Today I shall be Mainly...

[Stanley]

You can laugh but I was a mean machine once of a day!
Today will be keeping warm, looking after Jack and making sure I am ready for another bout of storms coming in!

[Marilyn]

My son once drew his granny with an enormous head, half inch stick arms and 12 inch long legs. Considering he was less than three foot tall at the time, I imagine all adults had long legs to him.

Had Febby's grand kids over this afternoon. The girl turns eleven shortly and is quieter and more sedate of late. The little boy was his horror self. We all sighed with relief to wave him off....exhausted now.

[Cathy]

I recognised the Grandpa Stanley Doll straight away... well done Yiota!!

[Stanley]

Cathy, it's worrying, even I can see the likeness...

[hartley353]

Rude awakening this morning, The expected lie in wasn't to be, Mary wants to be out at the shops early. Now I can settle down with my new DVD's open a can of pringles pour the rest of a bottle of wine and just relax. Now it feels a lot like Christmas.

[Stanley]

I saw some footage of 'The Sales'... Beats me...
Butcher's Day and big question is what do I do with the stew pack of veggies that is drying up? I shall think of something! I shall put a new loaf in while I think.

[Nolic]

Off up to North Lancashire. Trying to avoid fallen trees and bad drivers. Nolic

[Stanley]

Wind is getting up but I know you will be careful... Get back safely.

[Sue]

Ah, a quiet day, the family gave gone back home, the house is back to normal and the washing nearly finished. We got up yesterday morning to find Julia had stripped the beds and all the bedding was in the washer. Now that IS a house guest.

[Wendyf]

Trying to get online! We keep losing our internet connection at the moment.
All visitors gone and I have been doing my little bookkeeping job today. Time to venture out in the storm and take everything back to the shop in Skipton...there is no where to work there so I bring all the stuff here.

[Nolic]

Avoided M6 and used A65. Some roads between Ingleton and Lancaster have been blocked but all tree's cleared. It was wild in Lancaster and East Coast trains have all been replaced by buses between Preston and Carlisle - that will be afun journey as M6 restricted to 50mph all through Cumbria. Not good especially when idiots do not drive to the conditions. Nolic

[Marilyn]

Hubby spent the last six hours putting together an Ikea Cupboard for my Utility/ Laundry.
Looks terrific, but the instructions were a nightmare ( diagrams with no writing at all )....and the poor love required about eight sticking plasters along the way ( for him, not the cupboard).
Have had to go around with a wet wipe to remove blood from various surfaces...light switch, washing machine, walls, door handle and the cupboard itself.
Quite an exhausting day really...love some of those Ikea kitchens but if it takes six hours to put one cupboard together...think it would be beyond our patience levels.
( gee...they have some wonderful things though. I managed to bring all of their catalogues home)

[Stanley]

Sounds as though the video would have been a best seller. Tell Febby that even us old engineers can be fooled. I remember being called in once to erect a pair of bunk beds by a lady who knew it was beyond her. I piled in and had almost finished when I realised I had got two essential parts confused and incorporated the top one in the bottom bunk. This meant pulling the whole thing apart and starting again. A valuable lesson! As I pointed out to the lady she would probably not have made that mistake because she's have been reading the instructions more carefully.
Just done my annual back up to two external drives. My data is safe once more! Now I can get on with the day!



Tripped over this. Thought I would post it to make sure everything is working in the new archive14!

[Sue]

Hmm, what to do today?

[PanBiker]

Taking Ruby back to Stratford, better day fir it today, AA road watch says just a bit of delay above the toll, we'll see.

[Sue]

Went to check dads house, three fence panels have been blown down, new windows leak so we have mould inside along one newly painted wall, toilet ceiling leaking agh!

[PanBiker]

Just got back from the round trip to Stratford and back. M6 southbound turned into a nightmare just the other side of Charnock Richard, queuing traffic, this continued all the way to the other side of Thelwall and the M56 junction. That stretch took well over an hour so we came off and headed for Stoke via the A50 and 500. Back onto the motorway which was clear by then and down the toll following our normal route. The go slow on the motorway and the detour for 50 odd miles turned the whole downward journey into 5 hours just about double what it normally takes to cover the 170 miles.

I noticed once we got back on the southbound M6 that the northbound carriageway was starting to back up as well. Traffic reports on the RDS car radio said that the northbound was queuing from junction 10 (around Birmingham) to junction 17 (Sandbach), only about 50 miles as the crow flies! Decision was made on the downward journey that we would not be using the M6 to get home.

We did the A46, M69 and M1 coming off at Wakefield over the top to Bradford and round the ring road to get home. There is only about 5 miles difference in the distance via M6 or M1 although the trek along the A650 on the latter is a bit of a pain. 3 hours though from end to end so not too bad.

[Marilyn]

Sounds like hell to me, Panny.
When we travelled from the depth of Cornwall to Ingleton in September, it took us almost 13 hours. Unbelievable...for such travel times in such a small country. We thought the sat nav was telling "porkies". Luckily we had checked the sat nav the night before so left at 5am the next morning in disbelief, thinking it may readjust itself at some point. I had a raging temperature/sore throat/ headache and all I wanted to do was lie down but couldn't because of the suitcases taking up most of the car. Awful day...

[Stanley]

I sympathise with anyone having to travel these days. Luckily I don't have any reason to do it. I have said before and will say it again, I saw the Glory Days of road travel. Barring wether I could forecast my journey time to five minutes no matter how far it was. The only traffic problem we ever had in those days was getting through Carlisle on the first Friday of Glasgow Fair when all the Scots were heading for Blackpool but that was when the main route was through the town centre.
Today is keeping warm, looking after Jack and enjoying my reading....

[hartley353]

We return to scotland today, no travel problems expected and the weather should be reasonable. Over the last 45 years I have never had a bad journey when traveling north, and once into Scotland and off the main road it can be positively lonely. The only downside is the upset tummy I can expect after a new year binge, I am fortunate to have never had a headache so hangovers aren't to bad.

[Sue]

We went into Manchester by tram today. It was our friends joint 70th birthday party down near the Palce theatre. Parking would have been about £9 for the afternoon, but as we live in Greater Manchester we could use our bus pass. It was 1 hour from door to door and free!

[Stanley]

Hiding away from the weather and the last dead days of 2013 as they slip away.

[Sue]

Today will be a quiet day, I have Brionys cold, so think I will sit in the warm and knit or read.

[Stanley]

Good plan Sue....

[Sue]

My cold is worse! This evening we are out to friends as usual for New Years Eve, hope I manage to hold out till midnight. This evening will be my last alcoholic drink for a month, a shame to waste it sipping hot lemons! Lol