Tag Archives: ford cortina

Tuesday 18th August 2015 – LAST DAY IN MONTREAL

Last night’s sleep wasn’t anything like as good as the previous night’s, but that can be explained by the fact that as soon as I came in last night, I drank about a litre of spruce beer.

Being on my travels didn’t help matters either. I’d spent much of the night in the company of a young person who was having gender issues. He or she had half-undergone the hormone therapy necessary to change sex, but then had had a change of mind and not only stopped the treatment but was changing back. This led on from here to me taking a taxi – one of mine as it happens – to go to a white house somewhere. The driver was completely new – I was his first customer – and the journey was interesting to say the least, including undertaking another driver at a road junction and overshooting the destination. The driver said “well that was a bit of a disaster, wasn’t it?” to which I replied “don’t worry. We all have to start somewhere”.

So after breakfast I cracked on with some more work on the computer and this took me right up until 11:00. I had my airport shuttle booked for 11:15 and didn’t want to miss it, so I made sure that it arrived on time by pouring myself a full cup of coffee at 11:14 precisely. Works every time!

It took 5 minutes to get to the airport from where this hotel is, and I spent the time helping out a couple of people who needed to travel into the city. There was a 747 bus already in at the stop and the driver took 10 minutes to sort himself out, during which time a woman with three kids came onto the bus. She told them to sit down “as it’s going to be a long ride”
“And if I know anything about Montreal bus drivers, a wild ride too” I added.

And sure enough, off we shot and arrived at the coach station at the rue de Berri just 35 minutes later, shaken but not stirred.

Ten dollars it cost to leave my bag in the consigne, which is quite expensive, but then imagine what it would have cost in time and so on to go all the way back to the hotel to pick it up and then lug it all the way back here through the city later this evening. This had to be the sensible option – the hotel shuttle to the airport and then the 747 bus directly to the coach terminal.

And I can’t believe this but in a Dollar Store just round the corner from the bus station as I continue my stroll down rue St Catherine Est I find exactly the right adapter for the Swiss electrical plugs. That’s an amazing find, and something else to add to the travel bag

This is a beautiful little street isn’t it – a pile of beautiful little houses down there and some typical Quebec maisonettes of the type that you see in all of the urban areas.

Balconies and open staircases – must be beautiful to sit outside on them on a lovely summer’s evening but it must be hell, absolute hell in the middle of a Quebec winter trying to get to your front door.

But why I stopped was to look at the corner of the street at this new building is that it’s the site of the Ouimetoscope.

That was the very first cinema to be opened in Montreal – in January 1906 in fact, and the following year was rebuilt to be come the largest cinema in North America at the time.

There’s some kind of scheme going on here in Montreal at the moment – what they call the Piano Publique. They have dumped a load of pianos about in different parts of the city and are encouraging people to sit down and play them.

This guy isn’t too bad at all as it happens. I could sit and listen to him for quite a while, but I just don’t have the time.

Look at this gorgeous art-deco building here on the corner of St Catherine and Alexandre Deseve, at 1560 rue St Catherine Est. There’s been a “Club Sandwich” here in the past as well as an Irish bar and the Hotel Bourbon.

It’s the Complexe Bourbon, quite a favourite spot in the city in the past, and at one time was up for sale for $8,500,000, but that was several years ago. It looks as if it will be pulled down before its much older and what a shame because it’s beautiful.

This church was formerly the Sacre Coeur de Jesus down at the end of the rue Alexandre Deseve.

The church doesn’t function as a church any more and the big house at the side, the ancienne Presbytere, is now a centre d’accueil pour les jeunes en difficulte – possibly the Association les Chemins du Soleil which is situated, according to a poster that I saw plastered about the church, at 1155 rue Alexandre Deseve.

At the parc Charles Campbell, a lawyer and philanthropist of the 19th Century who left all of his money to create parks for children to amuse themselves in the open air, they are having a Neighbourhood Fair tonight, with entertainment, food and all kinds of stuff going on.

And you might not be able to see him but there’s a guy sitting in that tree just there pulling that banner up at the far end of that rope.

I had lunch at the Subway down here, asked once again if i wanted cheese with my “nothing but crudites”, and ended up by dropping half of it on the floor and making a huge mess everywhere.

But after lunch I strolled down to the metro station to tale the train all the way down to Honore Beauregard, the end of the line

That’s the view down rue Sherbrooke est down towards the famous Olympic Stadium and its leaning tower. Anyway, I’ll walk down here for a little while, the old Chemin du Roy, and see what I can find, if anything.

Right by the Langelier metro station is a Motel le marquis. Cheapest room is about $80 – not too bad, I suppose. I’ll have to remember that.

And from here I caught a bus that took me all the way down the Boulevard Langelier towards the Galeries d’Anjou.

That’s all of the big buildings near the end of the autoroute at the junction between Highway 40 and Highway 25 there and the Galeries d’Anjou are somewhere to the right of that.

And I’ve found the Value Village! Furthermore, it’s 30% off on Tuesdays for senior citizens! Spend! Spend! Spend! But I could only find one book and one CD that interested me. Rather a waste of a senior citizen’s discount if you ask me.

Canadian Tire have tents at $29:99 and $34:99- that’s the three-seater one which is 7 feet wide so my bed will fit in there quite comfortably whereas the cheaper one is only 6 feet at its widest and that might be a struggle. Then we start to get into the realm of big tents after that. I mean, why would you have a tent to sleep 14 people? I don’t even know 14 people, let alone 14 people with whom I’d like to go away on holiday, but then they do go in for big families in Quebec.

In rue Jean Talon I’ve just seen the rustiest cars that I’ve ever seen, any of mine and the Cortina parked down my field since 1997 included. I didn’t take a photo of it because it isn’t the polite thing to do but it’s so rotten that the windscreen is about to drop out – the whole windscreen surround including the roof corners have just gone. Makes that grey Cortina look good and that’s stood in a field for 18 years.

And it’s suddenly occurred to me what I haven’t seen at all ever since I’ve been in Canada on Saturday, and I haven’t seen a cat.

This is the sports ground at the rue Jean Talon and way over there behind the floodlights in the distance and across the motorway behind it is the motel where I stayed the very first night that I was ever in Canada.

But what had caught my eye was the drinking fountain so I had a good wash to cool me down, filled my cap with water and stuck it on my head. All of the cold water ran off down the back of my neck and believe me, it was the best feeling that I had ever had.

I got to see one of the new Transits from close up and I reckon that there are differences to the European ones inside. In fact there seem to be quite a few differences so I wonder what has happened here that the differences haven’t been carried forward, because it is reasonabily impressive.

There’s no model designation on it either, which surprises me – just a ” Ford”, and made in Kansas City judging by a sticker on the windscreen. Body number begins 1FT(or 2)NR1CM

There’s a little process of gentrification going on in the rue Jean Talon – it’s been a bit down-at-heel in places but in other places there are bits of building going on and it’s all starting to look quite nice

These new bank buildings are on the corner of the Boulevard Viau and rue Jean Talon and are typical of what is going on all around here

I walked on quite a way past Viau, past Pius IX and past a couple of metro stations and by this time I was starting to lose interest. Time was slowly passing on, the only pizza places that I has passed (I really fancied a pizza tonight and I had my cheese all at the ready) were these ethic places full of grease, and I was hot, sticky, exhausted and footsore.

So I hopped onto the metro all the way to Snowdon where I still didn’t find the pizza that I wanted (and I had my vegan cheese all ready too) and eneded up back at the falafel place at the Cote-des-Neiges, for want of anything better.

It was just outside here that I met my first traditional bus driver. There was a bus stop just outside the restaurant and there was a bus just pulling up. I asked him if he was going to the Snowdon metro station down at the bottom of the hill, to which he replied that I was facing the wrong way – the station was just “back there”. And then he drove off.

The station “back there” was in fact the “Cote des Neiges” so I don’t know whether he was having a mental blank or whether he was just being difficult. Anyway, I trudged back up to the Cote des Neiges metro station and went round to the coach station.

Having rescued my suitcase I ended up chatting with two women, one aged 84 and the other aged 91, who were regular bus travellers, even at their age. They were off to visit their third sister somewhere in the USA. This passed the time quite nicely until my bus pulled in, and then I was off.

We went over the Cartier Bridge and then into Longueuil for more passengers, and then we were off. I curled up on my seat and dozed off to sleep.

-2

Tuesday 28th July 2015 – I’VE HAD A BAD DAY TODAY

The alarm went off at 07:30 as usual, followed by the reminders at 07:45 and 08:00, but there was no way that I was able to leave my bed.

I ache just about everywhere – in places that I didn’t realise that I had places. I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m far too old to go crawling around under cars the way that I did. Nice and leisurely, with a cup of coffee and a couple of biscuits every hour, I can manage that and I’m quite happy to do so. But working like I did yesterday, 9.5 hours non-stop without a pause, mauling some really heavy equipment about – I’m far too old for that.

But that wasn’t the worst of it. On a reasonable car where everything is there within reach, it’s quite easy. For example, with a Ford Cortina with a Pinto engine (of which there are dozens around here) the only time that you have to lie down is to take off the bottom pulley on the crankshaft. And that is that. The rest you can do standing up. With this blasted technological marvel of the 21st Century, you need to be up on top and on your back down below at the same time with three hands each.

And I have to do it all again when I need to re-assemble it.

But I can see now how it is that the vehicle has come here to be done. It’s quite simply that no-one else will touch it. And I can understand why.

But at least I had a nice concrete pad to lie down on after our efforts last year. Imagine trying to do this lying on damp gravel.

So I eventually crawled out of bed and I sat down in my chair and that was that. I couldn’t even move to make myself some food so I’ve just been nibbling on what I could reach.

Rosemary rang me up for a chat and instead, she had 90 minutes of me venting my spleen and letting off steam. Poor Rosemary. I just hope that I feel better tomorrow. I couldn’t even think about tiling today. And this is going to annoy me. I wanted to finish my tiling before I go away but Caliburn is parked up the road while this pile of scrap is parked in my drive and so I would have to carry all of the tiles and the sacks of cement 200 metres down here. There was no way that I was going to do that today and I probably won’t feel much like doing it tomorrow either. So it’s not just losing two days of work by working on this car, it’s also losing several other days while I recover from my exertions and no-one will ever think about that. I wish that I had never offered to do it now. It’s messed up all of my plans completely.

So starving, hungry, cold and fed up, and aching just about everywhere, I’m going back to bed. I hope that I have as much excitement as I did last night when I was once more back at school in Nantwich with a mini-traveller loaded with stuff and all kinds of people trying to peer in to see what there was. And an old girlfriend of mine, Ann, putting in an appearance too. Whatever was she doing here?

Tuesday 13th January 2015 – D’OHHHH!

It’s mystified me for quite a while – the subject of the wind turbine on the side of the house.

You may recall that just before I went to Canada in August I was up on the scaffolding at the front of the house tidying up all of the wiring and one of the things that I tidied up was the wiring to the Wind Turbine. I also fitted a charge controller, a timer and a data panel.

Returning from Canada after 7 weeks away, I was expecting to see a significant reading on the data panel and the timer, and no-one was more astonished than I was to see not a thing. That really confused me greatly.

I didn’t give it much thought after that, being preoccupied with other things, but I did notice while I was up on the scaffolding getting some tools the other day that there were two wires danging down from underneath the junction box. The thought immediately went through my mind that I must have forgotten to connect them up, and that was the explanation for nothing happening.

Today, with 20 minutes to spare before lunch and having promised to deal with a few odd jobs today, and especially with the I went up onto the scaffolding to connect up the wires.

Prising off the top of the junction box, I noticed that these two loose wites were supposed to be loose – they are the wires that will be connecting the third bank of solar panels in due course, and the wires connecting the wind turbine were properly connected up. At least, that’s what I thought at first, but closer inspection revealed nothing of the kind.

Don’t ask me what goes through my mind at certain moments, or whatever I must have been doing at the time, but somehow, despite the clearest indications and a great deal of effort being put into colour coding and all that kind of thing, I somehow managed to connect up the positive lead to the negative feed, and vice versa.

I stood and stared at this for about 10 minutes open-mouthed, and then disconnected everything and reconnected everything correctly. And almost immediately, the green power light that I had fixed into the junction box came on. Since then, I’ve had the old familiar sound of the wind turbine murmuring away in the background.

I really don’t understand what goes on in my mind sometimes, but it’s worrying.

During the night I’d been on my travels around the Holmes Chapel area of Cheshire, in XCL, my red Ford Cortina Mark 5 estate that lives in a lock-up in Montaigut, and I was up comparatively early this morning.

After breakfast I came across another “d’ohhhh!” moment too. It seems that I was premature in declaring that the wallpapering had finished. I’d missed a bit and so I had to deal with that first. Once that was done I had to vacuum up the dust on the stairs (I’m enjoying this soot sucker that I’ve converted into a vacuum cleaner) and then mask everywhere off. That took most of the rest of the morning.

After lunch I collected up a pile of wood, did some tidying up and tool collecting, and then in the last hour or so started work on the shower room floor. THat’s now all cut to size and ready for nailing down, sanding off and varnishing now.

Remember what I said yesterday about knocking off? Well, here I was at 18:00 with the floor only half-done, but regardless, I carried on working until it was finished off.

And in the water butt, following on the fractured tap there, the front water butt is now empty and ready for cleaning and a new tap fitting. But of course I don’t have a new tap (I should have bought one on Saturday, shouldn’t I?) so it’s a good job that I drew off those couple of buckets of water for a reserve supply

-1

Sunday 29th June 2014 – YOU CAN’T BELIEVE YOUR EYES, CAN YOU?

I thought you wouldn’t. But that is indeed snow up there in the background. Here on the 29th June, the temperature has dropped to 3.3°C and there is snow in the rain here but up in the mountain pass that I’ve just driven through, it really is snowing.

So where am I then? I’m actually in a village called Lech which is high in the Austrian Tyrol way above the Arlberg Pass between Innsbuck and Bregenz on the Swiss border. Nerina and I visited here on our honeymoon in October 1988 and made a vow that one day we would come and stay here. Of course things have moved on a great deal since those days, but here I am all the same. At least I have made it here.

And here is a guest-house that charges just €25 for bed and breakfast and while it isn’t 5-star luxury, I’ve never had value for money quite like this. I also found a decent Italian restaurant here that cooked me a special meal. I spent the evening there talking Italian to the staff there and it’s amazing how much came back.

This has made me make a decision that for all of the languages that I can speak in a marginal kind of way, I’m going to spend some time in each country at least once per year. I’m not sure how this will work for my Russian, but we’ll see.

This photo is interesting too. This is Sankt Christophe, the highest point in the Arlberg Pass. I have a photo that I took here when Nerina and I passed by. It featured the old Cortina estate that we had – OCC 883S and a hanging cloud that had chased us all the way up the pass billowing over the crest. This photo features Caliburn of course, and it would have featured Strawberry Moose too except that it was absolutely p155ing down and snowing, and His Nibs didn’t fancy getting wet.

And I can’t say I blame him either. This is what it looked like on the Motorway between Innsbruck and Bregenz. Totally dreadful as you can see and I was driving with the rear foglights on. It was the only way to be seen through the spray coming off the road. The hanging clouds wedged up against the mountains look impressive too.

And doesn’t Strawberry Moose take an excellent photograph? He should be proud of his skills.

This is the weather that we have been having all day. It was raining when I left bei Hanzi this morning and gradually degenerated as I drove down the B11 towards the Austrian frontier. Once in the Alps we got the lot and that was that.

So I’m going to have an early night and hope for better things tomorrow.

-3

Wednesday 28th March 2012 – PREPARING THESE RAISED BEDS …

… is not as easy as you might think.

I did another one today and all in all it took me a good four hours to have it ready and planted.

This particular one has the shallots and also some of the onions. And I hope that I have better luck with them than I did last year. I didn’t find a single shallot and neither did I find a single onion.

Anyway, here’s a photo of the garden as it is at the moment.

Down the right-hand side you can see the land that I cleared a couple of weeks ago when I had my garden fire The framework for the greenhouse and the windows to fill in the framework are there as you can see.

You can see the drain to the right, and then right on the extreme right-hand edge is the stone wall that marks the property boundary.

There’s also a pile of gravel and a pile of broken bricks there too.

The white metal that you see is the remains of an old Ford Transit and in it is a pile of wood from trees that I cut down when I started to clear out this area, whenever that was.

The other pile of wood in the right foreground is from trees that I cut down this winter.

On the left side are the raised beds. Down at the end is the newest of the beds, which will have the new potatoes. To the left of it is the new compost bin.

The three beds covered in black plastic – they were last year’s beds. They are dug through and they will be having beans and peas in them.

Then, by the cloche are the two beds that I have dug out these last two days. The two beds that will be having the brassica and that I dug out last week are the two covered in black plastic by the old grey Ford Cortina.

So just four more beds to dig out, and two that need just a quick going over, and then everything will be ready for planting. But I need to put the early spuds in soon, and the cabbages will soon be past their planting date if I don’t get a move on.

-3

Wednesday 14th March 2012 – WHAT A SHOWER!

Even though it is soon to be the annual conference of an … errrrr … organisation (said he, using the term loosely) that featured quite heavily in these pages at one time or another, it is not to that which I am referring.

Neither am I referring to my visitors either.

And I use the term in the plural because I had more than one today.

First off at 09:00 this morning, the phone rang and it was Désirée, the local estate agent.

And 09:00 too, you might be thinking, but to everyone’s surprise, including Yours Truly’s, I’d been up for hours. And I mean hours as well. I’d been trying to speak to Désirée for a while and at last she was free and so she came round here for a chat.

Amongst the things about which we chatted, and probably the most important, was the building that I own in Montaigut. Long-term readers of these pages will know that I own something like a derelict warehouse there and I use it to keep some cars, namely the Traction, the 2000E and the Mark V Cortina estate.

Above it though is a large space that was formerly six large rooms on two levels, but the dividers, both horizontally and vertically, are long gone. I need to do something about this place and converting the upstairs into two apartments is what I have in mind.

And so I had a good pick of Désirée’s brains – after all, she’s the professional.

Another visitor was Bill, who came round with a radio-cassette player out of an old car. There was a tape stuck in it and being an electronic unit you can’t get the tape out without power.

At least, most people can’t get the tape out but with the aid of three long fine-pointed screwdrivers and a pair of fine long-nosed pliers, I can manage to do it.

All these years of a misspent youth, that’s what I put it all down to.

In between the visits I finally managed to light the fire, the first of the year. And that is busy (even as we speak) disposing of much of the waste wood and the weeds that I have been pulling up this last couple of weeks.

You’ll notice though that it isn’t on the site of where the greenhouse will be. There was far too much stuff to burn, and the trees were overhanging far too much.

But I’ve left some over there – I’ll burn that off tomorrow and that should kill off many of the weeds on the site of where the greenhouse will be.

But back to the shower thing. At 18:00 I noticed that the water in the solar water heater was at 31°C today, and that the water in the dump load was off the scale again. So 5 litres of that water into the solar water heater gave me 38.5°C and I had my first home-grown shower of the year.

Just for a change I actually feel properly clean.

And I was right about the wind as well.

Tuesday 10th May 2011- I’ve moved the Ford Cortina 2000E estate …

… and you can see it in its new home. That’s where it will be staying for the foreseeable future.

Mind you, it wasn’t easy to get it in there though. The manual chain winch was one thing – the big trolley jack to pick up the rear end and pivot it round in a tight enclosed space was something else completely.

Not to mention the time I had to spend in sweeping out the barn just there. Two dustbin-loads of rubbish and dust and whatever else might be in there. I’ll have to have an hour or so to sift it through.

The old caravan body is gone too now. That disappeared into the flames at some point during the afternoon so that’s another job well-done.

And unfortunately, that’s not the only thing that has gone too, as you can see. A 4-metre length of plastic guttering off the barn and two plastic dustbins went as well. And some of the plastic off the offcuts of barn roof, all of that has gone too.

The heat off a burning caravan body is ferocious and took me completely by surprise. Aluminium melts at 660°C and judging by the holes in the caravan roof we had more than that in some parts of the conflagration.

The wisdom of having a fire like that in the middle of a drought like this is something for which I should have bargained. I’m glad that nothing actually took hold or I would have been having problems

Anyway I was still working at 19:40 putting the Cortina away. It shows you how much I was enjoying myself, losing track of time like this.

-1

Friday 6th May 2011 – Some of the things …

… that I have to do around here! It’s not very easy. In fact it was quite a pantomime to drag the old caravan body out of the barn as I expected it might be. And as I also expected that it might, it did come out in bits as well, eventually.

Mind you it took some moving, with a hand-winch, a rope and a couple of stout chains and my estimate of having the Ford Cortina 2000E estate in there by knocking-off time – well, knocking-off time on Tuesday, maybe. We shall see.

Liz asked me the other day “are you lonely?” Too right, when you have a job like this to do. Wives and girlfriends do have their place occasionally, and had one such been here, then the Cortina would have been moved and the caravan body dragged out and the Cortina put in there by the close of play yesterday.

But then again, which wife or girlfriend would give up what she has for half of what I have? And in any case, as I know from bitter experience, he who travels fastest travels alone and it’s better to be on your own that be badly-accompanied. Had I still been living in a state of Holy Matrimony, I would still be driving a taxi or a bus around Crewe. I’ve come an awfully long way in the last 18 years, and I wouldn’t have got here in a taxi or a bus.

Anyway, enough of me reminiscing. The caravan body is out and it’s ready to be burned. Tomorrow I’m out at this house that they want to demolish (first I knew of this was a letter from the Mayor of Pionsat saying that the President of Pionsat-Patrimoine had nominated me ….. – pity he hadn’t told me about it) and then off to some fete or other that Marianne, the journalist from La Montagne, wants me to photograph. That’s followed at 19:00 (just for a change) by Marcillat’s 1st XI being thrashed by Breuil – there’s no match at Pionsat this weekend.

Sunday I’m busy, Monday I’m out in the evening so I can’t leave a fire unattended, and so it’s Tuesday for my fire and for putting the Cortina in the barn. That’s 3 full days for someone to come up with a major change of plan.

-1

Thursday 5th May 2011 – Considering that it’s only …

… the 5th of May today and there’s about 6 or 7 weeks to the apex of the year, I am proud to announce that nevertheless I’ve set a new record today for solar energy. In the house, bank one received 173 amp-hours and bank two received 166 amp-hours. That’s over 4 KwH of solar power and whichever way you look at it, that’s impressive for just 780 watts of generating capacity.

And so you can tell the kind of day that we had. Beautiful blue skies and not a cloud anywhere. The kind of day that you would expect the solar water heater to give me enough heat to have a shower, a shave and a coffee as well. But it isn’t to be because I’ve made some kind of error in my calculations. Looking for a place to install it in a hurry while I demolished the beichstuhl, I fastened upon a nice spot out of the way and in full sun, but shaded by the fence so that I can shower there in peace. But what I didn’t take into my calculations is that while in the spring the sun has no problem heating the water, we are having issues with leaf shading from the trees and the water is struggling to heat up to a respectable temperature.

There is a way round this. The heat eschanger is really hot – 50°C is no big deal at all – and so I could run the water in the solar heater through the heat exchanger so that the water would heat up through there, and I even have a suitable pump to do it. But I can’t get electricity down there to power the pump and Terry can’t find the hole saw that he has for cutting through the stone walls so that I can run a cable through. I’ll have to think of a plan B. Such as tipping some hot water out of the electric immersion heater into the solar tank.

Today was a paperwork day. I worked on the website first and then caught up with some paperwork that needed doing. I had a delivery from FEDEX and the contents of that required my attention too. I ended up having to go into Pionsat to the Post and to the Bank, and I’ve had to spend a shed-load of money today – errrr about €7,000 in fact. But it’s all going to be worth it in the long run.

Back from the town, it wasn’t worth starting in the barn and so I planted the tomato and aubergine plants that I bought 10 days ago, and thoroughly watered the garden. And despite having had 7mm of rain two days ago it was as dry as a bone and I used about 175 litres out of the dirty water butt that takes the rainfall off the barn roof. And if there had been more water there I would have used that too. It’s hard to believe just how dry the soil is.

Anyway tomorrow I’ll move the caravan body from the barn and burn it if I can, and then move the Ford Cortina 2000E estate and the Ford Escort van. I’ll be glad to have them in a secure place.

-1

Wednesday 4th May 2011 – I hope that you all …

… had a Happy Star Wars Day. Yes, May the Fourth be with you.

For me, it started early and I’ve no idea why but I was awake long before the alarm clock, and after a bad night as well where I didn’t sleep too much (teach me to crash out in the early evening). And after breakfast I spent some more time on the computer and my Newfoundland web pages.

Following that I went to move all of the stuff that’s on the edge of the public highway. The ancient rotavator and the Honda Melody scooter, those I moved with no trouble. The old cement mixer – the wheels on that were seized thanks to Claude tipping a load of cement all over them and not cleaning it off. And so in the end I had both wheels off, cleaned them up, greased the spindles and reassembled everything. And now it moves around quite easily.

After lunch I went to move the ride-on lawnmower but that was stuck in drive and there was no way to free it all off. In the end I dismantled all of the drive train and now that moves freely as well.

So with all of that out of the way it was time to move the Ford Cortina 2000E estate. After many trials and tribulations I managed to start it, but this blasted clutch won’t free off. In the end I chained the car to a tree and started it in gear to see if the sudden jolt would free the clutch. I considered two possibilities – that the subframe would rip out of the chassis mounts, or that the sudden jolt would pull down the tree.

Of course, I didn’t count upon the chain snapping, did I?

In the end I moved the car by hand-winching it about 50 yards and at 4 feet per pull it took forever – it was just before 19:00 when I knocked off.

Tomorrow I need to go to the bank in Pionsat and so when that is done I’ll be in a position to winch the old caravan body out of the barn. If I can get it round the corner and down the hill on my own I shall burn it and then I can get the Cortina inside and put the Ford Escort van across the doorway where I can dismantle it at my leisure.

-4

Thursday 28th April 2011 – Well, today didn’t get off to a very good start.

No indeed. I heard all of the alarms go off at 08:00, but then the next thing that I remembered was looking at the time on the clock and it was 10:35. Ahh well.

But I didn’t miss anything though. We are back in the hanging clouds again and it’s just like winter with low clouds and damp and so on everywhere. It’s perked up the rainwater but that’s about all. I even had to turn the fridge off.

And due to the miserable wet weather I was back in the barn again after lunch. I’ve almost finished tidying up the parking place in there and I reckon that with about another hour’s work I could drag the caravan body out. But it won’t be moving soon as I need to move the Ford Cortina 2000E estate and to do that I need to move the trailer. But it’s nice to think that I can now see the wood rather than the trees.

It’s also nice to be able to get at my huge toolbox and find all my mechanics’ tools. Just like old friends they are. I’m looking forward to getting the Cortina into the barn so that I can make a start on it.

What was surprising though was the things that I found – loads of things I’d forgotten about, including the drawers with all the important Cortina bits – and I’ve not seen that since I dismantled my workshop in Crewe in April 1989. There was also an electric screwdriver from that era or maybe a little later – and it was still holding a charge, which astonished me.

I’m slowly making progress, slowly being the operative word. But I’ll get there in the end. Tomorrow it’s the Royal Wedding and so in keeping with the general contents of the event I’ve set aside the day to deal with the contents of the composting toilet. I think that it’s quite appropriate.

-3

Monday 21st March 2011 – And if you thought …

that yesterday’s 260-odd amp-hours was impressive, then what about today’s 300 amp-hours? We haven’t had many days like that in June and July.

Not only that, the water temperature in the home-made immersion heater topped 60°C and that was impressive too. In fact, it was more-than-impressive – it was the highest figure ever recorded. And it’s only March as well.

You can guess the kind of day that we’ve been having today. Cold and windy but totally beautiful.

And what have I been up to today? Last night just as I was going to bed Terry mailed me. “I need to give you your stuff back as I need the van empty”
“Okay” I replied. “I’ll see what I can do. Come round as late as possible”
And so today I started to tidy up in the barn again and make a huge pile of space to put stuff. But then I had a phone call. “I need to come to see The Beguiled. Can I drop your stuff off in an hour’s time?”

So the tidying went out of the window and stuff was thrown everywhere to make a big space. Terry arrived and so did my furniture, and that is nice. There’s still lots of space too, which I’ll need for when I go back and fetch the rest of the stuff. But the barn where I want to put the Ford Cortina 2000E – that can be cleared in a day or so. I just need to move the caravan shell.

I was whacked after that (strange things go on around here) and crashed out – I almost missed the Anglo-French Group meeting but I awoke just in time.

But I’m thinking about this barn. It’s not going to be difficult to put a suspended floor in over the garage bit, you know I’m going to be looking into this

-3

Thursday 17th March 2011 – It all depends on if you are an optimist or a pessimist …

…as to whether you would say that Caliburn is half-empty or half-full. And so seeing as I am in the process of unloading him, I’ll say that he is half-empty.

So after my incredibly early start this morning, I managed to get the Ford Cortina 2000E estate off the trailer and parked up at the side of the lane. That was quite interesting too but I took the HT lead off to make sure that the engine didn’t fire up while I was bumping it off the trailer with the starter. We’ve had enough issues with unexpected firings-up of engines while manoeuvring around tight corners on the starter motor just recently – we don’t want any more.

And once I started up the engine it promptly ran out of fuel. But some nice clean new petrol doesn’t half make it run easier.

Once the 2000E was safely parked up I dismantled the room in which I lived for 2 years – the little lean-to. The fitted bed and shelves have all gone and once it was empty it had a good brush and a clean.

After lunch I had to go into Pionsat for a few things and on my return I started on the emptying of Caliburn. The boxes will be stacked in the little lean-to that I have just cleaned and which will eventually be transformed into the office.

Next plan once I’ve emptied Caliburn is to sort out the barn, tow the old caravan body outside and burn it (I was going to keep it but I need the space now) and put the furniture from the Brussels apartment in there until I can move it into the house.

I’m going to have my work cut out.

-3

Tuesday 15th March 2011 – Well, I’m off!

Yes, and in news that will surprise, if not stagger, every single (and even the married) readers of this blog, yesterday I was up, breakfasted and working long before the alarm went off. And by choice as well!

We took the sofa and the mattress downstairs to Caliburn and they went off to the tip. Terry came to help so it didn’t take long. And after fuelling up at the garage where the old man moans like hell if you spill any diesel, we came home and carried on emptying.

The Estate Agent came and spent an hour poking around. She fell in love with the kitchen, which I knew she would, after all Marianne who chose it for me has excellent taste. And I mean – what with Liz whose taste is just as good, who can possibly go wrong?

Once that was done we loaded both vans, thoroughly cleaned up, hitched up the trailer to Caliburn and then fought our way through the rush-hour traffic to the motorway (well, it was 17:20 when we set off). Terry and Liz went home at their own pace while Caliburn and I pulled the 2000E on the trailer over the Ardennes and then over the Monts de la Bourgogne, so it was a long night for us.

But having towed all kinds of trailers with all kinds of cars on them, this trailer that Terry bought to move his tractor and the scaffolding is the best that I have ever used and it is well-worth the money. I’m seriously impressed with that.

I had a few hours sleep on the N7 between Nevers and Moulins as I didn’t want to arrive here in the dark. Reversing the trailer in the pitch-black with no marker lights is not my idea of fun.

But talking of crashing, the concierge of the apartments came over to chat to me while we were loading the van.
“While you were taking your old car out of the garage downstairs, you didn’t see anyone trying to break into the garage opposite? There’s a huge dent in the door as if someone has driven right into it trying to break it down“
“To be honest, Mme Rascar, while Terry and I were down there getting the car out, we didn’t see anyone else at all“
Isn’t that bizarre?

What is even more bizarre though is that in the past, if anything in the building had gone slightly wrong, people would always come round to blame me for it, even if I hadn’t been there for a month. But they can’t say anything to me right now because they know what to expect. After the issues about my LDV being parked there for a while and the fuss that they made about it, there are two vehicles even more abandoned than the LDV parked there right now. And the first word that anyone says to me about anything and they know exactly what response they will receive.

Monday 14th March 2011 – After all that happened yesterday …

… I was out like a light until 07:30.

My swollen face has gone down quite a bit today which is just as well as I had to go out shopping for more supplies.

But almost everything is done, a good deal of the furniture and so on is downstairs ready for loading, and the Cortina is now on the trailer. That was exciting, moving that, and I’ll tell you more about it at a later date when all of the fuss has died down.

The good news though is that it may well be that with the Estate Agent coming tomorrow and valuing the place, and then finishing off and tidying up, we might even be away by tomorrow night if we are lucky. That would be exciting if it happens. Otherwise it will be Wednesday when we set sail for home.

And not before time either. The hotel plan has fallen through because with everything that we’ve been doing, the place is clean and tidy enough and we can simply retreat out of the apartment dragging the vacuum cleaner behind us. That will save us a good day or two anyway and I can’t say that I’m sorry.

EPIC HALL

The Poisoned Pen (or Poisoned Chalice, more like) – or my relentless struggle against reality