Tag Archives: skype

Wednesday 4th September 2019 – BANE OF BRITAIN …

… strikes again!

Just about to board my ‘plane in Calgary when … “Blimey – where’s my jacket?”.

And I know exactly where it is. Hanging up on a hook behind the door in the hotel of course.

It seems that I am destined to travel the world leaving a trail of my possessions scattered behind me as some kind of trail marker for wherever I have been. For example, my geological notes are festooning a beach on Devon Island and my lens cap is somewhere in Cambridge Bay.

And now the coat is in Calgary.

But I blame the stress myself. I had yet another bad night last night with very little sleep and it’s a good job that I was awake because the promised alarm call never came. I had to scamper down the stairs at 04:30 where the shuttle bus was already waiting.

Hardly surprising that something was left behind.

Having checked in, I went for breakfast at Tim Hortons. A couple of bagels, coffee and juice. The first Tim Hortons visit this year by the way.

Security was pretty painless and I had something of a wait afterwards for the plane.

But once on the plane I had something of a surprise – something that seems to be happening more and more these days.

A couple with three little kids were sitting behind me and I heard them talking German. So when I got up to go for a ride on the porcelain horse I said something back in German.
“Do you speak German then?” he asked.
“Only a little’ I replied. “But I’m from Europe anyway”
“We live in Europe too – in Munich”
“Whereabouts?”
He told me a name that I didn’t recognise
“I visit Munich quite often. I have friends in Eching”
“Ahhh – that’s where IKEA is. Are you off back to Europe now? We are, later today”
“No, I’m off to New Brunswick. I have family and friends there”.
“Ohh! Whereabouts? I was raised in New Brunswick”
“Some small settlement north of a place called Woodstock”
“Woodstock? That’s where I actually lived!”

This world is getting far too small for my liking.

At Toronto I did something that I should have done years ago and rekindled my SKYPE account, so I can make calls from my phone at wi-fi points. I rang the hotel and they had indeed found my jacket. I told them to hang onto it until I could work out how to pick it up.

I had a very pleasant companion accompanying me to Fredericton, and once there, Zoe came to pick me up.

We had a nice drive back through the rainstorm and tried three restaurants before we found one that was interested in serving us. One had closed down abd the other one, despite advertising as open until 21:00 had locked its doors even though the staff was inside looking out.

We went to Murray’s instead. I had home fires with vegetables followed by toast and jam. Quite a change from the cooking on The Good Ship Ve … errr … Ocean Endeavour.

Rachel and I had a very lengthy chat here and now I’ve retired to bed. I know that this bed is comfortable so I’m hoping at last to have a really good sleep. I’m not going anywhere tomorrow. Anyone who wants me will have to come and get me.

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Saturday 20th July 2013 – I HAD A DAY OFF TODAY

Not like me, a day off on a Saturday, but there is method in my madness.

I’m leaving here to go back to Brussels on Monday evening and as we are radioing all day that day, it would have meant that I would have had to load up Caliburn and clean up around here on Saturday.

And on Sunday, my day off, I would have been messing up the place and looking for stuff that I’d already packed away.

Didn’t seem logical to me, hence the decision to have a day off today and do the work tomorrow.

Mind you, the photographer guy came round this morning and took my pic, and instead of having taken against my house (which, quite frankly, given the weeds around here, would have been a silly thing to do) I had it taken against Caliburn.

Let Caliburn share in some of the limelight.

But it was scorching this morning, really hot. And I soon put a stop to that. After going down to the Intermarché at Pionsat for some bread at lunchtime (I’m not shopping as I’m not going to be here) I cleaned out the solar shower and refilled it.

Of course, that was when the weather changed and we had heavy clouds for the rest of the day.

Cécile skyped me for a chat and I took advantage of having a notebook computer with built-in webcam and gave her a guided tour of the new shower room and the tidy bedroom.

I could make a habit of this – anyone else like the guided tour?

So really, that is that.

Tomorrow I’ll still have my lie-in but then I’ll be working. I need to tidy out Caliburn, collect all of the stuff that I’m taking to Brussels, and then have a good tidy up and clean-up around here.

And if the weather holds up, I might even have a solar shower.

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Monday 15th July 2013 – I’M WHACKED!

And it’s hardly surprising.

If you think that 19:40 and 19:45 is late to knock off, how about 20:35? And I was having so much fun that I would have carried on too if I hadn’t been so tired.

This morning first thing I uploaded another pile of Nova Scotia pages and I’ve now arrived at Halifax.

The Halifax pages have been on line for quite a while, and so the next step is to go to Truro and then the Stellarton/Port Glasgow conurbation.

Once those pages were up and running I dashed off a quick 2002 words (in under two hours – I was on form) for the additional notes for the Radio Anglais programmes that we record for Radio Arverne

If that wasn’t enough, I sorted out the music and wrote part of the script for the Radio Tartasse rock programmes that we do. Yes, everyone is having their money’s worth.from me today.

In the shower room, I’m ahead of myself and doesn’t that make a pleasant change for once?

Just the plasterboard on the wall at the head of the stairs and around the window to fix now – all the rest is installed and the wiring is exactly where I want it, which also makes a change.

The gaps between the window and the wall on both the outside and the inside are now sealed too and that Ryobi Plus One mastic gun is an impressive piece of kit, that’s for sure.

I must buy myself one of those without any doubt.

base shower room les guis virlet puy de dome franceBut where I am ahead of myself is that the shower tray is installed and fitted.

With two layers of flooring, I cut out a square in the top layer with the circular saw (and that took ages to get the correct shape – in places I had to use the drill and chisel) and then I had to drill a big hole in the second layer of floor to pass the drain through.

I didn’t have a hole saw big enough for that and so I cut four smaller holes in a cloverleaf pattern and with the jigsaw cut out the bit in the middle.

And then I lined the hole with the plumbers mastic that Terry gave me, dropped the shower tray in, and then sealed it off all round. It really looks impressive – seeing a shower tray in the shower room.

Whatever next?

I had a good chat with Rachel and with Cécile on skype this evening and I won’t be doing much more as I’m whacked.

Tomorrow I’ll be checking on the sealing around the shower base, fitting the missing bits of plasterboard, and then starting to build the false wall around the shower base.

When that’s in, I can measure up for the tiles.

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