Tag Archives: new bed

Thursday 11th May 2017 – I ENDED UP …

… not going to bed – or to sofa – very early at all. In fact, just as I was about to retire someone came on line and we ended up having a very long chat about all kinds of things – a chat that went on for a couple of hours. It was after 12:00 by the time that I retired, and that’s not something that’s happening too often these days as you know.

Nevertheless, I was awake quite early – long before the alarm – but it took me quite a while to summon up the energy to leave my stinking pit. It wasn’t easy, I promise you. and it took me ages to pluck up the courage to go down to the depot de pain for my baguette.

But once I was awake, I was off. And I’ve had another hard-working day today too. I now have two rather large bookcases, ready to bring some more books back from the Auvergne next time I’m there, whenever that might be, and I also now have another quite posh set of shelves.

And I bet that my LPs never ever thought that they would ever see the light of day again, but there they are on the shelves along with the DVDs and CDs that I brought with me (not all of them by a long way) and the Hi-Fi – first time that the Hi-Fi and the LPs, and the DVD and Video players, have seen the light of day since 2011 and how I have missed them … "you’ll need to improve your aim" – ed.

Although that might not sound like too much, what took the time was filling the shelves and rearranging everything. That was quite a work of art and now it can truly be said that the floor is quite reasonably tidy for me.

But it wasn’t like that at one point, because I was at a certain moment up to my knees in cardboard boxes. And I’m not joking either. But now, all of the cardboard has been gathered up from everywhere and there’s a big pile right by the side of the sofa. When the rest of the stuff is brought out of Caliburn (which might be tomorrow – you never know) I can move the empty cardboard down into Caliburn and head off to the dechetterie.

Rosemary rang me up later this afternoon for a chat – all of … errr … 1 hour and 11 minutes. I like talking to Rosemary and it’s good to talk to her, especially when we are putting the world to rights. And it seems to need it just now, doesn’t it?

So now, I’m going to have a shower. And there’s a good reason for this – namely that tonight I can finally go to sleep on my new bed. All new bedding, quilts and pillows too, and you have no idea just how much I’ve been looking forward to this. That’s why I’m going to pretty myself up and smell properly for a change.

It’s a shame to ruin the new bed, isn’t it?

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Tuesday 9th May 2017 – BLIMEY!

These knives that I bought at IKEA yesterday aren’t half sharp. I cut myself three times today making lunch – once with the big bread knife slicing open the baguette and twice with the little one slicing my tomato. They are so sharp that in fact you don’t feel yourself being cut.

But you certainly feel it afterwards.

As seems to be the usual situation here, I fell asleep in the middle of the film. And it was still dark when I awoke. I’d been on my travels too, driving a vehicle somewhere and in doing a three-point turn in someone’s draiveway I’d bumped his vehicle. He was an old naggy guy and his wife was an old naggy woman too. his vehicle was a rusty wreck but I couldn’t argue my way out of any liability and so we settled by my paying him £20:00. And it was then once I’d given him the cash that he told me that his vehicle had been bumped in exactly the same place a week ago and that the insurance company was to pay him for the damage.

After an early breakfast and having had a little relax, I attacked the bed. And it’s now finished -and when the mattress has finished expanding (tomorrow evening, I reckon) I can go to sleep on it.

But it took me all day to do the bed instead of the hour or so that I was hoping, because it was dismantled into all kinds of fiddly little bits and pieces that took ages to find, ages to sort out and ages to fix. And I ended up with a bad back too so I had to go and sit down for an hour or two in between.

Not only that, I had to go out for my bank appointment at 13:30 seeing as how it was arranged for 14:00. And i’ve found a short cut down into town too so it didn’t take me long to get there.

The appointment dragged on and on though – well more than 90 minutes and I had to send out for some water. I could drop off my insurance certificate on the estate agents and then walk back up the hill. It was so hot that I had to stop for a breather on the way up, and it was a good job that I had bought a bottle of water.

So now the bed’s finished, and tomorrow night I’ll be sleeping on it. So it’s the sofa again tonight.

But before I go, I’ll just mention the baguette. You might recall me moaning about it the other day – the bread from the depot de pain at the newsagent’s. It seems that I picked up the wrong baguette there.They do have the standard ones, and at a more-democratic €0:90 too. I just didn’t see them the other day.

So now I know.

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Monday 20th April 2015 – WELL, I’M ALL SPENT UP NOW.

€790 in IKEA today, and I didn’t buy anything like what I was planning to do.

None of the kitchen worktops impressed me except for one – and that was a mere €399 per m², which is perhaps a little over the top and in any case, I don’t have the machinery to cut the marble.

I’ll have to see what’s on offer elsewhere.

But I now have my bed and a nice and expensive firm mattress, as well as a pile of new bedding, and a nice dark-brown deep-pile rug to go by the side of the bed. I’ve also bought some mirrors for the bedroom.

And that’s where all of my money has gone today. But it’s all good stuff anyway.

This morning I finally finished off everything for the rock music programmes that we’ll be recording next week, and I’m well on the way to doing the next month’s too.

Then it was off to pick up Liz and down to Gerzat to record the Radio Arverne sessions, and then we went to IKEA.

spectacular clouds st gervais d'auvergne puy de dome franceOn the way back, we had some spectacular clouds. This one over St Gervais really was impressive – much better than it looks in the photograph.

And the town over there, bathed in the sunlight, looked quite good too. All in all, it really was a beautiful evening to be out and about. We could do with a few more of these.

buds on apple trees les guis virlet puy de dome franceDown at Riom and Gerzat, the trees are already in full bloom, so I was quite impressed to see that the fruit trees that I have in buckets outside the front door are now blooming too.

It’s all of a couple of weeks late of course, as I have said already, but it’s still as beautiful as ever when it does arrive. It’s a sure sign that summer is on its way.

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