30 - Broken sleep then up around 8:15am. . walked. Bare handedly picked up as much of the broken glass as I could, from where the loud drinkers from last night had predictably happily smashed their bottle all over the path. .returning along the roads on the way home, there were a couple of bits of paper blowing about on the floor. Ignored the first and then curiosity got the better of me and I picked up the next to have a look at what it was. Turned out to be a final BT phone bill for someone, saying the bill was in credit and a cheque was enclosed for around £120. Walked back and picked up the other bit of paper and sure enough it was the cheque!! Ugggh - guess I'll have to try and return that to the payee if I can. Because the account was being closed there was no phone number I could call, so I figured it'd have to wait until I could look up the address and figure out where across town it was . . ended up doing more pottering in the garden - all day!! I can't figure out how just messing around like that trimming a few things and re-potting some plants can be SO time consuming. Seems SUCH a waste of time. And then there's all that nonsense of having to continually water everything! The price of water down here is SO expensive, if it weren't for the rainwater butt, I simply wouldn't even consider it . . eventually PCd late afternoon and looked up the address on the phone bill .
walked with Sally in the heat across town,
eventually found the house (damn - needent have walked so far!),
knocked at the door and was able to reunite the cheque with its
owner . carried on through town. Tired and flagging in the heat a
bit, I treated myself to a can of Redbull to try and inject a
little energy into myself. Jeeze that stuff is expensive. £1.20
something I think it was, just for a little tin. You can buy
alcoholic drinks for less! No wonder the company have money to
burn, sponsoring all the big sporting events and such . . Sat in
BGdns on the top of my favourite gun emplacement for ages, just
watching the world go by again, smoking, drinking my redbull and
playing with the camcorder just a little. Made sure Sally was
comfortably hydrated using the small bottle of water I'd brought
with me, together with my 'custom dog bowl' trick. A plastic
freezer bag. Slips in a pocket so is like me not having to carry
anything, and when rolled into a shallow bowl like shape, is just
perfect for her to have a drink from. I've spent a lot of time up
there of late. Not a bad way to while away the hours, although I
never seem quite able to really relax and just enjoy it. Always
feel strangely kinda guilty and unsettled, as though I really
should be doing something else!? . . . ate pizza, a banana and a
Mum donated mini cheesecake. . touched base with BB . .ate bowls
of cornflakes . . to bed around 1am. s29 - Up around 8:30am. Very warm already. Looks like the forecast of a bit of a heatwave for this week is gonna be right. Seems like we've had a pretty good 'summer' already. . walked and carried on down town and bought a bunch more Nimh batteries in the covered market . . guitarred in the garden . . ate corned beef and mayo sandwiches, crisps and chocolate . .napped . . walked. As we passed his place, K said he had a bone for Sally which he'd leave by his car for me to pick up on the way back. Sat in BGdns for ages, just watching the world go by, although my favourite spot on top of the gun emplacement was occupied by a couple of rock-loving guys with a stereo, so it wasn't as pleasant or peaceful as it could have been, and then got worse when a small bunch of young people insisted on being obnoxiously loud as they proceeded to get (more?) drunk on top of the other nearby gun emplacement. 'Litter duty' in the morning I bet! . . stopped by Ks on the way back to pick up the bone, but it wasn't there. He'd left a piece of paper on his windscreen saying how a seagull had swooped down and made off with it!! lololol . . TVd . . touched base with BB . . ate salami and lettuce rolls, Mum donated jam tarts and chocolate . .to bed around 1:30am. s
28 - Back up around 9:30am. Overcast. . walked in a hint of light drizzle here and there. . sat in the conservatory having a coffee when I returned, I saw a movement out of the corner of my eye. No more than three feet away, having a look about on top of some recently moved oblong stone planters, was a (the?) mouse! It eventually disappeared from sight only to reappear a while later on the nuts. In broad daylight! Ended up attempting to film it all the rest of the morning, although the resultant clips sadly weren't really worth all the effort. . had to relocate a frog, out from under the drain cover again!!!?? I'm gonna have to do something about that to stop it being possible for them to get trapped in there, although I'm really not sure how on earth they are getting in. I SO want to have a pond in the garden again like I used to in Bristol. The area where the garden shed was, really would be perfect, depending on what may be underneath all the concrete slabs. I suspect roots from the nearby tree may be an obstacle - and I'm not sure I could physicaly cope with all the work involved any more!. . . ate two thirds+ of a huge Mum donated pizza . . napped until around 7:30pm . . drove to walk . .BB called breifly . . TVd/PCd . . knocked up the quick 'cloud' video . . touched base with BB . . ate the remaining slices of pizza and a mini cheescake . . to bed after 2am just before a heavy rain shower passed through. That's good - the garden needs rain pretty bad.
27 - Up around 8:30am . . walked in the heat . . totally out of character, Sally had a bit of a go at a small dog that came wandering by. Turned into a bit of an unpleasant scene - like she 'almost' meant it!!? To be honest, I rather suspect it was simply because the little dog acted wrongly (in 'wolf'/dog-body-language/behavior terms) and ran away from her yelping and snapping at her - which simply had her instinctively chase after it!! It's kinda like that sort of 'wrong' behavior gets an underdog attacked by a pack. Nevertheless, it was totally out of character for Sally, and extremely embarassing for me! The poor woman owner of the little dog was somewhat distressed and I had to go rushing in and grab Sally by the scruff of her neck and haul her away. I don't make a habit of it, but on this occasion I confess to slapping Sally across the muzzle before roughly leashing her back up! :o( . thankfully the woman took it all pretty well. . pottered in the garden re-potting yet more . . Mum called in with food donations for chats etc. . guitarred . . ate salami and lettuce rolls . . PCd/TVd . . touched base with BB . . TVd/PCd until bed around 2am. . hardly any sleep for hours because of restless Sally pacing around the house!? Back up around 4:30am to let her use the garden with a bit of an upset stomach. Suprisingly misty out. ss
26 - Up real late around 9am . . drove to walk. Stopped at the store on the way home for milk, tobacco and two pepperonni pizzas only £1 each! . . did laundry and pottered in the garden all day trying to sort things out a bit, in particular all the garden pots. I've pretty much deliberately neglected them all since I move in here, because there were just SO many of them. They really are absolutely EVERYWHERE. Figured it was high time I tried to sort though them all and maybe attempt to salvage anything which still hints at being alive by re-potting it. Unbelievably time consuming nonsense. With very rare exceptions, I reckon everything should be in the ground somewhere, just getting on with growing - not all potted up and fragile requiring constant attention! On top of that, I have absolutely no sign whatsoever of being remotely 'greenfingered' , and haven't a clue what plant is what. A few of the bits and pieces which may yet survive which I've re-potted, I strongly suspect are actually weeds anyway! . at some point I lifted the drain cover just to make sure it was still all clear and not threatening to block up again. Oh my god!!!!! Trapped down in the drain enclosure, sat on top of the metal grid was a frog. Poor little thing!!! All the outflow from the kitchen waste pipes was dumping down on top of it, and it had no escape!! Even the hot soapy water from where I was doing laundry was pouring all over it!!!!!! Frantically rescued it, and another trapped on the patio nearby, and quickly re-located them both to the dark relative safety of debris under the garden hedge. . pottered for hours and hours making seemingly no progress at all . . eventually called it quits for the time being and showered all the grime off. . checked mail on the PC and found to my great concern and unease that some 'cunninghamguy ' character had more or less copied the housefire video I'd shot, stuck it together with a copy of the news video from the local paper, and then re-uploaded them (as his own?) with some crappy backing music under the 'entertainment' tag!?? That got my back up quite a bit. Aside from all the other issues, it just seemed so pointless!? I ended up putting a 'restrained' comment on his video suggesting it was plagiarism, and 'why would you do that'? (What I SHOULD have done was put him in touch with that 'Pilgrim' guy who objected to the video in the first place on moral grounds! lolol) . Apparantly, although I didn't return in time to see it, this had the effect of him 'labelling' his video to reference back to the original(s). At some later point (either late tonight or early tomorrow), I received a message saying "TAKEN OFF YOUTUBE. I AM SORRY ABOUT PUTTING YOUR VIDEO ON YOUTUBE THERE FOR I HAVE TAKEN IT OFF " All very weird (I can't help but wonder if he actually took it down simply because the music he used was flagged as copyright?). Glad that is off my mind now. . .walked with the camcorder, tripod and my hip flask of red wine and sat in BGdns on top of the gun emplacement for ages watching water skiiers, fish jumping, seal, etc, etc, etc. Filmed a bit of a big storm cloud building in the distant sky over Torquay, with a timelapse video in mind. . . ate microwaved roast beef and left over potatoes, stuffing peas and gravy etc. . popped out in the garden at some point and would you believe it - what appeared to be the same two frogs from earlier had made their way back down onto the prison of the patio, and one was even on top of the drain cover (how on earth did it get up there?)!! Re-located them once again back up onto the higher garden. I'm gonna have to change something somehow or this is going to be an ongoing hassle! . touched base with BB . . TVd trying in vain, to avoid the unsavory saturation coverage of the Michael Jackson story. I think some of his music really was VERY good, but I fail to understand the bizarre reaction many people seem to have had to his death - and I really don't think the news channels should have devoted SO much time to it all. (Of interest to many perhaps, but surely not 'in the public interest' to be informed of all the minutia?) Why did the authorities release the 911 phone call? Why would people suddenly rush out and buy his albums cause he died? Why were people queuing up to have their smiling photos taken next to his Hollywood boulevarde 'star' and piles of bouquets? All very weird I thought - and somehow rather distasteful/unpleasant? a
25 - Woken by 'a bang' (next doors front door again maybe?) around 7:30am . . walked . . worked in the back garden all day trimming all the hedges. A 'major' trim, which will hopefully keep things in order for while at least. Too much debris for my bulging compost bin, I'll be having to do a tip trip soon. :o( . . ate Mum donated pizza with extra mushrooms, onion and cheese . . drove to walk. A gaggle of sail boats were out on the water but struggling to find wind and all kinda tripping over each other as they hardly moved.
'Western Lady
II' was moored up on the edge of the outer harbour! What's she
doing back? I thought they'd been sold off to private owners and
were long gone for good? They should never have got rid of them!
There's something about those original Western Lady boats. They
have a certain look - and of course their own WWII history. Don't
know quite why but even 'I' have a fondness for them (as do most
people in the area I gather) and I was glad to see it sat there,
albeit looking a little in need of a paint job! (Surfing the
local news site later, it appears the local ferry company has
somehow managed to buy her back (I'd love to know how much!) and
they'll be doing a bit of a refit and then she'll be back in
service in the bay. Yayyy. Quite right too. :o) ) . . bumped into
one of the dog walkers I speak to who'd previously told me about
how he's done some painting. I'd asked to see sometime, the album
of photos of his work he said he had. He had the album with him
and I was able to satisfy my curiosity. Oh my goodness! I'd
expected to have to 'just be polite' and offer appropriate praise,
but what I hadn't bargained for was just exactly how good his
works were! I think snobs of the artworld look down on people who
can 'only' paint from photos, but I have no problem with that, as
long as the finished painting is good. And boy, were this guys
paintings good! VERY good as far as I could tell from the photos.
Without question, he could make money from that talent if he so
chose, and yet he hardly ever picks up a brush any more
apparantly. . I ended up with my usual feelings of inadequacy
following such a chat. I wish I had a talent for something - just
something - ANYTHING!! :o( . . 'Charlie's Angel' Farrah Fawcett
died this day (of cancer of the anus apparantly!!!!! Of all the
things you can get cancer of, that sounds like a particularly
unpleasant one!!!! Be a real bummer to get that one!!!!) . . TVd
. . JK called to let me know Michael Jackson was dead! Really?!
Got off the phone pretty quick and tuned into news channels for a
while before touching base with BB . . TV/PCd until well gone 3am.
s24 - Poor fitful sleep for only a few hours then back up around 8:30am. . Sunny and very warm . .walked . . gardened in the front garden, hedge trimming, de-weeding and got round to planting some potted fir trees into the ground. I'm really not into all this 'having things in pots' all over the place, like the previous occupants were. Too much high maintenenace all the time. With all the sun we've been having this year, those pots have continually dried right out, and I was in danger of allowing the trees to die. (The 'mind your own business' I'd planted around the tree bases HAS all died.) I think they'll have a much better chance of surviving in the ground. . was just moving stuff in from the front and heading out to do the same sort of work in the back garden early afternoon when Sis1 and Mum called in, preventing me from carrying on, which was probably just as well because I was exhausted already . . cuppas and chats. Happily got rid of just a couple of the old planters and hanging baskets littering the garden, which Sis1 seems keen on having. I definitely have absolutely NO intention of EVER doing hanging baskets! . . declined the suggestion I should accompany them down town for fish and chips, because I was tired and filthy, and stopped half way through everything with tools and stuff everywhere, really not in the mood (and seldom am at the best of times). Mum suggested they could bring me some back, which seemed like an excellent idea. . showered and cleared up and then ended up feeling faint from lack of food all day, and having to just sit around waiting, not eating anything or able to get Sally's walk over with, because I had no idea when they'd be returning! The longer I had to wait, the hungrier and more short tempered I got (ungrateful sod!). If I'd known they wouldn't be returning for over three hours I think I would have declined Mums generous offer and just got on and eaten something when it suited me and then walked Sally! . . . at long, long last they returned for a cuppa and more chats as I ravenously devoured my cod and chips. SO hungry and 'shakey' by then, I could easily have eaten two! . .skipped the walk . chats, and had a look at all Sis1s India holiday photos on her laptop, etc. Interesting I guess, but absolutely NOT a place I've EVER had any desire to visit. I'll happily go to my grave without experiencing at first hand, all that horrific poverty, suffering and polution thank you very much. I just can't handle it . .Eventually bid them both farewell long gone 10pm . . touched base with BB . .TVd. Because of the elevation of my house away from the road etc, I've gotten into the habit during the summer of watching TV with the curtains left open. Means I get to see the nightly circling of bats over my front garden, the 'high beam' of distant aircraft tracking up from the South, the moon and stars and clouds etc. Tonight I saw a pretty neat and bright shooting star falling, south south east. :o) . . exhausted to bed around midnight.
23 - Woken by Sally clatter around 8:15am. . . walked the long walk through the woods, down to both beaches and then sat on my favourite gun emplacement roof in BGdns for a while, 'having a day off' so it felt after the last few of non stop filming and PCing/editing etc. Beautiful warm and sunny, and relatively peaceful still. . got chatting to a pleasant woman, on the path below me. Eventually at some point she suggested she'd use my camera to take a picture of me and Sally sat there. I have few, so accepted her offer. What I didn't realise was how much hassle it was going to be. For her to be able to reach up to take the camera, she had to take a step up onto a slight grassy embankment. With what turned out to be somehow dodgy legs, this entailed her pretty much crawling up it very slowly on all fours, and then down again - twice! Agonising to watch - and really could have made a funny video, poor woman! Sadly, it wasn't worth all her bother since the two shots I ended up with, were somehow unfortunately pretty lackluster and not really even worthy of inclusion here . . needed food pretty bad. Haven't been eating anywhere near enough these last several days! Did roast potatoes and stuffing and defrosted some beef from the freezer. Quickly mowed the lawns while the potatoes cooked. . drank a glass of red wine and eventually ate a huge roast dinner, with peas and a pint of gravy. . napped from around 3:30 until 7:30pm, and probably would have carried on sleeping if not for Sally coming up and clattering around the room!! . . sat in the garden for a bit. Skipped the evening walk. PCd this all evening . . touched base with BB . . PCd this until around 2am. . ate liver pate sandwiches and crisps . . TVd until daylight before bed! s
22 - Woken by Sally clatter on the bedroom floorboards around 7:30am. .woke up with a coffee and cigarettes while PCing, trying to work out how to tackle the soundtrack for the trawler race video!?? The fact that I've decided to go with varying degrees of timelapse on almost the entire thing makes for a real awkward fiddle with the real time audio, to keep it in time, continuity wise. . walked and stopped for milk and tobacco on the way home. While in conversation with someone, it was suggested that the local pub IS closing down due to a lack of punters - and in fact it wasn't open on the weekend! Of course I never go in them, not least of all because I can't afford their amazingly high drink prices (and I'm a smoker), but for some reason I am somewhat saddened THAT one is going. On the occassions I have been in there (or perhaps mostly outside having a cigarette), it's always struck me as a pretty nice place to have a comfortable relaxed (as much as I ever can be in a pub) drink and a bit of food, WITH Sally being quite welcome. Despite generally hating pubs and drunks, I can recognise that the country/society is much the poorer for having lost almost all of its unique local pubs. :o( . . PCd the day away doing the soundtrack as best I could. Pretty much worked it out in the end, without losing too many maroon bangs and trawler hoots. (Damn that wind noise - and that is WITH the 'wind-cut' function on the camcorder ON! Maybe it just goes to show it really WAS very windy from that Northerly wind and why I was SO cold up there on the day.) . did dish washing and vacuuming chores in the processing 'down time' . . eventually had the thing done, split into ten minute chunks and started uploading them to YouTube around 5pm . .ate a Mum donated Mars bar to try to keep me going on my starvation diet . . left the PC on, uploading the last of the files and drove to walk around 7pm . . TVd feeling utterly UTTERLY exhausted! . . ate pepperoni pizza and chocolate . . TVd . . touched base with BB . . PCd breifly before bed. The local newspaper website had reports of how a young (probably 'in drink') guy had fallen overboard from one of the boats and been rescued during the race. I wonder if that was why the lifeboat sprang into action and transferred someone back into harbour in the middle of the race (included in my video). There had also been a big mass brawl by young people outside a harbourside pub in town after the race - and then a few other assaults around town later in the evening!!! Well - that's not the publicity the event organsisers were wanting is it! Wow - thank goodness I trusted my instincts and didn't go down there and witness or get involved in any of that (although WHAT a video opportunity some of THAT may have been!). . to bed around 12:30am. sa
21 - Up around 8:45am. .coffee, cigarettes and annadin tablet for breakfast . . walked. Grew overcast but felt warmer than yesterday I thought. Surprisingly little (only one carrier bag full of) litter to pick up. The council workers had been round already. .found £1. . PCd all day trying to trim the trawler race video footage down to a 'reasonable' chunk of interest. Trouble I had with it was, as far as I was concerned, the whole thing was an extraordinary spectacle, with almost ALL of the footage 'pleasing' to at least MY eye, and therefor NOT discardable. The 'ruthlessness' of being a film editor, is something I'm not so good at. I mean - YOU try cutting down around four hours of such a photogenic spectacle, to a three minute or so 'soundbite' type clip!!! One mans out-take is anothers perfect shot. . ate six pieces of bread and butter sandwiches with tuna, mayo and crisps . . Mum called breifly to say Sis1 would be down later in the week . . PCd through until gone midnight . . touched base with BB . . ate biscuits . . watched a test of the trimmed down to thirty minutes video, before eventually to bed after 2am actually feeling really rather unwell. Trouble sleeping. a
20 - Up at 7:30am with the alarm . .walked early to get it over and done with, so I had time to get back home and drop Sally off before heading straight back down again before the start of the 11 o'clock trawler race. . left Sally at home before 10am and returned to BGdns with the tripods, cameras, batteries and a couple of camcorder tapes (I'm gradually recording over 'precious' stuff from last year!! :o( ) to have a go at filming the trawler race. Headed straight down to the top of my favourite gun emplacement via my newly discovered short cut, 'off path' through the undergrowth. Yayy - what a relief. No one up there yet - my reason for getting there so early - it's all mine! Hah. :o) . set up my tripods in the optimum position (on the best corner of the roof, so my camera views would be unobstructed if others turned up there) and then sat around with cigarettes waiting for the off. .some guy appeared out of the bushes with a camera at some point and started hanging around next to me chatting, just as the first small fishing boat began making its way to the race start point. I didn't mean to be rude but made it very clear I wasn't going to be chatting while I was filming (obvious isn't it? For gods sake shut up fool!) He pretty soon retreated to the bushes and disappeared. lol . .plenty people all watching from around about below me . . my vantage point was in the shade from the occasional sunny spells that breezed through on the strong Northerly wind. So long not moving, I ended up feeling absolutely frozen!! Damn - I knew it, from previous filming experience - I SHOULD have worn my hooded fleece, despite everyone else being all dressed in shorts and T shirts. Even had my coat all done up and gloves on! Frozen! That damned wind was SO strong, it was buffeting the tripod, and with much of the filming done at maximum 25x zoom, it was impossible to keep the camera still! :o( Nevertheless, I managed to record what I thought were some pretty damned neat shots (a collage of stills from four of my favourites included below here). For me there is something particularly satisfying about the first, because I managed to get the Paignton steam train going past behind the trawlers in the distance. Just a BIG scene somehow. -//-
let Sally out for her final garden visit of
the evening around 12:45am and stumbled upon a mouse having a go
at the nuts in the birdfeeder hung in the tree. Funny thing was,
it didn't immediately dart away like I HAVE snatched a glimpse of
it doing once or twice before. It just sat there and carried on
trying to tease the nuts through the wire, even as Sally passed a
couple of feet underneath on her way to the lawn and I watched
from the patio by the kitchen window! I guess maybe it's seen
more of Sally and I from its hiding places than we have of it. In
fact it stayed there SO long, I was eventually even encouraged to
bother having a go at getting the camcorder from my coat pocket,
hung up inside the house. Incredibly on my return it was STILL
there, and remained so JUST long enough for me to grab a little
footage of it. Beautiful little thing. Fragile, oh SO fragile
existance! Even SO much more so than mine. :o( . . PCd . .
eventually to bed after 2am. s
While sat on a
seat in the lower part of the gardens, all of a sudden a huge
warship came into view around Berry Head, and then hung around
for a bit in front of the breakwater (they weren't of course, but
it sure looked as though they were checking out where the fire
had been - and a couple of guys on the helicopter deck at the
back appeared to be taking photos of it!) before effectively
doing a three point turn and then eventually racing back out to
sea, around the point and out of sight. I think that has to be
the most impressive ship I've seen, close-in, since I've been
down here. According to dog walkers etc, there have been lots (more
impressive) in the past, but I've never seen them. Really was
impressive - and SO fast as it cruised away. Couldn't resist
videoing a little. . PCd/guitarred. Went on line and looked up
the 'D97' ship (and ended up on the Royal Navy website watching a
video all about HMS Edinburgh - and especially its armament.
Jeeze - if they'd felt so inclined, they could have pretty much
removed Brixham from the map! (Awwwww - well - ok, as long as you
do Torquay first - and get all your mates to do Plymouth before
that! lol :o) ) Definitely impressive and also because of what it
represents about the society and the country in which I by-chance
find myself, and all that 'out there' infinitely complicated 'moment
in time' evolution/philosophy/psychology/sociology stuff!! (Do
other people always have such spontaneous overwelming depressing
thoughts when confronted by such an impressive/kinda beautiful
sight?). . TVd . . touched base with JK and BB . . ate biscuits.
. PCd until bed around 4am. ds
stripped out hinges and shelves etc and then
started the dismantling by having a look at the roof. Blimey - no
wonder the thing has been threatening to topple over. Huge great
inch thick+ slabs of particle board (like is used to board up
derelict buildings or shop fronts with broken windows) had been
somehow laid over the top of the original thin roof, and more
than one ineffectual layer of tar felt had been secured over it
all. Nothing had been done to in any way strengthen the sides of
the structure, and rain had gotten in and soaked the particle
board, so it was unbelieveably top heavy and unstable as a result!
No way could I remove those slabs of board from the roof where
they were, so there was little choice but to knock out just a
handful of the side cladding timbers before removing the big
flower tub support and then just giving the thing a bit of a push.
That was all it took. The whole thing collapsed to the floor -
dangerously guided very slightly as it did so, by me pulling on a
corner in an attempt to stop it bringing down the adjacent garden
fence! . once on the ground it was then just a long, LONG process
of dismantling (mostly with a claw hammer - although much by hand
it was so rotten) and then cutting everything up into car sized
chunks with the circular saw. I HAD imagined I'd be able to maybe
salvage some of the timber but it turned out not a single piece
was re-usable for anything. Actually, before I started the
cutting up, I walked to a nearby neighbours house and knocked on
his door. He has a wood burning stove and a big wood pile in his
garden, and in passing once I'd confirmed he would be interested
in having the shed timber. 
Now I'd
actually dismantled it, did he still want it and if so, what
would be his preferred size of cut up pieces (to save HIM the
work with his dangerous 'no safety guard' miniature table saw).
Sadly, because he already had SO much, he didn't actually have
anywhere to store mine, so I was unfortunately 'lumbered' (lol)
with it. Shame - that would have been SO neat to have been able
to just shift it all up the lane. Oh well. . Took ages and a
horrible filthy job, hot in the sun. Happily managed to save a
few frogs and even one newt from the destruction. Took most of
the day but eventually I had it all reduced to just a big heap of
cut timber, ready for multiple trips to the tip. Exhausted and
absolutely filthy! . . cut my hair and beard and showered . .
drove to walk in a light shower of rain! Stopped at the store on
the return and bought a 'going cheap' pre cooked sausage ring. .
.TVd. . PCd breifly only for it to turn into a hour long session!!!
I'd received a YouTube message from a fireman at the local fire
station! "I wanted to know whether there is any
possibility i can get hold of this video clip (fire at Berry Head
Road 29/06/09) so we can put it onto our station computer."
Funny that, hot on the heels of someone objecting to it being on
there. The Youtube video is of course a short cut down version of
what I actually recorded - with a modification done to the audio
so as not to include me talking with dog walkers during the
recording. I assumed the fire guys would rather have the whole
thing (terribly shaky as it was), which almost (all but a few
minutes) pretty much shows the whole event, from the black smoke
at the start of the fire before they'd arrived, to the white
smoke once they'd got it under control - and then a bunch of
random shots of them damping down etc. once I'd walked up there.
What I needed to do, was review the footage (just under an hour!)
and listen to the 'actual' soundtrack, to make sure there was no
reason I couldn't simply give them a full copy as recorded. .
tedious having to sit through it all, but thankfully as far as I
could see, there was no reason to censor any of the captured 'sad
old men/dog walker type' chit chat. . . touched base with BB . .
cooked and ate a pepperoni pizza with half the cold sausage
sliced, extra cheese and onion. Didn't get the cooking quite
right and ended up eating it luke warm and a bit 'wet'. :o| .
guitarred/TVd . . ate half a chocolate swiss roll . . TVd until
bed around 1:30am. s
So much so, I
actually called out my concern to the owners who'd not noticed
what was going on. Without 'too' much concern they began calling
after them and when the ducks eventually got fed up with being
chased and flew a short distance away, the dogs did start
swimming all the way back to shore. Apparantly doing that sort of
thing wasn't unusual for them, and they'd even had a small crowd
watching a similar event at Dartmouth once. Thank god Sally doesn't
do that sort of thing. They really were far enough out to have
been in danger from passing boats! . . .the big NYK 'Sirius'
container ship that's been at anchor pretty close in for weeks
because of the downturn in global trade, had finally slipped away
some time during the day. It'd been mentioned in the local paper
I bought the other day, and they'd said how it was soon going to
be leaving. What they didn't mention was that its sister ship 'Olympus'
was pretty much going to moor up and take its place, albeit MUCH
further out to sea on the distant horizon. . . PCd breifly . .guitarred
. . touched base with BB . . cooked and ate two cheese burgers
with onion and then a bowl of Mum donated strawberries and cream!
. .TVd until bed around 2am.s
while showing
Mum the info I'd found about the watercolour painting, we got
into conversation about my grandfathers old broken 'Jaeger Le
Coultre' watch. Although the glass is cracked, it appears not to
work, and there is a very unnatural rattle from inside if you
shake it, it'd been kept because there was some suggestion that
at one time it WAS an expensive watch and 'could' be worth having
repaired. Attempted to have a surf and look it up, although
without actually knowing what specific model it was from Mums
vague description, I knew I'd be fumbling around in the dark. . .
eventually left Sally at home in the dry and walked back with Mum
in the torrential rain (got soaked immediately!) to return her
spade and have a quick close look at the watch in the hope of
maybe being able to identify the model. Sadly I couldn't find
anything on it which gave me the model type. . Surfed. Yikes -
watches by that maker ARE expensive!! Poked around all over the
place but consistantly failed in identifying it. Interesting. .
HEAVY rain and lots of it. So heavy it washed moss and debris
down from the roof which at one point blocked the drain in the
back garden. Luckily I spotted it and was able to wade out and
clear the block before any damage was done by water getting in
the airbricks. . . ate a Mum donated pastry and chicken slice . .
touched base with JK breifly to see if his partialy burned roof
was leaking. Miraculously not. . .napped . . drove to walk . .
guitarred/TVd various comedy shows on different tv channels all
evening. .ate a pizza with extra cheese . . touched base with BB
. . TVd (old Richard Pryor stand up) until bed around 2:30am. s
She's been
trying to clear out a lot of old stuff she's had laying around
for years, and we got into conversation about an old original
watercolour that'd been passed down from grandma, which Dad had
always liked. She'd suggested I may like it to put on one of my
walls, but I declined because I'm really not a sort of person who
can appreciate art, and I don't do the pictures on walls thing (If
I DID, I'd hang prints of some of my own photos in charity shop
frames). Seemed a good idea to jot down some of the information
that was on the back of the picture, with a view to having a bit
of a look on the internet to see if there was any information on
the artist and try and guage if it was maybe actually worth
anything. . heading home I got into conversation with someone who
turned out to be a neighbour who wanted to compliment my pot hole
filling efforts in the lane! :o) Her comments were well received
and much appreciated. . . 
PCd and surfed
looking up the picture/artist details. Turned out to be very
little out there, but 'just' enough to get at least a bit of a
feel for who the artist was and what it 'could' be worth-ish (although
to get more of an idea I would have had to submit my e-mail
address and 'join' various auction sites, which I wasn't prepared
to do.). "Herbert William Hicks 1880 - 1944. Painter in
watercolour and gouache of moorland and coastal scenes, who was
born in Exeter in 1880. A self taught artists, 'Herbie Hicks' was
a prolific painter of many West Contry views in a similar style
to F.J. Widgery. Many of the subjects were local Devon views and
were usually inscribed wth the location on the reverse. Much of
his work was sold through C. Samuel's Gallery, in Fore Street,
Exeter. He was a friend of the Exeter artist, Frederick Parr and
sometimes painted together in an attic studio. A fall in demand
for the pictures in the 1930's forced Hicks to abandon painting
and concentrate on his hairdressing business." There
were a couple of pictures of his on the net, and even 'I' could
tell they were done in a very similar style. Given the not
brilliant condition of the one we have, I imagine it 'could' be
worth anything from maybe £50 up to a hundred or two at the very
most, depending on who may be interested at the time of sale.
Presumably since it's of the beach at 'Welcombe' in Bude, it
would be of greatest interest to someone local to there? Whatever
- I guess it's definitely worth Mum hanging on to. . . while
surfing I somehow bumped into a relatively new (I think) webcam.