Tag Archives: eric hall

Sunday 7th August 2011 – I DIDN’T GET MUCH …

… sleep last night either. Not because I wasn’t tired, but the torrential rain – all 11mm of it, that fell through the night was enough to keep anyone awake.

So I missed the start of the Sunday meeting in Pionsat but made the brocante, but just like everything in Pionsat, it’s getting worse and worse.

But the Bourrée de Vergheas, the Auvergnat folk dancing and folk music group from Vergheas down the road, they were in attendance. Giving one of their dancing sessions in the square and inviting the local people (and the tourists) to take part.

Back home, Terry rang me up. He’s had a stone chip on the windscreen of his van and it’s split the screen. With no Liz around, he needs the benefit of yours truly to sort out the claim so we met up at Pionsat again to discuss things.

Apart from that, I’ve had a Sunday off. I deserve one too, because I’ve been working hard just recently. And I’m back at work tomorrow.

-2

Saturday 6th August 2011 – I didn’t think much of today.

I was up early yet again – I dunno what’s happened just recently – but seeing as it’s Saturday I had a nice leisurely morning doing not very much.

This afternoon I went shopping – to Commentry as it happens – and just for a change I spent nothing above what would normally spend during a budget-shopping outing. They didn’t even have one of the gutter ends that I wanted.

But I was importuned on the LIDL Car Park and a lengthy chat about wind turbines ensued. I can’t say it often enough – vehicle advertising seems to work for me, and work for me in spades.

It was cold in the pool in Neris les Bains – it’s been a cloudy muggy day (right now we are having torrential rainstorms of quite a violent kind) and yet they had the sides of the pool open. I don’t understand that. And the lock on the closed shower is broken too – that means I have to shower in the full public gaze and so can’t have my customary “plumbing the depths” type of shower.

20 laps of the pool wore me out though and in the middle of watching a film and drinking my coffee I crashed right out again, and it wasn’t until 23:50 that I came round again. I probably won’t sleep now and I’ve been cleaning all of my SD cards ready to take them to Canada at the end of the month. Things are proceeding apace.

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Friday 5th August 2011 – We didn’t manage to start the Minerva :-(

Bill came round this afternoon as planned and we had a good play with the Minerva. But we didn’t manage to start it. We cleaned the plugs and the points, checked the electrics out and made sure that there was a nice bright spark wherever there should be one.

We worked out how to hot-wire it so that we had the ignition circuit live, but the starter bendix gear wouldn’t slide out. In the end we removed the starter (and that entailed removing the floor and the oil filter of the Minerva) and cleaned it so that the bendix gear would slide out, but the starter still wouldn’t turn over. After dismantling it, we found the cause as well. While the vehicle has been standing, there’s been a slight oil leak and it’s dripped inside the starter motor and fouled all the coils. 8 or 9 years of standing hasn’t done it much good and I need a new starter for it now.

But it does fire up though – I tried it on the starting handle and not only is there plenty of compression I got it to backfire twice – that with my bad arm as well and now it is even worse.

I freed off the clutch pedal too. Simple lack of use. I took off the grease nipple heated it with a blow torch to melt away the old manky grease, refitted the nipple and pumped a huge load of grease into it. That’s quite nice now.

I had a mind to invite Bill in afterwards for coffee but he was in a hurry to get away. But no matter. I had spent the morning tidying up in my room and fitting a couple more bookshelves so that the place is so much tidier now, so some good will come out of it all.

Tomorrow is shopping. I think that I’ll go to Commentry, and then go for a swim at Neris les Bains.

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Thursday 4th August 2011 – Having waxed so lyrical …

… about the surprising people who follow this garbage, it’s only fair that I comment that there are, would you believe, some people who don’t actually follow it. Yes, this afternoon while I was working outside, Simon turned up in his van
“I was just passing by so I thought I’d drop by to help you unload the oil tank”.

Yes, if he had seen Tuesday’s entry, he would have known …

But while we are on the subject of oil tanks, I may well soon have another. Anne, who sometimes reads this rubbish, saw that I had been given Simon’s, and she wondered if I would like hers as well. “What are you going to do with them?” I hear you ask. That is simple. One will be at the top of the bank and the other one will be at the bottom. They will be connected by a pipe with a series of filters in line, and the idea will be to tip used waste oil into the top tank, let it settle for a while, and then run it through the filters into the bottom tank. With the reasonably-clean waste oil, I can then refine it.

And so with being up fairly early this morning I had a good day outside. I’ve finished the shelving (well, as far as I can until I can sort out some more wood) and I’ve moved the paint from out of the barn into this little room. There will be lots of other stuff to follow it and that will give me the space to tidy things a little. I’ve already sorted out the plumbing stuff, and that makes a difference.

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Wednesday 3rd August 2011 – Well, I’m exhausted this evening.

I had another early start for a change and then attacked the web site. I’ve almost finished the Halifax pages and it won’t be too long before they are on line.

After that, seeing as the weather was miserable, I attacked the Sankey Trailer. That’s now empty at last, and I’ve fitted the new bracket for the jockey wheel. That meant drilling the chassis, seeing as it’s a heavy duty bracket and doesn’t fit into the holes of the lightweight one, and the huge inverter, a LIDL 300-watt electric drill and sone decent bits (stepping up from 3mm, 5mm, 8mm, 10mm) made short work of that. But the problem isn’t really the bracket – the jockey wheel just isn’t strong enough for it. But never mind – there will be one on one of the old caravan chassis that I can use.

After lunch I set about cleaning out the room that is over the bread oven in the lean-to. Full of tiles, dust, straw, all kinds of stuff in there since God knows when. That took a while and I’m now on the way to building a pile of wooden shelving to go in there. I’m going to store in there everything that won’t be spoiled by rats – such as engine oil, paint, all kinds of things like that. It’s high time I had a go at getting my storage sorted out.

So that took until about 18:30 when I ran out of easily-available wood. What I did then was to move the Sankey trailer into its new home. And I rather wish I hadn’t because you have no idea how heavy it is, and it’s all uphill as well. I finally got it to move and then I realised that I couldn’t let it go as it would roll back down right into Caliburn. A Sankey (these are the old British Army Land-rover trailers in case you are wondering) weighs about half a ton and that is blasted heavy going uphill on your own when you have a pulled muscle in your shoulder, I can tell you. But it’s now in place and I had to go and lie down for an hour afterwards. It’s a long time since I’ve hurt like that.

This evening I’ve been surfing the web. Shopping on IKEA Montreal, Walmart Montreal, a Solar Panel shop in St Laurent, and a few other places besides. I’m having to do all of this on my own of course, the way things have turned out, but it’s still exciting all the same.

With regard to a mobile phone, that scam company never got back to me, as I suspected that they might not. I was looking on eBay for a triband phone for North America but the prices are absurd, and then I saw a battery for the ancient Nokia 6110 that is hanging around here – just £2:49 plus 35p postage. What I’ll do is just pile loads of credit on my French mobile number and use that with the Nokia. It would have been easier with a proper phone and a proper phone number but there are some things that you just can’t do remotely.

One thing that I realised years ago, and I can’t ever remember why I keep on forgetting it, is that at the end of the day I just have to be self-reliant, do what I can do myself, and not lose any sleep about anything else.

-1

Tuesday 2nd August 2011 – The best-laid plans …

… of mice and men oft go gang agley’. And today was no exception.

Dunno what happened last night but at 05:30 I was lying in bed still awake reading a book in the dawn sunlight. That kind of thing can upset your day and as a result it was rather a late start again (nothing like as late as Sunday though).

Working on the website again this morning and then after lunch I started to empty the trailer while I was waiting for the water to reach temperature. But a phone call soon stopped that. Was I free to do a furniture delivery to the other side of Montlucon?

“Caliburn will only work if you know the magic words” I said
“Stop messing around, Eric. You’ll be well-paid”
“Ahhh – you DO know the magic words”

And so two guys came and helped me unload the oil tank and we all went off to do this delivery – and I was indeed well-paid. Thank you, Pascal.

I also discovered a really cheap fruit and veg shop there and now that’s me sorted out with tomatoes and cucumbers.

Mind you, I didn;t get the rest of my washing done and it won’t be done any time soon as the weather has broken, the glorious summer weather has gone and we are back in storms again – just about 30 seconds after I made the point that we have been 4 days without rain and the place is beginning to need watering. You can’t get any better timing than that.

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Monday 1st August 2011 – Actually I’m quite astonished …

… by the people who read this rubbish, and how helpful they are. Having published yesterday about my missing morning, the farmer who owns the field next door came roaring to the rescue this morning on his tractor – at 07:11 exactly as it happens. And I didn’t even know that he read my blog!

And so after crawling out of my bed at a reasonably-indecent time, I spent a few hours on my website. I’m now finalising the pages on Halifax ready to publish them. I’ll let you know when they are on line and you can read them, and you’ll see why it is my favourite city in North America.

But before that – you might remember me saying that I have made a few alterations to the media corner in the attic where I live. Well, here you can see it in all its glory and I have to say that it does look quite impressive, as does the huge pile of wood and paper ready for winter.

And that’s not going to be all that far away you know. At least the wood is keeping dry in here. It’ll burn a treat when we need it.

After I finished on the website, I went outside and spent the morning working on the guttering. You may remember that I had several issues with the guttering – on the house there was a piece missing and there was another piece that had collapsed under the weight of the snow in the winter. On the barn, a piece melted in the heat from the fire earlier this year, and part of the rest of the guttering had sagged.

Anyway, I’d fixed it all before lunch. There’s a few new brackets and a couple of the old ones have been bent further round – let’s see if that stops the water cascading over the top. I also replaced the melted bit but apart from the fact that I can’t find the left-hand gutter end that was attached to it, I can’t find any other either – which is bizarre because I have three right-hand ones. How did I manage that?

The guttering on the house is fixed now as well and the missing piece added. I’ll post a pic here tomorrow so that you can see it, for I forgot to take one earlier.

After lunch, seeing as it was a glorious day, I did a load of washing. Temperature in the 12-volt immersion heater, heated by the surplus electric energy, reached 62.5°C and so it was a nice hot wash. And while that was doing, I did some tidying up and then I had a nice solar shower, seeing as the water in there was 38.5°C. So clean clothes, clean bedding, and clean me tonight. What luxury!

After the Anglo-French meeting I bumped into Simon. He was trying to fit a 700-litre diesel tank into the back of his van to take to the tip tomorrow and so I went to help him. But to cut a long story short, it’s now in the back of Caliburn ready for me to use as a biodiesel tank for when I set up my refinery. Thanks, Simon. And apart from that, Bill and I had the guided tour of his new abode.

Tomorrow if the weather stays nice, I’ll be doing another load of washing and that should bring it up to date. And now I have some heavy duty sacks, I’ll be doing what I ought to have done a year ago – namely emptying the Sankey trailer.

And while I was up a ladder hanging on grimly with one hand “lucky grimly” – ed, using a cordless drill and balancing a few lengths of guttering, I seem somehow to have pulled a muscle in my right forearm and it hurts like hell.

-2

Sunday 31st July 2011 – While I was having breakfast …

… I was watching the Sherlock Holmes film the Golden Pince-Nez and in it is the immortal line, something like “he’s still in bed. If the weather is really bad he stays in bed until midday”. And that really started my day quite badly because it was the easily the most beautiful day for quite some time and and for reasons that I really do not know, it was 12:22 when I woke up.

No – what happened there I have no idea at all.

Anyway, after breakfast, instead of living in the middle of all kinds of boxes and so on, I revised the media corner and made a pile of impromptu shelves out of old bits of wood and some wine boxes, and now all of the CDs, videos and DVDs are neatly piled up properly where I can see them and where I won’t trip over them. There’s still a long way to go before this place here looks presentable, what with everything I brought back from Brussels, but at least it’s a start. You can’t say I didn’t work at all this afternoon.

This evening, just by way of a change, I went out socialising, and that’s not something that happens every day. I was invited to a barbecue by Isolde – the girl for whom we did a furniture removal last year. She was entertaining and there were loads of people there, including a huge pile of kids which was nice.

I spent most of the time chatting to Karl, Lou, Jean and Elizabeth – after all, it’s really nice to see them.

But as dusk descended on Espinasse I started to feel homesick like I usually do – I don’t do crowds as you know – and so in the best traditions of the News of the Screws, I “made my excuses and left”.

And I’m glad that I left before it went dark because it gave me an opportunity to photograph the sunset and tonight it was absolutely beautiful. It’s not very often that I really catch it exactly at the right moment seeing that I can’t actually see it from my house.

Tomorrow, if I remember to wake up, I’ll do a load of washing if the weather is as nice as it was today. It really was a glorious day.

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Saturday 30th July 2011 – Do you realise …

… that the next time that I do a monthly mega-shop, I shall be doing it in Montreal? I didn’t realise until I was on my way home from Montlucon where I have been today.

Yes, supplies are running low here and so it was time that I did a monthly mega-shop for all of the tinned stuff, the health food supplies and the like. And I spent over €100 with not very much to show for it either – no toys or anything. But at least the cupboards are no longer bare and I’ll be able to eat for the next month.

At Brico Depot (and I haven’t been there for ages either) I bought all of the tags for the shelving units that I bought in the IKEA sale. Even more exciting, they had 300mm pine planks on sale too, just what I need for the shelving units. A good idea to go there, it was.

On the way back I went to Neris les Bains and had a good swim and a shower. Summer is finally back again. And it was quite pleasant in there too and now I am clean – at least on the outside.

This evening I’ve made a start on packing for Canada. The most important thing to take is the music – I can’t go anywhere without music and so I’ve been recording all of my mp3s onto CD so I can take them with me. I just hope that the car’s CD player recognises mp3s. If not, I’m a bit stuck.

And so Montreal. I’ve made a list of what I need and it’s rather silly. A saucepan – knife and fork – tin opener – all that kind of stuff. That’s a Dollar Store job and if not, an IKEA and that’s why I’m landing in Montreal – there are no IKEA branches further east.

Another thing too – I saw soneone take a photo of Caliburn this afternoon. An elderly man and his wife. Does this mean I should be expecting a phone call about solar panels? It’s really a good move plastering your vehicle with advertising if you are in business. I don’t care what anyone else says.

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Friday 29th July 2011 – AFTER THE EXERTIONS OF YESTERDAY …

… it will come as no surprise for you to learn that this morning I was up at … errr … 06:48.

However, that was to go for a gypsy’s. No way I was staying up at that time of the morning. 09:30 was a much more realistic time to haul myself out of my stinking pit.

After breakfast I was back on the computer with the website – to see how far I can get with that today.

Later I was outside working on the wiring in the barn – there were a few things I needed to do like install some crocodile clips for charging spare batteries and the like. And once I had accomplished that, I set too and emptied, cleaned and tidied Caliburn.

After that, I came up here for an early finish and watched a film. And I’m annoyed with myself now!

That’s because when I was emptying out the apartment in Brussels earlier this year I threw away a huge pile of videotapes with loads of good stuff on them, on the grounds that they were recorded in Long Play.

But remember that 12-volt TV/video player that I bought at that brocante a while back? I’ve just discovered this evening that it plays Long Play tapes.

Hardly any surprise that I’m upset!

-7

Thursday 28th July 2011 – MAYBE IT WAS …

… the shock of being up and out of bed by 08:00 this morning that did it – I dunno – but I didn’t last long this evening, that’s for sure.

And I don’t know why I was up before the alarm went off but anyway, so I was.

The morning I spent working on my website and in the afternoon I went on the internet and did a huge pile of housekeeping, getting all kinds of stuff ready for my trip to Canada, sending out piles of reminders and the like. But the most important part was actually closing down my electricity account in Brussels. On the phone, as you might expect with it being Belgium, no-one was interested. “Can’t be bothered” is the phrase. But eventually I worked out how to do it on the internet and after much steam and heat, it’s now concluded. Mind you, there is a delay of 6 weeks in bringing things up to date, so I’m told. Only to be expected, I suppose.

But there is something quite sinister about something else. There’s a site on line where you can obtain phone numbers in different countries and have all the calls transferred to another number of your choice. And so I registered a really good Halifax, Nova Scotia, number with them.

And then I had an e-mail ….
Due to some discrepancies on your account 418767, our automated alerting system has placed it on hold. I am very sorry for any inconvenience this interruption in calls may cause. Customer Service will review your account soon, but you can act now and speed up this process.

For fastest return to active service, please email us a high quality image of both the front and back of the credit card used on this account and your government issued ID. Please also email an high quality image of the government issued ID of the credit card holder if the credit card holder is different than the account holder.

… and do you know – I suppose they even get people who do this too. Anyway it’s an American company and the FBI have a decent cybercrime unit and so I made a report to them.

I was still working in the evening too. I’ve bought a big, well, enormous chest of drawers in the IKEA sale the other day and now that’s up here, built, installed and filled with clothes.

It’s no wonder that I crashed out early on.

Wednesday 27th July 2011 – AND SO, WHAT WITH MY VERY LATE NIGHT …

… I found myself wide awake again at all of 09:30.

But being awake, and even heaving myself out of my stinking pit and wandering around is no guarantee that I’m in the same world as anyone else as you all know. And so it was today. This morning was significant by my being glued to the sofa taking it easy and watching a few films.

This afternoon I did however leap into action – if it can be called that.

Unloading Caliburn? Not on your nelly. I wasn’t leaping into that much action! I did however rearrange my room a little.

A while ago now Liz and Terry gave me a canvas-covered wardrobe and I’ve erected it now and put all my clothes in it. It meant a few changes up here but it’ll be much better when it’s all finished, whenever that might be.

And now, having lived through all of the excitement of today’s activities I’m off to bed in a minute. I’ll be having another leisurely day tomorrow as well.

-3

Tuesday 26th July 2011 – NEXT MORNING …

… saw me in IKEA where they had sold out of everything interesting and so instead I went to Marianne’s.

After lunch we took a pile of my old stuff down to the Charity Shops and then we went to Brico to buy a pile of cable to rewire all of her internet connections, and that took me most of the afternoon.

At 19:20 precisely I left Brussels, maybe for the last time as I now have no reason to be back there, and headed off home.

And I was glad to leave, I can tell you. Charity shops refusing goods, and refusing them with a sneer and an offensive remark, large vans deliberately turning into your path when they can see you coming, and the final straw was the brand-new Range Rover that tried to run me down on a zebra crossing. Yes, by that time I had really had enough and now I’m wondering how that Range Rover driver will be explaining the large size 9-sized dent in his rear wing.

Yes, I was in a bad mood when I left.

The journey home was exciting. The Lady Who Lives In The Satnav predicted that I would arrive home at 03:51, and I was home at … errr …. 03:50 precisely.

And that was quite a surprise, and for several reasons.

She took me down a completely different route – the Mons by-pass, then the N2 via Soissons to the Francilienne, and then round via Melun, Fontainebleu and the RN7. She also wanted to send me via Nevers and Moulins but I took the short cut via Bourges.
I made a few unscheduled stops along the way. One of the stops, not too far beyond Mons but in France was this absolutely gorgeous thing that I saw.
It’s been absolutely ages since I’ve featured any nice and interesting old cars in my postings, so it’s high time that we showed you another one. This is an original Panhard-Levassor and I think that it might be a CS model from the early 1930s – not that I know too much about it. But whatever it is, it is beautiful – it really is
Another unscheduled stop was at Melun where at the ELF garage there – the cheapest in France, diesel was at 129.9. That called for a major fuel-up.
and then we had the road works. The way out of Brussels was full of them, as was the Francilienne. I calculated that I lost about 15 minutes at least in that lot. And there were also road works on the roads between Gien and Bourges and that slowed me down quite a lot as well. In fact, along that stretch of road I started to fall asleep. It had been a long day

But apart from that, I didn’t stop at all – not even for food or coffee (luckily at Marianne’s I had made a big mug of coffee in my thermal mug). I was in a hurry to return home.

Monday 25th July 2011 – AND THAT WAS THAT!

Yes, Expo has gone. All signed, sealed and delivered.

At 14:30 I walked into the lawyer’s office and at 15:00 I walked out again minus one apartment.

Well, almost – the new owners asked me to accompany them back to the premises to show them where everything was and how it all worked and so I duly obliged.

But already the money is melting a hole in my pocket. This morning I went to my travel agent and she booked me a flight to Canada on 31st August, with a return on 25th September. Not only that, she does a good deal on airport hotels – much cheaper than I can get them, and so I have a hotel reserved at each end of my journey – Paris the night before I go and Paris the night I get back. That is just as well.

I’ve also reserved a car for when I’m over there – well, not quite a car. What with accommodation issues and you can’t really expect anyone to do this kind of thing for you as they are never sure what it is that you actually want, so what I’ve done is to hire a minivan – a 7-seater MPV thing. Most of the seats fold flat in those and with half an hour’s work I can make a neat little caravanette.

I know it’s not a motel or a B&B but it worked out at just about $27 per night extra over the basic car hire, and you can’t get a motel for anything like that. While I’m there I’ll try to sort out a caravan or something. That’s the usual trick.

I’ve also spent quite a packet in IKEA. They were having a sale and there was quite a bit of cheap stuff that would go nicely to improve the comforts of my little room. Cheap stiff indeed but by the time you add it all up, it’s not so cheap then. But all the same, it will improve things quite a bit up there.

And I’ve had my chips too!. Along with a large plate of falafel and now I’m in the back of Caliburn on the lorry park with the unsecured internet connection. Tomorrow I’ll be helping Marianne and then I’ll be heading for home tomorrow night.

But on my way back to the lorry park where I spent the night, I found myself going round the Schuman roundabout at the top pf the rue de la Loi.

You’ll recall that we were there the other day too and I remember saying how struck I was by how beautiful it was all looking with its new streetlights and all f the traffic passing by. So much so that I couldn’t resist parking Caliburn up and spending another half an hour there taking different photos.

And it’s a good job that I did because while I was gazing up the hill past the roundabout at the Parc de la Cinquantenaire and how nicely illuminated that was in the distance, I intercepted a Danish car that was heading the wrong way down the street.

Looking for a hotel, they were apparently, but they weren’t looking at the one-way signs in the street. Anyway so after a brief discussion I packed them off to the Marriott and I leapt into Caliburn and went on my weary way to the lorry park for the night.

-3

Sunday 24th July 2011 – THINGS TO DO …

… places to go, people to see. So I had better get a wiggle on as i don’t have much time.

This morning, I started off by emptying the garage downstairs and packing the contents into Caliburn. And it was all swept it out , done and (quite literally) dusted within 10 minutes. I didn’t hang about.

I finished off by having my final shower on the premises – I don’t want to dirty the place up any more than I have to. And then I cleared off and that was that.

I’d been invited for lunch round at Marianne’s, which was very nice of her. She cooks some really nice food and it’s a pleasure to go round there.

And after lunch we went for our usual walk around the lake in the Bois de la Cambre followed by a coffee at one of the cafés here. It wasn’t really a sunny summer bary, despite it being towards the end of July.

And it’s hard to believe that this is probably going to be the last time that I shall spend a pleasant, relaxing Sunday afternoon quite like this one.

Later that evening I cleared off and now I’m parked up on the lorry park behind the RTBF tower at Schaerbeek. The irony of this is that it was here that I spent the night the day before I signed to buy Expo. What a strange thought to remember.

Anyway, let’s see what happens tomorrow.

EPIC HALL

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