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Elsa Peters
January 5, 2012, 5:17pm Report to Moderator

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Thursday 5th January

What a silly morning.  Woke up at four thirty, stoked up the fire since it was still going, read a couple of chapters of my new book and then decided that there was more sleep to be had and bedded down until eight ten....success.

Loaded the fire again, cooked breakfast of poached eggs and then settled down to my book.  Nothing much happening so it was a pleasurable interlude.  Took down the Christmas decorations since it is Twelfth Night and burnt the Christmas tree to free the spirits.  Popped the lights that didn't work last year back into the electric socket. there was a hiss, a bang and they were then designated to fry on the bonfire along with the tree...

Checked out my internet and the websites that I visit.  Realised that there was probably loads of water on the roof of the wreck now that the snow was melting so got up there and started shoveling snow and ice but I think it was a losing battle.  I was almost tempted to drill some holes into the roof/ceiling of the upstairs/ downstairs but I think that might come tomorrow...I had my lesson to sort out and deliver in Djebel to my student.  On the way in, there was a phone call from Gouljan to ask if I could do the taxi run after I had finished my lesson and so to horse, she is now home after receiving the news that the funding for her education project has now been removed and she is now funded by Bulgaria and having to work for one third of less than she was on before.  I'm sure there is an outlet for a school here where we can dictate our own market value.

So back home...it was robbing Peter to pay Paul with both fires and by the time that one was going the other was out and vice-versa.   Eventually I have both going and pumping out the heat.  Supper tonight was the remains of yesterday's lunch and very well received it was.  

Wind appears to have changed round from the west and there are clouds in the sky whizzing round the moon.  I'm thinking of getting up on the roof of the wreck and surrounding it with polythene tomorrow since there is enough snow melt up there already....it has predicted snow for the weekend.

Tonight...back to my book...it's a bit of a slow story in a simple repetitive style that I might come to appreciate...so now onward and upwards and before I forget...it is Danuta's birthday today ...so happy birthday and may there be many more of them.  I hear Scotland has suffered madly in the gales...may you soon be back to normal...

LM....I've got a book to get back to, two fires to service and an empty glass....and since I've just had a break in provider connection and it has come back that I have no connection to the internet...I'm going to post quickly...LN
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Elsa Peters
January 6, 2012, 4:27pm Report to Moderator

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Friday 6th January

Just finished my update and the electricity flickered and lost it all....

Silly o'clock this morning and settled into a book realiasing that there wasn't much chance of sleep.  The rain had awoken me and that ladies and gentlemen is the story of today.  It hasn't stopped.  The fields and hillsides are flooded as is my garden...thunder has been batting around all day and the latest crash was only a few seconds ago so I'm not staying around.  I'll post pictures tomorrow of the floods, the ark that will be started tomorrow (I've just downloaded the plans to Noah's design), the cows will not be the first to go in, I shall.

Supper was a roast chicken with roast carrots, hasselback potatoes, roasted onions and red cabbage and it was to die for and if it keeps on raining, it probably will be to die for.

LN...my wine has evapourated from my glass again.  I'm posting before there is another crash or the electricity decides to waver.  It's supposed to be snowing tomorrow....well anything is better than this damp dreary stuff...LN
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Elsa Peters
January 7, 2012, 9:00am Report to Moderator

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Saturday 7th January

Morning...can't show you the floods from yesterday...they are no more...well they're there but they're under the snow.  So that rain that was lashing down last night at some point turned to the white stuff and covered everything up again.  It's melting though and leaving slush everywhere and fog is gathering but this morning I was up on the roof of the wreck and I've got a couple of sheets of polythene and decided that I would cover the roof timbers so that if it does snow again it will give an element of protection.  I also found a sheet of black plastic underfloor damp proof stuff that I have nailed over half of the hallway to save it becoming completely waterlogged...after all it's only January and goodness knows when the men will be back.  It's not cold today but I cleared the slush off the terraces so that if the temperature does drop tonight as it's supposed to, I shan't get a skid pan outside the door.

Finished one of the four books that arrived on Wednesday and now on to the next. Enough chicken from yesterday to stick in the slow cooker and since it's only eleven o'clock....must find something constructive to do....let's see what I can get up to....



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MOS
January 7, 2012, 5:09pm Report to Moderator
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Hi Elsa
Happy New Year
i think you better put some ski's on that ark it will most likely have to be multyfunctional if your weather doesent improve ,
Hope you are keeping well, we are snugled round the log burner waiting for the potatoes to roast on the top ,then its nosh time whilst we watch Hocus pocus on the telly .
just finished my book and i have one about bee keeping to start next but that will wait till tomorow
ni nits sugar .geoff and H xx
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Elsa Peters
January 7, 2012, 9:04pm Report to Moderator

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Saturday continued

Beautiful clear windy night but all I can hear is the whoosh of polythene.  I fear that all that hard work was in vain and tomorrow I shall find it over the hills and far away....or rather ...not find it.  

So what did I do with the remains of the chicken?  Fried up the remaining veg, added the chicken, put in the gravy, added more water and rice, brought it to the boil and stuck it on the wood burner until the rice was ready.  Result...very tasty.

My house is toasty, I'm now heading for the wooden hills apart from the fact that I sleep downstairs in the winter...so now I'm going down the wooden hills from the PC and as my mother used to say, off to Bedfordshire and dear MOS you will understand that one more than most.  Taking MOS suggestion, I'm going to modify Noah's design and make it multifunctional. LN... I have plans to dream up....
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Elsa Peters
January 8, 2012, 6:27pm Report to Moderator

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Sunday 8th January

Early start and got the fires going so that the house was warm...It is damp today..the polythene held overnight so there is no need for me to scale the heights and knock in a few nails.  Well there probably is but it's not happening.

I lost my thermometer...looked around for it and couldn't see it anywhere and remembered that it was on my winter front door support that hadn't been erected by the men...promised but not carried through.  So this measure of degrees was hidden below this huge edifice and so I decided to retrieve it.  Now you know the point... should I be raising it upright or not...and your brains says no but when it is half way up...as the saying goes it is neither up nor down so with a little more effort...so it is up and the result is...I have been on painkillers all afternoon and suffering for my bravado.

Gouljan arrived this afternoon with biscuits...I provided the tea...but now I am on the red wine soothing my pain.  Supper was an easy meal tonight of chippies with bread and butter, mayonnaise and tomato ketchup with a hint of vinegar and salt.    Not quite like the roast of a couple of days ago but it was just as well received.

LN....the fire calls...
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Elsa Peters
January 9, 2012, 6:52pm Report to Moderator

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Monday 9th January

Got to bed last night at about eleven and slept through until six forty which for me was a little miracle....

There was another thin covering of snow and it seems to have settled into the routine of disappearing during the day and a gentle dropping of the white stuff overnight that melts during the day.  Got the first fire going from last night's embers and the second from the new fire...it's this robbing Peter to pay Paul stuff as a walk between the two with a glowing coal between.  But today I seem to have got the measure of both.

Decided to go up on the roof and knock a few more nails in to secure the polythene and stupidly forgot to put some gloves on.  Now it didn't seem cold when I was skitting around filling log baskets and coal scuttles but up there with the damp keen wind was another matter.  Why is it that when you have a hammer and nails that they aren't necessarily in the same place at the same time.  When there is a sheet of polythene held in your teeth or you are trying to secure a plank across the outside of roof timbers and your hands are frozen...'t ain't much fun.  Came back in and fortunately the wind seems to have dropped but I'm going to leave the roof to its own devices from now on....

Forgot to mention by visiting bird.  He sits in the tree in the afternoons and generally looks around....I reckon it's some sort of shrike...got a funny beak and a black mask around it's eyes....I need to get out there with the camera right under the tree....my camera was on full stretch today....

Carried on with the third book in the series and this one seems to be better than the second.  Bit more of a story with this one but there are some steamy scenes it it that I didn't expect.....I did come across an 'Angel' bookmark and it's the 'Angel of Solitude' and the quote is that 'Strength and Courage is found Within'.  I wished I'd have found a bit more of it when I was balancing on a shaky ladder in the roof of the wreck.  

Supper tonight was leek and potato soup with cheese on toast dippers.  Quick, easy and filling and some left for tomorrow.  Going back to my book now....moons up, clouds gently rolling by and polythene stationary...so far so good.

LN......time I put my PC to bed but I'll remember to post the pickies tonight.....



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January 9, 2012, 9:31pm Report to Moderator
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Elsa that first photo of 'yesterday morning'  is quite stunning.  How lucky you were there with the camera.  Yesterday afternoon after a gloomy day, across Scotland was seen a purple coloured sky which was very beautiful and of course very unusual.  Sod's law, I was in a meeting at the time with no view of the sky, but I did see a beautiful photo of it.
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Elsa Peters
January 10, 2012, 7:35am Report to Moderator

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Quoted from 50
Elsa that first photo of 'yesterday morning'  is quite stunning.  How lucky you were there with the camera.  Yesterday afternoon after a gloomy day, across Scotland was seen a purple coloured sky which was very beautiful and of course very unusual.  Sod's law, I was in a meeting at the time with no view of the sky, but I did see a beautiful photo of it.


Sorry Danuta...I would ask the question if you'd been on the hooch again...after all we are talking about Scotland here....and was that the meeting where you remain 'anonymous'.... ...get back to your packing woman.

First eye opening this morning...five ten...second one that drew me to action was seven twenty and it was the flicker of the fire from the hallway that caused me to climb from the warmth of my zebra nest and head towards the glimmer.....either the fire was still going or I'd had a problem with the electrics...   All was contained...one log doing it's stuff so I gave it a mate and ...a fire without much cajoling and effort.  Attended to the little one in the kitchen and that was still going, the minus seven overnight had not encroached at all and coming back from emptying the ash can I noticed the full moon going down.  Rushed inside to get my camera, got outside again, realised that the battery was as dead as the proverbial dodo, went back to get a new battery and lo and behold, the bugger had slipped into the morning mist.  As for that sun coming up...,I know it's there but that too is hiding it's little face and struggling to break free.  It will be good later, the house will fill up with its warmth and I can then forget about fires until about four this afternoon when I get back from my English student. Go on sun, you know you want to.....catch you later....





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Elsa Peters
January 10, 2012, 6:47pm Report to Moderator

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Tuesday continued

Started preparing for my lesson and now found out that the site I use for my material has decided that you have to join and there is an annual subscription.  I noticed that some of the articles had Free printed on them so I shall just have to look out for the freebies.  They blame the cost of having to use more resources now that they have become popular...how come some of the sites offset it with advertisers?  I no know....

So today's lesson was about pseudoscorpions in the bathroom but it was a sweet release from the fifteen page hurricane article.  One of the questions was to interview someone who had been in a hurricane and so I got him to ask me questions about how I felt during the 1987 one that sailed over my house in Brighton.  His little eyes lit up when I answered some of the questions and I think he felt WOW...

Did a little bit of shopping....bought a snow scraper only to be told that there wasn't any snow but I questioned the price in Turkish and my little man that never smiles raised the corners of his mouth as I paid up.  Topped up on a few essentials, the wine store is replenished, I was out of onions and a few bits for the freezer means that I am replete for the next few days.

Had the remains of last night's soup but gave it a topping of fried mushrooms and garlic croutons and it went down rather well with a glass of the red stuff.  Fires going beautifully, temperature is into minus already this evening and threatens to be much lower.  Back to my book and just a few pickies to post.

LN...busy day with nothing to do tomorrow....so far...



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