Monday 23rd January 12

Up early and got busy doing things... breakfast, emails..... and then there was a knock on the front door.  It was the head groundsman from St Johns College, with two gardeners, and their flat-bed truck with 3 HUGE slices of tree on.... asking me if I'd like them?   I jumped at the chance, and said I'd be out in 30 seconds to help.  Each lump was the buttressed base of a big lime tree.... a couple of weeks ago the college took down dozens of them, thinning the row of mature limes on Lord Mayors Walk by removing every other one.

So, each one took all four of us to lift, and I asked for them to be put in a place where I wouldn't need to try to move them.  The other trees had been taken to a field near Dunnington, where someone at the college was a happy recipient, and the amount of wood would probably keep his stoves going for decades!

A bit later, I tried to split one of the rounds just with my maul... but the wood is slightly spongy and it didn't respond at all.  So I chainsawed them into quarters, and then bashed these with the splitting maul, which worked.

I also did some clearing up in the conservatory, taking several trays of squishy pears out, and ready to take down the garden to the new compost heap.  I put another couple of layers on, but have more to take down tomorrow.

Gill had a hospital appointment to see if her arthritis can be dealt with, so I made a pasta and sauce (on the woodstove of course!) and Gill was pleased with this when she got in.

I did some 'house admin': sorting out our energy bills. I had read the gas and electricity meters on Saturday and phoned Good Energy and left a lengthy message but I phoned them today because they hadn't got back to me.  Based on meter readings on 21st January 2011 and last Saturday, 23rd January 2012, we have used 56 cubic metres of gas - 626 kwh, or 1.71 kwh/day.  Based on this consumption for last year, next year's bill is £107.94.  We use far more electricity, 1938 kwh, or 5.3 kwh/day, and Good Energy will charge us £362.62 for next year's consumption.  So, our annual energy bills are £470, which for a family of 4 is pretty low, although I'd like them to be lower! I will pay these bills by bank transfer soon.

Oh!  I got a postal delivery... of two bike tyres, not wanted anymore by my facebook friend Graeme, who has replaced his bike and had two new tyres spare.  One has a kevlar anti-puncture lining.  He didn't want anything for them, just the postage of £4.41; I sent him £5 via PayPal.

So, a good day, plenty of activity outside and plenty of 'work' inside!

Monday 16th January 12

A very quiet day, although as our youngest didn't go to school as he wasn't feeling well, by the afternoon he was back to normal so we had an hour of science lesson.

I did get out later in the afternoon and build some logpile, making a very attractive looking stack which when I've finished I may get around to taking some photos of, as I incorporated several split rounds in their original round shape.

But most of the day was doing things inside, including cooking potatoes for tea, making coleslaw, and later, boiling a large pan of beetroot and then when done, topping and tailing them and peeling them, prior to pickling some and making soup out of some. This took ages, as I estimate there were about 30 little beetroots to deal with...

Monday 21st November 11

Slept til after 10, as it was a long weekend and I didn't get to bed til 3am.

I rang Cycle Heaven about the Weber trailer hitch I asked them to get for me, and the chap said there was nothing on my records about asking them to order a trailer hitch.  He said it would be available in a couple of weeks... I protested, and he said he'd speak to the boss and see if things could be sped up.  Later, I got a message on the answerphone to ring them... and apparently they DO have one in stock, and will fit it tomorrow!  Brilliant, but a bit of a heart-stopping moment to think my trailer wouldn't be usable for a fortnight!

I did quite a bit of washing up, and wood stacking, and some composting, and later in the afternoon, because Gill was out, I made a nice tea.  Boiled spuds on one woodstove, fried leeks and onions on the other one.  Put the nearly cooked spuds into the leek/onion with the remains of the tomato soup stuff I made a few days back and has been in the fridge.  This I cooked up with some Marmite water (cleaned out an old jar with hot water) and whilst that was cooking on the stove top, I made a breadcrumb/pumpkin seed/walnut/goats cheese crumble topping, which I put on top and put more grated goats cheese on top.. and 20 minutes in the oven to crisp off the top.  This was ready just as Gill came in with our eldest, and it all went, and was appreciated.

In the evening I cycled round to Edward's for a York in Transition Directors' meeting.  Good to see Barry and Colin too, it was a productive meeting.

Home to jarring up pears and turning out the pear leather, halving, coring and peeling more pears for drying, and answering composting and wormery queries on facebook.

Tuesday 25th October 11

Long lie-in, such a peaceful house and such a late night last night.  My Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome is really kicking in without Gill around to make me feel guilty about being up and about at 2am or 3am.  I was doing things around the house til 3.30am last night, and slept til after 10am.

But I got going with my usual bowl of cereal and did the usual facebooking and catching up with emails, before lunch and then some chainsawing, as Mark Windmill my gardener friend had delivered some elder and probably Leylandii logs to me yesterday.  So I chopped, split and stacked all of them, and at 6 got ready to go to the Hull Road Ward Planning Panel where we had some interesting planning dilemmas to look at.

I made myself a cauliflower and macaroni cheese with garlic for tea, cooked entirely on the woodstove.  What a treat to have something so garlicky, as none of the rest of the family like garlic as much as me, so as they're away, I'll have a few things I like and they don't.

Edward came round to ask me to sign a few cheques for York in Transition, and gave me a set of papers to give to the Council, to allow us to access some grants we've been awarded.

Up til well after 3am pottering around and listening to music, peeling fruit for drying, etc.  

Tuesday 12th July 11

Quite a good day, got up early as was due into the Steiner School to move furniture at 10am.  I took in my composting stuff as I wanted to continue to sort out the New Zealand bins. 

When I got there Gillian was nowhere to be found but I spoke to a couple of people and asked them to pass my message on that I was available to move desks etc out of the office.  I went to get on with the composting.  A bit later, Gillian came to see me, and told me that the carpet people had said that the desks could stay in the office.  So I just continued doing the compost bin.

There were a trio of small boys playing in the front of the school, and I asked them if they'd be able to help me.  I asked them if they could build the brick walls of the finished compost area, and they happily went to get the bricks I showed them, and had great fun finding huge spiders, and carried up to 6 bricks at a time to the enclosure I'd started to make, and they got it to be 4 bricks high.

I worked til after midday, and got a big pile of the most wonderful finished compost, plus materials for the new heap, a good layer of sticks (chopped up with my secateurs) and uncomposted moss and other bits and bobs.  When I'd done enough riddling I chopped up a sack full of fresh fruit and veg materials I'd brought with me, and spread that on top, and on top of this, another layer of the vegetation which had been used to decorate the place last week.

But I wanted to come home for lunch, so I left and popped in to Alligator to pick up their resources.

Gill had taken the boys to Scarborough for the day, on the train, so I had a couple of quiet hours over lunch to catch up with emails and other messages.  I found out that the bottle of Port from David might be worth £100, and that there's an auction site which would sell it for me.  I rang David and told him, and he agreed that I could sell all of his Port via this Manchester-based auction house, and he'd split the money with me!  Exciting!

I lit the stove and did assorted washing up, and made myself some tea.... a tiny throw-away squash, half a huge onion and some cooked rice which had been in the fridge for quite a long time.  Fried this all up on the woodstove.  It was passable.

Then soon after 6 I emptied my trailer and cycled off to Tang Hall Library for the Hull Road Ward Planning Panel.  I'd not put a change of start time into my diary and the meeting had started at 6, so I was late.  But glad I went, as one of the new Councillors was there, Neil Barnes.  We had some interesting applications to look through, and we didn't finish til after 7.30.

I did a little bit more work in the garden after I got in, just an hour til 9pm, when I came in and had a fairly 'normal' evening for me!

Saturday 19th March 11

Woken by the phone and it was Richard, David's cousin, saying David's scan earlier this week had revealed something not too good, and he was therefore in hospital.  And therefore don't come at 4pm to work for David.  I may get time to go and see him in hospital in the next few days.

At about 11 I set off for the Steiner School for the financial interview for next year's fees.  As we only submitted our info a few weeks ago, the info hasn't changed and so our contribution is the same. 

I came back via the log pile just off Fulford Road.  I've found out the land belongs to the MoD and therefore they don't want the logs.  The treesurgeon took most of them, but because I spoke to them, they've left some for me.  So I came back with a very well loaded trailer, and did a bit of splitting and stacking, and later some chainsawing too.

I also did some cooking; I prepared some leeks and potatoes and an onion and stick of celery, and made a leek and potato soup which Gill and I had for tea.

At lunchtime I got confirmation that I'll be able to see Colin and Lucy next Wednesday after the Wipe Out Waste event, so in the afternoon I went to town to get my return ticket from Weston Super Mare to York.  I called in to Cycle Heaven as my front sprocket (chain wheel) is wearing down, which is why it's been jumping when I've pushed hard on it.  Also, my brakes are really not up to the job, and I find them very difficult to tighten.  So Ash tightened my brakes and said he'd order a stainless steel sprocket and replace the brakes with much better ones.  That'll be done next week when I'm in London.

I cycled on to the station and then on to Millers Yard and along the cycle track to home.

I popped round to collect more wood off Jamie, and met his wife Bernie. 

The leek and potato soup was lovely, had it with a couple of mini pitta breads warmed on a sheet of aluminium foil on top of the stove.

Gill and I had a game of Scrabble and I chopped up red peppers and put them for drying.  More yummy sweet paprika on the way....

Sunday 26th December 10

A really nothingy day... woken by fighting so went downstairs to see what was happening and got a thank you from Gill as the boys know that I don't stand for any nonsense.

But that was just about the highlight of the day... I did a lot of chatting on the computer, Scrabble, watching TV, and mid afternoon spent a couple of hours piling frozen veg on top of more frozen veg, and then stacking logs.  Nothing unusual.

My tea was almost the same as yesterday... parsnips and the last of the bhajis, (hurrah!) but this time I cooked the lot on the woodstove (hurrah again!).

Did a few jobs around the house, washed up, some tidying, bringing wood in, dealing with a wasp which came in on the wood, making toast (the boys supper), in front of the stove, that sort of thing.

I did some networking too, putting my real friend Ali, and new facebook friend Jody McIntyre in touch with  another new facebook friend, Dave Lupton, who does 'Crippen' cartoons. I like the way that Dave, who also does Sox cartoons, provides a written description of his cartoon so that visually impaired people can have the cartoon explained by someone reading the text.  I like this Green Party cartoon by Sox.. I also shared the link to a really good wildlife film called The Bear (shortened version, long version part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, and finally, part 9,)  sent to me by one of my friends.  So, much online stuff today.

Sunday 12th December 10

Quite a tough day, without Gilly around.  She rang before we got up from a payphone in the hospital, as her mobile was out of power.  Later, I rang the ward and then she rang back.  She had eaten and was feeling well, and awaiting some tests.

I made porridge for the first time in, well, decades, as it was requested by our youngest.  Apparently it was very good!

I asked the boys if they would go and buy some bread, cereal and goats milk from the Co-op, and with a bit of persuasion, they did.  Later I did a quick trip to Country Fresh where I got fruit and vegetables and 2 sacks of recyclables.

I had a short time on the computer and got a telling off from our niece for mentioning that Gill was in hospital, but I said that I'd not mentioned any gruesome details and it was the best way to tell people what was happening (and why I couldn't do several things I'd planned to do today) and also, the status privacy was limited to friends only.  She later apologised for her outburst, but I'm glad she cares so much about her Auntie. Maybe she doesn't realise that some people share all sorts of stories on facebook, like this sad and moving one.  I did get dozens of messages wishing Gill well, people saying that they were thinking of her, praying for her, keeping her 'in the light' and sending hugs, best wishes and all manner of positivity.  Let's hope it works!

Mid afternoon I told the boys they had to come off the computers to do some physical activity, and gave them ample warning of the time to get off by and said if they weren't off by that time, they wouldn't be allowed on after tea.  This worked.  We spent quite a bit of time with two spades breaking up the ice off the pavement in front of our house, and also Dave and Marion's next door.  I tried to get them started on the pavement in front of Ken and Di's but they weren't having it.  Several pedestrians walked past and thanked us, so we knew it was a worthwhile thing to do.

The boys then read quietly and I split a few logs and stacked for a bit, until it was too dark to continue.  Then I came in and sorted tea.  I fried sweet potato slices on the stove, and a large ordinary potato too, made a toastie for one of them and eggy bread for the other.  I had a thrown-away instant couscous thing someone gave me plus a (frozen) pastie that someone gave me, cooked on the stove.

At about 8pm I took bathwater upstairs for one of the boys and had a bit of a to-do, then realised I'd left one of the big cans filling up downstairs, and it had overflowed.  Not too badly though.  And then the sink wouldn't empty.  I couldn't find the plunger and my cupped hand wouldn't shift it.  I tried a wire, no joy.  Eventually I found a slim siphon tube which I slipped as far down as possible and blew hard.  This caused a black fountain to come out of the overflow.  So then I covered the overflow and the plughole as best as I could and blew hard... and bingo!  It worked.  A bit later I poured a load of boiling water down the hole to shift any grease and loose biofilm.  I could have done without this hassle today.

Gill had got herself a hire phone next to her bed (I think) and we all had a chat with her.  She'd had some investigations and nothing had been found, so she'll be released tomorrow, but will go in again as an outpatient soon to have more investigations.

So a really busy day, on the go most the time, and missed Gill... her company and her contributions to managing the house.

Wednesday 27th May 09

Another nice 'n' late morning, I'm loving these holidays, not having to get the little darlings up and ready for school.

So, up after 9 and phoned Pauline as there was an outstanding invite from her to go and cut up some old Xmas trees for her little stove. I said I'd be along later in the morning.

So got up and out of the house after 11, and zoomed over to Pauline with loppers and bowsaw to do a few minutes woodchopping, collecting a pallet from a skip for her, and a builders bag so she can turn out her fabric compost bin and refill it. Then I had a real coffee with her, and a very good in-depth chat. She is such a caring person, concerned about a mutual friend and discussing how best to help a complicated situation.

I arrived back home bearing a magazine called Living Woods which she has subscribed to, as she has dreams of owning a little woodland. It looks excellent! I look forward to having time to read it...

I sorted out the sacks of goodies I brought back from Country Fresh, including 3 big red peppers and about 17 big tomatoes. So I washed and trimmed the tomatoes, nothing seriously wrong with them, just some physical damage, so had to reject the equivalent of about 4 of them. The rest I added to a big saucepan with a finely chopped onion, 3 garlics (also thrown away!) and a stick of celery, and stewed this all on our faithful logburner. When simmered for half an hour, I added some basil and bouillon, and Gill whizzed it to make a pizza topping. Gill made pizza dough and then two pizzas.

Immediately after tea, I zoomed off to the Merchant Taylor's Hall in town to give blood. As I hadn't booked in, I had an hour's wait... perfect, just perfect for reading Living Woods, which I really enjoyed. And when the time came to donate, I managed to do my pint (?) in 4 minutes 56 seconds! Fast! And a fast cuppa and biscuit, I cycled home, finding a large willow log at St Nicks and naughtily lifting it onto my trailer. My puncture wound did not explode! I also picked up a couple of sacks from Freshways and was home before 9, feeling great.

Gill gave me some cake and a coffee and I settled down to try to write my last column for Community Care. I am very good at getting distracted, though!

Tuesday 6th January '09

Quite an early start, as taking our youngest into school at 8.30ish... cycling in was really cold but no ice on the roads, fortunately.

Had a busy morning.. lots of paperwork to do and admin which hasn't got done whilst the boys have been at home over the holidays. So registered to do my tax online and a variety of other things, including jarring up dried fruit. But also played some Scrabble on Facebook! Gill went for lunch in town with Alison and Melody.

Kept the stove going all day and toasted crumpets for lunch, well, part of lunch. The day went oh so quickly... and before I knew it, 3pm and time to cycle down to school again and pick up out little 'un. The Green Thumbs assembly about the Blue Peter Mission Nutrition Bring and Buy Sale is on Friday so chatted with Julia about when this is going to be practiced. fortunately I don't need to be there... just to attend the assembly.

I did a little bit of logpile management and came in to have tea... spaghetti and tomato/broccoli topping, all done on the woodstove.

Then off out to the Tang Hall Community Centre to facilitate the Hull Road Ward Planning Panel meeting... dealt with just two applications but it was good to be with Andrew and Stephen who are both more knowledgeable than me about planning matters. Carolyn didn't turn up... I rang her when I got back and she'd fallen asleep and missed the meeting. She was glad I'd checked on her, as she's usually very reliable and knew that if she'd fallen or something, I'd be able to alert someone or do something... although thinking about it, not sure what.

This meeting took an hour and I came home via the cycle track to pick up sticks for kindling and logpiles.

Boys finished a game of Yu-Gi-Oh and went to bed. I typed up minutes from last night's LETS meeting and sent them off.