Tag Archives: table

Saturday 13th May 2017 – I’M DESPERATELY DISAPPOINTED …

… about my hi-fi. 6 years in a cardboard box in a very damp and dusty environment hasn’t done it any good at all.

It’s a really expensive system too – cost me a small fortune back in the 1980s. All hi-quality Marantz stuff too. I connected it all up this afternoon and it’s crackling and popping and not doing too much in the way of sound.

I’m not sure what I can do about it. I’ll try to find some electrical contact cleaner to give everything a good going-over but I’m not too optimistic about this at all.

In other bad news, the new frying pan and small wok that I bought don’t seem to make sufficient contact on my halogen hob. It won’t detect them and so it won’t fire up. And I’m dismayed about that too.

Another thing is that the thing that I bought at IKEA to hang my curtains is the wrong thing and i’ll have to take it back.

But it’s not all bad news.

I’ve had a very productive – and successful – day. For a start, I’ve arranged for Caliburn’s Controle Technique for the end of the month.

And I enquired about a garage to service Caliburn and prepare him for his test. He told me of a place that he knew and could recommend so round there I went. I mentioned the little problem that I have with the front end and before I’d even finished describing it, he told me exactly what it was. Anyway, he’s booked in there and we’ll see if the garage proprietor can walk the walk as well as he can talk the talk.

On the way back into town, I noticed a shop that sells factory-reject and shop-soiled electrical equipment. And here I hit the jackpot. They had a new combined microwave/grill oven thing with no box and a missing grill support (but I can invent one of those anyway) for just €49:00 instead of €99:00 which it would have been had it been perfect. It didn’t take me many seconds to have it in the back of Caliburn.

It was a busy day shopping too. I now have a telephone so I might even be able receive calls if I’m not careful. As well as that, I have a nice oilcloth on top of my new table. A red strawberry and cherry design and it looks quite nice.

And while I was there I found exactly what I need for the curtains, and about a quarter of the price too. So I’ll have to measure up now and go back there next week for the stuff that I need.

still no vegan cheese in the Bio shop, but they did have vegan sausages and so for tea tonight I had a welcome variation to my diet. No tinned stuff and pasta today but microwaved potatoes, baked beans and vegan sausages. It certainly was nice too and thanks to Alison for buying me the beans when she went to the UK last winter.

And the carpet is down too. I fetched it up from Caliburn this evening and now there’s nothing left from IKEA in there (apart from the curtain rail that I intend to take back). I assembled the two chairs and finished off the big cupboard by the door too. So on Monday I can take all of the cardboard downstairs to Caliburn and take it to the dechetterie. And on the way back I can buy what I need for the curtains.

So I might have an early night tonight. It was a late night yet again last night what with one thing and another, but I did have a decent sleep – all the way right through until the alarm went off.

And tomorrow, it’s Sunday and there’s no alarm, so I might even have a lie-in just for a change.

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Wednesday 10th May 2017 – I’M WHACKED YET AGAIN …

… but at least I have more furniture and the place is a little more tidy.

Once again, I fell asleep watching my film. And once again I was off on my travels – with a welcome return of Zero, who has accompanied me on many of my nocturnal voyages in the past. I was in Stoke on Trent at the house of someone I once knew, and it was a total mess with rubbish and filth absolutely everywhere – the kind of conditions in which not even I could live, and that’s saying something. I’d been looking after Zero and after she had gone to bed I’d washed my socks and undies in the sink and left them on the draining board to dry. But then the couple came back and the woman expressed surprise, if not anger, at seeing my washing there. I did explain that I didn’t expect them back until long after I had awoken, but that cut no ice. So then it was a case of looking for the bread. But in every cupboard that I opened, it was full of cake – a kind of yellowy raisin cake – and as you opened a cupboard door, the action caused a pile of cake to fall out on the floor, so they just picked it up off the disgusting floor and put it back.

This morning I was awake long before the alarm went off and breakfast was yet again early. I had a good relax but at 08:30 nipped out to the depot de pain to pick up my baguette.

And so to work.

It took three trips to bring up the shelving for the kitchen. And much longer than I expected to assemble it. But what took even longer was to fill it with everything. I never realised just how much tinned food I had. It’s going to take me a year to eat all of it. But the pile of stuff that you saw on the floor nearest the camera in the photo from a couple of weeks ago – that is no more. It’s all on the shelves and there’s room to move about.

After lunch I attacked the kitchen table. That was an expensive piece of kit and weighs a ton. I had to open all of the packets and bring it up bit by bit. It took ages to assemble and I needed a crane to move it, but it’s a really good size (160×70 with two drop-down leaves) and has 6 drawers built in. As you know, storage is a big issue here.

It needs an oilcloth on it but that’s for Saturday when I’m out and about. In the meantime it is covered by the plastic sheet from off the mattress. That should protect it.

And that’s not all either. There was still time before knocking off to assemble a couple of chairs. I’ve bought four to go with my table and there are two now assembled – one in the kitchen area and the other in the bedroom for now.

Talking of the bedroom, I’m having another night on the sofa. I found a label for the mattress and this told me that the waiting period for sleeping on it is 72 hours. I want it to be the best possible, so another day won’t hurt. But I am looking forward to sleeping on it.

But as for sleeping, I did have a little … errr … relax after I finished the table and before I attacked the chairs.

With the kitchen table I’ve arranged it so that it’s by the sink and I can use it as a worktop. It was nice to have a place where I could properly fix a meal.

So now it’s an early night yet again. And hope that I might be able to watch a film all the way through.

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Tuesday 14th February 2012 – IT WAS A PLEASURE …

… to wake up this morning with a temperature of 13.5°C up here in the room. It’s been a while since I’ve had a temperature like that.

Mind you, what wasn’t a pleasure was being woken up by a phone call at some ungodly hour of the morning. However, it did concern work so I can’t complain too much I suppose, even if it did get me off on the wrong foot.

heavy snow 2012 LES GUIS VIRLET puy de dome franceAfter all of that, I went to beat the bounds of the property. As you know, we had a right caning of snow through the night and I wanted to see what the weather had done to the place.

The answer is, as you might expect, that I’m properly snowed in and I shan’t be going anywhere for a bit. Luckily I had the foresight to leave Caliburn up at he top of the bank

As an aside, you can see the Sankey trailer and the Minerva, and also the old orange central heating tank that Simon gave me to use to store biofuels in.

And while I was checking up on the house, I had a brainwave, And it’s so simple that I’ve no idea why I never thought of it before – and I’m kicking myself for having suffered like this these last couple of weeks.

And so I dashed off for a rummage in the barn.

In the apartment in Brussels I had a small white kitchen table with two drop leaves and I remember bringing it down here. That had to be around somewhere and eventually I found all of the pieces.

I brought it up into the attic and assembled it in the room, and laid all of the kitchen stuff on it. It’s now making quite a useful kitchen worktop up here and I wished that I had remembered it earlier.

This afternoon I didn’t manage to do very much as I had a whole series of phone calls one after the other, and so it was pretty much a wasted day. Still, there will be other days.

Tea was baked potatoes and spicy beans, cooked in the oven. This was an excellent buy, this new woodstove.

But the temperature outside just now is astonishing – minus 1.6°C. That’s over 10°C improvement from last night. If that kind of temperature transforms itself into a decent daytime temperature, I might even have some water tomorrow.

And not before time either – I’m now reduced to melting buckets of snow.

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