather good bit of dinner.

 

I took a few photos of our day. We came home, and we both had a little sleep. But not as much as the dogs did. It’s three hours past dog-dinner-time and they are still snoring.

18 October 2024 (Friday) - Early Shift

I was wide awake and raring to go far too early this morning. I got up and as I scoffed my brekkie I watched some utter drivel on Netflix about some West Indian family living in London in the 1980s. I doubt I shall watch any more.

 

I got dressed in the dark and went off to find my car. Having no idea where I'd left it yesterday I was rather pleased to find it right outside the house. I set off, and immediately did the first of the many emergency stops I did this morning.

Back in the day when I cycled to work (which I did for about fifteen years) I had lights on the front and back of my bike, and I wore a bright yellow hi-vis vest. An hour before dawn this morning I lost count of the amount of half-wits on bikes that I nearly ran over. Not one had any lights on their bikes, all were clad entirely in black, and all had those stupid ear buds in preventing them from hearing anything; least of all me shouting at them.

 

As I drove the pundits on the radio were interviewing one of the head honchos at Netflix who was talking about the popularity of one of their subscription packages. If you take this deal you don't get bombarded with adverts. Apparently they've done research and found that the general public doesn't like adverts and tend to fast-forward through them. If the public can’t fast-forward through them then they go to toilet during the adverts or make a cup of tea, and it turns out that if the public are forced to watch an advert for a particular product then they are more likely to buy whatever it is from a competing company.

How long had it taken them to realise this?

And there was news from the Middle East. The Israelis have killed the boss of Hamas but intend to continue the war anyway. I can remember an interview on the radio about the situation in Gaza about five years ago. People from all sides of the conflict were harping on about grievances that happened twenty years before any of them were born. All admitted that no one was prepared to give an inch, and all admitted the fighting would continue indefinitely. The people being interviewed at the time all but admitted the hatred they had for each other was so strong that they really would rather have war than peace. And (as always) it is the little people that suffer.

I would say that five years later nothing has changed, but today's interview on the matter was with someone whose accent was so think I couldn't make out a word he was saying. I wish Radio Four would sort out their phone interviews. They always go one of three ways.

The phone line keeps dropping out.

The interviewee mumbles and stutters.

The interviewee barely speaks English.

 

I got to work and did my bit. Today was rather busy. I don’t dislike work, but it is seriously getting in my way. I spent much of today looking out the window at rather good weather thinking about what I might be doing in my garden.

But an early start meant for an early finish. I came home, and saw my screws and drill bits and new wellies had arrived. I was rather pleased about that. I then took the dogs out to the garden to do the “feed the fish” ceremony. Treacle particularly likes “feed the fish”; she gets very over-excited about it. As I feed the fish I give the dogs some fish food. Are a few dried rice flakes really that good? The dogs certainly seem to think so.

Mind you, Treacle was limping a bit… perhaps she needs to take it easy? She’s getting rather old. And grey.

 

“er indoors ^TM” sorted some ribs for dinner which we scoffed whilst watching The Completely Made Up Adventures of Dick Turpin on Apple TV. It was rather good; yet another show which seems to have slipped past most people. But what with Sky and Amazon Prime and Apple TV there’s far too many channels to watch.

“er indoors ^TM” said I could scoff a box of choccies she had for her birthday. Last year. Their best before date was a year ago, but I scoffed them anyway.

I feel rather sick now.

17 October 2024 (Thursday) - Home Alone

This morning’s petty squabble on Facebook was about the national Town Criers’ Championship which took place recently in Rye. No? – it passed off pretty much unnoticed, didn’t it? Traditionally it has been held in Hastings but over the last couple of years it has moved to Rye as Hastings Town Council say they can’t afford it any more. Those who like town crier competitions are up in arms about this. Those who don’t were pointing out that council-funded town crier competitions attract dozens of people whereas self-funding events (like the bonfire parade and Jack in the Green) attract tens of thousands. Time for a change in the way the thing is funded, perhaps? It strikes me that town crier competitions are the Radio Three of public entertainment; only there because someone else is paying for it. I wonder how long Rye town council will carry on shelling out for this event?

 

“er indoors ^TM” was having an office day today so she set off leaving me with the dogs. Yesterday Treacle had a dodgy leg, but this morning it seemed better. We went to the woods and I thought that if her leg was playing up we might cut the walk short and come home. We walked four miles; she seemed fine.

Sadly as we walked we had an “episode”. Some child was toddling along with its father, and on seeing Bailey went absolutely hysterical. I could understand it if Bailey was the size of other dogs, but she is XS of the dog world.

With walk walked we came home; I was expecting the dogs to be filthy; their bellies needed hosing off but they weren’t that grubby at all considering the overnight rain. And seeing how their backs were dry I did the monthly flea treatments. In a novel break with tradition Treacle didn’t run away. All three were as good as gold for a drop on the back of the neck.

 

My plan for today was to screw together all the wooden sleepers of the bog filter. I had a look in the shed and saw I didn’t have quite enough screws. And (to be honest) my drill bit isn’t what it once was. So I ordered up some more from Amazon, and whilst I was at it I ordered some new wellies too. My ones sprung a leak a week or so ago, and they let quite a bit of water in whilst we were up the woods earlier.

 

With plans poggered I cracked on with the ironing whilst watching a DVD. “Quadrophenia” was nowhere near as good as I remembered it. Once it had finished I got up. Treacle leapt up thinking she was missing something and she hobbled after me. Having seemingly been fine whilst in the woods she was certainly struggling this afternoon. I sat on the sofa rubbing her leg for much of the afternoon.

As I massaged I watched more episodes of “Four in a Bed” in which the proprietors of four bed and breakfast establishments competed to see who was best. The loser had the right arse about losing; amazingly he didn’t seem to realise that his establishment’s gimmick (they didn’t actually do a breakfast) would count against him.

 

“er indoors ^TM” came home. I fed her Plov Mk II. It was an improvement on what I’d boiled up a week ago. Having said that, it has still got a way to go. Mk III won’t have carrots, and korma might be a better flavour than tikka was.

As we scoffed we watched the most recent episode of “Lego Masters: Australia”. I won’t give the game away, but I will say that in this episode the weakest team were eliminated, and I smiled.

 

Oh – and Pigsy died today. He was an absolute hero back in the day. Sandy died from heart issues four years ago, and Tripitaka died of leukaemia nearly forty years ago. When you bear in mind that him who played the horse died seven years ago, there’s only Monkey left.

They don’t make TV shows like that any more.