14 March 2024 (Thursday) - Busy, Busy

I managed something of a lie-in this morning, staying in my pit until eight o’clock which was something of a result.

I made brekkie and had my usual look at the Internet. I sent out four birthday wishes to friends having birthdays (the friends not having birthdays can wait their turn) and had a look-see to find out if I’d missed much. I find myself intrigued by the antics of Matt Hayes these days; again his Facebook page was rather active. Twenty years ago he made fishing programs for the telly. He’s coming back by popular demand, but the “popular demand” has a different perspective on Mr Hayes’ fishing programmes to that which Mr Hayes has. They see it as entertainment. Mr Hayes sees it as livelihood and expects to be paid for making more telly programs. I suppose he could make them in his spare time for free and on the cheap, but that’s not what professional celebrities do, is it?

I also got the notification that our Munzee Clan has reached level two, and we are half-way to our monthly target. A result for those who like sticking bar codes on lamp posts.

 

With “er indoors ^TM” at her office today, she set off to work. I put washing into the washing machine and took the dogs up to the woods where we had a good walk… once we’d evaded the chap with the Akitas. That bloke is an idiot. He’s got two dogs that are far stronger than he is, and they drag him all over the place. When he sees us coming he makes a point of being where we are going to walk and shouting that we should give him a wide berth. When we turn and take another path he runs to be in front of us again. Fortunately I saw him first today.

We met a couple of other dog walkers, we posed for photos, we ate horse poo. Quite a good walk really.

 

We came home and had the mud hosed off of our bellies, I did the dogs’ flea treatments, hung out washing, had a cuppa and went into the garden. Bearing in mind that it is getting warmer I thought I might activate the pond’s filter. Take out the old ultra-violet bulb, pop in the new one, turn it all on. Ten minutes maximum.

Getting the filter open took some doing. And when I found the glass thingy which holds the uv bulb it was rather stiff. I gave it some welly and as it came free so it smashed the old uv bulb, leaving the plug bit wedged into the socket. I eventually prised it out, got the new bulb in place, turned it all on, and had a smug smile as I saw the glow of the new bulb from it’s port-hole and watched the water flowing.

And then the water stopped flowing and the glow from the port-hole wasn’t there any more.

And then I saw an O-ring laying on the decorative bridge which hides the pond filter.

I took it all apart again and saw the watertight sleeve in which the uv bulb sits was full of water. I cleaned and dried it all out, put it all back together again this time with the O-ring in place and this time it worked.

I then cracked on with painting fence panels until I couldn’t move. I would have got on faster had I not been fighting Treacle for the kneeling pad for much of the time.

Remembering what we used to do last year I loudly announced that I was going to feed the fish, the dogs charged up the garden to the pond. It is some months since we last did that, but they remembered.

 

As I ached somewhat I settled in front of the telly and watched episodes of “Four in a Bed” in which people started off best of friends but soon got nasty with each other.

“er indoors ^TM” came home and boiled up a rather good bit of dinner which we scoffed watching “Taskmaster: New Zealand”. We’ve also got episodes of “Lego Masters: New Zealand” on the Sky-Q box to watch as well. For all that New Zealand is geographically much bigger than the UK, it only has half the population of London. How do they generate so much good TV?

 

This is my third week of semi-retirement and I feel that I’m going to work tomorrow for a rest.

13 March 2024 (Wednesday) - Walk, FTF, McDinner, Fence Painting

As I scoffed brekkie I peered into the Internet. I saw I had an e-invitation to sign a petition to get the Eurostar to stop at Ashford (like it used to). I didn’t sign it. The Eurostar not stopping in Ashford is just like all these pubs closing; if something don’t get used (and therefore don’t make money) it gets the chop.

If enough people had got on the Eurostar at Ashford it would have kept going. It wasn’t making enough money to pay for the border force people and ticket offices and so it closed. For all that I liked the idea of being able to walk up the road and get a train to France, I actually did it once, and that was when work was paying for it.

There was also an email about a new geocache not very far from where we were going this morning. But by the time we’d done dog breakfast and got dressed and farted about it would have been found by someone else… in any case the local king of the First to Find was probably already on the way by the time I’d seen it (or so I thought).

 

So I put that new cache out of my mind, and once the dogs were all ready I took them for their morning constitutional. As we drove to the woods the pundits on the radio were talking about why so many local councils are going bankrupt. They were interviewing some Conservative politician or other; I don’t know who he was but he made a good point.

If you aren’t feeling well you go to a doctor who has been to medical school and who has then acquired many years of experience. If you need work doing on your house you have a look on review websites and pick the best person for the job. But when it comes to running a local council we all vote for whoever stands up and says “vote for me; I’m not as crap as all the others”. Even though they probably have absolutely no experience of running anything at all. And then we all act surprised when they can’t do the job to which we all appointed them even though they were utterly unqualified.

When you think about it, this is no way to run a council, is it? And we run the country that way too.

 

We got to the woods, and had a good time. We played with other dogs. We rolled in a dead blackbird. We did some filming for the movie I’m planning to make for this year’s “Geocaching International Film Festival”.

After four miles we got back to the car. I had a look at the listing for that geocache which had gone live earlier… still no finds and it was only a mile away… The call of the FTF was strong.

It wasn’t long before we were very suspiciously rummaging in someone’s front garden. As we rummaged so a voice called out: “You’re the first”. I’ve been first to find a geocache two hundred and seventy-eight times before, but there is nothing like that smug satisfaction I had this morning when I realised I was first one to find it for the two hundred and seventy-ninth time. Mind you I logged it at 10.25am; two and a quarter hours after publication. Round here, that’s an eternity.

 

We came home for a bath, then leaving the dogs under the supervision of “er indoors ^TM” I drove down to Folkestone. “Stormageddon – Bringer of Destruction ^TM” had gone to school, but “Darcie Waa Waa ^TM” had had “Daddy’s Little Angel ^TM” up quite literally all night. We went for McDinner to calm their nerves. “Darcie Waa Waa ^TM” likes pressing the buttons on the food ordering machine at McDonalds and letting her do so gives you the added excitement of not quite knowing what you going to end up getting.

I had a Big Mac with extra pickles. Littlun doesn’t like pickles; she threw hers at random passers-by. You can get away with doing that when you are two years old.

We went back to theirs for a cuppa and to fuss Pogo. “Darcie Waa Waa ^TM” was impressed that I could catch a ball, and I spent far too long throwing a ball into the air and catching it to her frank amazement.

 

After a rather busy morning I returned home, and seeing the forecast rain hadn’t appeared I went into the garden and painted more fence panels. In the past I’ve averaged one panel every hour and a quarter; today I got three panels done in two and a half hours. I was impressed but ached somewhat afterwards.

I came in just as the doorbell work. The bathroom man was bringing samples of wall and floor tiles. It looks like this new bathroom is going to happen. I pootled on the lap-top for a little while, then tried to move… and couldn’t.

I think I might have overdone it today. But this is silly. A walk round the woods, McDinner, and painting three fence panels. I can’t really do much less in a day, can I?

12 March 2024 (Tuesday) - A Bottle of Plonk

Five people on my “Facebook Friends” list had a birthday today. “Facebook Friends” are odd things; only one of these five has made any effort whatsoever to keep in touch over the last few years.

After my usual dull morning routine I set off. I didn't go round the town Points-of-Interest-ing this morning. Instead I drove up the motorway and into Aylesford where I capped a Qrewzee and deployed a carrot on the appropriately named Bailey's bridge. There's never a dull moment when playing Munzee.

 

As I drove the pundits on the radio were talking about how the Princess of Wales has admitted to tweaking up her family photo that was all over the news yesterday. I can't help but feel that real princesses run round in their undercrackers bashing things with a great big sword, and don't ponce around with PhotoShop. That's what real princesses have flunkies for.

And there was a lot of talk about how much vets are charging for their services. It was mentioned this morning that fifteen years ago ninety per cent of UK vets were privately operated. These days most are part of large corporate chains, and don't actually advertise that most or all of the vets in any given area are all part of the same company. They certainly don't advertise that they have a monopoly and so can charge what they like. Back in the day when Sid needed his teeth taking out, “Daddy’s Little Angel ^TM” shopped around for the best quote, and there was quite a bit of difference in the prices being quoted. But nowadays with every vet being operated by the same bunch, they are all going to quote the same price, safe in the knowledge that they won't be undercut.

Some woman phoned in to the radio this morning claiming she'd just spent seven hundred quid having her dog's teeth cleaned. My cousin is facing a two thousand pounds vet bill at the moment.

Vets have never been cheap (My little Fudge cost me a small fortune towards the end) but their prices are getting rather out of hand.

 

I got to work; there was cake. Chocolate ring donuts. Given a choice, chocolate ring donuts would be a long way down on my list of preferences, but the choice I was given was "have it or go without", so I had one. It was rather good actually.

 

I came home to find “er indoors ^TM” had the builders in. She wants the bathroom doing. I don’t. I want the bathroom done. A subtle difference. The kitchen is rather good now it has been done, but the actual doing was rather painful.

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up a very good bit of dinner which we washed down with a bottle of cheap plonk which was certainly better than stuff three times the price. And with dinner scoffed I shared cheese and biscuits with the dogs. They had biscuits, I had cheese. Sadly just mousetrap. The camembert I’d had my eye on expired three months ago and smelt rather grim.

And again Treacle showed how she understands every word I say. When all the biscuits were gone I said “all gone”. Morgan and Bailey hung around looking hopeful; Treacle immediately went off to sit with “er indoors ^TM”. She understands every word. Treacle that is; not “er indoors ^TM”.

11 March 2024 (Monday) - Princesses

Again with an alarm set I saw pretty much every hour of the night. I gave up trying to sleep at five o’clock and watched an episode of “Friday Night Dinner” in which Martin was claiming innocence about various misdemeanours and blaming his brain for making him do them.

I then had a little look at the Internet where people were quarrelling about whether or not a narwhal could successfully breed with a Beluga. Long story short – they could. To the vast majority this would be a matter of the utmost indifference but some people were getting rather nasty about the matter.

I sent out birthday wishes to friends whose birthday was today, then set off.

 

I drove through a rather dark and foggy morning. After I'd done my usual haul of Munzee Points of Interest I headed off to work. The motorway was surprisingly busy at half past six in the morning.

As I drove the pundits on the radio were spouting their usual drivel as they do. Apparently the world is up in arms because the Mother's Day photo of the Princess of Wales and her children was supposedly faked.

Whether this was to cover up her illness or to make the family look better remains unclear. It looks fine to me, but what do I know? Personally I would have thought there were more burning issues in the world to be addressed.

And there was an interview with someone or other about the state of the country's schools. Yet again the pundits on the radio couldn't find any so-called experts on education who could pronounce the word "curriculum". With all of the country's education experts talking about the "kriklum" is it surprising the schools are in such a state?

Mind you I did find myself thinking of an old mate's sister who fancied herself as an expert on rocks but would speak about the science of "Jolly G", and of another old mate (sadly dead these last fifteen years) who, on the strength of his wife's working in the pharmaceutical industry, considered himself an expert on "ibooferen".

 

Work was much the same as ever. I came home via the dentist. I’d spent much of the day trying to reschedule an appointment. Each time, after fifteen minutes holding on the phone I was told they were busy and got cut off. So I walked in to find three receptionists gossiping.

I made an appointment for next Thursday, then headed home.

 

With “er indoors ^TM” off at the bowling league’s booze-up I settled on front of the telly with the dogs and watched a film. “Damsel” is currently the number one film on Netflix at the moment. I can only describe it as a rather poorly thought-out version of “Dungeons and Dragons” with more holes on the plot than there are in my pants, but it was quite entertaining nonetheless. A Princess as princesses should be – running round in her undercrackers belting things with a great big sword.

 

A film on Netflix that I liked… there’s a novelty.

10 March 2024 (Sunday) - Mother's Day

I woke listening to the sound of the rain on the bedroom window, and lay there listening to it.

I got up, made toast and peered into the Internet.

Yesterday I ran the monthly geo-event. The thing was open to all, but I sent out about sixty personal invitations to Kentish Hunters of Tupperware. Quite a few people came along. A lot of people had other things to do which was understandable; things always clash. But some of the people I thought might be along didn’t reply to me, and all went to Coventry for a huge Munzee event… about which I knew absolutely nothing at all until this morning’s rummage round the Internet after it was all over. Perhaps I’m being paranoid, but this isn’t the first time this has happened.

Would we have gone to Coventry if we’d known about it? Probably not, but it would have been nice to have known about it. It turns out there’s a calendar of these events. You’d think someone would make the effort to publicise these events, wouldn’t you?

I also saw a lot of photos of breakfasts in bed and pressies and stuff for Mother’s Day. Not that I was particularly close to her, but I miss my mum…

 

I then spent a little while chasing my tail on eBay. Yesterday “er indoors ^TM” came home with some little Lego houses. They were part of a series of a promotion run jointly by Weetabix and Lego. I thought there were six sets in the promotion. There weren’t. After seemingly ages I found that there were only three. And “er indoors ^TM” had picked up a complete set at a bargain price.

 

I nipped out to the car and drove round to Pets at Home to get dog food. Whilst I was at it I thought I might get dog treats too.

I then came home, and in a lull in the rain we walked the dogs round the block having a little Munzee session in which I unlocked one Qrate, got another and our clan got our first monthly achievement. On the flip side, two of those supposedly going to be in our clan this month did rather well at yesterday’s Munzee event (the one about which I knew nothing) and have chosen to go with another more adventurous clan. That leaves us with the same amount of Munzing to do with only two thirds of the people Munzing that we’d planned to have.

 

With walk walked we had a cuppa. I could have made a start on waking the pond for this year. I could have painted the fence. But with the drizzle getting worse I settled myself in front of the telly and watched a film we’d recorded some time ago. “Four Weddings and a Funeral” is now thirty years old. To me the thing which showed the film’s age the most was that at the weddings everyone had cameras. These days people would use their phone to take a photo. With one or two notable exceptions, who has a camera these days?

We then watched the New Year’s episode of “Taskmaster”; one round featured scoffing poppadoms. We got peckish; “er indoors ^TM” found some poppadoms and lime pickle in the cupboard.

 

Seeing it is Mother’s Day “er indoors ^TM” was ordered round to the abode of the first fruit of our loins, and I cracked on with my latest project.  

The first time I went to a meeting of geocachers there was a walk organised before the meet. If you turn up in the back of beyond and see others gathering for a walk, then it is a fair bet that you are in the right place. However when you walk in to a pub there’s all sorts of groups here and there, and you really don’t want to approach the wrong lot. Back in the day there was a banner for county geo-meets which we would display so people new to the game knew where to go. Sadly the banner fell apart. I have a plan to make a new one… if it don’t cost too much. I drew up a provisional first draft for a design, and sent it off to the local sign-making company to get a quote.

I then wrote up some CPD and watched the dogs. Yesterday when “er indoors ^TM” was out with her mates the dogs slept. But they’d had a busy day. They’d only had a short walk this morning and had slept for much of the afternoon, and so were alert to every sound; waiting for her return.

 

“er indoors ^TM” eventually returned and set about dinner. Once I’ve scoffed it I’m thinking about an early night. For all that I’ve done nothing all day, I’m feeling all in.

9 March 2024 (Saturday) - Geo Meet

For some really strange geocachical reason I needed an empty sweetie tub this morning. I’d seen one in the shed on Thursday… it wasn’t there this morning. I wonder where that went.

I made toast and had a little look at the Internet. It was still there. I sent out some birthday wishes, and read on Facebook that the Now Show on Radio Four is coming to an end. Presented by Steve Punt and Hugh Dennis it used to be funny many years ago, but like so much on telly and radio it has been flogged to death. I once saw them live many years ago at the Leas Cliff Hall when they were hilarious. I saw them again at the Gulbenkian when I could only describe them as smug and self-satisfied. Sadly, like me, they lost the spark over the years.

There wasn’t a lot else going on on-line. So I zoomed round the garden and harvested a bumper crop of dog turds… then zoomed round again and got even more. You’d be surprised at how elusive a dog turd can be.

 

We got ourselves organised and set off to Dog Club. Dog Club was much the same as ever… loads of people standing in a field making polite conversation whist the dogs did dog things. It sounds dull, but it is one of the highlights of the week. The field is slowly drying out, but there’s still enough mud to get the dogs grubby, especially when Kai and Roo lie down in it. There is something strangely satisfying when someone else’s dog does something daft.

As we drove home I got Steve’s Mystery Year competition right – the Queen’s “horrible anus” – 1992. Much as I loved and admired the late Queen, she did rather score an own goal with the “annus horribilis” comment. At the time the royals weren’t overly popular, no one speaks Latin, and coming out with a comment like that was really giving ammunition to her detractors.

 

Once home “er indoors ^TM” dealt with the dogs and I popped up the road for pastries. As I crossed the road some woman in a car beeped at me and waved frantically. I wonder who she was? Mookie in the shop said she drives past regularly shouting abuse at passers-by.

I got me a croissant for myself and a pain au chocolat for “er indoors ^TM”, sent out a Munzee birthday card, and as I  got ready for the next adventure so “Found It” logs were arriving in my in-box from people out doing the geocaches I’d set for today’s geo-event.

 

“er indoors ^TM” drove us all round to Singleton Barn where I was hosting this month’s meet-up of Hunters of Tupperware. We had a rather good meet. Attendance was down on previous meets, but it was good to catch up with old friends, and meet some new ones. Sadly the ale on the pub’s pumps was a tad past its best, but having made the wise decision of asking for a taster first I went for the bottled stuff. And we had some cheesy chips too. “We” being both me and the dogs.

The geo-meet was rather good; talking about things geocachical. I got a pointer about a geo-puzzle which had had me thinking for some time. I mentioned this puzzle a week ago when I said “I’ve got to find two numbers. The first “is a funny one really and only consists of three characters”. I know that one”. “Well, it now turns out that I had that wrong.

 

Having been the first ones to the meet, after four bottles of ale we were the past ones to leave. We came home where I had a little snooze, and whilst I was sparko “er indoors ^TM” slipped out and picked me up a pressie. Someone locally was selling Lego. Apparently his daughter had grown out of it. I hadn’t.

 

“er indoors ^TM” went off to her mate’s party. I sat with sleeping dogs and watched a film on Netflix. “Bull” was a rather good film right up until the last five minutes when it suddenly went all surreal. But it was better than a load of stuff I’ve watched recently.

Today was rather good.

8 March 2024 (Friday) - Early Shift

Having been sleeping rather well all week, with an alarm set I was wide awake from three o’clock this morning.

I gave up laying awake, took my Seven Seas stuff. made toast, and watched an episode of “Friday Night Dinner” in which “Horrible Grandma” came to visit. Then I had a quick look at the Internet just in case anything revolutionary had happened overnight. It hadn’t; it rarely does. The only thing of note was quite a bit of consternation being expressed over the local branch of Peacocks closing down. Peacocks is a local store which caters for people who like to dress as though it was still 1980. The observation had been made that you can get better stuff cheaper from Amazon, and there were those bleating that not everyone can shop on-line. Seriously? I’m sorry, I don’t want to come over as rude or uncaring but we are half-way through the third decade of the twenty-first century. Not being able to order stuff on Amazon is akin to not being able to read or write. I’m a sixty-year-old grandparent and can manage. I know people twenty years older than me who can use the Internet easily enough.

 

I set off to work via some Munzee Points of Interest as I do. As I drove the pundits on the radio were talking about how ITV are looking to make savings. Profits are down because advertisers aren't keen to throw money at them anymore. It would seem that, like me, more and more people have discovered the "fast-forward" button and aren't actually watching the adverts anymore.

There was also talk about how ex-Prime Minister Theresa May has decided to stand down as a Member of Parliament at the next general election. Faced with an almost certain fall from Prime Minister to obscure opposition MP, I can't say I blame her. It was nice of her to give the news to her local newspaper and let them have the exclusive story.

 

I got to work. I'd not been to Maidstone for nearly three weeks. I found I rather missed the place. Compare that to other places I've worked where I felt physically ill at the prospect of going in.

As I did my thing so my phone beeped. All the geocaches I'd prepared in readiness for tomorrow's geo-meet had gone live, and within an hour or so they were all found for the first time. That showed the puzzles were solve-able and that the co-ords were right.

 

Being on an early shift was a result. I got home and with “er indoors ^TM” off to see her mum I cracked on with the ironing. As I ironed I watched a film on Netflix: “Spaceman”. According to Wikipedia it “follows an astronaut sent on a mission to the edge of the solar system who encounters a creature that helps him put his earthly problems back together”. According to me it was a right load of old tripe.

I seem to think that about more and more films these days.

“er indoors ^TM” is coming home with KFC for my tea… with any luck.