Reply to: test please delete

[NickFitz]

There was some wildlife stuff on around teatime, to keep the apes happy

Tonight, I’ve read quite a chunk of SS-GB. He has a way of drawing you in, this Deighton chap

Monday tomorrow, and back to work. I switched over to the work laptop for a quick look at Teams late last week, and the tricky end-of-year stuff that was causing so many problems was sorted out by the other dev, so I’ll be able to get back to the thing I’ve been working on. And next week is a Bank Holiday, so there’s that to look forward to

Goodnight all

[ladymuck]

There was some accident on the M25 this evening that brought it to a standstill. Both sides by the looks of it but I think all the real activity was on the other side.
EDIT: according to websites that seem to track such things, there was only congestion today anti-clockwise, nothing clockwise, and nothing to support the 'slow down incident ahead' signs on the gantry.

On setting off again, my clutch started playing up with the pedal not feeling right and then developing a nasty clunk noise. I pulled over at the first lay-by on the A30 after getting off the M25 and called my brother who posited a few theories but ultimately reassured me that I'd be safe to drive home. It got better as I drove but will take it for a spin in the week and see if it persists. Yea olde jalopy tripped over to 99k miles when passing through Dorking on the way home; maybe it's in shock.

[NickFitz]

Tea has been shepherd’s pie out of the freezer

Accompanying this, What Happened at Chernobyl? on iPlayer, which featured much of the same contemporary footage as the programme last night, but less of it because it’s thirty minutes rather than two hours. There’s also interviews with various people involved in different aspects of the matter and a look around the place now, including inside the New Safe Confinement and the control room for Reactor 4, where it all started

My TV went mad earlier, with the things in the so-called “Smart Hub” (the foolish name given to the main menu) becoming disassociated from the things they claimed to be: selecting TV started iPlayer, the iPlayer button started the Blu-ray player, something else would start the Apple TV, and so on. I had to dig through the settings menus until I eventually found a way to reset the menu without resetting everything else, then set it back up again

[NickFitz]

Delicious aroma in the kitchen

Unfortunately, it’s coming in through the window. I’m considering going round knocking on doors until I find out which neighbour it’s from and asking for the recipe

[xoggoth]

Took ghastly old ll2 to garden centre to look for a parasol. Waste of time, she didn't see one she liked.

[sadkingbilly]

Afternoon all
After a bit of general pottering and hydraulic engineering around the garden, lunch was a ginster's cornish pasty.
wiv lashings and lashings of manly HP sauce.
lovely day, - CBS, but the wind is decidedly protestant.
Start project #3 tomorrow, I wonder if I'll ever get round to retiring again?
we'll see...................

[NickFitz]

Lunch has been some leftover bits from last night

[ladymuck]

^^ Mum had robins nesting in her bird box earlier this year (they nicked all the moss off my brother's bonsais) but on recent visits I haven't seen any comings or goings so I suspect it's been abandoned. I'll wait a few more months before clearing it out though.



Morning all

Sunny with high level wispy fluff. Currently 13 degrees with a high of 19 expected. Barometer up to 1026 mBar.

Sunrise 05:43; Sunset 20:16 BST

Off to see Mum today. My brother has texted with a few instructions of things he forgot to do before he went out for the day. Mainly little stuff such as where he's put the biscuits and to put an extra toilet roll in the bathroom. (Mum will eat all biscuits and we don't know what she does with loo roll)

[NickFitz]

Morning denizens

Cloudy, but they’re unsubstantial and letting a lot of sunlight through. It’s already 10° and aiming for 18° later; the barometers are back up to 1014/1022mB

Having still been using the electric blanket to keep my toes warm a couple of weeks ago, I’m now contemplating switching to the two-thirds duvet, as the bed was a bit too warm last night. There also appears to be a monster of some kind in the bedroom, probably a mosquito or the like, as there are a number of what seem to be small bites on my right arm. At least the loratadine I take at night to guard against hay fever has prevented them becoming itchy

[WTFH]

Morning all
CBS, etc.
A very pleasant walk has been had, now watching the robins flying in and out feeding their young in the sparrow box, while the great tit is still sitting on her 7 eggs.

[DoctorStrangelove]

Morning.

Sunday.

Dry.

Grey.

Wanly sunny.

16.3 deg in here, 17.5 in the kitchen, 15 in the leanto.

1018 mBar, 30.06 in Hg, 763.6 Torr, 14.765 psi, (up from 1016 last night), 61% RH (Lidl electric).

Meanwhile on the 26th of March 2020 Brillo popped in a lot, with BR14, WTFH, and quackhandle getting a post in edgeways.

Awake at 06:00 again. No return to the land of nod today.

Walk (unabbreviated, towpath) walked in the wan sunshine. Definitely more pleasant than yesterday's sweat inducing heatwave. .

Lunch: brunch. Entertainment: The Archers omnibus something off r4. The Mediaeval sins thing at 11:45 weekdays.

Bedroom springs duly cleaned. Dust++ in places.

Did the hedges (but only my half of the front hedge, their half is over 6 feet now ), extracted the remainder of last year's moss from the car, chopped up the buddleia and discovered someone had left two dogtulip bags under it.

Tea: beans on toast with scrambled egg. Nice enough. Entertainment: Round Britain Quiz. Well I recognised "All around the watchtower" by Hendrix which was something, I suppose.


In other other news: it's just rained rather heavily, just to remind us that it could. .


Beyond Skinwalker Ranch: more Blazian bollox.

Sergeant Cork S4 E1 "the case of the vengeful garnet". You silly moo.E5 "The case of the pious patriarch". God botherers wanting to stop prostitution. Someone is sending them nasty letters.

Blaze: A ship through time: more about the Newport ship found buried in mud.

DMAX+1: Ancient undisclosed files or somesuch bollox.

[NickFitz]

The usual Monkey Life and other wildlife stuff today was followed this evening (after the dash cam thing with the vaguely annoying narration) by Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes, which had some very interesting footage and eyewitness accounts; the TV series clearly drew heavily on this material. The disaster itself happened forty years and one hour ago, give or take a few minutes

And I started reading Len Deighton’s SS-GB which I’d been meaning to read then forgetting about for years until I was reminded yet again by his recent death

Goodnight all

[ladymuck]

Just in time bed making this evening.

Dinner was pho from Pho.

[xoggoth]

Must get round to bringing my Window 11 PC from the spare room to my office. My old Windows 10 is getting very slow, just rename a file and you get that annoying little spinning thing for about 5 secs.

[NickFitz]

Lunch was a ham bap. And tea was brought to me from the curry house over on the Hindu side of town that I first tried a few weeks ago. Very nice; very generous portions too, so it’ll be leftovers for lunch for a couple of days

In washing news, the dishwasher did its magic this afternoon, and the washer-dryer has taken over this evening, doing the mundane laundry