Door #3

It's over a year since I painted the first internal door, and in that time I've only managed one other - the study door that long-time readers may remember was propped up on the landing for several months. No particular reason, except other projects (and life in general) got in the way.

I get the impression Nikki is keen for me to get on with it now. Or get on with something at least. First it was dealing the various bits of bare plaster and damp damage and now that's done, the remaining five doors are coming under scrutiny. Which is fair enough. I feel like I've had quite a long break from "home improvements," especially as we spent what little bit of summer we had tidying up the garden.

A few moments' head-scratching was required to come up with a workspace for this small project, which if I carry on and do each door sequentially I estimate will take about two months. The lounge door was painted in the lounge, before plastering, so clearly that's out of bounds now. I painted the study door in the dining room (wooden floors, a bit of sheeting, simples!) but since then we've bought two new arm-chairs which now occupy the painting space. Only one answer: the conservatory. Using that as a workshop will give me an added incentive to get on with the job, as it won't be long before it starts to get very cold in there. Autumn is, after all, just around the corner.

So I set myself up in there yesterday, took off the dining room door and filled/sanded the first side. It's not in bad condition - there are no cracks in the panels and only a few small gouges in the rest of the frame. Today saw the first coat of undercoat, and I'm always freshly surprised by the difference a single coat of white paint can make to the look of a door. If I stick to the normal schedule this one should be back up just over a week.

Shifters, shifters, there were never such devoted shifters

It was all hands to the pumps today to help the shifters... shift. The idea being that if each person took responsibility for their own stuff the job would go a lot smoother. Many hands and all that. 'Course the theory falls down when some of them can't make it owing to prior engagements, so we ended up wedging two lots of desktop kit and three people's boxes into the back of the car for the short journey to Cheadle.

Ironically, this was my first sight of Nikki's old offices. Having parked outside them virtually every working day for almost three years when picking her up, I'd never ventured inside. As you might expect from a small office in an old building, they looked very tired. The general demeanour was not helped by the empty desks, piles of boxes, and small heaps of detritus left behind when desks had been moved from positions they'd occupied for 30 years. But even looking beyond that it was clear that the offices would have been quite poky and dark to work in. Narrow corridors, old furniture, and very reminiscent of the kind of working environment I "enjoyed" for at least the first ten years of my career.

We dodged around the professional removals men who were taking the old desks away to a charity auction, and soon had the car loaded up and ready to roll.

The new place is a complete contrast. In fact I get the impression the amount of space has taken everyone by surprise. The phrase I heard most often after arriving there was "it didn't look this big on the plans." Which, you know, is nice for them all. Plenty of light, airy space. Brand new furniture. A newly-fitted kitchen (not yet complete when we were there, but with fitter beavering away), new phones, new network and, for those who had not had flat panel monitors before, all new monitors.

All this newness inspired Nikki to want some new desk accoutrements, so we headed off round the ring road to IKEA and wandered through the store enjoying the fact that we didn't have to rush for once. She found exactly what she was looking for: a set of two stand-up magazine holders and an in-tray (both called, confusingly, DOKUMENT), and we picked up a few things for our place too, including a pair of KASSETT boxes for the study. No amusing ikease names jumped out at us today, sadly.

A quick hop back to the business park, narrowly avoiding the Canada geese that have settled in by the lake, and an even more rapid assembly of Nikki's new in-tray and we were ready to come home and enjoy a midday cuppa. Our leaving was delayed slightly by the arrival of her new IP phone. We had a play with it before we left but disappointingly I was unable to find a CTU ring tone. An admittedly small drawback in the face of all the smart newness.

Curry mark 2

Not often we go out for a drink on a Friday night, but this was a special occasion: the last working day for Nikki and her colleagues in their old offices in Northenden. They're moving to posh new offices in Cheadle Royal Business Park over the weekend and have been clearing out almost 30 years of "archives" for the last couple of weeks in preparation for the move.

First stop: the Farmers Arms. Closest pub to the old offices and hence a favourite watering hole, until a recent altercation about something and nothing made the... er... decision makers of the group decide to take their custom elsewhere. I guess they must have put their differences aside in a nod to the long years' tradition for one last night. Two rounds here and then a short walk to...

Lounge About. A rather nice bar in the middle of Northenden furnished with extremely large, old, comfy sofas. What a brilliant idea. Sadly the choice of beer was only what you might call "bar standard" - Peroni, Sagres, an IPA, an Extra Cold or two, etc, etc - but in the end it didn't matter much, as we only stayed for one. It was soon time to move on to...

Jai Kathmandu. This "famous" curry house further down Palatine Road has been made legendary by tales from many of Nikki's colleagues, so I was expecting great things. At first glance there didn't appear to be a table free but once the manager recognised Bob, a couple who had not yet been served were moved over to a smaller table, and two large tables pushed together to accommodate eight of us in style. The advantages of being a regular, I guess. Little did the manager know that this was likely to be his last visit from this particular group (even though Bob did suggest the odd trip back, possibly for a Christmas curry).

On the evidence of tonight's meal I have to say I won't be joining them for that Christmas curry. Whether because they were extraordinarily busy - they'd initially told us to come back in an hour and even after seating us it still took almost an hour to be served - or because their curries tend towards Nepalese style, I don't know, but I wasn't tempted by anything on the specials menu and having fallen back on the old standby of chicken vindaloo I was served the most insipid example of that dish I've ever eaten (and I've eaten a few). It delivered only the merest hint of the vindaloo's traditional sourness and almost none of the heat. A real disappointment after the big build up. Their Peshwari nan left a lot to be desired too. Dry, burnt, and with no discernible sultanas. Tch! Strike one!

Curry revisited

Having made contact with a bunch of ex-colleagues last month, it appears I'm now "in with the in crowd" again, and not long after that outing I received a permanent invite to their monthly curryfest.

Mates' etiquette was at the forefront of my mind when accepting this month's invite. Left to my own devices, I wouldn't go every month, but since this was the first "non-special-event" invite, I felt it important to establish my credentials, as it were, as part of this small fraternity of curry lovers.

As it happened, the restaurant we'd used last month - Garlic Spice - was closed this evening. Unclear whether this is a temporary outage or a more permanent demise in these credit crunchy days. Either way it meant we had to choose between the other walkable options which, I was pleased to discover, numbered at least three. After a brief debate we opted for Eastern Revive, only a couple of minutes walk in the opposite direction and one which, a short Google revealed, is very well reviewed and liked by the locals. This was obvious from the moment we walked in. Not only was the place surprisingly busy for a Thursday (and also in view of the aforementioned crunch of credit) but we were welcomed fulsomely and a table large enough to accommodate the seven of us assembled before our very eyes.

Having never tried, or even heard of, Chicken Silsilla before last week when Nikki and I made an all-too-rare trip to Chorlton's marvellous Asian Fusion, I was surprised and delighted to find the same dish available here, and persuaded two of the others to join me. The meal was of equal quality to that enjoyed at Fusion, and the conversation flowed so freely we were still sitting chatting when the waiters collectively cleared their throats at 11.15.

Book review: The Book Thief

August's book club book - The Book Thief - is a hugely bestselling, award-winning, and well-reviewed account of the events that befall young Liesel Meminger during World War II after she is orphaned and sent to live on Himmel Street with foster parents Hans and Rosa Hubermann. The book is narrated by Death, who despite his stereotypical depiction on the cover art, insists that he doesn't have a skull-like face, or a scythe.

The Book Thief is undoubtedly well-written, in a literary way. As usual with literary works it has almost no plot to speak of, but meanders its way pleasantly enough through Liesel's few years on Himmel Street. There are no spoilers here (unlike in that Wikipedia entry linked above), but several things conspired to dull my enjoyment of this book to the point where it ended up on the metaphorical pile of those I've read and ended up thinking "so what."

So much of this novel seems cynically designed to appeal to lovers of literary work. To make it stand out from the crowd, rather than concentrating on its story. The device of using Death as narrator adds nothing to the work, and Zusak's depiction of Death has none of the humour of Pratchett's Mort, and none of the chill horror of the traditional Grim Reaper. He's just a sad old gatherer of souls, disinterestedly looking upon the lives of those he waits to collect and enjoying only the faintest and most occasional glimmer of excitement when he comes across a story like that of the book thief. How apt. Because only someone with an equally boring and monotonous existence could revel in this tale.

Even the descriptive passages and figurative language felt calculated to me. Calculated to elicit the maximum effect from the literati as they ooh and ahh over each new turn of phrase. 'Tears like wire', 'hair like splinters (or twigs) brushed away from a face with a wooden hand'. As if the author pored over his work groping and grasping for an original way to say something and - yes - finding it, but in the end, so what? Mostly they stuck out like the points on barbed wire, scratching my eyes as they scanned the text.

One or two of the characters stood out - Hans and Rudy are probably worth mentioning - but overall I couldn't develop any empathy with any of them until the last 30-40 pages, by which time I'd long since written the book off. I'm not a huge fan of WWII literature in any case (see my February review) so in the end this was just another heap of meh. I gave it 5 out of 10, but in the group discussion it gained two 10s and a good smattering of 9s, so don't take my word for it.

An absence of being moist

Ever been irritated and satisfied at the same time? I finished those small (re)decorating tasks today, finally. So the irritating part is that small jobs like this (I reckon all three areas we're talking about here add up to no more than 25 square feet) need just as many individual visits - stain stop; replastering; two coats of paint; and, in the case of the study ceiling/walls, additional days because the ceiling and walls can't be done on the same day owing to one or other edge being wet - as a much larger project. Which means just as many brush- and roller-cleaning events too.

The satisfying part should be obvious. We now have a kitchen ceiling that doesn't stare balefully down at you with its one plaster eye (albeit the painted part is slightly whiter than the non-painted part, but that's only temporary), the landing doesn't look so much like a building site, and the study doesn't have that mouldy, mottled, bubbling aspect of something out of Skellig's shed. Result! It's only taken a week.

Or two years, if you count the elapsed time.

More Stupid Signage

While we're on the subject of signage at the Wildlife Park, the last photo of the day on Monday was this one - a sign displayed on the fence beside the gate leading from the final animal area to the shop.

Now I've seen some rip-offs in my time, and dealt with some tightwads, but this really took the biscuit. For a start, there are signs all over the place telling you not to cross the barrier, so the chances of finding a peacock feather on the path must be fairly remote, but to then expect visitors to hand them in, and then pay two quid - TWO QUID!! - to get them back again.

Well, it made me laugh. You know, on top of the £11.50 we'd already paid. Each. Which includes a £1 surcharge for their charity. AND signed the Gift Aid declaration so they can claim the freakin' tax back. It's a damn good job we had a voucher allowing one of us to get in free. The one paying the lowest admission price, naturally. So I said to Blythe, even though she qualified for their child rate, she could blimmin' well claim to be an adult, and then at least we could save paying £11.50 for her rather than saving £8.

That made all the difference.

An ass among asses

It's often said that the law is an ass, and while we were at the Wildlife Park yesterday, we saw signs all over the place reminding us of that very fact.

No smoking in any part of the park, they said. Anyone wishing to smoke must leave the park. This is, I'm sure you'll appreciate, an OPEN AIR wildlife park. Sure, there are buildings. Restaurant, shop, animal houses, but these areas are outweighed many times over by the paths, walkways and open-air enclosures.

Now I've never been a smoker, and it's true that I've been known to rant against inconsiderate smokers in the past, but come on. This is taking persecution (and the letter of the law) a bit far. It seems they've classed the entire park as one huge "place of work" and banned smoking everywhere. So if you feel the craving, you have to step from one section of open-air path to another, through a small metal barrier.

I didn't see anything preventing the smoke blowing back across the barrier. I think they need another sign warning anyone standing in the vicinity of the barrier that they might be at risk.

These Animals May Bite

First day of a week's holiday yesterday that I've taken off to spend some time with my lovely daughters. It's great having them around the house, but when I'm working our chats are limited to lunchtimes and snatched conversations around a teapot while it brews our latest cuppa, so I wanted to take advantage of my extra holiday and have a week where we could all relax together without the distraction of earning a crust.

Since this is a British summer the weather forecast for the week isn't brilliant, and when Nikki happened across a leaflet for the South Lakes Wild Animal Park we knew we'd have to go early in the week if we wanted to avoid being rained on.






The usual crop of giraffes, rhinos, lions, tigers, penguins etc were entertaining enough, but the real fun of the day came from listening to our fellow visitors. See the lemur shots up there? As you can see, most of them are ring-tailed lemurs, but casually draped in the grass on the left side is what may be a red ruffed lemur. One knowledgeable young man informed the rest of his family that this was "probably an orang-utan," while his grandma remarked that the huddled group of lemurs "looked like refugees."

Climbing up the steep slope past the flamingo pond I overheard one guy ask if his group wanted to come see "the flamencoes" and I almost tripped over a mother entreating her toddler to "stay on the path, or you'll be eaten by a wild animal." Poor kid will grow up never remembering why she has a life-long dread of zoos.

But the best comment of the day came from the mother taking a photograph of her son standing beside one of the rheas which were wandering loose on the path outside the main aviary.

"Smile Jeremy. No, smile like a person."

Being Moist

When a friend of ours recently stated categorically that he wanted to be moist, I thought he'd lost his mind. Being moist has been nothing but trouble for us since we moved into this gaff. In his case, however, he was after playing the part of Moist in any potential production of Terry Pratchett's Going Postal. Whereas in our case it's a question of too much rain and leaking showers.

Since we first had those problems, the roof has been fixed and so has the shower, but what we're left with is some damp damage to the decorating in the study, and a small area of replastered kitchen ceiling that's a bit of an eyesore.

The damage in the study comprises flaking paint on the ceiling above Nikki's chimney breast, together with some slight lifting of the plaster on the vertical surfaces just below, so the first task was to scrape back all the loose material and paint it over with some "stain stop" solvent-based paint.

There's no evidence (in terms of damp smells or watermarks) that this area is still being moistened on a regular basis, but I know from experience that damp stains are tenacious buggers and will bleed through regular paint unless special measures are taken. I've had good results with the stain stopper before, so I'm sticking with what I know works.

Since the plaster damage extends over quite a large area I've invested in a tub of SmoothOver along with the relevant toolset. Parts of the kitchen ceiling will also benefit from a liberal application of this jollop (the bits where our plasterer hadn't taken as much care as usual owing to us making the mistake of admitting we'll be having the whole ceiling replastered at some stage), and while I'm at it there's those large cracks around what used to be the bathroom door, where the jobbing plasterer subcontracted by the World's Worst Bathroom Fitters didn't give a shit and slapped his mix on the minimum possible area to qualify as "his job."

Hard to believe that one small tub of ready-mixed Polyfilla could be so versatile in fixing three of the niggling little jobs left over from some of the major works of the last two-and-a-bit years.

The Lull

Haven't been blogging much lately because tbh there hasn't been much to blog *about*. Ironic really, that I could be on the brink of a life-changing event, but until something happens on that front everything seems somehow quieter and flatter than usual.

Sure, I've had another couple of rejections arriving from the queries I sent out before #44, but as you might expect their pain is massively dulled by the knowledge that someone, somewhere in New York City, is reading my manuscript.

I've half expected a second request for a full or a partial to arrive on the heels of the first, which would be doubly ironic. The rules of querying would forbid me from sending it to anyone else while it is being considered by the first requester. For that very reason I've suspended sending out any more queries for the time being, although there are still 14 out there that I'm waiting to hear back from.

Visit UKwriters

I have joined this place though. I came across it via the blog of one of my recent commenters (thanks Laurence!). I know received wisdom is that it's good to join a writers' group but doing this IRL never appealed to me overmuch. Writers as a breed are solitary folk sitting in garrets sharpening pencils and staring out of windows waiting for inspiration, or crouched over their keyboards with semi-maniacal stares illuminated only by the soft glow of a desk lamp and the reflections of their monitors in their wire-rimmed spectacles as they bash out another best-seller. They don't do groups. But they DO do virtual groups, so this could well be perfect.

Query No. 44.

I'm going to have to stop checking my email immediately before bed.

It was incredibly hard to get to sleep last night after that pre-nocturnal check revealed the words:
Thank you for your query. We read it with some interest and would like to see the full manuscript.

Yes, after 43 attempts ended in total disinterest (we're not taking on new clients; this isn't the kind of thing we're looking for; we no longer take email queries), someone finally wants to read my book.

OK, it's a bit early to be breaking out the champagne, but to be honest I feel like I've already had three glasses.

Odds of Evens means a sure-fire loser

We sped over to Nottingham at a snail's pace this morning (owing to the M1 roadworks, which have now reached new heights of ridiculousness) for a long-delayed visit to my Mum. We haven't been over since the weekend before her birthday, which is in March, but to be honest we've (I've) been putting it off. These visits are becoming more of an emotional ordeal with each tick of life's relentless clock. With a rapidly failing memory, she hardly ever has any news for us, simply on account of her not being able to remember much of what has happened, and so has fallen back even more heavily on her stock of extremely well-worn and oft-repeated phrases in lieu of real conversation.

This time around, even my standard levels of dread were insufficient to set expectations for the new depths this visit would plumb as I embarked on the pointless task of relating our news. I say pointless, because it's obvious even during the telling that most of it will be forgotten moments afterward, but there is, clearly, no other option. We can't sit it in silence for four hours.

One of our snippets was that I've recently hooked up with my cousin Joanne on Facebook. Now it's hard enough explaining the concept of Facebook to someone who has absolutely no interest in the Internet, and pretty much no concept of why anyone would want to spend time on it, but I'm used to having to dish up copious quantities of modern-day cultural scaffolding to shore up my stories so that wasn't much of an issue. I was totally unprepared however for the complete lack of recognition on my Mum's part for the name 'Joanne'.

"You know. Jacqueline's daughter."
Blank stare. Slight shake of the head.
"No, I don't know who she is."

We had some photos of Nat's recent Belize trip on our iPod/Phone too.
"Here's one of Nat with a boa constrictor round her neck."
Short pause.
"Who did you say this was?"

But this post isn't really about Mother And Her Failing Memory. To counteract the stress of these visits we occasionally treat ourselves to a pub meal on the way home.

We initially intended to stop at our favourite journeying watering hole - the Dog & Partridge at Dunford Bridge. Home of the UK's finest fish supper as well as an extensive range of main meal alternatives and a good supply of fine local ales. However, since our last visit to the Dog, we have sampled the delights of...

... the Bull I' Th' Thorn just outside Buxton; scene of much hilarity (not to mention temporarily misplaced tempers) during Annie's birthday weekend. Nikki had had a hankering for one of Graham's meat pies for a few days, and casually dropped the stone of the Bull into the calm millpond of our chosen eatery just as I'd thought everything was all settled.

As usual, the final decision was left to me.

"Why do I have to pick? I always pick."
"Because I'm not bothered which one we go to."
"Neither am I."
etc.

I didn't know which one I'd end up heading for until we set off back home, at which point I plumped for the Bull. Mainly, it has to be said, because the sun had broken through the mid-afternoon cloud, and I fancied a leisurely drive through the rolling hills of Derbyshire in preference to the "same old same old" aspect of the trans-Pennine route.

Bad decision.

As we approached the Bull from the south, we were almost upon it (in fact I'd already started indicating to turn into the car park) when we noticed both entrances were cordoned off with dayglo orange barriers, and the camping field next to the pub was awash with multicoloured canvas. One of Graham's famous biking rallies? A camping weekend organised by a group WAY more into tents than the Chorlton Players? Whatever it was, the pub was clearly closed to all but the chosen few, and our dinner plans were left as ragged and bloody as a piece of weekend roadkill.

A few hundred yards further up the road we tripped over the Duke of York, which proved to be *almost* the equal of the Bull in terms of comestible quality, and what's more served up a cracking pint of Robinson's. Result!

Can there be anything more satisfying...

...than sitting in one's study while working, and hearing the strains of one of your favourite albums of all time coming up from downstairs, because it's being listened to by your daughters?

Well, I'm sure you have your own list of "most satisfying moments," but this *definitely* qualifies as one of mine.

It's like... passing on the baton of prog rock enjoyment to the next generation. What a pity there are so few contemporary bands with the musical prowess of those great 70s icons to create new stuff that's equally as good.

*waits patiently for the denizens of bothbarson to hotly contest that last point*

That syncing feeling

Woke up to a little message from iTunes to say 8 tunes had not been copied because they couldn't be found.

Which, out of 1930 tunes, isn't a bad hit rate, but it still surprised me. I thought I'd sorted everything out. Turned out to be songs from my old "Caraoke" folders (yes, I know it's spelled karaoke. These songs were for listening to in the car. Geddit?) some of which I'd already spotted had been *moved* into the folders from their original locations, rather than copied. Don't ask me why; I must have been having an off day.

Anyway since the magic of playlists means I no longer need duplicates for the purposes of practising my karaoke warblings while on long drives, I'd decided I could delete the Caraoke folders. All three of them. Which explains the missing eight tunes. Damn.

Luckily they're all songs from compilation albums currently gathering dust in the top room. At some stage I'll need to dig them out and re-rip the missing tracks. For now, the other 1922 will just have to keep me going.

I'm starting to sync

Almost three weeks after I started on this tagging/album art business, I think I'm finally ready to go. To... you know... plug the damned thing in and let it rip.

The last item on the list, and easily the most tedious, was finding art for every single one of the tracks that I'd called "Singles" and Paul had lumped together as "Tunes." Removing the duplicates, listening again to the Tunes I didn't recognise, airbrushing some out of the picture, and deciding whether to go with a grainy scan of the original single's cover, or the album sleeve the track is from, or just some random picture associated with the artist.

But now, it's all done. And I'm syncing fast. Well, as fast as iTunes can manage, which looks like it'll be done sometime in the early hours of tomorrow.