Tuesday 24 May 2016

Top tip for. Car cleaing

Top Tip for retirees - well anybody really . I cleaned the car with a pressure washer and brush BUT instead of using a chammy leather to dry the car I used a -  Karcher Window washer ! Had the car dry and streak free in no time.




I then cut the hedge and went to the tip , then to the supermarket , then cut some more hedge , then my neighbours hedge, My timing is out . I am on work Time speed. I need to get into retirement speed , its surprising much day there is to do things in.. I did four days work in one morning.

The tip was surprisingly busy. I was the youngest there .

Blast from the past


Me aged 0

In the days when cowboys ruled . I (the one on the left) have a homemade outfit whilst my cousin has a shop bought one , about sums it up. In fact thinking about it that was FELT. It was dark brown and the light colour was diarrhea brown. Looks more like the thing grandmothers wore with those frills down the front. Still the woollen Jumper goes well. Was it always winter?

 The worlds largest rabbit ? My family dont believe me when I say I had a giant rabbit . It was a canadian white. I got it becuase a women who worked with my mother at Chiltonian Biscuit factory said she had 2 rabbits that roamed about the house and garden when she was out. My mum said they aren't  the same sex are they ? Yes, replied the lady, but its Ok they are brother and sister - so I got a rabbit


Didn't catch this. It was on a scout camp near Bournemouth on a farm . Somebody caught it and we all took turns posing with it. Taken with my Brownie 127 camera. I saved up months to buy it . It was 27/6 and I got a shilling a week pocket money and I added in Birthday money . I had to wait another week to get the money for a film to put in it . Luckily my Uncle was into photography and developed the films for nothing. I dont normally wear a belt around my T shirt but I got this in the camping store and it was all beaded in Indian (Native American ) beadwork and was my pride and joy.



 Ah Schooldays. We were at the playing fields , mostly my classmates though I see some interlopers from other year so it must have been the inter house football match, Cant be though because there are several house colours on show here (I know its black and white but I know what the houses were). The light colours are yellow for saxon house , I am in red for Roman house then there is blue for norman and green for dane. I am the little one fourth from the right back row. I wonder where they are now ? Best to let the past go.



Me in my interview suit. My gran boughtit for me , taylor made at Alexenaders Taylors , now NEXT I think , note the waistcoat watchchain knitted tie and slanted pockets , with 6" double vents in the back of the jacket . Ready for the world .


Taken at work . Correspondence clerk (note dictating machine ) we even had a typing pool !! Could be a fearful place for a young lad or a distracting one .This was taken for the Queens Visit she was going to officially open the building and there were photos showing the happy staff at work . Didnt meet the queen she got sidetracked by Basingstoke council and I think the tree she planted died .


Another work photo , sort off. Men V women at football. In those far off days of inequality we (the men) were not allowed to shoot at goal past the halfway line. We were told to keep our hands high when we tackled. We had several matches like this and we lost them all. One of the girls was a ringer as her mum worked at the AA , the girl playing was a student PE Teacher and ran rings around the men. I think one of my colleagues is being wrestled to the ground having refused to give the ball back in a vain attempt to keep the score down.
I think it was in this match one of the girls raised her top so disorientating me that she went on to get a goal.
Actually looking at this again I think thats me on the ground being assualted while the PE teacher hammers another goal in. As I remember it the speactators saved several goals for the girls as well.

Fun but we never got to swop shirts.


I rented a Vauxhall Chevette !! For a day out at Longleat I think. I see I am wearing flares and rather natty shoes , must have been in an Elvis tribute band or Alvin Stardust , coo choo coo ca choo don't write songs like that anymore..
I didn't particularly want a Chevette its just what I got . I rented it because I rode bikes and didn't have a car . Rounded edges to the pictures ! That was in the days when you sent you pictures off to get them processed. They must have thought they had a job for life.

Monday 23 May 2016

Random


My sort of gadget it doesn't require electricity . does not break down or ,require servicing, It is functinal well thought out and  does exactly what it says it will do on the packaging. It is a magnetic fridge magnet ,come beer mat ,come bottle opener - ah bliss.


Must clear out the garage one day but I cant possibly disturb the cat.


Curiosity killed the cat they say , definitely intrigued here but this is a cat with a water fetish.


and one for boxes
I asked this cat to move I think its deaf

Easing into retirement

Today I had a day off. Tomorrow I have a day off. A little glimpse of retirement ? I had set today aside to put some lino down in the bathroom.
I have taken every Monday and Tuesday off until I retire .this leaves me with a certain lack of pressure in not having to get a job done. I looked at what needed doing and thought I will do that much today , that much tomorrow and those later .This is how I will spend my day a bit of this and a bit of that doing what I want.  Don't get me wrong I am married . I cant leave a job 'unfinished'. The bathroom is all back together the lino laid and the bathroom usable BUT there are jobs to do but I can plan them I can take my time and I can do them until they are the way I want them. .
 I went shopping for some DIY stuff. The Staff outnumbered the customers so I was able to ask questions like how come it says £3.98 on the label and £7.19 at the till? I am wary of having a go at staff unless they are obnoxious. After all they work there they don't make the stuff so I tend to be polite. However this particular store and I have a history of products that don't quite do the job . products where only their pipes , joints and connectors seem to fit their products and where the price at the till doesn't match the price on the label.I am always told that someone must have put it in the wrong place, So when a different price came up  I said That  is not what it said on the rack.
It must have been in the wrong place, replied the lady on the till .
I took her to the 'place' and demonstrated thatit had not been put back by a careless customer but was labelled wrong, I demonstrated that none of the label matched the codes and therefore the prices were incorrect or misleading.
 I got the item for £3.98 but that not the point it happens to often. I went back this afternoon nothing had been moved.
I went to a Builders Merchant  that had sealant on sale when I got to the till they wanted £6.87 . I protested as the shelf price was £4.87  and they said that is the price if you buy 3 !! But the discounted price was prominent the lower price which was the actual price was in small script.

I have some putty in the garage , there is a place for traditional products. It was a bit hard. A drop of linseed oil some very satisfying kneading and squeezing and it was all usable again. You cant do that with silicone sealant!! My uncle was a painter and decorator always smelt of his trade ,it was an indefinable but pleasant smell evocative like a new car smell, So the smell of putty or linseed oil imediatley takes me back to my childhood and Christmas when he would turn up with the sort of toy nobody else ever bought , a shooting gallery one year ,all enclosed in a clear plastic hood with pressed tin targets that spun and a gun that fired ball bearings , another year it was  clockwork tank that deposited circles of Talcum powder on the carpet every six inches when it fired the gun.


Sunday 22 May 2016

From our correspondent on a roof in the outskirts of Melbourne


Mainly here I was wondering how I would get up and out of the chair . There was a point where I gently slid down the roof to have my progress arrested by my brother in law grabbing me , I was heard to say "Dont touch me ! I am English"




 New years eve, where after some light libation my brother in law said that though we could not drive into Melbourne to see the celebrations as we had both had a tot or two we could see it from the roof .
I look a lot more confident than I feel. The white spots in the distance are fireworks over Melbourne.


Second visit to Aus for Christmas 2013 Just to show why you have to go


Great Ocean Road, Not quite what I expected , my son in law said it was dangerous and needed caution so I envisaged this long lonely road with hardly a soul on it , parts where only a single vehicle could pass with the wheels on the very edge . None of this is true . It is such a tourist attraction that it is basically one long traffic Jam. The danger comes from people watching the view and not the road. My pictures belie this but then we couldn't photograph where it was busiest .


I had an Australian workmate many moons ago who wrote a humorous intro to Australia together with some Australianisms and there translation . One was flat out at Bells. This isnt Bells . I saw signs for Bells but when I suggested we stop my wife said we needed to push on at it was just another beach , so here is a picture of a beach we did stop at and have to ourselves. No I cant remember what it was called but they are all this good so stop where you like.
















Thursday 19 May 2016

My Son


 My son possibly the reason he left the country . He did not have any pan stick so used poster paint . It was days before he finally removed all traces of the white face ..



Cleland Wildlife Park


 This was where we stayed in Adelaide , You will notice it is raining . I didnt think it rained in Australia the first of many assumptions I was disabused of. The hotel was in this street. This was the older part of Adelaide behind me was all the new stuff.


Ed, or Fred or someone , a friend of my daughters took us here , it is a viewing station above cleland wildlife park. There are also more mountains in Australia than you think, well then I thought , in fact the snowy mountains were about it . This is another set. Glorious views. In fact Aus is prettier , wetter and greener than ever I did think. I love Aus.


 The kind lady working in the viewing station and gift shop was concerned when she found we planned to walk to the wildlife park especially as my daughter was wearing flip flops she made it sound like a trek throught the himalayas and insisted on lending my daughter her boots



It wasnt actuall at all difficult and I think flip flops were enough however DONT do it the other way unless you are really fit. I saw several heart attacks pass me going the other way . Most gasped "is it far to the viewing station ?" They looked pretty desperate.


Adelaide and district


 On top of the world well the lighthouse in Port adelaide


 Mainstreet port Adelaide


My daughter uses her skills to wait table in Glenelg


The wildlife park , the Kangeroos were so well fed they would not come to you , you had to go to them if you wanted to feed them'





There was an opportunity to hold a Koala but only if it came to you , this one did but I cannot find the photo.


More views from the lighthouse



The plastic men stick together