Engagement Present - BBQ Bucket!

Thank you to Vodqueen and Al! Can't wait to try it out!


Already used it to carry all the spare beer home from the show...very useful... ;)


Off to the hospital soon, so wish me luck!

Stunning Surrey Sunset

With a quote, courtesy of GeorgieR -

"Fling wide the curtains! - that's a Surrey sunset low down the line sings the Addiscombe train."

John Betjeman Love in a Valley (published 1937)

Laughton Cuckoo Spring Fayre 2007 in pictures

So just a few of the higher resolution pics from the weekend... ;)






























More here if you like this kind of thing... ;)

Laughton - rain, rain, rain...

Laughton - rain, rain, rain...
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

It's not stopped now since mid-afternoon yesterday, the site is starting to get really muddy and we haven't seen any members of the paying public at all this morning and it's really very unusual for absolutely nobody to come...still it's early...we may yet see a few brave souls in all weather gear and thermal pants...



This could well be the last time we come to this particular show, to camp, anyway...mud and rain...again...Bah!

Just spent...

Just spent...
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

...a fraught half hour trying to work out, from a position of zero experience, how to set up a satellite tv system in a camper van so we can watch the F1...suffice it to say, we couldn't find more than eleven percent of a sniff of Astra...a miserable failure...thanks Vodqueen for coming to the rescue with a terrestrial aerial...Phew! ;)

Weather today not as bad as was forecast either...things are looking up! ;)

Laughton - rain

Laughton - rain
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

Oh well, the rain is coming down now and if you turn ninety degrees from this lovely setting sun, unfortunately it looks like the riders of the apocalypse are just making sure that they have remembered to turn the oven off and pick up their door keys...we could be in for a rough ride... :(

Charity Tombola

Charity Tombola
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

Best ever haul on the Tombola! Twenty odd DVDs, a bottle of stella, and a hand knitted pair of old ladies bed socks! Rain holding off, so far... ;)

Laughton update

Laughton update
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

We have awoken to scattered showers, weather report was for sunny intervals for later though, followed by heavy rain on sunday and monday...so if you want to come perhaps today is probably the best day... ;)

Alan and Scammell...

Alan and Scammel...
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

...have arrived safe and sound, we are all set up, weather has been absolutely wonderful, I even have a sun burnt neck to keep me glowing at night...Spent most of the day helping the others to get set up, making simple camp food and playing 'Innocent Life' on the PSP, which is a gripping farming sim, believe it or not... ;)

Laughton - George

Laughton - George
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

...well we've now spent the usual twenty five minutes of gentle 'discussion' with George, the collections and display marshall, he is the chap on the right...who loves to get deeply involved with even the smallest positioning issue when quite honestly everyone is perfectly capable of lining up in rows without a huge amount of help...anyway, that's the stressful bit over with now...time to get set up... ;)

Laughton - made it...

Laughton - made it...
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

...but the rest of the convoy is half an hour behind us, so we've decided to wait at the entrance to maximize the chances of pitching our various campers and caravans together...weather is really picking up now, so looking good for today at least... ;)

Off to Laughton

Camper is packed, so off we go! Weather not looking fantastic, but no way as bad as last time (we drove down in the rain, I seem to remember!)...

More later... ;)

Butterfly - Fuji S9600 super macro

Better click it to see the detail, pretty impressive lens on this thing, this shot was taken at a distance of just under half an inch (I must admit I was quite amazed it didn't fly off)... ;)

A scorcher in Islington?

Well, it looks the part anyway (highs of 22 degrees today for this area are to be expected), I checked the weather report for the rest of the week and it's looking good (highs of 27(!) degrees on Friday) for Eastbourne (which is near Laughton) where we are planning to spend the weekend (camping out in Colin the camper, among all the steam engines and vintage vehicles)...it wasn't very nice weather last time, so please, rain, don't come this time - we can both do with a bit of a break (been so hectic just lately)...

It was all going so well!

It sounded a bit like one of the radiators was coming up to the boil (same noise a kettle makes), but in fact (now the hot water is under the same level of pressure as the cold water) it had sprung a leak! So he's coming back to replace it...also the taps in the bathroom won't stop dripping, so I'm not sure they are quite up to taking the pressure either (however, I am told that they might well settle down after a couple of days, so I'll just keep half an eye on them for the time being)...

Anyway, little problems aside, it's all in, job done...hot water on demand, no more flicking a switch and waiting, no more timers - just boiling hot water at the twist of a tap...I had a lovely long soak to celebrate... ;)

Now if I could only find my mobile phone and my PSP, both of them seem to have gone missing in the chaos...

Update - found them both tucked safely in my camera bag...phew! ;)

1000th Post!

Another little landmark - and it just so happens - post **1000** on Finkblog turns out to be about plumbing (hrm)! ;)

Anyway, a brief break for an 18th birthday celebration last night (congratulations Anna!), work resumed at about 9am this morning -

- the boiler came back out for a while for the elaborate pipework to be installed -

- the hot water tank lost it's jacket -

- and got kicked out into the road -

- where someone down a few doors spotted it and promptly negotiated it's removal for scrap value (saves us a dump run) -

- the naughty old boiler came out and joined it (but no-one came begging to take it away, tellingly) -

- and then the floor started coming up...

I'm trying to ignore the other noises coming from upstairs (which are ranging all the way from creaky, saw-like, hammer-murder and clanky to chainsaw, hammer drill and Jason Donovan on the radio)...best off sticking to being "coffee bitch" and keeping out the way, I think...that combination could be dangerous! ;)

New boiler update - work in progress!

Well, it's all happening here (note to self - got to be careful, just noticed I'm on post 999, next post must say something about this landmark!) -

- anyway, the big toys came out (diamond blades!), time to make a hole through the wall of the outside cupboard -

- about 3 minutes of drilling later the guide poked through -

- and then the blade started to appear (with lots of smoke and dust) -

- and almost before I could focus on it (well, okay, before I could focus on it), out it popped -

- "Bit of PVA on there mate and you got a pretty unique door stop" (think I might do that!) -

- Anyway, here is the hole -

- and poor Santa and Snowman (who got a bit of brick dust, but should be used to "light dustings" of things, if you ask me) -

- and then, even as I was flickr'ing the last bunch of pictures, I got a call, it was in already! -

- the inside looks like a bloody motorbike engine -

- believe it or not there is a spark plug on the injection system (yes, injection system!) which super heats 80 meters of micro-size aluminium tube (which loops the round bit at the top), then the bit at the bottom is a massive heat exchanger (*exactly* the same technology used as a heat sink on a PC processor, but reversed to work as a heat dump)!

Amazing stuff! Learning a lot here... :)

Plumber arrived and work has commenced!

Well, after a cup of coffee anyway... ;) That's the boiler in the big cardboard box (a "one man lift" apparently, so no strained backs today) -

- equipped also with an absolute mountain of copper fixings -

- meters of copper pipe, and about 5 boxes of tools (useful for holding the doors open, if nothing else) -

- First job is to drain the system down, which he said he was expecting to "be like treacle" but turned out to be as fresh as a mountain spring (this is very good news apparently!) -

- he even tasted some, but I managed to resist the temptation -

Outside Cupboard - Before

This is where it's going to go when it's installed, the spur for the power is already there (that was done during the week) just below the shelf -

Preparations complete - New Boiler

So, we are ready! For those of you who have ever dared to look inside our cupboard by the front door, be amazed! Yes, you can take your hands from where you were covering your face to stop the avalanche crushing you, for all of Flyingpops' shoes have migrated into the hall! -

- the freezer (once lost under piles of winter coats), is in the living room (where I will defrost it later, if I find time, as it's not been done since we moved in) -

- all the myriad complex hanging contraptions have gone from around the broken old boiler, here you can also see the (now illegal) flue arrangement... -

- The bathroom is standing by (hopefully he will fix the toilet so it actually fills itself up too, although I have to congratulate us on how green we have been as a result, recycling the bath water to flush the toilet is commendable, but getting just a little tiresome now)...

Perhaps normality can resume soon...it will be truly wonderful to be back in a house with hot water, central heating and freely flushing facilities...even if it is costing us our entire savings for doing the bathroom up, oh well...gotta be done... ;)

More later...

Broken Boiler

We are obviously lined up for all the good luck at the moment, had the fellow round to take a look at our boiler and it was basically written off as a death trap, to make things all the much more convenient, it's now illegal to install a boiler inside a house connected to the outside only by a flue (in case it becomes blocked and forces carbon monoxide to vent into the house, thus killing all the occupants) so it can't go in the same place...(I suppose at least giving us a large new cupboard space to use)...anyway, after much poking around, the outside cupboard was decided on as a new destination (as I find it rather tricky to get up into the loft if the pilot light ever went out or anything)...so, the water supply, electricity etc. is all having to be re-routed, and all this is going to happen over the weekend, starting tomorrow...

Pics later...wish us luck!

Knee update

So went back to the docs this morning (got the 2nd earliest appointment), and was a bit suprised to find a different doctor sat in the consulting room (so, without quite intending to deliberately do so, I got a second opinion)...funny how things work out sometimes... ;)

This time it went like a breeze, a referral is "no problem" and it will be typed up and ready by Saturday! Plus there was none of this talk of exploratory surgery, this doctor said she would be recommending an MRI scan (which sounds much more like it)...! Just hope my normal doctor doesn't get upset by all this... ;)

Anyway, regardless, I'm going to get to see what it's like to be an unwell rich person! I'm quite excited! Knowing my luck though I'll just end up at East Surrey Hospital but just not have to queue up for quite as long... ;)

Tesco Bargain Canvas Photo Printing

Well, what can I say but "Wow", £20 (they emailed us a deal, it's normally £27) for a 30cm by 40cm canvas print (they call it "Medium"), and the quality of that printing is absolutely amazing, none of the detail has been lost...the colours are just as they were in the original...and it only took about 5 working days from ordering (on their website) to delivery!

What an absolute bargain, and it looks fantastic on the living room wall...first shot of mine I have ever felt compelled to do this with, and I'm just thrilled with the result...

Thank you Mr Tesco... ;)

Original shot for comparison -

Bird Table - Thrush

Well, having a 10x zoom certainly makes taking pictures of the wildlife a bit easier! Even shot this one through the patio doors (they get a bit scared if you open the door)... ;)

Really funny thing I have noticed about the birds just lately is that they seem to have specific times (like humans eating breakfast, lunch and dinner) when they all seem to turn up, not a minute goes by without at least one of them grabbing a cheeky mouthful, and then the bird table is empty for hours on end...

I guess they eat until their little bellies are full and then just muck around for a while, not much else for them to do at this time of year! Oh and something I did forget, even though I now remember I noticed them doing last year, they are using the water garden as a bird bath *and* for drinking water...no wonder I'm having to top it up so often!

Still, there's absolutely nothing I can do about it short of putting it under chicken wire (which would rather ruin it's appearance imho)...

South Park and Horley Car Boot sale (in the rain)

Oh well, that was a bit of a waste of time...quite funny though to see the number of people, who despite the persistent downpour, still decided to pack their cars up and come to sit in the middle of a damp field -
-
or in the case of Horley, a car park, and try to sell their soggy wares to the very few fanatics (us not included, we didn't even undo our seatbelts at Horley, shot that one out the window)...who had also braved the conditions, clutching their pennies in the hope of a floppy bargain...

Tesco Water Garden - Year 2

Well, we obviously had a mild enough winter for the water garden to survive, I didn't really do anything else other than occasionally top it up, and it's all sprung back to life (in fact, it actually looks like we have a lot more sprouting up), more pics when we get some blooms... ;)

Dallas on UKTV Gold

Damn them, damn them! As if I didn't have to put up with Dallas enough the first time round! In fact, it's hard to actually summon a memory of sitting down to do my homework (back when I was in school) without Dallas coming on and distracting me (and hating myself for it)...I've now accidentally stumbled upon (and been powerless to resist) watching almost two complete episodes (in the last week)...!

PLEASE!!! SAVE ME!!!!

So...the Knee and F1...

...the doc said that my knee was much improved, but that I should take it easy (no running for buses) for one more week, just try not to stress it too much...and I'm to return next week, so no real progress I'm afraid...

In other news, the four week gap in the F1 calendar is almost over, we'll see what that time has done (development-wise) for the teams over the weekend! Alonso has the home advantage, it being the Spanish GP (which he won last year), but I'll be cheering for Hamilton...oh and David Coultard, who managed to set a new lap record during practice in his funky new Red Bull...wtf?

It's looking like the Circuit de Catalunya might actually host an exciting race this year, especially with the new track layout (supposed to allow more overtaking)! ;)

Normal Service will be resumed soon...

...sorry for the lack of posts, being robbed of mobility makes jack a dull boy, back in London town today (knee much less swolen, the drugs are working, at least, although it took 3 days before I noticed it really starting to improve)...got the docs this pm for my next assessment, I'll let you know how I get on...hopefully(?) I will get my referral to BUPA for exploratory surgery...*shudder*...

I'm sure Peter Andre didn't have to suffer all this before they let him go private...

A few more shots... ;)

Nothing too exciting, as I am still on doctors orders not to walk anywhere... >;P

New Camera - Fuji Finepix S9600

Hurrah! Got my new camera, had a look at the big bad boys (£400-600 starting packs) and they were either too heavy/cumbersome or were missing things that are rather important to me (like *forcing* one to shoot through the view finder, which makes working from interesting angles a rather hit-and-miss, or uncomfortable affair), and, frankly, they are just stupidly expensive for not *that* much of an improvement (imho) considering everything else you need to carry to equal the convenience...

This camera was £279, has a very decent spec - 9 megapixel, 10.7x optical zoom (on a 28-300mm lens which can focus in "super macro" mode to 1*cm* thanks to the revolutionary CCD) plus a digital zoom I'm never going to use, runs off 4xAA cells (hurrah again! This is going to be a *must* have for every single camera I own in the future, hate having to drag the chargers around the world), it can take any combination of XD, compact flash or IBM microdrive (yes, it can carry a mini hard disk!), blah blah blah...oh and the LCD display tilts up and down (like a camcorder, see the pic below) so you can easily shoot over the heads in a crowd (useful for Bug Jam!) or at something right on the floor without putting your head in the mud...

Anyway, enough of all that nonsense, here are some of the pics I took today!



Oh and two *amazing* ones, this one, I shot at full zoom, out the left hand window of the car (us travelling at 30mph (left to right), oncoming traffic at about 70mph) in "anti-shake" mode (never had one of them before!) -

- Now, check out these, taken one second apart (see the black car in the distance) -

- one quick twist of the zoom, and was able to snap this(!) incredible!

- (Flyingpops said "you could be a spy with that camera", she's not wrong!)...anyway, that's just a few shots from the day today, lots of new features to play with, lots to learn, but not bad for my first days play...very happy with it, and feel like I have saved myself a fortune... ;)


Now I have to seriously rest my knee, hobbled as little as possible, but it's still killing me... :(

Just had a quick look, and the (f)ailing Mavica served me faithfully (until the C13's started coming) for just over 8000 shots (during it's time with me - a year and a half, meaning about 15 shots per day over that period)...not sure if that's good or not, really (to virtual camera death), but it *is* still going (just) as long as I use original Sony media...

Oh and thanks to Flyingpops for her (occasional bursts of) patience while I have been making my mind up, and to Vodqueen (she knows why... ;)

Email Britain

So, the British Library (and Microsoft, although, I suspect only for the publicity) have teamed up to create a massive archive of email for use by researchers "from the future"...Apart from producing a wonderfully trippy flash website (that I scrabbed (inventing another new word) the picture above from)...there is also an email address to forward your "good, bad or interesting" emails (email@emailbritain.co.uk), but read the site first, as they want you to put certain words in the subject line to enable easy sorting in the archive.

Interesting project! They are hoping to collect over a million emails, so far they have just over 500, so I thought I would help to spread the word...oh and they will reject anything "defamatory" or "unsuitable"...you know what they mean... ;) Although interestingly they will collect spam examples, so now you have a good use for them!

Let the bombardment commence... ;)

Knee Injury...again...

Well, here's a novel twist to the knee saga, I just got called "rather stupid" by my GP (no wonder I normally go to the walk in centre)..."You managed to do one thing right" (she was talking about me self medicating anti-inflammatory drugs) "and then forgot about the most important bit - rest". "Going into London", she continued, "is just going to make matters worse, and as for a referral", I had asked her to recommend me to Bupa (as Flyingpops gets free Bupa cover for her nearest and dearest as a benefit at work) "the finest specialist in the country wouldn't touch that knee in it's current state, ask any medical professional and they will tell you the same thing"....("Oh", I thought, a little deflated)..."Now complete rest for one week, take one of these - twice a day" (Diclofenac Sodium, a new one on me), "Come back to me and I will assess you for suitability for exploratory surgery. Oh, don't worry", she said, spotting the fear in my eye, "It will be conducted under a general anaesthetic"...

Thank heavens for small mercies... :(

Digg killed by it's own users?

Striking a solid blow for freedom of speech (and fair use for that matter), following in the now distant wake of the cracking of CSS (the DVD encryption system), HD DVD has had it's "key" broken by "the hacker community(tm)"...it's a simple, short number (it's all just maths at the end of the day anyway), but it's a secret number which the MPAA don't want anyone to know...understandably...

Someone posted it on Digg, and digg moderators removed it...so someone else posted it, and it got deleted, and then - the world exploded - 50,000+ diggs and thousands and thousands of comments (mostly containing the secret number) later and the founder of Digg has waded in, basically saying - okay, we surrender, but because of you, this could well be the end of the line for the site...

The lawyers are baying, they have caught the scent of blood...

History in the making...?

Made it...

Made it...
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

...but no-one offered me a seat...as per usual... :(

Making a valiant effort...

Making a valiant effort...
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

...to get to my conference today, but my knee has been playing up again, badly swolen and very painful, going to have to see how I get on...not looking forward to the tube... :(