Monday 1st December

And we're on the downward run to Christmas.  I'd like to say 'white out' but it's been a very grey day today.  Damp, miserable, cold and it took me until lunchtime to get dressed.  I did put my trousers over my PJs this morning and donned my coat to get fresh bread from the van but as for the rest of the day I've been holed up so to speak.

Got the sewing machine out and I've made the lavender bags that are going into the goody bags for my neighbours for my 25th Festivities.  I think I might go into Kardjali tomorrow and get the gift bags and more of the 'usuals' that get wrapped up individually to fill the bags.  The four favourites in the village all get the same....they probably sit around together and open them just to check.  There'll be a few more this year...and it might end up more of a bran tub for the rest.  I've been included in so much village activity this year at all of the birth celebration, deaths and marriages and lunchtime get togethers for no reason at all.  It's my way of saying a thank you to them.

I was going to finish the bags by embroidering them this evening but by the time supper was cooked the little light that we had today had faded and I'd prefer to do it in daylight.  Much easier on the eyes.  No pictures today...I'm not able to post them on the first message of the month...software issues....so they'll be more tomorrow.  Going down to the fire now and I think I'm in the downstairs bedroom tonight in the nest....really need to cosy up after rubbish weather today.  LN...I'm back to my fire...

Tuesday 2nd December

So the mornings are getting better....I slept through until six this morning but was a grim morning to wake up to.  Rain, fog ,damp and miserable but the consolation was the fire was still going so with a little encouragement I had a full blaze by six twenty.  Coffee, book and lazed the morning and eventually got ready for the day.  Two lots of wood in and topped up the coal bucket and decided that this was the place to be.  Kardjali in the rain going between the shops was not on the cards.

So the rest of the day was sitting in front of the fire with my embroidery threads and finished a couple of lavender bags off and then moved upstairs and created my new desk diary for next year so it's been a very creative day and there was no chance of doing anything outside.  I suppose I could go and tidy the little house and organise the pot plants but I'll save that for another day.

Seven thirty my time....got a fillet steak out of the freezer and it's that with chippies tonight so I better get on and I think there's a little red wine remaining in the wine box.....so to horse so they say.....LN...the kitchen calls....

Wednesday 3rd December

Eight twenty this morning when I woke up and I don't know what I put it down to.  Supper was late last night but I watched Egg Heads on internet tv and was fully wound down last night, no reading, no active brain before I went to bed so probably that was it.  Of course it could have had something to do with the couple of glasses of wine that I had to help supper go down...

And another wet day here...no glimmer of anything and I have pools of water at the bottom of my garden.  Bet the poor moles are getting flooded out...well ever hopeful.  I've got little mini Vesuvius stretching along the channel that was dug to remove drainage water from the underneath of the little house.  Looks like good soil though so I might fill a few pots with it.....I found a pack of freesia bulbs that I thought I'd lost so I need to get them in, last years appear to be coming up in the garden so none for the house this year.  

No photos again...I couldn't see the mountains at all this morning and it hasn't stopped raining all day.  Rain is forecast again for tomorrow so the plan to go into Kardjali with the Librarian may be shelved.  Looking at the long range though....it could be like this until Christmas...joy oh, joy....My only visitor today was one of Semile's sheep dogs heading for the burning pit in the garden.  I headed him off from the upstairs balcony but he did look a bedraggled specimen ...not a day to be out guarding the sheep....especially with all the mist round...they sort of blended into the hillside.  Internet tv and time for Egg Heads.....and then down to the fire....LN

Thursday 4th December

Well I made the phone call last night to the Librarian and we cancelled tomorrow.  It was a very quick call, the mother of all thunderstorms was rattling around.  It started at about eight thirty my time and went on after midnight.  The electricity went off a couple of times but only for minutes and I was hoping that I didn't have to take apart the fire and put it in the kitchen burner...No electricity, no pump once the UPS runs out of juice...

Seven twenty start, fire still going, coffee made, washed up from last night and down to the bread wagon when he arrived just after eight.  Padded trousers over pyjama bottoms and on with a big coat since it was still throwing it down.  I noticed that Haciber was returning carrying some chicken wings and I didn't know that he carried those sort of things on the wagon so I came back with quite a goodie bag of bread, breakfast bun, orange juice, chicken wings and half a dozen eggs.  It makes me realise that you could live quite successfully out of the van and I'm sure that if you ordered stuff, he would bring it out for you.  So had my breakfast, got another supply of logs in and have had a very lazy day again.  I've designed a calendar but I can't get it to print out properly...I want A5 printed on A4 but it seems to come up with odd sizes no matter how I set it to print.  Made some more cards and tomorrow I'm off to Kardjali and am going to do my present shop plus a few essentials such as fish fingers (comfort food), butter and firelighters....there is no way that I'm getting into the habit of collecting fir cones and storing bags of the things to get the fire to catch....I've not gone that native.  Lots of little birds  looking very bedraggled sitting on the lime tree in the garden...probably reserving energy.

Chicken wings with potatoes and onions for supper...delicious and just drawn the curtains for the night.  I think I've just heard a clap of distant thunder...not again...please...and a little sun tomorrow wouldn't go amiss.  More problems in other towns that have a river running through them....my stream is running well outside the front wall since I cleared the leaves from the ditch last week...a job well done.

So computer off...it was thunder....down to the fire with a new book....restful day again.....but activity tomorrow regardless of the weather before I develop cabin fever...LN

Friday 5th December

Well I suppose six thirty was OK since the eyes were heading south at ten of the clock.  I read for a while, dropped the Kindle and realised that the safest place was horizontal.

Coffee, read for a while, fire still going so rescued it and loaded it up ready for the day and then closed it down and it was still in when I got back form my wonderings.  Prepared supper before I left and it was ready for hotting up when I got back.  Onions, the rest of the chicken wings with lots of chili and potatoes.   Into Djebel and popped into the shop and found out that it was my student's mum's birthday so there was a present to be bought.  She had visitors with gifts so I headed off to the garage but it was too busy this morning to get any sense out of anyone so I've booked it in for tuesday.  It was reluctant to start this morning so it's either water in the diesel or worn out glow plugs but whichever want...I need to know with winter almost upon us.

Into Kardjali.....managed to find some metal curtain rings...and two ceramic tiles that will do for the side tables in my bedroom to save the bits falling through.  I'll make use of the curtain rings tomorrow when I make the curtain for the lounge small window.  Into the leva shop and got most of the things for the ladies pressies, over to Mania and managed to get a leather Timberland coat, a leather jerkin and a sweater for seven pounds.  On to the sewing shop and managed to find some embroidery needles with big eyes and some leather sewing machine needles should I have need to redesign anything.  Back to the Panda clothes shop and found a pair of slippers and a neck scarf for the presents and then to Kaufland for the gift bag and the card and a few more things.  Into Lidl for the butter and bacon and forgot the firelighters which were on the list and managed to find those in Djebel.  Into the shop and the gifts were readily received and then I went to the stationers to get the wrapping paper for my gift bags but couldn't find any gift bags...on the list for another day.

Unpacked my finds and put in the appropriate places...more fire wood in and fire resuscitated and brought to life...supper warmed and eaten with French bread but maybe a little too much chili flakes.....I could suffer for my art....Heading for eight my time and the sofa and a book look inviting.  Not so much rain today but the temperature has dropped....It might mean snow....hippee...LN

Saturday 6th December

Really damp start again and we're back to rain, rain, rain.  Seven start, fire salvaged yet again and sat down with poached eggs on toast with coffee at eight this morning enjoying the warmth.  Lazed around doing yesterday's sudoku witch took me three attempts and today's is still requiring attention.

A knock on the door at ten thirty made me realise that I'm still in pyjamas so I verified that it was female at the door before I opened it and it was Remsier.  Her gas bottle had run out and she wondered if I was going into Djebel so that she could get it refilled.  I wasn't but now I was!!  She is off to Sofia tomorrow in a taxi, apparently her thirty five year old son who works in Belgium has come back and has just undergone a heart operation...worrying times for her.  So I picked her up at just before twelve with the gas bottle and her grandson and off we set.  Now the man there I know and he insists on speaking to me in a mixture of Bulgarian and German which I sort of get by with but I noticed that part of the forecourt had disappeared....there has been so much rain that it had washed away the underneath and there was a great big hole where there used to be tarmac.  He tried to explain that there had been a torrent of water from the hillside over the road and just washed it away.  So over to the M-Tel shop so that Remsier could buy a new Sim card for her grandson's phone but I'm not sure if it's for her hospitalised son or not.....didn't get the translation.

So home...she wanted to pay me but her husband is the one that splits my logs for me so I've just tied him up for a couple of hours work...it's a much better idea.  Make an omelet when I got back with potatoes, onions and some ham that I had and that means no cooking tonight,  Gouldjan came round this afternoon clutching two bags of clothes from Haciber that are destined for the poor of the villages and Gouldjan distributes them but said they needed washing.  Tomorrow I shall look like Widow Twankey....I've offered to get them done for her as my contribution to the cause...so no student tomorrow...they have other things to do and now...so do I.

Seven minus fifteen my time.....I'm about to try today's sudoku so wish me luck.  The house is beautifully warm since the fire has been going well all day.  It's not that it's cold...just horribly damp...LN

Sunday 7th December

Seven start and finished my book so it was on to the Kindle and find a new series to download.  I didn't bother with the fire...it seemed warmer but as soon as the Widow Twanky exercise began and the morning brightness rescinded into the gloom or the rest of the week the fire was ignited, stoked so that the washing could dry inside.  Unfortunately there is no fire without smoke so to speak and I thing it's down to the dampness of the air.  Anyway...opened the door, got in two loads of wood to keep the home fires burning and topped up the coal bucket and headed for the kitchen for the statutory bacon, egg and fried bread.  Well it is Sunday.  Phoned the Librarian and suddenly the phone went dead I appear to have only three stotinki credit.  So the four hundred minutes that I'd accumulated have been wiped without trace and when I tried to phone customer service apparently I didn't have enough credit to speak to anyone.  The problem is that they send you a text message in English but when you go for the automated options it's in Bulgarian...so that's gong to work then...

No student today so generally had a lazy morning after the usual morning turnaround and settled in to complete yesterday's and today's sudoku and I had to resort to paper for Saturdays.  I tried it with pencil first but there seems no conviction in a pencil so got out the pen and finished it eventually.  I entered the result into the computer and managed to knock one minute off my average time.  OK it's cheating but I'd worked hard at it....

Finished another couple of lavender bags off this afternoon and then headed to the computer and settled into Filmon tv and got hooked into the afternoon session of the snooker....I just love bad boy Ronnie and of course I'm cheering for him...  They're on their afternoon break now...I don't go for the post-mortems  so I've come off it and try more later.  Songs of Praise just didn't float it for me.

The leeks still remain in the kitchen unadulterated...I'm not hungry at all so am not rushing to prepare anything yet...I'll wait for the mood to take me.  Still not a good forecast for the rest of the week...looks like more of the same.  Had a bonfire so the cats were out in force along with the magpies for the pickings.  I'm down for the fire now....got a new book and new author to have a go at....LN...I'l let you know how the first book goes...

Tuesday 9th December

Not my fault for yesterday.....I went into the shop to complain and apparently it was their end...they were having trouble with the mast.  It went down at five thirty more or less last night and it was up by  elevenish this morning....Just back from having the car fixed...all will be revealed later...this is to let my family know that I'm OK and haven't been eaten by stray dogs and the likes...Now fire, lunch and finding something constructive to do....

Tuesday continued

Yesterday I was doing the Widow Twanky finale and ended up ironing the ones that needed ironing and they were all packed and ready for delivery at eight thirty in the morning.  My next task was to get out the petchka pipes and give them a going over and it appeared that there was a build up of debris just where it goes into the connection in the bathroom but all were taken down cleaned and replaced and now it's chugging along nicely...Two jobs down and only ten thirty.  Finished off another lavender bag so that goes in the post tomorrow, the intention was to get my cards off this morning but the internet going down last night meant that I couldn't get to some of the addresses so it's shelved for tomorrow now.

I ate too much food yesterday so have spent the day wishing I hadn't.  Baked beans on toast for breakfast, fish cake sandwiches for lunch and pork chops and chippies for supper.  I think the weather has something to do with it...rain rain and it's still raining.  

So this morning was a seven start, got the wood in and started the reluctant Beast to get it into the garage.  I delivered the clothes to the school, Gouldjan wasn't there but they were gratefully accepted.  I went over to the Internet shop, down to the garage and one broken down glow plug was detected and renewed.  Stopped off at the garage shop to have a chat with my student's mum, over to the supermarket to get in a few essentials and home for just after one.  

I've wasted an afternoon but there again they're mine to waste.  I watched Countdown, followed by Flog It and I started to watch Andrew Marr's 'Making of Britain' but I just couldn't watch him.  His mouth irritates me and don't ask me why...I don't know.  I find that that's all I'm watching and not listening.  

Seven thirty my time...everything is closed up for the night and tomorrow snow is forecast but we'll wait and see.....I think it might be another damp squib of a day so my cards get done tomorrow, into the post of Thursday and then into Kardjali for final shopping.   LN..the fire calls and I have more pork chops to do something with since they came out in a frozen lump.....Note to self...sort before storage...LN

Thursday 11th December

Well I woke up last night in the chair and it was too late to post.  I was cold, the fire was on its last legs and yes, it was and still is raining,  This weather is really quite depressing....it's not that it's that cold but damp and miserable and I think everyone's thinking the same.  

Finished my cards yesterday and they'll get posted in the morning.  According to the weather forecast '... the sun will come out tomorrow...bet your bottom dollar'...and so it should be like that for the next four days but well into the minus at night.  Sort out day today....I want to give the house a good clean ready for the festive season, not that anyone is coming this year to the best of my knowledge but the neighbours do pop in now and again.  

There was a very busy woodpecker out yesterday.  I think he was furtling the seeds out of a fir cone that had dropped from my tree.  Unfortunately when I tried to go out to take the shot he flew away but that's the best I could do.  Onwards and upwards....out with the hoover and the mop and bucket....there's lots to do....