Fake 116

Another correspondent - in this case a hearty charity, in token of my being a warfarin person - faking up correspondence which has been prepared by a computer as if it were a genuine, cuddly person-to-person missive. A practise I find rather tiresome.

And another charity which seems to spend a good proportion of what little I give them on mail shots back to me. With this one having the added irritation of lots of bits of paper inside carrying my name and address, so in this careful age, paper to go through the shredder. And from thence to the brick compost bin at the bottom of the garden. And from thence, in due course, onto flower beds.

No idea whether this is, in the round, more or less ecological than whatever it is that the council do with the waste paper which we put in our green dustbin.

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2021/01/fake-115.html.

Liriodendrum

In Epsom town this morning, for an authorised purpose, although I did use the occasion to pay visits to Grape Tree and Waitrose to stock up on a few items of wet and dry grocery. And kippers - which, incidentally, were perhaps one third of the price of haddock. A smoke at a snip, as they say. Then on the way back, the liriodendrum of West Hill caught my eye, the one last noticed at reference 1.

Poking around in the flowerbeds underneath, I recovered three seed pods, about two inches long, about half an inch near the base, tapering to a point at the top. Pretty wet. There is a snap of the green pods at reference 2.

Back home, I found that the seed scales peeled away from the central core, two of which can be seen bottom left in the snap above, in a most engaging & clever way. A sort of mutant pine cone. We shall see if I can conjure any of the scales into life.

Then after lunch, our regular game of Scrabble, at which BH is improving, or at least taking more seriously, and is now winning around one game in three. Yesterday, by a considerable margin. So today, I was pleased to turn the tables, beating her by getting on for a hundred points, although the aggregate score was poor, something under 500. Particularly pleased with my coup of 68, achieved by getting 'quailed' to straddle two double words - although I did have to be firm about this counting four times.

PS: OED tells me that quail as in bird is a foreign word, that is to say French. Whereas quail as in fear is a proper Olde English word.

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/06/liriodendrum.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/08/wisley-themed.html.

Gammon plus

After the shanks on the Thursday, it was the turn of the gammon on Sunday. At least a cut of cured pork, weighing something over a pound and probably cut from a leg by the people who supply Sainsbury's. Didn't look much like either gammon or ham, but boiled up it tasted quite like gammon hot and quite like ham cold. Rather good in fact. Served with a light white sauce and boiled vegetables.

And followed by a mincemeat and apple tart. Served on the same sort of white and blue enamel as was used for the same purpose when I was a child, although this particular enamel is of Chinese origin from an outfit called 'Bumper Harvest', probably not around sixty years ago. And seemingly not around now, as according to Bing, the stuff now counts as heritage, with a rather more elaborate sample snapped above at Etsy of reference 4, the people from whom I bought my woodworm infested ladder, noticed at reference 5.

The whole taken with a bottle of the Pierre Précieuse I came across at Terroirs and noticed at reference 1, something more than eighteen months ago now. Reduced to buying the stuff direct from Guildford at the moment, Terroirs being presently inaccessible. See reference 2. The people who did us the Christmas hamper noticed at reference 3.

What might be called a slimming Sunday, at least in appearance, that is to say without a Sunday roast.

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/05/alien-cheese.html.

Reference 2: http://lescaves.co.uk/lescaves-home.

Reference 3: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/11/wine-buffs.html.

Reference 4: https://www.etsy.com/uk.

Reference 5: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/09/ladder-nostalgia.html.

Lollipop man

I read this morning that our fat leader has told his Chancellor to tell us that he is not going to raise income tax, national insurance or VAT to help pay the huge bill for coronavirus. He is also the leader of the party of sound money, the party of Margaret Thatcher that does not spend more money than there is in the piggy bank. Or the cocoa tin, if that is where it is kept. Which two policies, taken together, strike me as bizarre, given that the three items mentioned account for two thirds of the tax take.

Is it all part of maintaining the illusion that we can have something for nothing? An illusion which may help the Tories to keep the red wall blue? An illusion which much of the media and most of our politicians seem keen to maintain. An illusion which is paid for by being in considerable debt to people like the Saudis who are sitting on great piles of money. Concerning which, curiously, I believe that the Prophet says that thou shall not lend money out at interest. See reference 3.

Or is it just that our fat leader can't bear to be the bearer of bad news? He needs to be the bearer of good news so that he can hear all those clapping hands. Perhaps he should be called the lollipop man.

Reference 1: https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/9178. The usually reliable source of the snap above.

Reference 2: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/11/footing-bill.html. The last outing of this particular subject.

Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usury.

No.26 (provisional)

Following the frustrations about registration plate No.26 recorded at reference 1 and elsewhere, I think we can now make a provisional claim, pending the rules committee getting around to replying to my minute, my submission, on the matter.

Watching Wycliff (series 4, episode 3, 'On Account') this evening on the grown-ups' channel, that is to say ITV3, where you get all kinds of helpful advertisements of interest to the older viewer, I thought I glimpsed a No.26, a few minutes before the end of the episode. The camera did not see fit to go back to the car in question, so obviously an opportunity to try my hand at ITV Player.

First stop the Freeview timetable, which unlike some timetables I can think of, does not wipe events as soon as they are in the past, so I was able to recover series and episode numbers.

Onto ITV Player, which I did seem to have an account with, despite it having been renamed ITV Hub. Lots of stuff there, including what I wanted. And there was a fast forward feature. After spending perhaps 5 minutes watching advertisements with the sound turned off, it turned out that I had indeed seen No.26, snapped above. Not really worth stumping up the £10 a month or whatever they wanted to get the advertisements turned off.

A reminder that the unconscious brain was clearly on the case, even if I was not. I had not thought about number plates since our walk around Stamford Green earlier in the day - but the brain had carried on processing likely stimuli, even though the bit of my mind that I am in touch with was busy with poisoned baby food.

PS: as it happens, an episode that we knew we had seen at least once before. But only because BH and I both knew that we had seen certain shots before and we both knew, at various places, what was going to happen next, or what the significance of some clue was. No overlap though, with BH and I remembering different things. And no overview; no idea at all about the episode as a whole.

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2021/01/frustration.html. 

Bulkhead light

Following notice at reference 1, the new-to-us bulkhead light has now been installed.

First job, dig out the rats' tail file which came to us from BH's naval uncle and use it to file out the second fixing bolt, perforated but still stuck.

Second job, open up a circular hole in the back plate to take the supply. Wondered why the marked circle did not come ready made, with a plastic cover, in the way of the two holes which had been made.

Third job, remove relevant fuse, deploy the new-to-us ladder (reference 2) and take down the old light. The bar across the top does make standing near the top feel a bit safer. Uncovering a couple of quite large spiders who appeared to have bedded down for the winter.

New light installed in fairly short order, working first time. But I worry about the wires being rather close to the bulb, protective casings notwithstanding. Then it dawns on me why the chap before me had put kitchen foil behind the bulb.

Kitchen foil deployed and light still works. Hopefully it will absorb the heat for long enough to see us out - the previous foil having done for more than thirty years. But I dare say an electrician might pull a long face and suggest we spend several hundred pounds on having him install a proper light.

Then it dawns on me that the reason the light is called a bulkhead light is because it is shaped like a bulkhead, not because you fix it on one. And that bulkheads are the other way round. In which case one would used one of the two holes which were provided - left and right in the snap above - and the wires would be a lot further away from the bulb. Plus, cables coming in through a prepared hole in the bottom of the light casing much more sound from a water point of view than coming in through a hole that I have cut in the back.

That apart, the light looks to be well made. Solid looking, satisfying.

And it looks well enough with the cover back on, although the effect is rather spoiled by now knowing that it is the wrong way around. Not that the right way around would have worked in this particular location.

The next day, worried about the seal ring, which while sound was old, smeared vaseline all over it. Maybe that will help keep the water out.

So verdict, as in the previous post, fair. 

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2021/01/frustration.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/09/ladder-nostalgia.html.

Performance: fair

A slightly more serious operation than ours

During a large part of today, BT subcontractors were replacing a telegraph pole not many yards away, the telegraph pole from which our landline and broadband services are delivered.

Neither landline nor broadband services were available for most of this time.

Which is fair enough as far as pole replacement time is concerned, but the first we heard of it was when someone knocked on the door mid morning and told us services would be down for a couple of hours or so. Not clever if you, your partner and your children were all trying to work from home. Not to mention Grandma in her cupboard, playing around on eBay. O2, by way of contrast, send out texts to warn subscribers when they are doing a spot of planned maintenance, usually the day before.

At around 16:00, they knocked on the door to ask if services were back. To which the answer was landline no, Broadband yes. Some fiddling around. Still the same. Plug a widget with lights in the socket just inside our front door and some more fiddling around. By around 16:30 all up and running again. But if we had been out - which I grant is unlikely just presently - they would presumably have walked away from a landline which was not working.

None of the engineers - maybe four of them altogether - bothered with face masks when they knocked on doors.

There was some talk in the road of emergency pole replacement, which would go some way to excusing the lack of notice, although not quite sure how you have a pole emergency. After all, they are quite substantial. And thoroughly tarred. In any event, all things considered, not brilliant.

PS 1: the BT Broadband service is generally very good - as it should be as I believe I am paying well over the odds for it. See also reference 1.

PS 2: Tuesday: BT may not have given us any warning of pole action, but this morning BH found a bedraggled bit of A4 sculling around the wet road, which should have been attached to the new pole, telling us that a new pole had been installed and what we could do if we didn't like it. Which is not quite the same as being told before the event. With all of this being amply covered by Paragraph 75(2) of Part 11 of Schedule 3A of the Communications Act 2003, reproduced at reference 2. Performance make of fair unchanged.

PS 3: BH also reminds me that FIL used to have a telegraph pole planted in his front garden, to which BT had right of access. For this, he was paid the not so ample sum of £15 or so per annum.

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/12/more-bad-news.html.

Reference 2: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/21/schedule/3A.