Tag Archives: coffee percolator

Friday 20th July 2018 – IN THE ABSENCE …

… of a webhost at the moment (upgrades always happen at the most inconvenient times and take longer than planned), I shall be making notes, and posting them up when normal service is resumed, whenever that might be.

In the meantime, I had a decent night’s sleep for a change. In bed not too late, not too early, and I slept all the way through until the alarm. And it’s been a while since that has happened.

We had all of the usual procedure, including fresh coffee (which tasted disgusting) and then, at long last, probably 12 years in fact, I sat down at my desk and did some work.

All the way right through until, would you believe, 17:00 when I reckoned that it might be a good idea to have some more food.

No hummus as I said yesterday, and so I sat down and made some. And it’s wicked too. A pile of chick peas, some tahini, some olive oil, some chick pea liquid, a big pile of garlic, some olives, some tomato, basil, oregano, tarragon and black pepper. All of it whizzed up in the electric whizzer that I bought earlier this year.

Having tried some on my butties I can safely say that I won’t ever be bothered by werewolves and vampires. It’s probably the best that I’ve ever made. There’s a container in the fridge and two more in the freezer and this will keep me going for a few weeks.

And then – back to work. It’s really good having a proper place to work and it’s about time too.

I did actually make it outside – round about 21:45 – for a walk in the dusk. Crowds of people still about even though it’s gone quite cool. Clearly some people don’t have enough to do.

As for me, I’m going back to my desk and carrying on. And quite right too. There’s plenty to do.

Saturday 14th July 2018 – EVERYONE KNOWS …

… that today is a Bank Holiday – or jour ferié in France.

It’s also the day 200 – odd years ago that the French stormed the Bastille – the fortified prison in the centre of Paris. The reason why they did this is probably because with it being a jour ferié all of the shops were closed and they had nothing else to do … “are you sure about this?” – ed.

I celebrated the jour ferié by switching off the alarm last night and having a lie-in. But 07:45 was far too early to leave my stinking pit so I turned over for five minutes. And then it was 08:55.

With the usual morning performance, and then I had a very late breakfast. And having reorganised things a little better in here just recently, I set up the coffee machine – only to find that I’ve almost run out of ground coffee.

That’s right – ground coffee. So if people tell me that my coffee tastes like mud I can tell them that it was ground only half an hour ago.

But with it being a jour ferié, I had a little treat – another fig roll. So I pulled that out – and then forgot to eat it. So I’ll have two tomorrow because although it might not be a jour ferié, it’s a Sunday.

First task today was the photos. 271 from my little adventure and I’d dealt with about half. So all through the rest of the morning and the early afternoon I edited them all and then uploaded them to the internet.

A very late lunch, so I made my butties and went to sit on the wall in the glorious sunshine where I was joined by not one but two lizards. This pear treat is becoming quite the thing, isn’t it? I’ll probably end up with a couple of dinosaurs.

On the way back to here i Went via Caliburn to bring another load of stuff up to the apartment, and was accosted by a weird neighbour who wanted to have a good chat – and not about all that much either but it’s amazing just how some people can spin it out.

When I eventually returned to here, I transferred all of the files from the portable laptop to the one that I use here and made sure that they were all deleted to save space.

It was then I noticed that the portable “Storex” drive that I take on my travels, despite being practically empty according to the File manager, had over 5gb of material on it.

Of course, finding “hidden” files on an “empty” hard drive is only the work of half an hour or so – good old T223, hey? – and they were all revealed. More stuff that I knew that I had and had subsequently lost. So they’ll be reignited and moved in due course too.

With the neighbour outside, I’d missed my afternoon walk, but I carried on with another task. when I was in IKEA in Caen before I went away, I’d bought three little units to store the CDs and DVDs but it wasn’t enough. However it was all that they had.

However at the IKEA in Munich they had two more so I bought those (cheaper than at Caen too!) and assembled them this evening. Yes – working at 20:30, and on a Bank Holiday too!

But I didn’t miss my evening walk though.

It was a beautiful evening and there were crowds and crowds of people about, with a group of people having a party sitting on one of the old World War II gun mounts from the Atlantic Wall here on the Pointe du Roc.

And had I not had all of this work to do, I would have joined them too, so nice was the weather.

You’ll remember the other day just how far out the tide had gone, with all of the people collecting shellfish offshore.

But this evening the tide was right in and you can see from the harbour marker light how far in the tide comes in and how high it reaches when it’s really high.

The tidal ranger here is one of the highest in Europe apparently.

While I was out on my walk I bumped into a friendly neighbourhood policewoman.

She told me that there would be a firework display this evening at about 23:00 or thereabouts down in the docks, so round about 22:30 I went back out again.

There was a huge crowd down on the quayside but not all that many up here.

And so I had a grandstand view of the proceedings, sitting on my wall.

We had to wait until about 23:30 before things got under way, and then the spectacle began.

It’s not usually my kind of thing, but I have to be sociable and take part in the local proceedings. And it was actually quite good – much better than I was thinking that it might be.

The crowds weren’t just on land either.

Just before the event started, a few boats pulled up outside the harbour and dropped anchor so that the people on board could watch the fireworks from offshore.

Nevertheless, I still reckon that I had the best view of the proceedings from up here.

The whole show went on for about half an hour, and the finale was certainly impressive.

It certainly lit up the harbour and probably the bay for miles around. And once it had finished all of the crowds and the boats drifted away.

I drifted off back home to my apartment for a relax, and then I’ll go to bed. And hopefully I’ll have another good sleep.

But when will my appetite come back?

baie de mont st michel ferry ile de chausey granville manche normandy france

firework display port de granville harbour manche normandy france

Thursday 14th June 2018 – I HAD AN EXCITING …

… e-mail today.

It’s from Nikon and it concerns the repair of my camera lens (which was the subject of a factory recall, as regular readers of this rubbish may remember). It’s the report of the examination of the lens to see if it falls within the guarantee, and the bill for any repair.

It tells me that it indeed a guarantee repair, and that the amount payable is €0:00.

It goes on to tell me that

I need to pay this before 15th August, or else interest of 10% per annum will be levied.
I can’t have my lens until I’ve paid the bill.
if my lens is retained after the 15th August there’s a storage charge of €40:00.

Therefore I have sent them an e-mail asking them for their advice in making payment. Do I pay with cash, cheque, banker’s order or credit card?

And I am awaiting their reply with interest.

We’ve also had a day of neighbourly interaction. I walked into town with one neighbour, and met another one while I was down there.

But first of all, I beat the alarm clock this morning. That is, I was awake before it went off, and that is not of course the same as saying that I was out of bed. That was slightly (yes, only slightly) later.

And a nice hot shower after breakfast and a change of clothes to make myself look pretty, and then off to town.

Remember the other day when I showed you the photographs that had mysteriously appeared on the city walls in the Place Maurice Marland?

Well, here they are erecting some more a little bit further along the walls. It’s going to be some exhibition.

And while I was standing on the wall overlooking the harbour taking this photo I fell in with one of my neighbours. She was on her way to the chemist’s for some medicines so we walked into town together.

From there I walked on up the hill to LIDL and I was in luck by the railway station.

We have central rubbish collection points here in Granville where we recycle our refuse. But the collection points look so small that many people wonder how we cope.

The answer is that they are icebergs. Only one-tenth of the thing is above the surface and the rest is submerged. And there they are lifting a recycling bin out of the ground to empty into the refuse lorry.

Apparently the lorry does the paper one week, the glass another week and the general refuse the third week, or something like that.

The roadworks in the Avenue des Vendéens are well-advanced and the road is open now in both directions.

They are working on the pavements now and there’s at least one car driver that is going to have a big surprise. Remember the car that we saw the other day parked across the pedestrian crossing? The driver isn’t going to be able to do that down the Avenue des Vendéens because the council is actively taking steps to prevent it.

And quite right too, if you ask me.

At LIDL I spent a little more money than I anticipated. Firstly, they had some giant cable ties on offer. And Iw as thinking yesterday that a couple of those would come in handy for fastening Caliburn’s fire extinguisher instead of having it rolling around the floor.

But more importantly, they had one of these Italian expresso coffee makers, the kind that you put on the hotplate to boil up and the steam pressure decants it. Being married to a girl who is half-Italian, I grew to like those very much.

I have one here but it’s not been used for years because it wouldn’t work on my induction hob so it’s in a pretty miserable condition. But this new hob that I bought the other week will work it just fine.

Back into town on my way home and I bumped into another neighbour, likewise on her way to the chemist’s. So I went with her and afterwards I invited her for a coffee. We were there for hours and when I returned here afterwards I found that it was actually lunchtime. It’s not like me to be this sociable, is it?

The weather was rather cloudy, overcast and windy. Not the day for sitting on the wall watching the world go by. I had my butties in here. And then I carried on updating the second (actually the first) page about my trip to the desert.

A long session on the guitar (I have to get weaving) and my afternoon walk as well.

Tea was a burger in a bap with baked potato and vegetables. I’ve now run out of carrots (LIDL didn’t have any loose ones and a big pack of them won’t keep) so I’ll have to invent something for tomorrow.

The usual walk around the walls, and all is revealed. We can now see what this wooden framework was for.

Yes, more photos.

And I can tell you something about the photographer too. She’s called Emma Barthère, born in 1982 at the foot of the Pyrenees Mountains, which must have been pretty uncomfortable for her mother.

At the age of 20 (ie 2002) she went to study in Paris and after 10 years of Parisian frenzy she abandoned everything and came to Granville in 2015. And if you can work that one out, please let me know.

As for the rest of her biography, I have at times been accused of writing pretentious prose … "you, Eric? Surely not!" – ed … but I can’t hold a candle to Emma Barthère, that’s for sure.

I’m going to try for another early night, but I’m stuck once again with Aqualung and Benefit. That means A Passion Play, Stand Up and Thick as a Brick are due to follow. Five of the best rock albums ever recorded.

And you know what that means, don’t you?

Wednesday 29th November 2017 – I THOUGHT …

… that we had seen the back of the Combattant today.

This afternoon, after a rather late lunch, I braved the games yet again. And this was probably the strongest of the strong winds that we have been experiencing just recently.

Just three or four of us out and about there were, and that’s no surprise either, even though there was a blue sky and a nice sun. But at least I got to see Combattant steaming … "dieseling" – ed … out of the harbour and off into the afternoon sun.

I missed the seconf alarm today. having had a good night’s sleep it was the first alarm that awoke me at 06:00, and I remember noting that at 06:06 and I ought to be getting up very soon. But instead, I must have dropped off again and I was still in bed when the second alarm went

For breakfast I tried a novel approach. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I bought a coffee machine the other day, but it won’t keep warm. And I bought a thermos flask last week. So I made a pot full of coffee this morning and poured it into the flask to drink during the day.

It sort-of kept warm for much of the day but by 16:30 when I came back from my walk the heat had gone off. But at least it’s some kind of progress for now.

And as for the highlight of the day, I took some of the rubbish to the Container outside. Or was it making a fresh load of muesli? How about that?

Tea tonight was pepper stuffed with bulghour, tomato, olive, onion, garlic and peanuts on a bed of pasta, frozen peas and fresh carrots tossed in a tomato sauce. And delicious it was too.

Later on, I went for a solitary perambulation around the city walls in the hurricane. Clear skies, visible stars, and the lights at Jersey and those on the wind turbines at Barneville Carteret clearly visible again.

No cat, but Commandant was back working again – obviously gone to empty itself of a load of silt earlier.

Back here, no electricity. There’s something tripping the fuse that works the sockets where the coffee machine, the kettle and the cooking hob are plugged in. That’s about 4 or 5 times that that’s happened now.

Monday 20th July 2015 – I HAVE NEVER FELT …

… so bad as I felt this morning.

There was no alarm call in the room this morning so I was quite surprised to be awake and sitting up on the edge of the bed at 07:40. But never mind getting up – the way that I was feeling, I was ready to crawl straight into the grave and I wouldn’t have cared at all. You would never ever have thought that I had had a really early night either.

Mind you, I had been on my travels during the night. Back in Brussels in fact, and I was back working at the EU which had somehow managed to transport its offices to Boulevard Reyers. I had a ground-floor two-bedroom flat somewhere in a traditional built-up area such as that on the bottom end of the Avenue Molière. Two-bedroom, it was, and a typical 1920s “3 pièces en enfilade”, but tidy as it might have been, the two bedrooms were under renovation so I had my double bed in the kitchen. This was rather inconvenient when I invited a young lady from the office back to my apartment to stay the night, but nevertheless, she came and stayed, and I was quite happy. Next morning, who should I bump into but Nina, a girlfriend from way back in the early 1970s. She grabbed me and said something along the lines of “now that I’ve got you, I’m not ever going to let you go again” – rather inconvenient seeing as how I’d invited the other girl to a rock concert that night. So I asked Nina if she fancied going to the rock concert, to which she replied “no”, which took a weight off my mind so that I could carry on with my plans, but Nina then said “but we can do something else instead” – and that threw me back into an even more confusing situation.

So with all of that, it’s no surprise that I was thoroughly out of sorts this morning.

Anyway, to cut a long story short … "hooray" – ed … after having an agonising couple of hours, I made a pot of coffee and drank it. And then I do have to say that I’ve never felt better after that. In fact I attacked a few things that had been built up for a while and dealt with them with gusto.

After lunch, I attacked the ceiling in the shower room, now that I have bought the tongue and grooving. And I was glad that I had had that coffee, because it was a struggle. I had to –

cut a few pieces with some fancy, intricate cuts
drill a large 60mm hole in one plank for the recessed light up at that end
rewire all of the lights
fit a batten to the beams under the suspended ceiling to attach (with some very long screws) the light cord switch
reroute a great deal of the wiring
wire in the 12-volt extension to the circuit that runs to the back of the wardrobe in the bedroom

And then I could start to fit the rest of the planks of tongue and groove.

Two more to fit and the ceiling will be finished, and even so, it was 19:25 by the time that I knocked off.

I’ll have to have a good pot of coffee tomorrow. I need to tidy up here because Rosemary is coming for an inspection, and she phoned me tonight to make sure that I hadn’t forgotten.

-1

Friday 10th July 2015 – THIS FLYING SHELF IDEA …

… isn’t working as well as it ought to. The upper part of it works fine – the tubes that cover the threaded rod need to be cut down a millimetre or two but apart from that I couldn’t want for anything better. Mind you, it would have helped considerably had I not drilled into it by accident when I was doing something else.

The lower part is fine too. All of the plugs and sockets are fitted and wired in and working. The little LED strip light does its job just fine and although it could be brighter, it’s there and working and illuminating the sink and the mirror behind it (whenever they might be installed). I expected to have had much more difficulty with that than I did.

Where it’s all going wrong is routing the wiring where it’s supposed to go. It doesn’t like these channels that I have cut and so goes everywhere. This means that I can’t properly join the upper and lower parts and that’s where it’s all going wrong. I could put an extra piece in between the two – just a strip around the outside, and screw that in position to clamp the wires in place, but that would mean cutting down the threaded rod, cutting down the tubes and having many more difficulties about screwing the threaded rod to the shelves.

I’ve been thinking long and hard about this, but getting nowhere yet.

This morning though, after another early start, I finished off the web pages that I’d been bringing up to date, and then starting to transcribe the dictaphone notes. Admittedly the days that I have done so far are short days, but 8 out of 45 in a couple of hours is impressive none-the-less.

And I also had the honour of making a coffee this afternoon in the percolator and forgetting to put the jug in position on the stand, so I’ve had a mini-flood in here.

It’s just not my day, is it?

Friday 26th June 2015 – DUNNO …

… who does the controle techniques around here but I hope it’s not the guy who does the controle techniques on Caliburn.

I’m the first to admit that I used to have cars with sills like this, but that was 25 years ago in another life and things were so much different in those days. I didn’t think that you would go very far with a car like this these days.

I’ve been out and about doing my shopping this evening. I know that I said that I would go to Montlucon tomorrow but I’ve ordered my circular saw by post and I don’t really need the tiles next week as I still haven’t finished the door, and then I have the ceiling to do, and I had forgotten about that.

What with having Monday off to go a-radioing, which means that I’ll have to do about 150 miles with a quarter of a tonnes of tiles in the back of Caliburn and before I go to Montlucon to buy the tiles, to empty Caliburn of all of the stuff that’s still in there.

For all of those reasons, I’ve postponed my trip to Montlucon until next weekend.

This morning, I was up early yet again and after breakfast, carried on with my website for a couple of hours. And it made me realise that I seem to have slipped rather unconsciously back into how I used to be when I lived in Belgium – doing the writing stuff in the morning before getting on with the heavy work in the afternoon. Especially as, these last few days, I’ve had the coffee machine bubbling away through the morning, such has been the amount of solar energy that I’ve received.

I’ve fitted all of the hinges to the door now and had a go at hanging it. It’s certainly the most difficult door that I have ever hung, even though I’ve taken more time over this than I have over any other door that I’ve hung.

The door wasn’t quite right – or to be more accurate, the floor isn’t quite right and the door is fouling.

I’ve had to cut off 4mm from the foot of the door and that’s not easy without a circular saw. I’ve done it by hand with the rough-cut saw and you can see how I’ve done it.

I use a length of aluminium in “L” section as a guide, clamped to the surface and then I saw along the guide. It’s not too bad actually although it takes quite a while to do it.

I’ve not re-tried the door yet. I’ve drilled and chiselled it out for the mortice closer. I had to hunt around for one of those because there were none in the house. In the end I found three in the barn, one of which didn’t have a lock so I’m using that. Instead, I’ll fit a little bolt on the inside of the door. I mean, there’s only me who lives here so it doesn’t really make much difference.

I could have finished the door if I had had another hour or so to work, but I was distracted.

I ended up on the phone to Canada for ages. I need to register Strider (my Ford Ranger) in Canada and for that I need an insurance policy and an address. This meant hassling Service New Brunswick – it’s been four years since I first applied for a street address for my parcel of land at Mars Hill Road. Anyway, after much binding in the marsh, I now have an address and I can progress.

At the insurance company, they were rather bewildered. They haven’t had a request like mine before – a person with a foreign driving licence wishing to insure a Canadian vehicle in Canada. They eventually decided to go away and discuss things with their Head Office and see what happens. I have to phone them back on Tuesday.

And then, with going shopping, I checked the temperature in the solar shower. 37.5°C with no added hot water and that was perfect. At 17:45 then I had a glorious hot shower and it was lovely. And then I could wander off into St Eloy and the shops.

So you see what I mean about being distracted, as well as needing an extra hour to finish off.

I might even have a go at it tomorrow.

23rd June 2015 – WE ARE RADIOING …

… next Monday. I had completely forgotten about it and so I need to get a wiggle on. It’s a good job that I had a few days on it earlier in the month in order to get ahead, otherwise I would be starting to struggle right now.

Consequently this mornng, I sat down and dashed off another 2000 words for our next hot topic. That makes about 25kb, which is about 5,000 words and at about 3kb per 5-minute segment, this is enough for 8 weeks. There’s plenty more where this came from too so with a bit of luck, God’s help and a Bobby, this might do until I return from Canada, with what is already in the pipeline. It means that I just have to do the additional notes and the dialogue for the rock music programmes.

At midday I reckoned that I had done enough for today and so I went into the shower room and measured up the inserts of the window frame in order to cut some plasterboarding. That wasn’t as straightforward as it might have been either. I mentioned the other day that with the house being an old fieldstone house, nothing is plumb and the walls are not parallel. It’s all kinds of shapes and so was this plasterboard that I had to cut. And I didn’t have any pieces long enough so I’ve had to join a couple of offcuts on either side;

I fitted a 20mm batten on one wall, a thickness that last night was perfectly correct. Through the night however, the wall has expanded and so the plasterboard is proud of the piece against which it is supposed to abut. I had a dsperate hunt around in the shed and in the end came across a length of 10mm hardboard from when we did the roof here in 2009. That needed drilling, shaping and fixing to the wall instead of the 20mm batten.

After lunch, during which I treated myself to yet another electric coffee, I fitted the plasterboarding to the walls. It’s screwed at one end to the battens and at the other end (ap against the window) it’s been “dot-and-dabbed”. I managed to find my plasterboarding cement after all. The glued ends are wedged up to the walls with counter-battens which will give it an “incentive” to stick. It needs to stick well because it’s going to have tiles fastened to it and “dot-and-dab” isn’t the strongest method of fastening it.

Still plenty of time left and so I’ve been fitting the roof rails for the suspended ceiling. I’ve even put an extra longitudinal support in pace because, even though it’s only lightweight tongue-and-grooving that I’ll be using, a span of 1450mm is too long, especially in humid conditions, and the ceiling might warp.

And tomorrow? I really WILL start on this door frame. I promise.

-1

Sunday 21st June 2015 – HAPPY SOLSTICE

Yes, the longest day of the year today. It’s all downhill from here. Where did the first 6 months of the year go?

And so I celebrated the Solstice by having a lie-in, seeing as it was Sunday today. And in view of the late night that I had had (02:30 when I finally crawled in), it was a good 10:15 when I eventually crawled out and gone 11:00 by the time that I had finished breakfast.

As for the laptop, it had indeed run out of battery so while I was breakfasting, I put it on charge in the barn using the 12-volt power lead that I have.

After breakfast, I spend a pleasant couple of hours going through the hard drive on the 1st Aspire, deleting loads of things that I no longer needed, deleting all kinds of programs and editing the start-up memory. Now, it fires up in seconds rather than the 10 minutes that it used to take and all in all, it’s now quite a stable platform.

But here’s a thing. I remember when I bought it that it had just 2GB of RAM on board, and that’s what it says on the sticker. But when I checked the system, it clearly shows that there is 4GB there. I don’t remember upgrading it, but I suppose that I must have done at some point when I was in the UK. And that might account for how much better it performs when compared to any of its later brothers. Upgrading this one to 8GB might just work because if i can make this perform as well as the 1st Aspire, then I’ll be reasonably satisfied.

This afternoon, I’ve been tidying up in here and for a change just recently, it’s now fit to receive visitors. I’ve even scrubbed the oilcloth that I use as a tablecloth on the table which I use for preparing the food.

I did set out to have a shower too, but the weather was deceiving. Although it looked quite a nice day outside, it wasn’t that warm – and the water in the solar shower was a mere 30°C. The water in the home-made 12-volt immersion heater that I use as a dump load was only 54°C so I couldn’t put enough of that into the solar shower to raise the temperature sufficiently.

Mind you, that was my own fault. Feeling like having a coffee this afternoon, I had the electric coffee percolator going for half an hour. Coffee made in there tastes so much better than instant coffee, but it isn’t half energy-consuming.

So back to work tomorrow – fitting the worktop in the shower room and then starting on the door frame. I really will have a shower tomorrow if it’s warm, and if I can’t have it in the solar shower, I’ll use the corner of the verandah and a bucket of hot water from the home-made 12-volt immersion heater.

-2

Wednesday 22nd April 2015 – HAVE A GUESS …

… where I’ll be sleeping tonight!

We now have acquired a mattress (which cost more than everything else in the bedroom combined), a new sheet, new pillows, new quilt, new mattress cover, new sheet and new pillowcases. And I shall be in there in a very short space of time.

I’ve even had a shower (5 litres of hot water at 69°C out of the home-made immersion heater that I use as a dump load for the excess solar energy and poured into the solar shower at 32°C and the result was gorgeous) and a shave too. I’ll be nice and clean in there.

And no alarm either. I’ll be sleeping in there until I awake and I don’t care if it’s not until lunchtime either.

Many thanks to Terry who helped me bring the mattress into the bedroom. It had to come in through the window and that was something to which I was not looking forward. But with Terry, we had done it in 2 minutes, and then spent two hours chatting and drinking coffee.

And that reminds me – talking of coffee – I had the percolator running again – and twice too. Once for me at lunchtime and once when Terry came round. The weather was such that I could certainly spare the electricity.

This morning, I had another go with the weedkiller and then I used the wood treatment to cover the stud wall that I had built the other day. At least – I’ve not built the wall but everything is cut and shaped, and it was the pieces that I covered in wood treatment.

So I’m off to bed in a minute, and tomorrow I’ll let you know how the bed is.

-2

Wednesday 15th April 2015 – I HAD AN UNEXPECTED …

… visitor at the front door this morning.

I’ve no idea what Bugs was doing there but he looked as if he was at home there all the same. Anyway he soon cleared off when I came to the front door and I was lucky to be able to squeeze off a slightly out-of-focus shpt as he scurried back up the drive.

So having been at one with the local wildlife, I carried on with work today.

First thing was to deal with the issue of the solar water heater. The temperature was 59°C in there this morning and at an average of 8°C per hour in the kind of weather that we have been having just now, then once the batteries are fully-charged, the water will boil up before the sun goes down tonight.

So what I did, and for the first time ever, was to drain 20 litres of water off it. Two buckets full, and I simply left it in the buckets to cool down. When the water started to heat up this afternoon, I simply tipped the buckets of lukewarm water into it. As a result, the water didn’t rise past 65°C, and that was fine.

Another thing that helped keep the water temperature down was to run the coffee machine for the first time this year.

850 watts at half an hour produced a nice pot of coffee as well as swallowing up some of the surplus energy, and I’ll have to do this more often. In any case, it saves on the gas here.

As for the work, I carried on in the shower room today.

First thing, I fitted the second batten for the shelf that will form the top of the composting toilet. You can see it here, at right angles to the shelf that I fitted yesterday.

There’s a third shelf too, but that’s in the false wall that I’ve temporarily dismantled while I’m working. The fourth shelf will be the top of the front panel, but you’ll see this in due course as the work progresses.

I’ve also finished the rest of the battens in the bathroom (for now at least).

You’ll see on the left just underneath the window the batten which will support the worktop into which I’ll be fitting the sink. This is something that I’ll be tackling sooner than you might think.

As for the battens, I’ve finally found my mitre gauge and with setting it up to 13mm (the battens are 26mm) I can mark off the mitres with some kind of accuracy. And even with my slightly-bent mitre saw with a couple of teeth missing, and my 100 year-old wood chisel, the level of accuracy that I’ve been managing has certainly astounded me.

So I’m having a well-earned rest and I might even have an early night too.

-1

Sunday 27th July 2014 – NOW HERE’S A THING …

I actually had a coffee percolator running here – all 850 watts of it – and it’s the first percolated coffee that I’ve ever made here with my electrical system. We are definitely making progress here.

WHen I turn the clock back to 2008 and the abuse and insults that were heaped upon me, all behind my back – in a public discussion forum by a so-called friend of mine when I talked about running a microwave oven here, well, the coffee machine draws the same current as a microwave and run for about the same length of time. I’m totally convinced that a microwave will run here and if I can find a cheap second-hand one as a test bed, I’ll be giving one a try.

Mind you, I did have a problem with the main circuit breaker tripping out as it has done on a few other occasions too. But this time, I was there when it happened and I could see exactly what was happening and it’s left me with a bit of omelette sur le visage. When I set up the system originally, I had a 600-watt inverter here. Consequently I wired a 75-amp circuit-breaker into the system, which was more-than-enough. Since then, I’ve installed a 1200-watt inverter and I seem to have … errr … forgotten to uprate the circuit-breaker.

Of course, 75 amps is the equivalent of about 950 watts and when I have the fridge running and a few other things besides, then a 850-watt coffee percolator is expecting rather too much.

Apart from that, I had a nice lie-in this morning, until 10:45 too and about time. And after breakfast I had a few things to do and then after lunch and the incident with the coffee machine, I did some shopping on the computer to buy the stuff for the Sankey Trailer and also some ink for the Hewlett Packard printer that I inherited. And that wasn’t as easy as it sounds either. I tried about 4 different cards before Paypal accepted one of them and to my surprise, it’s the one from the little rural bank here. None of the multinational cards word work.

I should also have ordered a new circuit breaker or 6 while I was at it but I forgot.

Anyway, that’s the end of the weekend and I’m back to work tomorrow.

Tuesday 17th July 2012 – NOW THIS IS ASTONISHING!

You are probably wondering what the photo below is all about – but read on.

Now to cut a long story short … "hooray" – ed … Rosemary came round today to offer me some more help in the garden and as I had no tinned potatoes for the salad I asked her to pick up a tin or two on the way round.

Instead of tins, she appeared with a bag of new potatoes – and these needed cooking of course.

It was a glorious day – probably one of the best I have ever had as far as solar energy goes (and doesn’t that make a change just recently?) and it came to my mind that ages ago I had bought a 400-watt electric steamer – cooker.

I’d never used it although I remembered a few weeks ago saying that I would like to give it a run out some time or other in the near future. With all of this solar energy right now it seemed that the appropriate moment had arisen.

Result – 15 minutes later one perfectly-steamed pile of spuds. I’m well-impressed with this. This really is Progress with a capital P.

I remember one of my best friends (an ex-best friend now as it happens) taking the p155 out of me behind my back with all of his friends on the Land Rover forum about my plans to try a microwave oven here.

They spent a considerable amount of time calling me a few choice names and so on.

And while an electric steam-cooker is hardly a microwave, it’s still up there with the coffee machine and the electric fire that we have had running during the winter as signs that home comforts are perfectly achievable with my set-up.

As you also know, I’m running a 12-volt TV-cum-video player up here as well.

Yes, I absolutely hate being surrounded by negativity – it drags me right downhill. One of the (many) reasons why I left the UK.

Rosemary and I spent a few hours weeding and I’ve never seen the garden looking as good as this, that’s for sure. We even started to pull up the new spuds but that was a waste of effort – seems like my crop has disappeared.

After Rosemary left, I carried on with the wall of the lean-to. You can tell how much I did by looking at where the mortar is still grey and not white.

I’ve accomplished quite a lot there but there’s still plenty to go and I’m wondering if I’ll have enough stones. If not, I’ll have to go on the scavenge and see what I can find.

But the wall underneath is in a bad way – there are three large cracks running down it. Seeing this made me glad that when I made a brief start in repairing it all back 10 years ago I had made that strip of reinforced concrete underneath where the breeze blocks are.

That strip of concrete is embedding the horizontal beams of the floor and thus ties all of the thing together. But once the new bit is finished I can repoint all of the cracks.

I’ve also been attacking the hole that I’m trying to drill out, what with all of this electricity we had today, and I’ve grounded out with the circular drill bit.

Of course, I lent out my other extension to Rob, didn’t I

We finished the day with the hottest solar shower I have had for a long time, and it was gorgeous.

But as for starting the day – how about 06:35 for breakfast? When has that ever happened before?

-2

Tuesday 14th December 2010 – GOD IT WAS HARD THIS MORNING …

… to get out of bed. Not surprising really, as in my little room up here the temperature had fallen to 7.8°C and it was taters.

But that was nothing.

My hunch about the temperature last night was correct – and correct in spades as the temperature had dropped right through the floor to an incredible -10.5°C outside through the night.

That’s not just the lowest temperature this winter so far, it’s also the lowest temperature of the year. And it’s also the second-lowest temperature that I have ever recorded.

The heat exchanger recorded a temperature of -14.8°C, and that is pretty good going too.

Tonight the temperature outside was even lower at teatime than it was yesterday so I don’t know if that is significant, but I’ll tell you tomorrow.

Mind you, up here this evening after I knocked off work it was a mere 4.8°C in my room. But a huge blaze in the little fire sorted that out (although not as much as I would have liked). And as a side effect the little coffee maker thing that I bought – it managed to conjure up a cup of coffee, so intense was the heat in the fire.

Work carried on apace in the bedroom – there was no way that I was going to work outside in the ridiculous daytime temperature of -5.4°C.

I fitted all of the battens to the long wall in the bedroom, fitted the space-blanket insulation and then put on the counter-battens. The first part of the wiring has been done as you know, and I’ve started to fit the polystyrene tiles over the top. If I put my back into it tomorrow I could have that wall finished.

What helped with the work was the set of overalls that I was wearing. They were on sale in LIDL last winter – a pair of XL-size quilted winter overalls rather like a huge ski-suit. They were expensive but today they were worth every penny and I would recommend a pair of them to anyone who intends to work around here in this weather. I could feel the heat as soon as I put them on and I was comfortable for all of the day. What I call an impressive piece of kit.

And I’m not going to hang around tonight either. it’s still cold and so I’m going to retreat underneath the covers and have an early night. I reckon that tomorrow is going to be even colder.

-2

Tuesday 7th December 2010 – I HAD A DAY OUT TODAY.

I was quietly drinking a coffee ready to go out and cut wood for this evening when Liz rang me. “Terry and I are on our way to Montlucon. Anything you want?”

Well, as it happens, this very morning I had been making a list of things that I want from Montlucon so I enquired “will you be going to Brico Depot?”
“Of course”
“Well, do you want an extra passenger?”
And so instead of working on my bedroom, I went to Montlucon instead.

I tried a couple of places but no wheel for Caliburn and I also bought a few useful things, including a small coffee pot thingy to fit on my little stove (€25 in the Auchan but only €6 in Gifi) but what was so depressing about the journey was that blasted flaming perishing Brico Depot was blasted flaming well closed for perishing stock taking.

So 30 kms there and 30 kms back for me (and add on another 20 kms each way for Liz and Terry) and the place was closed. So no extra insulation, no bits to finish off the wardrobe.

GRRRRRRRRR at Brico Depot!

But the temperature is crazy right now. It was a grey hazy day with just the odd burst of sun through the clouds but the temperature reached 15°C today. In the heat exchanger it reached 22.3°C. In a space of just about 36 hours the temperature has increased 20°C.

There’s clearly something wrong with this weather right now. But I’m not worrying about it. I didn’t get much sleep last night so I’m having an early night.

-3

EPIC HALL

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

Tag Archives: coffee percolator

Friday 20th July 2018 – IN THE ABSENCE …

Saturday 14th July 2018 – EVERYONE KNOWS …

Thursday 14th June 2018 – I HAD AN EXCITING …

Wednesday 29th November 2017 – I THOUGHT …

Monday 20th July 2015 – I HAVE NEVER FELT …

Friday 10th July 2015 – THIS FLYING SHELF IDEA …

Friday 26th June 2015 – DUNNO …

23rd June 2015 – WE ARE RADIOING …

Sunday 21st June 2015 – HAPPY SOLSTICE

Wednesday 22nd April 2015 – HAVE A GUESS …

Wednesday 15th April 2015 – I HAD AN UNEXPECTED …

Sunday 27th July 2014 – NOW HERE’S A THING …

Tuesday 17th July 2012 – NOW THIS IS ASTONISHING!

Tuesday 14th December 2010 – GOD IT WAS HARD THIS MORNING …

Tuesday 7th December 2010 – I HAD A DAY OUT TODAY.

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