Another good day!

but just as busy as yesterday!

I'm now another step closer to being ready to go in a fortnight. Today I have seriously de-cluttered the boat and been ruthless with what goes in the black sacks. I've also cleaned out the stove, blacked it and pollished the copper kettle that hangs above it, (that made it rain typically!)

Now I'm settling down for the evening to ready myself for the week ahead....

Another quest for the best caption!

I have created another caption picture for fun on my main Khayamanzi website. Access it here. I know this one isn't directly canal related but it is water related and the picture struck me as being quite funny. I have so enjoyed the previous 2 captions that I want to keep it going periodically.

Penultimate weekend

Next weekend will be my last weekend at home before leaving the following week! That made this week my penultimate weekend at home before my summer trip! Busy, busy, busy as I attempt to get Khayamanzi ready to go. You would think living aboard it would be a simple case of untying and starting the engine but I like the boat to be in good order before I leave for distant places.

This morning I took a trailer load of 'stuff' to the tip; things like my old fridge, my old door to the railway shed as well as a load of marina rubbish. I also accompanied John into town to get a summers worth of hayfever drugs, some more crickets for the lizard and spare light bulbs for the boat - oh the glamorous life I lead!!

My return and the rest of the day was spent mending a set of drawers that have fallen apart, mending my back step in the engine room, topping up the batteries, stocking up on cans of petrol for the generator, cleaning out the lizard tank and touching up some rust spots with rust killer.

I managed to feel good about myself this evening as I ticked off 5 jobs on my 12 strong list of jobs to do prior to the summer - and then promptly aded another 4!!

More to do tomorrow....

Next weekend is set to be even busier as I have Simba booked in for his summer grooming and nail clip at 9.00 on Saturday and then the car booked in at 9.30 for them to look at a very irritating and loud exhaust rattle that has developed. The week ahead sees me with very late evenings on several nights. I have induction day on Tuesday where my current class al go off to their secondary schools and I get to meet my next years class for the first time. In the evening is our open evenings so that prospective parents to the school can come and 'grill us' and parents of children in my next class can come and 'test me' to see just what I'm like!


On Wednesday evening I'm meeting with a guy, (another Andy!) who worked for his father building the marina here at Brinklow and is involved in the restoration of a steam loco, (a real life large one!) He wants to come and pick my brains and for me to help him set up a simple website for the project. Obviously this is a fascinating project and I am only to pleased to be able to help - I might even ask him to keep me in mind for a ride when the project is completed!

Thursday, and I have the year 6 leavers disco to run and on Friday we have our staff summer 'do' where we say goodbye to any staff leaving as well as herald the advance of the summer break!

I will leave tonight with a picture that my father took whilst I was in France. It's the back end of a grumpy Simba who now has a new green trellis to enable him to enjoy the fresh air on the pontoon without him escaping and causing general mayhem around the marina!

BW Reply - gee thanks!!

So today I received a reply from BW as follows.

Hello

I’ve had a look at your file and can see that the only other option for you would be to pay for your licence over the phone with your card details, that way we could get the licence out to you sooner. However I see that you pay over instalments so you may not wish to do this.

If this causes problems every year clashing with your holidays/boating the best thing to do is to buy a 3 or 6 month licence now which would change your renewal date. By doing that we could take a card payment over the phone at the Customer Service Centre for 3 months (£228.43) or 6 months (£391.61).

Please ring me at Customer Services on 0XXXXXXXXXX (my direct line) between 8am to 4pm if you wish to pay over the phone and I will do my best to get it processed as speedily as possible for you.

Kind regards

Jean Hicks
Customer Service Advisor
Customer Service CentreBritish Waterways

Now I could pay for a 3 months licence and then start again but that would mean paying a higher price for one year plus all the hassle of cancelling the existing DD and then setting one up again in 3 months time. Is it really so impossible in this beaurocratic age to issue a licence a month earlier given that the DD has ben set up for the past 7 years and pretty much guarantees the payment?

Nope - my stubborn side says why should I go to all the trouble ; I'm the customer and they provide the service I pay for. Sorry but I will be cruising with a very blunt note in the window, (as per the previous years,) for the first month or so of my new licence.

....and the fridge is struggling but still working! Mind you, we're all struggling at the moment. Fortunately Simba has been well catered for in the marina but the back cabin read 43 degrees when I returned home today. I am sitting here with the A/C on full and directed at me and it is still having trouble getting the boat below 27 degrees at the moment. I took the A/C unit into school today so my class now really like me! (I have to do somehting to gain popularity in the world!) I have told them that I will only bring it in each day after I review their behaviour from the previous day - devious and blackmail it may be, but it's effective!

Are we drifting towards a dictatorship?

It's not often I get political - I hate politics; in fact, I hate anything even vaguely political but I have an observation.

In what appears to be an increasingly desperate bid to stay politically popular in preparation for any future elections, it appears as if Gordon Brown and his labour crooners are drifting towards a dictatorship. Two examples:

1. I hear tonight that teachers are to be given an MOT style test every 5 years and kicked out if they fail. We already have procedures for incompetent teachers but only after layers and levels of support have been tried and failed. Surely that's better. Instant dismissal after a single failed 'test' is extremely draconian at best.
2. Watching the BBC London programme this evening I discover that anyone protesting against the Olympics are be be arrested and prosecuted during the Olympic Games. Even displaying an 'anti Olympic' poster could land you a fine of up to £20,000. The police have been given extra powers of forceful entry in order to gain access to any building that displays or is involved with any form of Olympic based protestation. I seem to remember huge discussions on Human Rights being had over the Beijing Olympics - it seems we are none better. I'm not normally on the side of the Human Rights bods but this one seems a step too far!

I wonder what will be next in the steps towards dictatorship. Ridiculous laws on drinking and boating imposed by Europe perhaps, laughable health and safety regulations insisting on dangerous bollards at locks and lethal 'guard rails' - who knows where this increasingly downward spiral might lead us?

BTW the fridge is working fantastically at present! This evening I even had a glass of apple juice that waso cold it burnt my throat as it went down - now that hasn't happened for years! The thermostat is set on no 3 and it holds consistently in the blue 'fridge' section of my thermometer, even in the 38 degree heat that my classroom registered this afternoon.

I notice that Andrew Denny has blogged regarding licence renewal. Well it is my annual battle with BW again. I pay for my licence by Direct Debit so the system is automated and I need do nothing but read the form, check the details and sit back and wait. The problem is that my licence expires end of July. The new licence is due to be sent out automatically around 15th July. I break up on 17th July and vanish immediately for the summer. Very close and quite likely that my licence won't get to me in time given that it is sent to my London address and then needs to be forwarded to my school by my father. A whole summer of cruising with an expired licence on display and many waterways officials at sites such as Harecastle and Standedge to explain to - quite apart from the scouring looks and audible 'tut tuts' at locks. I phone BW and explain. "Sorry", comes the reply, "the system is automated and there is nothign we can do". POPPYCOCK - press a button somewhere and help this law abiding licencee to remain within the law and BW rules please.

If my licence doesn't arrive on time, I would urge everyone to phone BW and report me - if they can't be bothered to help, then let's waste their time and force them to be more co-operative in the future or I will have the same battle next year and all future years!

Fridge - part 2!

What great people in this marina! I got home from work tonight to discover that Norman next door had Simba running up and down his pontoon with his dog to keep him cool in the shade of his boat and used my dog gate to keep the 2 of them under control and John and Eric had not only collected my new fridge but installed it for me as well - all I had to do was change the food over and lift the old one outside the boat!

I am now the proud owner of an LEC fridge as seen above and on this page!

It is now cooling down, (or trying to in this stifling heat and humidity). My only worry now, (as pointed out by John,) is that I am running both my fridge and my small freezer from the same cable. I am a little concerned that this may have been the cause of some of my previous failures and the fact that the compressors failed to switch off. I am sure many people more wise than I will confirm, (or hopefully otherwise,) that this could be a problem. The fridge seems to be cooling down at the moment and the freezer spends most of its life shut with only occasional door opening and so the compressor rarely runs on the freezer; this makes me suspicious that it could cause a problem but the large note on the instructions saying "over 90% of service call outs are due to incorrect cabling sizes" makes me worry that I might be trying to get too much magic fairy dust through one small wire!

Anyone know anything about this and can advise?

I slept last night with the air conditioning running. Having shut all the doors and windows and shoved the exhaust pipe through into the engine room, the back cabin quickly cooled from a sultry 26 degrees to a more respectable 18 degrees and I slept wonderfully, only stirring to pull the covers over me at around 2.00am when I got chilly! This evening it is still struggling to get my saloon down much below 22 degrees even though it's running flat out!

A text from my father in London ths morning simply read "41.2 in the sun here! Dad" You should try 36 energy obsessed 11 year olds in one small classroom after an hour of playing football at lunchtime - I would guess that I quite regularly reach that! (Why is it that they still have to be forced to take jumpers off?!)

According to my accordion teacher this evening, I am 'back on track' after almost a month of no lessons due to meetings, courses and French trips. Ah, French - on Thursday we have our French reunion evening involving cheese and wine for the parents; funny how that't the best attended event in the school calendar!

The weekend needs to see me pollishing the boat, topping up and checking the batteries and tidying the engine room, cratch and just about every cupboard on board in readiness for the trip north in a little over 2 weeks, (that sounds better than just under 3 weeks!)

Fridge!

Well, I got home this afternoon to discover that my fridge was around 15 degrees and all the food had gone off! I knew it was playing up. My old fridge gave up the ghost and this one was given to me by Eric when he upgraded. I don't think I should have scraped the ice off with a kitchen knife! My suspicions are that the gas has escaped and I've punctured it somwehere. John is going to get me a new one tomorrow and hopefully this will be one expensive mistake that I won't repeat.

My PDA software is popping up error message everywhere as I discover more and more software that doesn't register and is operating in demo mode. Tomorrow I have several phone calls to attempt and unlock various bits of software before my upgrade is fully complete. Why does nothing ever go simply!!??

3 more weeks before I break up and in that 3 weeks, I have to cram in more than I care to think about: leavers discos, sports days, induction days, first aid days, transition days, annual hike, open evenings, reports out, meeting my new class, saying goodbye to this one, teacher assessment levels to be entered and submitted, QCA results to be analysed, Sats results to be analysed and normal teaching and parent pacifying in between!

My summer route is now decided upon. Up through Harecastle, pick up my father north of the tunnel, head up through Standedge tunnel, over the Rochdale, (breaches permitting,) and back down again. Unfortunately right up and over the L&L looks just a little too optimistic for this year so the Bingley 5 rise will remain unconquered!

A very mixed day!

Well this post comes from London - piggy backing courtesy of my father's lodger's internet connection! Woke up this morning with the anticipation of driving down to London for a 'show'! It was a surprise planned for Fleur so I couldn't say too much about it before but now I can confess publicly to the world - we went to see Britains Got Talent - the 2009 live tour! Very sad I know but great fun and something very different. Here is a grainy mobile picture, (yes mobile and camera pictures/videos were allowed!) showing Stavros Flatley bringing the house down!

The disaster of the day was discovering as I pulled out of the gate from the marina to embark on my daily adventure that my CoPilot Live software has yet again let me down and refused to migrate over correctly to my new handset. The programme works but all street level mapping data stubbornly refuses to be found. The technical helpline is closed for the weekend and emails appear not to be unanswered out of office hours. Thanks ALK technologies. The software is great but if considering it - don't expect an easy ride in any technical support or issues of upgrade. I have spent the day 'fumbling around' trying to find my way about and now have to attempt navigating through all the Warwickshire back roads tomorrow to find my little shortcuts that get me home again.

A very frustrating day tempered only by the enjoyment of the show this evening. I shall leave you now, (before my laptop batteries die completely!) with a little grainy movie of Diversity giving their final performance.

Good night!

Not an everyday sight!

Leaving for school this morning and I spotted a police car sitting outside the car park at All Oaks Wood. I slowed down and glanced as I passed and found that during the night someone had 'placed' a red van in the North Oxford Canal!

I did get some good pictures from Keith of the crane lifting it out but unfortunately I've lost them due to the next paragraph!!

I decided to upgrade my old HTC TyTn11 to a new HTC touch 3G.

Was it worth it? I'll reserve judgement on that one for a few days! It's certainly smaller and sleeker looking but comes with almost no accessories, the mini USB plug is different so I have to buy completely new chargers and leads and it has taken me hours and hours to set it all up again!

Rare sense!

OK, so our school gets broken into - we phone the police and several hours later a solitary PCSO wanders up the drive to 'take a look'.

My car gets vandalised and the police tell me 'it will be a waste of time to persue it'.

My father's camper van gets stolen and the police tell him it will be 'long gone and probably in another country by now'.

Yet this poor guy simply gives out leaflets inviting people to an Easter church service and gets this reaction!



Never mind your particular religious views, in a so called 'Christan' country, is it just me or has everyone else had their brains radiated out and I'm the last one left with any common sense? Why is it that common sense is becoming less and less common these days! I think it should be renamed 'rare sense' as of now!

BTW. Thanks Tony for pointing out that my lower lock gates are the wrong way round at Foxwood Lock - I shall change them this weekend sometime; just checking!