Tag Archives: http://www.erichall.eu

Thursday 6th June 2013 – I MIGHT HAVE BROKEN …

… the back of all of this paperwork. I think that I’ve found it all and I’ve sorted it into at least things that need to be taken home for a further sorting or things that I can simply throw away. A mere 14 sacks there are – and that’s just the stuff for throwing.

Anyway, I’ve started emptying the sideboard in the living room now and that’s exciting too. I opened one of the doors and a couple of bats flew out – it’s that kind of sideboard. I’ll be here for a bit yet.

That was this afternoon though. This morning I made a rather startling discovery – or, rather, rediscovery. I went to Labrador in 2010 as you ll know by now and I wrote all of the web pages to cover the journey from Baie Comeau in Quebec all the way round to getting on the boat at Channel-Port-aux-Basques in Newfoundland that was going to take me across the Gulf of St Lawrence to Cape Breton Island.

But while I was ferreting about looking for something else, I came across a huge file that was in fact a large part of the journey, all properly written up as far as New Glasgow, and I can’t think why I never finished it all off. Anyway, I reckon that now I’ve done all of the radio stuff for the next while I deserve some time to myself so for a couple of hours each morning I’ll be doing that.

And pet hate of the day? When someone asks for my advice and I give it, and they go off and do something else completely, and when that all goes pear-shaped they spend half an hour ranting at me. Agatha Christie wrote in the Sleeping Murder, “Good advice is almost certain to be ignored, but that’s no reason for not giving it” – I’m not convinced of that if I’m going to be getting a pile of earache. I have better things to do with my time.

-5

We had our first …

… letter today addressed to “les héritiers de Mme Orban Marianne”. It was from her Insurance Company – the “Mutualité Chrètienne”.

“We have heard about the death of Mme Orban and we would like to express our sincere condoleances. Mme Orban reeived payments from us due to her incapacity to work, and was paid for the fortnight 1st May – 14th May before we learnt of her death. We would therefore be obliged if you could refund the overpayment before the 27th June next”

That is the “Mutualité Chrètienne” – the Christian Mutual Insurance Company. It totally beggars belief. I’m convinced that Marianne would have been far better off with the heathens for all the good that the Christians did her. What happened to the “forgiveness of sins” and “turn the other cheek”? Poor Marianne must be turning in her grave.

Apart from that, what else have I done? Yes, I’ve updated  few web pages that I had rather let go for a while. Most of them concerned the administration of the site but one of them had a rather large role to play in my visit to Labrador in 2010 and I had never brought it up to date. It was high time that I did something about that, seeing as how I wrote it a mere 8 years ago.

I also finished the writing for the next rock programme and formatted it. That’s one more thing out of the way. And then I made a start on the next lot of additional notes, but I haven’t gone all too far with that right now.

Apart from going out for my baguette at lunchtime, that’s really about it, so exciting is my life. Tomorrow is shopping day so bring on the excitement!

-5

Friday 4th January 2013 – IN A CHANGE …

… to the advertised programme, I’m not actually at home right now.

I was this morning though, and it was one of those mornings where nothing much out of the ordinary really happened.

After breakfast, I cracked on with the website for quite a while and then had a few little jobs to do here and there around the place.

Once lunch was out of the way I went round to Cecile’s to help her prepare for her do tonight. That took a while because her preparations are much more thorough than mine ever will be, and she’s far more adventurous too when it comes to cooking.

We were four at the table, all enjoying ourselves which was nice, and then after the others had left we did the tidying up.

The one thing that can be said about more preparation and more adventurous cooking is that it takes much longer than it should (in my opinion anyway) to clear up and wash up.

And when you’ve had a very late night with company, it’s even later still by the time that you have finished.

I was exhausted too and didn’t feel up to driving home and so I ended up staying the night.

Serves me right.

0

Thursday 3rd January 2013 – WHAT A LOUSY …

… day

Grey, wet, miserable, depressing

But that’s enough about me – the weather was even worse.

So with almost no solar energy today I didn’t do all that much. When I opened my eye and saw the weather, I closed it again and went back under the duvet.

And if it hadn’t been absolutely necessary to visit the beichstuhl I’d probably be there now. 

After breakfast and working on the website for a while I started on the floor in the shower room. But I wasn’t there as long as I might have been, and for a very simple reason too.

I will swear blind that I bought 5 packets of tongue-and-grooved flooring planks, but I’ve only been able to manage to find four – there’s one missing somewhere. And the result of that is that I ran out of floor with two planks to go.

GRRRRR!

So that means a trip to Montlucon and Brico Depot on Saturday, doesn’t it? I’m never going to finish this blasted flooring seeing as how all of the fates are conspiring against me.

To pass the rest of the time I started to sort out the firewood in the lean-to in order to make more space.

I could have cut it up as well but I have to do that outside and with it pouring down with rain it wasn’t much of a good plan. But there’s progress all the same.

This evening I had another meal the same as last night and it worked just as well, if not better.

Having a rip-roaring blaze at the beginning is definitely the key to cooking with the wood stove. It heats the oven up quicker and that cooks the potatoes better.

Basically, 2 hours for the spuds, 60 minutes for the sprouts and 90 minutes for the rest of the veg. The veggie-burger takes about 20 minutes or so.

I had a few phone calls too. Cécile called me twice and spoke to me for hours. She’s giving a dinner party tomorrow night and wants to know if I can help her tomorrow afternoon to prepare.

Seeing as I don’t have the wood to finish the floor, that seems like a good plan.

Marianne also rang up for a long chat and to tell me about her adventures at Riom hunting down old historical documents. One of these days when I’m not busy, whenever that might be, I’ll have to go with her.

As for me, this afternoon I telephoned the hospital at Montlucon to enquire about Bill.

The receptionist wasn’t all that forthcoming. After much verbal fencing, she expressed an interest in knowing who I was, and so I explained that I was neither family nor close friend but just an everyday run-of-the-mill friend of no particular significance.

She then said that she couldn’t give me any more information, but would I care to leave my phone number so that she can pass it on the Bill’s daughter – his next of kin

I don’t like the sound of that one little bit

-2

Wednesday 2nd January 2013 – IT WAS BACK …

… to work today.

First time since I’m not sure when.

However, first task was to start on the web page for my visit to Lévis (that’s pronounced “Layvee”, not “Levi’s”) which is across the St Lawrence from the city of Québec. That was a brief excursion on a ferry across the St Lawrence in the middle of the afternoon during my walk around Québec.

It’s usually a bad sign for me to encounter a ferry and I’m never in a good humour, because every time I see a ferry, it always makes me cross.

Once that was out of the way I had a marathon wood-chopping session. I’ve used up a pile of wood over the last couple of weeks and so it needed to be replaced.

That took quite a while and created a nice pile of sawdust for the composting toilet.

It’s also made a nice little space in the lean-to and I’m hoping that I can crack on with that idea. I’d love to have enough space in there for my little workshop by the end of winter

Finally, I carried on with the floor in the shower room, and I’ve worked out why there’s a problem with the floor levels. It seems that with the wisdom that only Brico Depot can conjure up, the grooves are off-centre.

Now that wouldn’t particularly matter if the off-centre was consistent on each plank but in fact, while a pack might be consistent, the batch isn’t.

And that’s just plain ridiculous because there’s a planed side and a rough side, so you can’t even turn the planks over in order to even out the centres.

For tea this evening I tried a little experiment.

As well as starting off the baked potatoes in the oven, I chopped up a few sprouts and carrots, put them in a pyrex dish with some water and put them in the oven too.

Add a veggie burger and onions and garlic in a baking tray and use some of the veg water to make a gravy and I had a magnificent evening meal. Just like a king, in fact.

A wise move indeed, buying this little stove as I have said so many times before.

And setting up a little kitchen in a corner here, that’s working too.

-2

Saturday 29th December 2012 – I went swimming today.

And how!

And the reason for that is that on the informal weather scale that I keep, this morning was classed as “scattered clouds” but this afternoon was classed as “glorious”. Nothing in the heavens to stop the sun streaming down, and I had the amount of solar energy that would have been expected in the summer.

So after a lie-in I finally finished off the Quebec pages after all this time and these are now on line. After that, it was a quick thrash around the shops in Commentry and then off to the swimming baths at Neris-les-Bains. And for a change it was reasonably warm in there and I’m nice and clean, and I’m looking forward to a good sleep tonight.

All in all, a very quiet day. I’ve been having a few of those just recently. I’m saving my strength for the new year.

-3

Friday 28th December 2012 – I SOMEHOW OVERLOOKED …

… to write up my notes last night before going to bed. Letting things slide a little, I am, just recently

I really don’t know what you pay me for.

Once again, I started off the morning working on my tour of Québec.

And once again I’ve been distracted in the afternoon.

I noticed yesterday when I was following her that one of her car sidelight wasn’t working. She has her Controle Technique (the French MoT) due next week I told her to bring the car round this afternoon and I’d have a look at it.

Changing the bulb didn’t resolve the problem, so I had a look underneath the bonnet. Replacing a fuse that was conspicuous by its absence resolved the sidelight issue fairly smartly, and there were one or two other little things that needed fixing, so I organised those too.

That was followed by a Hitchcock film (Cécile is as much a film buff as I am) and two and a plate or two of pasta and beans

One of these days I’ll restart work on things around here.

I promise I will.

-3

Sunday 23rd December 2012 – Sunday is a day of rest …

… although that wasn’t the case here today. I couldn’t even manage to lie in after 08:45.

After breakfast and some work on the computer I carried on tidying up in here. After all, I might be having visitors here in early course. And then, after a few hours of working on the Quebec website, I emptied Caliburn of all of the stuff bought in the UK the other week, and put it away. That was not as easy as it sounds, I’ll tell you.

However we finally had the day that I had been awaiting. Gorgeous, blue sky with scattered clouds and 70 amphours or so in each of the two solar banks on the house. That has cheered me up a little and it would be nice to see more of that for the next couple of days if possible. It’ll make the batteries look much more healthy.   

-3

Monday 12th November 2012 – SO ONCE AGAIN …

… yet another early morning, another early breakfast and another early start.

We started off the day by tidying up in here in the attic- something that I had been meaning to do over the weekend but somehow never managed it.

And then I cracked on with the website and the next round of radio programmes for Radio Anglais.

But here’s the exciting thing. I’ve decided, as many of you might already have guessed, to go to the UK for a week or so quite soon to catch up with old friends and have a break.

This involves a ferry crossing of course, but my plans to book a ferry on-line ended up being a total failure as I can’t make any of my credit cards work with these new security controls.

In the end I booked by phone with one of these bucket-shop travel agents (my usual one was just totally unhelpful and I won’t be using them again).

Just for a change, seeing as there is nothing to be gained or lost, I’ve abandoned my usual ferry routes and travelling on the Dieppe – Newhaven route. I’ve never sailed that route before and it will make a pleasant change for me.

But over 90 minutes trying to book a ferry is just absurd.

Anyway, I’ll start back to work tomorrow. I’ve plenty to do as you know

0

Friday 9th November 2012 – I DIDN’T QUITE …

… manage to do as much as I would have liked on the tidying up in the bedroom where I’m working.

I had a phone call from Cécile this morning inviting me round for a chat. She’s renovating a house all on her own and reading between the lines, she had run out of ideas and inspiration.

That, of course is something to which I can easily relate, having been here myself on many occasions and needing a push along the path (thanks, Terry).

Anyway, we had quite a long chat about things in her house and so she’s going out shopping tomorrow for some bits and pieces to help her along the way.

It really does help to have someone to chat to every now and again in circumstances like this.

This morning though, I had a good stint on the website and I’ve now finished my visit to Québec and I’m back in my motel in the Street of 100 Motels.

I can now start indexing the Québec photos and splitting the pages up into bite-sized morsels so as not to overwhelm the MTV generation with its truncated attention span.

That might take some time too.

After that, I cut a pile of firewood, emptied the composting toilet (there aren’t half some lovely jobs around here) and then attacked the tidying up for an hour or so.

The pile of stuff on the shelves is diminishing rapidly. I can’t imagine what half of the stuff is doing in here anyway. It should be in the barn.

Tonight I lit the fire, even though there wasn’t really a need. It’s just that I fancied jacket potatoes and baked beans for tea and for that I need the oven.

It was well-worth the effort too, really enjoyable.

And so I’ve decided to have an early night tonight. That will do me good too.

But before I go, a huge “well done” to Rhys who has at last, after all kinds of vicissitudes, some of which have been mentioned in these pages and others which haven’t, been finally awarded his citizenship of the USA.

Yes, I’m really happy for you and I’m sure that the rest of the readership is too.

You deserve it.

-1

Friday 26th October 2012 – I WAS RIGHT …

… about one thing.

And that was that I didn’t do too much today.

Up with the cock this morning (but that’s enough about my disgusting habits) and after breakfast (I’m back to 3 meals a day now so I’m clearly feeling better) I cleared off to Marcillat en Combraille.

Today’s the day for Radio Tartasse to record the Radio Anglais rock music programmes for the following month – get them out of the way as quickly as possible.

It didn’t take long either – a mere 28 minutes – and I was back here by 10:45.

Paperwork was next and then I carried on with the website – I’ve almost finished my walk around the city of Québec and it might even be on line by the end of next week.

I did intend to go outside today but the rain, that started as a slight drizzle, was by now a torrential downpour, and so I made a butty and came up here to watch a film. The Lady In Cement, starring none other than Frank Sinatra as a Philip Marlowe-type detective but with Attitude.

This film was a sequel to Sinatra’s Tony Rome, which I found in a junk shop for €1:99 and which so fascinated me that I bought the sequel full-price.

If there ever are any doubts about Sinatra’s acting ability then The Lady in Cement will dispel them completely. There are a few scenes in there that are magnificent, and it’s been a long time since I’ve said that about an acting performance.

These two films are so good that it did make me wonder whether or not they were ever going to make some kind of series out of them.

Anyway, after that I went downstairs and carried on working on the shelving for the cupboard.

Part of the problem with the wood that I buy is that it’s rough-cut stuff and so much of the time was spent sanding it all down ready to assemble. Given a few days of heavy weather though next week even that lot might be finished.

It won’t half be nice to have somewhere to store all of the stuff down there when the shelving is completed.

Tomorrow though I’m off to Montlucon if I wake up early enough. I need to make a mega-shop as I’m running low on stuff.

And that reminds me – the next monthly mega-shop that I do isn’t going to be in France. I might well be having my long-earned break 😉 

-4

Wednesday 17th October 2012 – I WAS LOOKING ….

…. through the stats for the past few years (the records that I have here go back to 2007) and one thing that I noticed is that this recent deterioration in the weather is occurring about 4 weeks earlier than in the previous years.

I hope that it’s not a forewarning because it won’t be very nice if it is.

Yes, last night was absolutely taters – temperature in my room dropped to 15.5°C. Hard to believe that this time last year it was still well into the 20s.

Anyway, a howling wind (good news for the wind turbines) brought the temperature up a few degrees.

This morning, after recording a few stats, I cracked on with my web site. At the moment I’m on my way to see St Andrews, the Scottish Protestant Church in Québec.

And when I finished that I went outside and emptied Caliburn of all of the pylons and the grillage that I had bought the other day.

After lunch I carried on moving stuff off the hard-standing – something that is going to take me years.

One of the difficulties I’m having is actually finding room to put stuff. But all of the old chevrons have been moved (back to where I moved them from 2 years ago) and I’ve also uprooted tons of nettles and entire root systems.

And tomorrow it will be more of the same, I reckon.

Totally frightening, what was growing in the hard-standing.

But there is an added complication in that part of the bank of the side of the hard-standing has collapsed, so I’ll need to dig that all out and then to secure it all somehow, otherwise it will just keep on slipping down and that will be a nuisance, to say the least

This tidying up of all of the nuts and screws and nails and so on is progressing apace. And it’s amazing what I’ve been finding.

It’s also turning out to be quite profitable – so far £0:15 and a token for the spin dryer in the laundry.

Spend, spend, spend, hey? 

-1

Thursday 11th October 2012 – WHAT A DAY!

Someone told me that this was supposed to be the best day of the week.

Well, I suppose that if you were a duck, then they would have been right. It rained from morning until evening, with just two little breaks of about half an hour.

And did I say rain?

Yes, 11mm of rain has fallen today. It’s now been 5 consecutive days that it’s rained now.

This morning, I did the usual work on the website but before lunch went and dug up the beetroot and picked the beans and peas. They are all dry and rattling around in their pods after the summer that we had, and there are tons of beetroot too

After lunch, I did what I said that I would do, and emptied the verandah.

Well, I didn’t. I couldn’t face doing that, wuss that I am.

But all of the paper is out (and I needed the wheelbarrow to move it, there was so much that it was far too heavy to lift) and all of the glass jars, pots and the like have gone too.

Some jars and pots I’ve kept – others have gone into Caliburn to be dropped at the dechetterie tomorrow and once I take down the washing (if it ever will dry, of course) I’ll be able to move around in there.

That will be progress.

I also carried on moving stuff off the hard-standing.

It’s not like me to be out there in rain gear so close to knocking-off time but I wanted to sort out the glass before I go to the dechetterie tomorrow. There are tons of broken bits that need taking.

Looks as if I’ll be busy tomorrow then.

-2

Friday 5th October 2012 – TALK ABOUT EARLY!

Yes, I had knocked off work today by 16:45!

But there was a reason for that.

On my official sky-watching scale, today would be described as “glorious”. So much so that when a small cloud floated by at about 15:30 I stood and watched it.

The batteries were fully-charged by midday and by 16:45 I had hot water at 64°C. All of this can only mean one thing, and so I unleashed the tabletop washing machine.

Loads of washing here as it’s been a few weeks since I last did some, and so that was that. Off we went

Of course, washing means clean sheets, quilt cover and pillowcases.

As for me, I’m still smoking from being too close to the fire that I lit in my brassière the other day. But not to worry – 5 litres of water at 64°C into the solar shower to push that temperature up, and I had a gorgeous and most unexpected shower, followed by clean clothes and the like.

That’ll all go nicely with the clean bedding.

While the washing machine was still going, I went and had another look at these LED strip lights.

The batteries that I had been burning were up to 12.55 volts (of course they didn’t stay like that) and when I switched on the strip light that I had fitted the other day, well, I wasn’t disappointed in the least.

Quite the reverse in fact.

So much so that I disconnected the 12-volt fluorescent strip light over the work bench in the barn and installed a pair of these, together with the appropriate switch. These are impressive, these strip lights, and I’m going to buy more of these wherever I can find them

This morning though I was feeling inspired for the first time for ages and had a good session on the web site. But I was interrupted for half an hour as Terry needed to go to the quarry and wanted a hand.

With being nice and clean, I won’t go to Commentry and the swimming baths tomorrow – i’ll just go for a quick flash around St Eloy-les-Mines. It really was a nice, unexpectedly good day today and I’m glad that I took full advantage.

-1

Friday 21st September 2012 – 19:32 …

… it was when I knocked off this evening – on POETS Day too, would you believe?

collapsed lean-to pointing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome franceBut at least I have all of the stones in place in the wall and all of the joints have been filled in.

Dodging the heavy rain showers of course, but I wasn’t going to let a little water bother me too much.

There was a half-bucket of mortar left over too, and nowhere to stick it (no suggestions, please), I put that on the inside upstairs.

And such is the state of play today.

I would like to say that the wall is finished but of course it isn’t. And I’m not very happy with it at all.

I had the predicted avalanche of stones that wiped out a lot of today’s work and a good part of yesterday’s too but I’ve managed to replace it all.

What I’m going to have to do is to leave it for a week or two for the stones to settle and the mortar to cure. Then to go over it again to see if there are any loose stones or cracks in the mortar and seal them in again.

At least, it’s in far better condition now that it ever was before.

And do you notice the addition to the guttering? The 87° angle and the guttering offcut that takes the water well away from under the eaves and stops 10 litres of rain water going down the back of your overalls 30 seconds after the rain starts?

This morning though I went to Marcillat-en-Combraille to record the Radio Anglais rock music programme for Radio Tartasse but there was no-one there.

I tried ringing them at home but no answer so after waiting half an hour I came home. Maybe they forgot – or else maybe I mixed up the dates. That wouldn’t surprise me.

So I came back and worked on the website for a couple of hours.

And this evening? Nothing at all. I deserve a rest and I’ll be going to bed in a tick.  

-4