difflock

Erm, Generally glad of the excuse for a breather!

My perspective, way before TM was invented, starting from about 1976 when "under pressure" collecting barley straw and being needlessly held up by a non-working Water Service crew needlessly blocking a busyish road with an abandoned vehicle(with drivers door left wide open) and attatched plant trailer, while the steering wheel attendant talked football(or possibly politics) with his mates. Yer man the SWA was fully aware of Dad sitting waiting, but ignored him, and continuied to ignore him, until Dad started bumping the trailer with the front wheel of the tractor, which started the trailer nodding which moved the attatched vehicle. Yer man got the message and pissed off. Any then too too many years working with a thicko but connected chargehand who appeared to delight in blocking off streets, or street side parking for no good reason and for needlessly extended periods. I suspect it made him feel powerful and important. I also provided TM for the local tree surgeon felling ADB afflicted trees this past spring, though only on a surprising busy quiet country road(bloody RR driving school rum Mums!) And as a driver for 40+ years too many times being held up at hopelessly out of sync double red lights 25 to 50m apart on a clear straight road. Etc etc etc. I do appreciate that TM on 3 or 4 way junctions is a total bollocks, but on a short straight stretch of road, not so much. But despite my frustrations I never felt the least inclined to resort to violence. And I even wait at TM red lights when out on the bicycle!

Mark and Sam after work. Forgotten weapons Cutting edge engineering pty Fall of Civilizations Various train cab view channels Just watched a couple of very good productions about Capt Eric Brown RN and Sir Frank Whittle And listen to a lot of Larkin Poe Stuff the BBC/ITV

This last few years I fell the Sitka, and mechanically handle it leaving it stacked in a pile unprocessed for a year, at least, then when I start cutting and splitting it, it is so much drier and ergo lighter, which my ould done 63 year old back really really, really appreciates, this also gives the various bugs and beetles that require dead trees with the bark on a good chance to lay eggs and mature(leaving biro pen sized holes!), which must be good for the whole wildlife foodchain. Anyway after splitting and stacking the 0.5m3 billet bundles 4 high but uncovered for 1 more season I was taking them in at about 12% moisture, having picked a dry blowy spell to do so. And this is in piss-wet North Co. Antrim. Splitting and exposure to the wind is the key to drying, though my stack lies to the Sun as well.. So anyway, in my experience Sitka is easy dried.

"have a life" hmmmm?

There is also the need to disconnect the perhaps non-serious, or unintended, or trival even, nature of the causation, from the possibly very highly unlikely outcome, like a fatality. Life is, I suppose, a bit of a lottery. P.S. Am I correct that in respect of causing a death with a motor vehicle, whether charged with careless or reckless driving, that jail is basically a foregone conclusion, but crippling someone or leaving them in a wheelchair does not attract the same mandatory jail sentence?

Oddly, but I suspect, not uniquely, I find that I can sometimes backtrack mentally to what I was doing or where I was the last time I remember having had the "lost" item, and therefore find it. But on the more frequent occasions where this technique does not work and I then purely accidently find the "lost" item, I always get stunning crystal clear flashback memory of exactly what I was doing with it and why I set it just there. So wtf can I not experience this crystal clear flashback memory to help me find the bloody thing. The human brain sure is a strange animal.

Winter tyres were a revelation on the Skoda, Continentals from recall, but since the car came factory fitted with(no doubt long life) hard compound ditch-finder Turenzas, anything else round and black would have been an improvment. I did run the winter tyres done over the summer when they got a bit worn, and in conscience I never noticed any difference, except they probably wear out a bit faster due to the softer compound, but compared to owning and swopping a second of rims and tyres, prob cost effective to run even proper winter tyres the year round, so I will probably compromise and fit all seasons to the Rav4 when she needs new boots.

Out yesterday, midday for a 20 mile cycle, and the same today, just back, it was "interesting" shall we say, on the couple of untreated roads, had to get off and walk up one small hill, as I could not put any power down without the back wheel squirming. Then on the way back I managed a couple of 2 wheel drifts, where the Sun had thawed the ice just enough to leave it looking like a wet road. Really, like really, surprised I managed to stay upright. PHEW! Cos these old bones don't bounce so good!

Snowing, well more gentle hail here this morning, lying too. Dogs not impressed.

We had a heady +1 with rain yesterday morning, but at least no wind, still felt proper miserable though. I imagine sub zero with snow would actually have felt pleasenter!

Good idea, I still got a few leftover from tiling the kitchen. Should certainly make them harder to lose. But carrying them will be a bitch.

I "lost" my car keys, on a key fob, as I got out of the car outside the Portakabin that I had just driven up to. I pulled the keys out of the ignition on autopilot, probably reached across to the passenger seat for sommat, got out and realized I had not got the keys in my hand. I idly looked, and better looked, and looked on the bitmac below the car, behind the front wheel etc etc, and borrowed a torch and a piece of wire and looked fished down between the seat and the centre console and I even asked Clive to look, explaining exactly what happened, all with no luck whatsoever. So I finally phoned the wife to bring me the spare keys. Got in the car at lunchtime, spare key into the ignition, and reached for the seatbelt. And there as I pulled the seatbelt across my body, neatly and securely clipped to the seatbelt with the aforesaid mentioned keyring was my "lost" set of keys. Which I deduced had been scooped out of my lap as I released the seatbelt. I slowly released the seatbelt and the keys disappeared up into the narrow darkish gap between the seat and the door. FFS!

Obvious innit, buy an even more expensive replacement, and volia! You will then have TWO! P.S. This strategem worked for me on two previous occassions, once for a multimeter, once for a joiners "L" shaped right angle thingamabob. Looked for ages, knowing they were not "lost" merely mislaid, finally reluctantly purchased replacements, and "volia" found them the day after the money was spent.

Like I lost my cherished Vertinox Alox Pioneer penkinife about a month ago. Looked everywhere, no luck. Browsed internet for a replacement, ideally with a high carbon blade and bottle opener( very important that!) but non locking for UK EDC knife law compliance. Like I might treat myself to sommat knife for Xmas. Still kept looking nonethless. No luck, so I took an old steel (German Panther brand perhaps?)lockblade out to the shed, clipped the point to bring it under 3" and filed off the locking gab. Brought it into the house, a bit disgruntled that stupid UK law made me do such shit to a perfectly good knife, and set it down on the table inside the back door, while I went into the utility room to wash my hands. As I came out of the utility I idly looked at the cardboard box that contains hats and gloves and other shit, sitting on the back corner of the table, looked in and INSTANTLY saw my "lost" penknife looking back at me. GERRR! P.S. The wife also left the immersion on for a solid 3 months, as we found out when we recieved the bill for the quarter! The switch was well hidden behind the foodmixer and breadmaker in "her" corner that I dare not disturb. So Whats the 3rd misfortune or calamity to be then!

At present we burn 1 carefully filled and heaped full banana box per day. Which heats the 750 ft sq of the house we live in. Underfloor under 500 sq ft of this area has been running for 1 hour early am this past few days, but only on a low setting to take the chill off the floor and drive the bedroom/bathroom radiators. This would use about 1,000 litres of kero per year. Easy to get it too hot if the Sun is about mid afternoon. But if windy, much harder to get the heat up, though the fire does burn more vigorously. A variable feast.

My take on this is that the stacked rings will **always trap moisture(either the sap, or even horizontally blown rain wicked into the gaps and then sucked up by the end grain, like even if covered by sheets of tin) and be really really slow to dry and get mouldy. We are perhaps windier and wetter than most of the rest of the UK so other experiences may differ. But if split and stacked the difference is that the windblown rain that gets into the stack, is as readily re-evaporated by the wind, which is occassionally without rain! Which is not so with stacked rings. **One must understand this is in part due to my exquisite cross cutting accuracy which allows for molecular bonding between the end grains🤣🤣, the same as happens with Axminster Engineer Series 47 Piece Gauge Block Set | Axminster Tools WWW.AXMINSTERTOOLS.COM 47 blocks ranging from 1mm to 100mm. Each block has its opposing faces dead flat and finely polished. So much so that when one is gently rubbed against another the surfaces...

My grandmother lit the fire wi a peat( turf to some) which just had had a strone of pariffin poured on it out of a teapot(which sat in the corner of the hearth) Essentially the same as modern firelighters.

The ratio of pooping to fire-lighting perplexes me?

The heavy corrougated cardboard fruit boxes we bring the groceries home from Tescos in. Hard to tear up, but, man sur, quare firelighting stuff.

I did not help that my day started with a fit of explosive sneezing at 05:00, so today as I came down wi some bloody lurgy, I simply could NOT get warm, it looked pleasent, and was dry, but there was a cutting edge to the air despite virtually no wind. Working outside at dysfunctional lights on a trailer did not help. The car was only reading 4 deg mind as I drove home at just before 16:00. And Thur past was 5 deg at 17:00 Sniffle. But a comfy 25 in the garden room.

I continue to be boggled at the unthinking stupidity of my fellow species. Like how in the name of under god did he not think to park somewhere safe(er)

I spent months imagining I was imagining hearing something weird while lying in bed, an odd intermittent humming. I finally figured out it is almost certainly the Leibherr freezer just on the other side of our downstairs bedroom wall. Resonating through the poured concrete floor that was cast hard up against the outside wall of the house( with no polystyrene expansion strip placed pre pour) Doh!

A brilliant pithy observation.