Daydream fund challenge part 4

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

Disturbed somebody helping themselves to herbs from the front garden windowboxes this morning.

I've never wanted to yell 'Gerroff my laaaaand!' so much as in that moment. I settled for quietly opening the window directly above their head and asking in my Grandmother's voice 'What exactly do you think you are doing there?'. They left over the wall rather quickly.

Maybe I should replace wild carrot with something else in the family.

Davesnave

:hello:Hi Folks....just signing-in to prove I'm still alive....

It's been a busy week or two with the main bit of progress being the installation of a new drain and a soakaway at the east end of the bungalow, finally connecting-up our en-suite to the system and getting the last bit of roof drainage sorted.

So, no more diggers in the garden!!!!:jWe also managed to lose most heaps of naff sub-soil and some stones. When I say 'lose' they're now in the front garden, so I just need to convince Pete he wants them. He's doing some major landscaping, trying to stop river erosion at present....which is handy.

In other news, the garage was prepared to give the car an MoT, but not to do repairs it needs, as these would exceed its value. (It's high pressure fuel pump, EGR valve and new exhaust for the technical ...about £1500 worth of parts!:eek:)

We're off to look for a newer one. We always buy older one-owner, low mileage well-serviced cars and run them till they hit a big problem. I have my eye on something 11 years old with 11 service stamps, only 40k and a tow bar for under £1300, but we'll have to be quick!

Is that a cuphea in your pot, maggie?

Davesnave

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

Maybe I should replace wild carrot with something else in the family.

Wot, like hemlock, perhaps? :eek:

Davesnave

alfie_1 wrote: »

so no grand "turn on ".... :rotfl:

Never mind. You can turn-off yourself for a while now on holiday. :beer:

Our builder and his wife left for Oz yesterday. Their worldly goods left a few days ago in a container, so they were camping-out in their rented house. :rotfl:

We collected their bed, fridge etc yesterday morning, so everything they still had is now in the van ready to go to the[STRIKE] tip[/STRIKE]recycling facility.

What a huge adventure!

DaftyDuck

11 years old and £40k? Wow, Maybach with a towbar? DB4 pickup?

If I ever sit down at my "real" computer when I'm neither exhausted nor having to do "real" work, I'll do an update on progress and failures... The former will take a minute or so, the latter will, no doubt, need a full tea pot!

ukmaggie45

Davesnave wrote: »

Is that a cuphea in your pot, maggie?

Yes. I've grown them here before, but haven't for a few years as everything on the patio got eaten by the rabbits. Apart from the mint. The purple verbena has done well too, though after yesterday's rain and wind it's looking a bit bedraggled today. You can't see it in the picture, there's also a low growing creepery plant with very pretty red flowers, can't remember the name of it. When you get up close it has tiny stripes on the outside of the petals. The 3 different plants came as a collection from Sarah Raven.

The trouble with keeping plants on the deck is it can become something of a wind tunnel when wind in some directions. We think our decking area will be a lot smaller next year when the new van arrives but I'm sure we'll manage a few pots again.

Davesnave

DaftyDuck wrote: »

11 years old and £40k? Wow, Maybach with a towbar? DB4 pickup?

Slip of keyboard altered.

Anyway it had gone. Went last week, which is doubly annoying, as I got up early, ready to drive to the West Midlands. :mad: I've been mumbling "Ooooh...sorry about that!" in my best Brummie voice all morning.... :wall:

One of the the few bad things about this part of the world is that it's a long way from places where cars are sensibly priced.....:(

greenbee

I've just had the tree surgeon round to quote for taking out the dead weeping willow and ash, and doing a whole lot of other stuff. I now need to call the electricity people about shrouding the wires so we can take the willow out, and then we need to work out where the hornets' nest is... they are hanging around about 2ft up the tree so we assume there is one in there somewhere!

DaftyDuck

greenbee - have you tried UKPower Networks, or whoever your local powerline maintenance operator is, to see if they'll do the work for free? They seem keen to deal with anything that might ever cause problems around here. Last year we had their helicopters survey our lines and, a couple of weeks later, they asked to trim back a few trees on our land. When I didn't wave a shotgun at them and shout "buggrorf", they were so grateful to be able to trim back eight or ten trees, they then trimmed a few more for me, and logged the lot in half an hour. Those trees were a good distance from the power lines, but they were quite happy to oblige. They even turned up with a chipper on caterpillar tracks so's not to damage the fields.

We have/had hornets on a low roof near my back door. They buzzed around up there, and I buzzed around below, and we all got on fine. Then the roofer turned up (early), and I felt I had to remove one or the other, and the hornets lost. I felt really guilty; lovely animals and, so long as you know your place, no real trouble. However, I'd view it differently if I were up a ladder, bashing away at tiles a few feet above their flightline.

I'm sorry that was a typo, Dave; I rather liked the idea of you turning up at the tip in your modded Aston DB pickup, mouldy carpet nestling on the polished cherry dashboard and goat hide seatbacks!

Anyway, Summer's gone, winter cometh, something in between. Shows are mainly over, so we get to rest for the while. Breeding to start in a couple of months. Not too many, so we don't have to market any, for the while at least. All's gone well so far. My favourite lamb (this week; I change every week) has a poorly leg, but is the friendliest, and she catches sight of me from the far corner of the field, and comes hobbling across at speed. So, to save her the effort, I have to trot towards her, give her a fuss, and then carry her (39 kilos) to the side of the field nearest to where I'm going to be. Then I hobble off with a broken back. She'll get better, thanks to the part-time vet in charge.

Work starts seriously on the house in three weeks. Two large and one small wood burners go in, a new oil boiler, thirty radiators, and a zillion pipes. The thermal store(s) wait for next year, and we run the system "dumb" this winter. Then, when that's been done in precisely twenty working days, the rear porch and bay window come off, and the conservatory goes on, along with four temporary windows.

As if that's not enough to go wrong, the general builder who's going to help me sort out the mess the others make, was going through a tough time (separation and god knows what), and was running out of options. So, I've let him move onto the farm in a large caravan/mobile home.... I mean, what could possibly go wrong? No, please don't answer that. I know I'm a soft touch, but he's a nice guy (I think).

greenbee

I've checked scottish & southern's website - they'll do a 5-year trim (they did one 3 years ago) but not felling. I'll try though I'll still need the cables shrouded as he needs to work on another tree that is near them - they did a 5 year trim last time and it just grew back faster. If we take the right branches out it will keep away from the lines.

I'm hoping the hornets move out before the tree has to come down, as they're no trouble where they are. I usually find wasps aren't an issue either - as long as you know where they are and where they fly you can keep out of their way.

Good luck with all the building work. You may find it's no bad thing having your general builder on site in his caravan... he'll be handy for the odd '5-minute job' and hopefully suitably grateful and helpful.

Builder should be appearing tomorrow and hopefully we'll have a plan for the outstanding work plus a plan and dates for at least some of the downstairs work. I might have to start making some decisions on flooring... and doing some packing up of stuff.