So what have you done today..?

Got my first interview since being offered a job and having it pulled from under me in April.
Week after next in dat der London

 

Wonderland Arena 1991 for me
(When Charlie Says first came out )

 

Removed the two upper suspension ball joints from our VW T4 camper...ultra seized in place, but actually came out with less fuss than I expected. However it is one of those "right tools for the job" jobs...I bought a ridiculously heavy duty ball joint extractor!

 

Ha! Spent all day doing laundry. On account of something's wrong with the machine, which keeps failing with an error code that means it can't fill with water. Except that, initially, it can. On the 2nd fill, it fails. Though if you catch it before then - after it drains but before it tries to refill - if you pause it, open the door and fill it manually, the program continues.

However, this is manually filling with cold water, not at 30 or 40 degrees. Though I'm currently experimenting with the synthetics wash I normally use, I don't expect it to complete - to catch it before it fails you have to constantly watch it - what I've done already and expect to do with the current load, is run it 2 or 3 times through the rinse program. Because it's all saturated with detergent. Basically I'm trying to get it acceptably rinsed, which presumably takes longer in cold water and absent wash cycle rinsing.

I'm willing to consider it clean, when finished, because it's still got to be at least as good as beating against a rock beside the river.

This is the machine that they tried to deliver a couple of years back while I was in hospital, after I'd contacted them to tell them I was in hospital. Probably Royal Mail.

 

For some reason I can't read that without wincing.

 

What will you do with the spaniels when you’re in The Smoke all day?

 

Already been trying to find dog walkers and it’s not easy, they’re all chocka “for the foreseeable future”.

It’s a 50/50 hybrid role though so I could potentially do 5 mornings a week come home and walk them and crack on.

Have even been thinking about starting my own dog walking business. How hard can it be? A big fuck off van, some liability insurance and away you go.

 

...and all day long picking up shit. Like most jobs really

 

My former dog walker had to jack it in recently as she broke a finger, the Lister screwed up the treatment and it didn’t heal properly. Her fully kitted out van (proper canine transport crates, ventilation etc) is up for sale for not a lot of money, so drop me a PM if you’re interested. She might even be able to line you up with some of her old clients in order to get you started, although they’re probably all on this side of Herts rather than over your way.

 

Shits all the same in any job it's the depth that is the variable.

 

I’ve been rediscovering the immense sense of satisfaction that a proper paper Ordnance Survey map provides. After my phone took an unscheduled swim while fording a river on a recent off-road ride, leaving me with no sat nav or OS app, I decided that analog tech which had served humans perfectly well for millennia was needed as a back up for our decidedly disaster prone 21st Century devices.

IMO, there’s ten times as much enjoyment to be had from the sound, feel and even the smell of a proper OS map compared to squinting at your phone, constantly having to zoom in and out and navigating menus whenever you need to consult the key.

Joy

 

Is the map waterproof too?

 

I imagine I will find out at some stage, but even when soaking wet it’ll be a damn sight more useful than a dead phone

You can get waterproof laminated versions of the OS Explorer series maps and I do have one, but they’re a lot bulkier and not as tactilely gratifying as an OG paper OS.

 

This reminds me of being out mountain biking the other week.
We’d come down a bridle path onto a country lane near to where a large van was parked. It was a lovely evening and a few couples were wandering about. The vans number plate caught my eye as the numbers had been placed so to the eye it read JUST DOG. I assumed there was a professional dog walking business walking some pooches nearby. That was until we spotted a gent receiving a blow job
What’s wrong with people these days?

 

You can get maps on a type of cloth now. Apparently wind and waterproof

 

...but only for secret missions

 

Stitched into the lining of your trench coat along with a few sovereigns

 

Or on rice paper. On the bottom of a macaroon. In a Tupperware box. Which reminds me...