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Two showers working, one more to go

I can confirm that tying the shower head in place with a J-cloth is not a satisfactory solution to a broken shower clamp. Fortunately, Rob the decorator was able to fit in a spot of handyman duties, and came round to sort out the new fittings after he’d finished painting for the day. I was very glad I’d called in a professional – not only did it require drilling through tiles, but he struggled to get the pieces to fit together and had to file them down to make them fit. But at least he had all the correct tools for doing so; it would have been beyond not only my DIY capabilities but also the contents of my toolbox.

While he was here, I also got Rob to look at the porch door, which was sticking badly. It turns out that’s because part of it was substantially rebuilt when I had the carpenters in over the summer. They replaced the rotten bits of the porch while they were here fitting the new windows, but it looks like the new piece of wood has swollen in all the damp weather we’ve been having. So Rob got out his electric plane and took off a slice of wood, and the door now shuts much better. Again, a job that I would have struggled to do without the correct tools. Sometimes, it is very useful to have a handyman on call, and he charges me an entirely reasonable price for sorting out these little jobs.

So that is the electric shower in the ensuite back to fully functioning order. I’m hoping the plumber will come next week to at least make a start on replacing and making good the built-in shower in the extension. With a bit of luck, I’ll have a full complement of working showers again in a few weeks……

21 09 2016 Gillian house Comments Off on Two showers working, one more to go Permalink

A Dorset Wedding

I recently spent a weekend in the depths of rural Dorset at the wedding of a friend and ex-colleague. I well remember that I was writing a bid with L, the bridegroom, whilst Christopher was extremely ill. So I was going into work each the morning, working on the bid, and then dashing off to the hospice after lunch to spend some time with Christopher. L was extremely supportive of me during that difficult time, and took on far more of the bid-writing than he strictly should have expected to. So it was really nice to be able to attend his wedding, and give him some moral support in return.

L now lives in a very rural part of Dorset, well inland from the coast, and organising a big wedding there required a lot of forward planning. It’s by no means a touristy part of the county (though the countryside and little villages are absolutely beautiful) so there wasn’t a single large hotel that they could use as a base for all their guests – who were coming from as far afield as Canada and Australia, not to mention the length and breadth of Britain. But there are a number of pubs in the local villages which all seemed to have three or four rooms above the bar, and the bride rang around all of them about nine months ago, and block-booked absolutely all the accommodation for miles around.

I was billeted in a recently renovated room above the bar of the Fiddleford Inn, which was so completely in the middle of nowhere that my taxi driver couldn’t find it! I was most definitely not impressed when he told me he “couldn’t quite place the village” – i.e. he was lost and had absolutely no idea where he was going! Fortunately, I had the phone number of the pub, and they were able to talk him in. However, it was well worth finding – it was a very pleasant pub, the recently-renovated rooms were very comfy, and the breakfast was good.

Shillingstone House, with the marquee to the left

Shillingstone House, with the marquee to the left

The wedding itself was held in the grounds of the local Big House. Not quite a stately home, but not far off, and with beautiful gardens. There was a huge marquee erected on the lawn, very luxurious wood-panelled portaloos on the drive, and a sort of bower in the grounds where the wedding itself took place. The weather was a bit dodgy – it stayed dry for the marriage itself, then as the bride and groom were signing the register the heavens opened and all the guests made a dash for the marquee. But it dried out in the late afternoon, in time for the wedding photos to be taken in the grounds, and the marquee was so well appointed that the weather was largely immaterial.

The bride has an identical twin sister, who was the chief bridesmaid. They really were astonishingly alike. In fact, the only way I could tell them apart on the wedding day was that one was wearing white, whilst the sister was in a similarly-styled dress, but in pink. Even their hair was styled the same. The landlady of the pub I was staying at said she too found them very confusing. Both the bride and her sister had been involved in organising a pre-wedding buffet and party at the pub on the Friday night, and the landlady was completely unable to tell which one of them she was dealing with!

The last formal part of the entertainment was a really impressive firework display, far better than many municipal displays that I’ve seen on Bonfire Night. I was a bit surprised that they’d chosen to have fireworks – L is ex-army, and many of the guests were currently serving or retired military personnel – and loud bangs are not necessarily a good thing in that company. I was talking to some of them at the end of the evening – one ex-soldier said it had reminded him of a busy night under fire in Sarajevo, whilst one of the women said it was more like being mortared in Basra! But they both seemed more nostalgic than stressed, so I suppose that’s a good thing!

18 09 2016 Gillian Day out
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Running out of showers

The best shower in the house is, or rather was, the one in the extension. It’s a mixer shower, built into the wall, and since we upgraded the hot water system to be full mains pressure, it made for a very good invigorating shower. Unfortunately, there was something of a design flaw with the mixer unit – in hard water areas such as this, the workings periodically got gunged up with limescale, making it very stiff to turn on and off, and also causing it to leak. I don’t mind the occasional dribble down the outside of the unit, but I recently noticed some cracked grouting which makes me think it’s probably been leaking behind the tiles as well. There are no “user serviceable parts inside”, so I couldn’t take the unit apart to de-scale it. When it got stiff, the only option was to put more effort into forcing the valve open – a practice that worked fine right up until the point that the metal control lever simply sheared off in my hand! Metal fatigue, by the look of it, and it left a nasty scratch on my thumb, as well as leaving the shower half-on, with no easy means of turning it off!

I eventually managed to get a grip on the remains of the control lever and forced the shower off – fortunately it was always easier to turn off than on. I looked out the instruction booklet from when it was installed, which had a list of spare part numbers, and called out my usual plumber to give me a quote for repairing it. That was several weeks ago, and I’ve been in regular contact with him since then trying to get it resolved. It turns out that, although the shower is only about 8 years old, the manufacturer has discontinued it and the spare parts are no longer available. I’m going to have to have an entire new unit. Plus the plumber will only quote for a straightforward installation. If, when he removes the old shower, he finds that there has been a serious and substantial leak, that will cost extra to make good. I’ve now given the go ahead for him to order the new parts, and I hope he’ll be able to install it later this month. Hopefully without too many nasty surprises.

It’s not been terribly urgent to get it fixed/replaced, because I’ve got an electric shower in my en suite bathroom which is entirely adequate for a few weeks use. Ok, it’s not as powerful as the broken one, but Christopher and I relied on it for years before we got the extension built, and I’ve been quite happy using it as a temporary measure. That was until the plastic clip that supports the shower head suddenly sheared off yesterday morning. I’ve tried to mend it using super glue, gorilla glue, and even lots of gaffer tape, but it’s well and truly broken and won’t hold the shower head in place any more. I’ve ordered a replacement shower riser rail assembly unit, which should do the trick, but it will require drilling through the tiles to put it up, which is well beyond my DIY capability. I’ll either have to get the plumber to do that as well while he’s here, or see if Rob the decorator will do an emergency mission to fit it.

So from this morning, I’ve been reduced to using the shower above the bath in what used to be Christopher’s bathroom. At least I’m fortunate to have such a wide selection of showering possibilities!  I’m being very careful not to even look at it funny, in case some critical piece of plumbing decides to spontaneously shear off, as I now have no further fallbacks…….. It has also made me realise that the shower curtains in that bathroom are beginning to perish, so I’ll have to replace those or else I’ll be risking a flood. 

Oh well. I suppose I could say “It never rains but it pours”, which is a pretty accurate way of summing up the current circumstances!

14 09 2016 Gillian status Comments (2) Permalink

Chinese State Circus

I rather enjoyed watching the Olympic gymnastics on the telly last month, so when I saw that the Chinese State Circus was in town, at the Malvern Theatres, I thought I’d treat myself to a standby ticket to today’s matinee. Normally, when I go to a Saturday matinee at the theatre, it’s full of coach loads of OAPs and I’m one of the youngest people there. Today was quite the opposite – it was full of families with young children and I felt positively elderly! There was one particular brat, aged about seven, sitting directly behind me who kept kicking my seat in an extremely annoying manner. I had to request her, politely but very firmly, to stop doing it, and fortunately that seemed to do the trick.

The show itself was very impressive. It was a mixture of dance, gymnastics, acrobatics, tumbling, juggling, Kung Fu, and even synchronised cycling. It was well choreographed and clearly very skilled, with about 30 artistes taking part in some breathtaking performances. It didn’t always go entirely smoothly – occasionally a juggler would drop something, or a tumbler wouldn’t quite get it spot on. But that just showed how hard the skills were, and they got a huge cheer from the audience when they tried the move again and nailed it. 

 During the Shaolin-monk-style Kung Fu act, with lots of excessive sword swinging, staff-lunging and athletic leaps, I was reminded irresistibly of the scene in the Indiana Jones film where Harrison Ford watches the display, then simply draws his pistol and shoots the guy instead! I wasn’t too enamoured with their act. There was also a rather irritating ringmaster/clown who seemed to be based on the Monkey character from the television series when I was a child. I could have done without him, though I suppose that his interventions gave the main acts time to change their costumes and catch their breath. Apart from the annoying Monkey King and the show-off Kung Fu monks, I found the rest of the acts absolutely gripping. It was a very enjoyable way of spending a Saturday afternoon.

10 09 2016 Gillian Day out
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Back at Fawlty Towers

My work seems to go in cycles, depending on what projects I’m working on. A few years ago, I was involved in an equipment trial down at our Hampshire office, and spent a lot of time staying at a hotel that could easily have passed for Fawlty Towers. But the last few years, I’ve been running a project based up here in Malvern, and have managed to organise most of the meetings at locations that are easier for me. However, all good things come to an end, that project’s now finished, and I found myself summoned to an early morning meeting on a new programme, down at the Hants HQ. Since I really wasn’t keen on another very early morning start, it was easier to go down the night before and stay at Fawlty Towers once more.

It’s been over three years since I was last there, and it seems to have had a something of a makeover or refurbishment in the mean time. I was put in a room I’ve stayed in many times before, and it had certainly been redecorated and looked much fresher. However, there was no armchair, only a horribly uncomfortable desk chair, the shower pressure was still as crap as I remembered it, and the sound insulation between adjacent rooms was still dreadful. So not all good news.

The restaurant still boasts that it’s by Marco Pierre White, which given all the tabloid fuss about his family recently isn’t necessarily something one would want to boast about. But I’m still unconvinced that he’s done much more than look casually at the menu – he certainly had nothing to do with the cooking of my burger and chips, and the chocolate and passionfruit mousse sounded a great deal better than it tasted. However, it was a perfectly adequate stay, in one of the few places that’s moderately convenient for the office HQ and meets the tight cost constraints that the company dictates. I suspect that I’ll end up staying there again, should this project take off. Oh well.

07 09 2016 Gillian Day out Comments (1) Permalink

Catching up with the news

Through complete coincidence, I’ve had a bit of a binge recently catching up with Christopher’s friends and family and getting up to date with the news and gossip. First, I had my annual lunch with Peter, Christopher’s stepfather. Peter goes on holiday every summer to visit some friends of his in the depths of Wales, and his route takes him practically past my front door on his way there and back. So we try to make a point of meeting up for lunch at a pub, at either a comfy country pub if it’s a weekend, or one close to my work if he’s passing by on a weekday. This year it was a midweek visit, so it was the option within walking distance of work. The pub’s not brilliant, but the food is filling and not too pretentious. We had a good chat, and Peter was able to give me good news of Christopher’s Tree – it’s apparently healthy and thriving. 

On Sunday I got a phone call out of the blue from some of Christopher’s university friends, a married couple who were the first of his friends that he introduced me to, and who came to our wedding. I’ve not seen them for ages – I suspect not since the funeral in fact, and I wasn’t exactly in the mood to chat at that point! But they were just an hour away, visiting some mutual friends in Wales, and they too would need to pass by my house on their way home, so was I around if they called in for a cup of tea? It was really good to see them again and to catch up on far too many years of news and gossip. I was a bit shocked though to realise that their son, whom I first met as a tiny baby, has now finished university!  It’s quite shocking how time flies……

30 08 2016 Gillian status Comments (1) Permalink

Cucumelon Bonanza!

Cuthbert's harvest

Cuthbert’s harvest

Cuthbert the Cucmelon really has come good. After several weeks of not producing anything, he’s now heavy with fruit. This is the first harvest of mini-fruits, and there’s at least as many again that should be ready by the weekend. Mind you, it was necessary to stand on a chair to pick them – he’s grown that much! I love the colouring and marking on them; they do look just like little watermelons.

I think my lunches at work this week are going to include a small handful of cucumelon. That’s rather a satisfying feeling.

25 08 2016 Gillian food
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Present Laughter

I’ve not been to the Malvern Theatres for a while, as there’s been a bit of a dull patch in their programme, with little that I’m interested in. This week though they did have a play showing that I particularly wanted to watch, so I used my theatre membership card to buy myself a standby ticket to the Saturday matinee. 

The play was Present Laughter by Noel Coward. I quite enjoy Coward’s plays, though the witty repartee gets a bit wearing after a while. However, the main attraction for me was that the lead role was played by Samuel West, the son of Timothy West and Prunella Scales. Sam was a friend of Christopher’s at Oxford thirty years ago. They were at different colleges, reading different subjects, but were both members of the university archery club. In Christopher’s case, that was because archery was one of his major pastimes and he was pretty good at it. As I understand it, Sam had already decided he wanted to be an actor, and joined the archery club as he thought that being able to handle a bow and arrows would potentially be a useful skill to have on his CV. So Christopher taught Sam to shoot, and thereafter watched his acting career develop with interest.  Quite often, we’d be watching some middlebrow documentary on the TV, when Christopher would say “That’s Sam!” – he had quite a steady career at one point doing voice overs and narrations. I remember that we also went to Stratford to see Sam play Hamlet; not one of my favourite Shakespeare plays, but definitely an iconic role.  So Christopher would have fully expected me to make a point of going to Malvern Theatres to watch Sam, no matter what the play was that he was in.

I realised half way through the first act that I’d seen Present Laughter before, and that it was vintage Coward – and I don’t necessarily mean that in a good way. The witty repartee was off the scale, and the main characters were ruthlessly selfish. Sam plays an ageing actor who for some reason inspires devotion in all those around him. Women (and men) throw themselves at him, and he behaves extremely badly with tantrums, hissy fits, and casual affairs, all while taking for granted the unwavering support of those around him. It’s a light comedy, that at times got dangerously close to being a farce. It was snort-out-loud funny in places, and was certainly very well acted by the main leads who all seemed to be thoroughly enjoying themselves. 

I didn’t enjoy it as much as I’d hoped, but that was largely because several of the main characters were so unlikeable. But it was a pleasant enough way to spend a Saturday afternoon, and I was pleased to see that the theatre was nearly full. My standby ticket was quite a lot further back in the stalls than it usually is. I’ll continue to keep an interested eye out for Sam’s career, as I know Christopher would have expected me to. If he can play to a very nearly full house in Malvern on a Saturday afternoon, with coaches waiting outside to collect punters from all over the West Midlands, he can’t be doing too badly!

21 08 2016 Gillian Day out
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Cuthbert’s Offspring

Cuthbert's first cucmelon fruit

Cuthbert’s first cucumelon fruit

Cuthbert the cucumelon has been growing like mad, and producing hundreds of little proto-fruit about 1cm long with small yellow flowers on the end, like the one at the top left of the photo above. These then develop into small grape-sized fruits that look very like a small watermelon, as you can see. The trick has been to leave the porch door open for a few hours over the weekends to encourage insects to come in to pollinate the flowers. Since a couple of hoverflies took up residence in the porch, Cuthbert has started setting fruit pretty much non-stop.

This first fruit ripened over the weekend, so I picked it and tried tasting it. I can report that it tastes very like a cucumber, but a little bit “zingy”. It’s actually rather pleasanter than I was expecting, and I will be quite happy to eat the fruits in a salad. I’m expecting quite a good crop – there must be several dozen ripening away at the moment, and the potential for dozens more. But Cuthbert has got so huge that I’m going to have to get the step-ladder out to harvest him!

16 08 2016 Gillian garden
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A flying visit to Glasgow

My ongoing tour of British universities continues – this week it was a visit to the physics and engineering departments at Glasgow University. I’ve never been to Glasgow before, so I would have been quite keen to stay overnight and have a quick look around – there’s been a huge amount of investment in the city over the past decade or so, and apparently it now belies its somewhat fearsome reputation. However, it was not to be. I was accompanying one of our senior managers who was on a very tight schedule and was therefore squeezing the trip into a single day. Since he lives in Malvern and was able to give me a lift to and from Birmingham airport, I had no excuse to stay longer than him. So I was picked up at 06:00, had a full day of meetings at the University, and finally got back home, absolutely shattered, at 23:30 the same day. Talk about a flying visit!

All I got to see of Glasgow was the airport, the view from the taxi on the way into the city, and the immediate area around the main university campus. The latter was pretty impressive – the main hall has apparently been nicknamed “Hogwarts” by the students, and it’s certainly an imposing high-Victorian edifice. The engineering department was a very odd mixture of Victorian Grade I listed building with a hideously ugly 1960s extension – but the facilities inside were stunning. I was taken around a suite of state of the art clean rooms for semiconductor manufacturing, and they really have invested massively in capital equipment. I had to dress up in the full clean room paraphernalia to go in – moonboots, overalls, hood, gloves and face mask. The boots were particularly difficult to walk in if you’re not used to them, especially up and down the stairs! I don’t think I’ve seen a multi-storey clean room before, much less been inside one. It was very interesting, though I suspect the that once you’ve seen one “laminar flow cabinet” you’ve seen them all…..

I’m trying to set up a project with the university, and if we can get it all sorted out I will probably have to go back there to monitor progress. Next time I’ll try harder to stay overnight – it really is right at the limit of what can be achieved in a day trip.

11 08 2016 Gillian Day out Comments (1) Permalink