The House Husband

According to the weather station, it was 38 degrees at the bottom of our garden at about 6pm tonight. Because of the temperature (it has been stifling all day) we did little more than laze around the house, waiting for the temperature to go down so we could take the poodles for a walk.

The reason this was a problem is not so much the heat but rather the fact that my thongs have glued themselves to the concrete outside. And to say we both lazed, is not entirely true…I lazed while Mirinda worked on something to do with work.

It was really too hot to do anything. In fact, it’s still pretty hot so this will be a pretty short entry.

I spent a bit of time photographing flowers today. Here’s a lobelia. I am now going to pour my poor self into bed.

A very bright lobelia on the herb table

It was Remembrance Sunday today. Not that it made a lot of difference to mine. I observed the two minutes silence on the 11th at 11:00 like I always do. I was reminded when I watched the results show for Strictly Come Dancing tonight and three soldiers sang a sad song based on a fellow soldier’s last letter to his wife. It was very poignant.

I don’t normally watch shows like Strictly. I make no bones about it. I find them dull. Not the dancing but the fact that it has celebrities competing rather than people who actually love ballroom dancing. Not that that would get me to watch it anyway – I really dislike talent shows as well.

However, last year when John Sargent was on Strictly he captured the public’s imagination with his diabolically bad dance skills and laissez fair attitude. Sadly he left before he was voted off, saying he felt it wasn’t fair for the couples working really hard when the public only kept him on for the comic potential. I must admit to watching a couple of shows just to see him. He was very funny.

This year we have Ann Widdicombe (or ‘Widdy’ as she’s become known). She is amazingly bad. Her page on the BBC website is here, though if you’re not in the UK, I’m not sure if you’ll be able to see it. But the thing is, no matter how bad she is, she doesn’t care. She’s enjoying every minute and doing it until she’s actually voted off.

Like this week, she wore a lurid pink dress that was described by one of the judges as a toilet brush cover. And he wasn’t being unkind. It was pretty dire. She dances like me! She’s really that bad. Anyway, it’s fun to watch the results show on a Sunday and wait for the moment she is finally voted off. It hasn’t happened yet. Mirinda will be amazed to find out she’s still there.

One thing you can say about Strictly is that it’s not dull. Which the weather was today. Dull, wet, cold, miserable. It really feels like February has arrived a few months early. I did manage to take the girls for a walk around the park – we kept to the path as the grassy areas are now mud locked water meadows.

In fact, all my photos were a pretty dire today although I did manage to capture the only bit of blue sky seen in Farnham for the last few days. Here it is:

The only bit of blue sky today

Mostly it all looked like this (which reminds me of the Yorkshire moors rather than Surrey):

Lone tree in Farnham Park

Speaking of remembrance…I hadn’t heard much about old Pauline ‘chippie’ Hanson for yonks. And then I spotted this piece about her plans. Excellent, I say. Keep her in Queensland.

At the moment, I’m looking out the study window and the sun is bathing the back garden in early evening rays and the sky is blue with a few fluffy clouds. It hasn’t been like that all day, however. Since 8 this morning, 3mm of rain has fallen in the garden. There’s been lots of intermittent showers. The sort that waits for me to go outside before pouring down. I feel like The Rain God from Hitch-hikers!

I talked to mum and dad on the phone and it started, lightly. Tiny drops barely wetting the ground. And then it stopped. After talking for about an hour I readied myself and set out to Farnham for the shopping. Fortunately I wore my raincoat. Halfway along the path, it fell. Sheets of light rain streaming in at an angle. By the time I arrived at castle Street I was nice and wet…and it stopped.

I had my Starbucks and popped into Waitrose as the sun shone from between bruised clouds. I then wandered down to Smith’s so I could buy a wedding acceptance for Stevie & Lara’s wedding. Shopping done and decidedly non-waterproof bag full, I started back for home.

As I reached the park the rain started again. Needless to say my raincoat had dried out. My shopping bag quickly soaked up enough water to double its weight as I walked, stopping under occasional trees that served as leaky umbrellas and brief respites from the drenching.

As I reached the top of our street, the rain stopped and the sun burst out. As usual, the poodles had been standing outside and were subsequently as wet as my shopping. Fortunately yesterdays haircuts meant they dried in about 10 minutes.

I then sat and worked on a report for Mirinda and some stuff for my dissertation. The weather seemed unsettled but the rain held off. At 2pm I took the poodles to the vet. Halfway along the alley the rain started again. And I was wet again.

After the vet I took them for a run in the park just in time for the skies to clear and for the sun to beam down as if it had never been gone. And the afternoon continued like this, the rain not returning. I’m sure the garden enjoyed it. I know I didn’t.

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There shall be no Nicktor night this week as he has suddenly developed gout! Poor sod. I have given him the advice that I am more than qualified to give and he is presently lying, prostrate on his lounge, foot up and unfettered as he drinks gallons of water. Bet he’s driving Dawn insane.

We’ve had sun and a slight wind for the last few days. This is always welcome because, if nothing else, it dries out the mud in the back garden. I say mud, it’s more like a quagmire. I’ve already lost three pairs of wellies in there.

Yesterday I visited a model village which was inside the real village it depicted. OK, this may not be anything too amazing but the model village also appeared in the model village. And, to be even more amazing, there was a model village in that one too. The scale started off at 1/10 and by the time the smallest village was reached, it was 1/1000! An amazing thing to stand in the middle of. I almost expected to see a tiny little me in there.

Ever since we changed the clocks, the rain has hardly stopped. Mirinda and the puppies have spent the last two days inside. I went shopping but otherwise spent the day inside, studying.

And then, just before 7pm, Mirinda suggested we walk to the castle. The rain had stopped and she was going a bit stir crazy. Naturally I laughed. I mean, how could I possibly go before 7:15? I told her as much. She thinks I’m a bit obsessed about The Archers.

And so, at 7:15, we left the house. As we reached the Avenue of Trees, a sea of mud spread out before us. The poodles were a bit sceptical about walking across it. We managed to get through the first bit, reaching the relatively solid grass.

All was fine except for the chill wind, until the hail started. It was lashing us, almost horizontal with the wind. We struggled to walk into it, the puppies’ ears stretched out alongside their heads, forced backwards. Carmen wanted to turn and give us a querulous glance but she was frightened her head would come off.

We didn’t make it as far as the castle. Mirinda shouted something impossible to hear. She turned, so I assumed she had suggested we return home. As soon as we started walking, the weather improved. That was mostly because the wind was now blowing from behind us.

We safely arrived home and the lovely short coated puppies took very little time to dry.

As I sat here wondering what to post for today, listening to Norah Jones lightly singing her own brand of smokey-voiced tunes, the following thought occurred to me. I wonder if Norah has to sing at Christmas while the Jones family are busy trimming the tree. Or do they give her a break? I could hear her singing Silent Night and Away In a Manger but that’s about it.

I told Mirinda, if I could be any famous singer, it would be Norah Jones. Her voice is amazing. That’s surprising because I do love so many raw, screechy voiced singers. And there’s always Frank (Zappa). But, no, Norah’s it! Of course, she has the advantage of being alive.

And the poodles seem to love her too. They are asleep down the back of the lounge, as usual. Day-z is all a-twitching while Carmen is making these strange exhaling noises. I guess they are just SO chilled by her singing. Which reminds me, for no reason at all, except that it popped into my head as I typed that last bit…

It was a red letter day for Dawn today. She graduated with her MA! She is now Dawn C BSc MA. I’ve told her I’ll not be able to associate with her in public until I get mine. Interestingly, the Chancellor at her university is Sanjeev Bhaskar, the actor/comic/writer guy from The Kumars at No 42 – he plays the son. He hands out the degrees so she shook his hand. She reports that his speech was very funny. He grew up around Southall and his dad worked at Nestles!

I’ve now moved upstairs and have changed from Norah to Florence from Florence and the Machine. Very different but still very enjoyable. And so, I read my weather station data and find that today we had 6.7mm of rain and the temperature tonight is down to -1.6 with little cloud and a promise of sun tomorrow (the last bit is from the BBC, the rest comes direct from the weather station).

Actually, we went out tonight and looked at Mars (and the grass was crunchy with frost). It’s the closest it will be for many years. It was sparkly and red and right next to the biggest, brightest moon I think I’ve ever seen! And for this reason, Mars just looked like any other star, even through the binoculars.

Apologies. I just realised I’d already written about the Talking Newspaper stuff! Though I’ve written in a bit more detail and I can’t write another 700 words tonight! So, sorry.

Today was a Farnham and Alton Talking Newspaper day. For those that don’t know, about once a month I go and read newspapers for the blind, partially sighted and anyone who has difficulty holding a newspaper. And, no, I do not sit opposite them and read out loud! It’s recorded and delivered on CD or flash drive or downloaded from their website.

I came across them in the local paper (of course). They were mentioned in an article about local charities. I was intrigued so Googled them and filled out a volunteer form. It wasn’t just philanthropic, I feel like I want to be a part of Farnham (I do love it here) and figured this was a good way to get to know people. Naturally, most of them are a good deal older than I am…but not all! Today I was reading with Lindsay and she is clearly not yet 50.

It also reminds me of my grandmother and her talking book device from the Blind Society. It was HUGE and certainly not portable. But it made such a difference when she was no longer able to read.

The place I go to is the other side of Farnham, in an estate called The Chantrys and an awful estate it is! Typical of the sort of estate thing they have here in the UK. Also typical is how they thought it good to build such an awful place in such a lovely spot! For Bob & Claire; it’s opposite the cemetery, not far from the farm you stayed at many years ago.

FATN has one of the places (maybe it was given to them by the council…I don’t know) and it’s here that all the work goes on. Having once been a house, it’s handy because it has a kitchen and a toilet.

Each group of 4 readers (one of whom is a presenter) arrive at their designated time and are given a selection of pages out of the local paper. We have to cut them out, stick them to recycled paper and then edit them down to around 90 seconds each. This bit is fun. I was always very fond of the red pen when I was a director.

Another fun thing is that most of the other readers (I’ve been doing it since September and I’ve not read with the same people twice) sit and complain about the grammar, spelling and general illiteracy of the newspaper editor. When I do this at home, Mirinda gets annoyed and tells me to shut up. At last! My spiritual home. My favourite so far was a retired English teacher. Boy, did she pick up on errors. And she hated it. The errors, I mean. Like me, she’s particularly fond of the mis- or non- use of apostrophes.

Actually, this slackness really amazes me at uni…but I’ll get in trouble if I go on, so I won’t.

Anyway, once the editing has finished, we move into the studio where the engineer tests our sound levels and microphone placement. The presenter then starts it all off and we read one after the other. I really enjoy it. We are expected to have a bit of a laugh with some of the lighter stories which is where I lap up the glee I produce. According to Mirinda, this isn’t the point. What can I say? I’m an entertainer first, a philanthropist second…

Once we’ve finished we all say goodbye (today the presenter actually said “It’s goodbye from me.” but sadly the next reader didn’t reply “And it’s goodbye from him.“), pack up and go home. A few days later we receive a copy of the CD in the post. I drop it into iTunes and we listen to it on Sunday mornings in bed. Though it makes me cringe a bit.

If anyone would like to read about the FATN, their site is here.

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I should also mention that this morning, at 9.27, I received the very first readings from my weather station. I went outside at 8 this morning and started work immediately. On returning from FATN, I set up the PC to receive the information and now I no longer have to go outside to find out what the weather’s like. This is my first collection of information:

My Very First Weather Data Set

It shows that the wind rather swirls around! It’s supposed to rain tonight. My fingers are crossed!

Today I finished my fourth assignment for my masters and the last one from last semester. It was with a great relief that I clicked the ‘are you sure you want to submit this assignment’ button on the uni website. And now, having completed a Domain Analysis of the archaeological museum sector, I feel replete. Now to concentrate on THIS semester.

And yet more news…for a break this afternoon, I dug a hole and planted the weather station pole in it. With another bag of instant cement, I tamped it down. Voila, there’s another pole in the garden. What with the obelisks and the two upright structures, our back garden is starting to look a little like the New York skyline! I’ll now have to wait for Thursday to set up the weather station.

I have an early start tomorrow so it’s only a short entry tonight.

The weather station is another step closer to being in place. Yesterday we popped over to Forest Lodge garden centre where I grabbed a post and a support for it to sit on. And then today, before taking the poodles to Hankley, we popped into Homebase for a bit of wood, a packet of nuts, bolts and washers and, most important, a bag of quick drying, post fixing, cement.

Hankley was lovely, as usual, with lots of other people dotted around the heather. Annoying but not so bad we didn’t have long stretches without having to say “Hello“.

The weekend has been rather grey (the sky looked a lot like the side of a naval vessel) with no rain, it should be noted, but Hankley still looks beautiful. I’m pretty sure, it doesn’t matter what the weather is like, Hankley is always beautiful. If we moved away, it is somewhere that would be seriously missed. By all four of us!

I noticed an old canister on the path. There are signs everywhere warning people not to pick things up. Hankley is used by the army for training purposes and it’s not difficult to find empty bullet cartridges (.303 they look like). This canister was a grenade smoke screen simulator. Odd that it was just sitting in the path. Ignoring things like bullets, the army usually leaves nothing. Clearly this was an accident. But it was very obvious.

Also very obvious was the horizontal porta-loo. We noticed this last weekend and it hasn’t been righted! What that means is that the one that remains vertical, has not been emptied because, I assume, if the truck had been, the driver would have fixed the inclination of the other one.

The porta-loo thing is interesting. As the soldiers are wandering all over the heathland, they must sometimes feel the call of nature. Naturally in a real war situation, they’d just go anywhere but here in the English countryside, a tree or a bush just isn’t good enough and so they get a porta-loo. How British is that. And they move them. I guess that depends on where they are wandering around.

Anyway, having walked around large swathes of heather laiden hills and sandy paths, we returned to the house. Mirinda proceeded to plant some tulips she’s been promising to do since 1999 and I started the construction of the weather station pole.

All was going well until I realised the bolts I’d purchased were too short…by about 10mm! Annoying. The sun had set and the light was almost completely gone as I switched bolts from one part to another. And finally, in the pitch, I spilled the packet of nuts, bolts and washers all over the ground, just before finishing. And a little strong language did pass my lips.

I managed to finish stage two of the weather station construction (stage one was testing the wi-fi with the base station on Boxing day) and packed everything away – I’m pretty sure I managed to pick up all the nuts, bolts and washers but I cannot be certain.

We have had a lovely weekend but tomorrow I am back at uni for a new semester and I have an essay to finish (STILL) by next Friday. And, of course, football with Nicktor on Tuesday…

By the way, I was joking about Mirinda waiting since 1999 to plant the tulips. It was 2005…

We had a lovely flurry of snow this afternoon which nicely topped up the remains from the other day.  We walked the dogs in the early evening glow and the park was a wasteland of white and sleety snow.  Oddly attractive and frightfully cold!

We’re not far from Basingstoke or Reading.  In fact it’s 25 & 30 miles respectively.  They are both just beyond the M3.  While we were enjoying our little white-out Mcflurry of a blizzard, both Basingstoke and Reading were under siege.  Sort of.  People were stuck in their cars with but a few drops of water and little in the way of food, ignoring the small squares of carpet which would hold a fair few crumbs of…something.

One of the people I follow on Twitter was somewhat distressed as her 81 year old step-father left to go shopping at 1pm for an hour and didn’t get back until after 10pm.  He had been stuck in traffic without a mobile phone (apparently he always leaves it at home…) and ended up walking up the steepest hill in Berkshire to get back to his wife.  One presumes he was a bit chilly!

His wife, meantime, had been stuck in a house with no boiler (it having blown up because of the freezing water), no electricity (it went off shortly after the boiler) and without knowing what was happening to her husband.

While washing up, I was listening to 5 Live (I do this whenever Radio 4 gets a bit dull – not often) and there were cries of distress coming from all along the M4 and surrounding roads as listeners rang in just to talk to another human being.  Most people were displaying a bit of the old blitz spirit, while the DJ tried to get them to blame someone for their predicament.  He didn’t mean god!  I think he wanted them to blame the council for not gritting.  But they disappointed him, I’m happy to say.  Most were just resigned.

Mirinda was supposed to go to her book club this afternoon.  I scraped Sidney clear of her blanket of snow and asked Mirinda if she was sure.  It wasn’t snowing but the sleet was being a pain.  She figured it would be ok.  About an hour and a half later I heard her come back in.  Apparently the further south she drove, the worse the weather was and the less visibility available.  Wisely, she had turned back.  I dread to think what would have happened had she continued on her way.

PS:  I decided to try making stollen again today, for the third time.  I told Mirinda if it didn’t work this time I was NEVER making it again.  Guess what?  I’m NEVER MAKING IT AGAIN!