Dorking Car Boot sale (and all that jazz)

So, we got up pretty early on Sunday (as we seem to do quite often!) and headed over to Dorking to try and get a wreath for the front door (and perhaps a little something for the living room wall at the weekly car boot sale -

- it was a gloriously sunny day (and thus *absolutely* freezing) -

- but it seems the blue skies were enough to tempt about half of Dorking to either buy or sell (or come along for the walk, and maybe get a new bear to chew on, if lucky)... ;)

Spotted a new stall (seems to be, Dorking Car boot sale is becoming more and more like a market with each passing week) selling fresh fish (actually smelt quite good, i.e. non-fishy, but then, the environment *was* close to refrigerator temperatures) -

- and a good number of house clearance type removal van types -

- must only be about 50% actual car boots on offer...

Still, succeeded in our mission, got a jolly nice wreath and on a whim picked up a live tree for Flyingpops' mum, who had been bemoaning the visual appearance of the huge old fibre optic tree they bought a few years back (fetched from loft and dusted down)...so we spent a couple of hours over there eating a spot of breakfast and assisting with the erection and decoration (200 lights!!!) of the new one -

- then we zoomed around Sainsburys' in Redhill for a few bits and bobs (for me to eat while I am off on holiday), popped up to the Priory Farm shop to pick up Flyingpops' festive feast (all lovingly hand-made) which we had pre-ordered last week, and then home...

I put dinner on, was really looking forward to a nice quiet evening, and at a convenient (hrm...) moment in that process Flyingpops and I decided to take a quick look at the toilet (which has had a trickling leak from the base of the cistern for a while now), we took the lid off and promptly managed to break the arm off the ballcock...leaving the toilet in constant "I need to be filling myself up" mode...a hectic and very wet five minutes later I had the thing wedged back into "I'm full" mode using the arm from the ballcock and a VW Beetle wall ornament...not ideal, but better than holding it with my finger, however, there was just no way we could risk leaving it like that overnight...

Flyingpops rang her dad for emergency assistance and he said he was "Coming right over", so while the cavalry were on their way we threw as much dinner down our throats as possible (before it went cold). As it happens Uncle Al actually drove Flyingpops' dad over and the pair of them (after calling for "Tea please!") had the whole thing locked down almost before the kettle had boiled...! Amazing!

Only bad thing as a result is no flushing toilet for the time being...we are awaiting a plumber to come today to take a look, but no sign yet...so my hopes of anything happening today are dwindling...For now, a bucket rests beside the toilet to do the flushing for us (which does the job for now, if inelegantly)...but why do these things always seem to crop up right before Christmas, eh...? ;)

Oh, and just before I go, a quick detox update - Day #5 now, mucked up a bit on Saturday (had a Big Mac and some Chicken Nuggets), but everything else is still going 100% and as it's been easy and rewarding I think there may be a related New Year's resolution in the pipeline ;)

Update - Plumber came, and apart from a few minutes on his mobile and a few ticks drinking tea, he was in and out within about half-an-hour! We now have a leak-free, flushing toilet...phew... ;)