SAD or just tired?

I have a clock in my kitchen.  Looks like this.  Has an AA battery.  It's been there for years.  It always used to run very slightly fast, which was quite useful as it meant that in reality I still had a couple of minutes in hand, if you see what I mean.



About three weeks ago it stopped, so I changed the battery.  A day later it stopped again, so I changed the battery again.  When it stopped a day after that I thought there must be something wrong with the clock itself, but no, the terminals looked clean and nothing was out of place.  I left it lying face down on the table.



When I came back later it had started ticking again, so I hung it up.  Over the next few weeks it would run for maybe 10, maybe 20 hours at a time and then stop.  Every time I laid it face down on the table and within about 5 minutes it had started again.  I came to the conclusion that my clock was tired and just needed a rest.

But since we've gone back to summer again, it hasn't stopped once.  Does my clock suffer from SAD, do you think?

A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do

My brain hurts.

All morning and half the afternoon I have been writing a report (currently four pages long) detailing the current state of the project we are managing.  Trying to put politely the fact that the person we have to work with as Chair is an idiot, who goes off at a tangent on her own, upsetting volunteers, trying to discredit other people's judgements and who uses as an excuse the fact that she didn't know what was going on.  The fact that she is completely incapable of listening to anyone goes totally over her head.  She has no creative side to her at all.  She thinks everything should be done in formal meetings, in committee.  She talks a load of council type rubbish.  And then she wonders why this project has taken four years to get off the ground. 

It's taken six months for them to figure out a way of reclaiming VAT on purchases for the project.  Why?  Who would seriously want to give a sixth of the HLF grant straight back to HMRC? 

We have to find some niche that she can be put in charge of, just to keep her out of the way of everyone else.  I have had to write this report just to make sure that she doesn't write it and now I shall have to email it to everyone involved that I can think of just so that she doesn't either pretend it's not like that, or else steal all the words and try to pretend they are hers.  Not that anyone would be fooled by that as she tends to write total gibberish with very little punctuation and terrible spelling (eg "graffic" artists - to rhyme with traffic, I suppose).

There.  I've said it now.

And then after that I've been doing our year end accounts.  Not because it's the actual year end - those were done months ago - but because I need to do our tax returns.  Not because they actually need submitting now, but because the tax credits annual review has to be done by the end of July, and so I might as well have actually done the tax returns as well.  At least I won't get a penalty for filing a late return.  And with a bit of luck the tax credits people might decide I'm so poor they might give me something.  Alternatively with daughter having just finished secondary education they will probably take some away.

So the rather nice sunshine I can see out the window is just that - outside the window.

W-w-w-w-w-w-wet again

Jeeeeze!!!  We've just gone from pretty dry and sunny to the biggest raindrops in the world.  Daughter said, "have you still got washing out?" - and at that point it was probably almost dry - and by the time I'd brought it in I was totally soaked.  Had to change my clothes, that soaked. 

I know I should be grateful that I live in a hilly city, and that for us to be flooded probably 40% of the country would be underwater, but still....

Why do I now think that rain is the default option?

Does anyone know a means of nudging the Gulf Stream back on course (ie north of the UK), otherwise we're all buggered from now till kingdom come?

Have you ever seen so many slugs?  And where have all these black slugs come from?

Yours, wetly....

That'll bee lovely

The philadelphus is getting towards the end of its magnificent flowering period.  There always seems to be rain to spoil the glorious parade of white.   A couple of weeks ago I was hanging out washing in the sunshine and the soundtrack was of maybe fifty bees buzzing away furiously behind me, giddy with all the nectar.  I couldn't think of anywhere I would rather be.

So today I have planted these:

Sixteen of them altogether.  That should keep the bees happy.

Che sera sera ....

Doing a bit of clearing out recently, came across this which elder son (the chef) drew when he was just seven.

And this is him, aged 18, when he won the Pudz Amateur Pudding Chef competition.  He's with the judge, Mich Turner, founder of the Little Venice Cake Company. 

And this picture was drawn by my daughter when she was three:

 And this is her a few weeks ago at the BMX World Championships in Birmingham.  (Note the way she's cunningly photoshopped it so she's the only one in colour.)  Yes, that is a Team GB jersey. Competitors came from as far afield as New Zealand and USA.

I have yet to find a picture drawn by my younger son when he was little that shows early indication of where he will go in life - but on current form I should be looking for one entitled Me on the Playstation!

Noah wouldn't feel out of place

Look, you know who you are.  Casting your weather spells.  Well, please stop it.  I am fed up with all this rain and now we have gale force winds as well and my house, which was built in 1870, is feeling the strain and bits are falling off.

In particular the front fascia board and soffit are disintegrating before my very eyes.  The bad news is that the telephone line is attached to the fascia board and at any moment we could lose our phone and internet connections.  The fact that you're reading this proves that they haven't detached themselves yet, but the bad weather elves aren't exactly helping matters.

So - to enable us to fix the problem OH has been buying and erecting scaffolding over the last couple of weeks.  No, no, no - in this house we do not employ scaffolding firms, we buy our own, because in the long run that's cheaper and anyway - we're bound to need it again somewhere else.  You mean, you haven't all got spare scaffolding in your back garden?

Of course, if you employed a scaffolding firm, they would have it all erected in a morning, but we are taking a different route.  We don't have scaffolding, we have "an installation".  Because OH feels nervous about being on a platform 20' in the air which might wobble, we have bracing poles here, there and everywhere.  Even I have been up to the top level (ie roof height) and felt perfectly safe.  (I did suggest that a couple of deckchairs would be useful and then we could have our own Jubilee celebrations up there.)

Actually, speaking of Jubilee, when I was last up there on Sunday I discovered, hiding between the ends of the rafters and presumably having been there for goodness knows how long, a rather splendid Union Jack, although it was a bit dirty.  I wanted to hang it from the scaffolding but OH wouldn't hear of it.  I shall wash it, and then I might take pictures.  Very appropriate for the day, though, I thought.

How's the weather with you?

To have or not to have. That is the question.

So.  Tomorrow we have the opportunity to vote on whether we, the people of Bristol, would like a mayor or not.  David Cameron and George Osborne have rushed down here to tell us to vote yes.  This instantly makes me think no.  I have watched the shenanigans with Boris and Ken.  This also makes me think no.  We have no idea whether a mayor would be good or bad, but  it is a step in an unknown direction, which also tempts me to think no.

But Bristol City Council has been consistently rubbish for the last, oh I don't know, millennium so maybe I should think yes.  Maybe anything is better than what we have now.  Look, we should have had a leaflet telling us about this election but have we had one?  Er, no.  But a lot of people in north Somerset and south Gloucestershire have had one.  They haven't got a vote on this, but Bristol City Council  (in its usual fashion) has cut corners and opted for the cheaper Royal Mail option which is to deliver the leaflet to ALL people with a BS postcode rather than selected postcodes actually within the city.

This is just indicative of what Bristol City Council is like.  There is never a majority so all decisions are compromises.  They have utterly failed on transport, schools, etc, etc.  Surely anything is better than what we have now.

But that is not a good basis on which to decide whether you want someone with vast power to rule over us for FOUR  years.  And so far no-one even knows what candidates there might be to vote for, which makes it even less appealing.

Okay, so that seems to be me decided.  Anyone want to change my opinion?