07:00 I rush out of bed early to get ready for a weekly zoom call from Australia and a local phone call, although it soon turns out that I didn't need to be quite so industrious - the zoom call isn't happening.
We're always a bit under pressure on Saturday mornings because we have a weekly zoom call with our daughter Sarah in Australia at 9 am (5 pm Perth time), and we also always get a phone call from Budgens, the local convenience store, usually at the same time (9 am), telling us that our delivery of next week's groceries is on its way, and how much money to transfer online.
Sarah, our daughter in Perth, Australia, seen here with
husband Francis and their twin daughters on Christmas day 2019
While I'm downstairs making the tea, Sarah texts me to say that she wants to do the zoom tomorrow instead - they're going out somewhere. Also she doesn't feel 100% because she had her COVID booster jab yesterday.
Poor Sarah !!!!!
But it's too late for me to "put the clock back" and get back into bed and go to sleep. Lois is already eating her Shreddies, and who's to blame her haha!!!
10:00 After we've swabbed down the groceries with disinfectant we turn to the Radio Times weekly puzzle pages (as you do!). Lois and I are getting just a bit too clever for these puzzles these days. We only started them last night - the Popmaster, the Pointless, the Eggheads, the Sudoku, the Trackword, the Enigma and, lastly, the crossword.
We almost solved the lot last night, although half a dozen clues in the crossword were left undone, when we went to bed at 10 pm.
We finish off the remaining clues this morning.
We feel satisfied to have finished it, but we're not happy with some of the clues - they're way too obscure. For example, 8 across: "In front of a nautical lavatory"|. Answer: "ahead".
This clue turns on knowing that "head" is a word for a toilet on board a ship. Who knew that? Not us, till we googled it, that is.
The big question has always been - how to avoid the horrors of a situation like the one in this picture?
We find that some anonymous person has kindly written a history of "nautical / marine heads", as follows:
In the days of sailing ships, the forerunner of today’s
marine toilet was known as the head or heads as there were normally two of
them, some of them being enclosed in a shelter.
They were located on each side of the bowsprit, which was an
integral part of the ship’s bow, overlooked only by the figurehead at the head
of the ship, and this is how the marine toilets become known as the "head".
Why were the "heads" located there?
1. Smells emanating from the heads would be blown away from the
deck of the ship by the following winds; that were normally from aft, as the
ship sailed before the wind.
2. Because the heads were right at the bow slanting
inwards, the waves constantly splashing seawater upwards would wash any
accumulation of waste from the port and starboard planking, whilst also keeping
the gratings used as a toilet seat and the surrounding deck area well washed.
See? Simples!!!!
I pass this explanation on to Lois and I'm afraid that all we can say is "Yuck!!!!" Still, I suppose it's all part of life's rich pageant. My god!
Who says that doing crosswords is a waste of time haha!!!
12:00 We go out for our walk on the local football field. It's nice to see that the junior soccer is in full swing. We have a flapjack and a hot chocolate at the Whiskers Coffee Stand.
we do our walk - nice to see the Junior Soccer games are in full swing,
as you can see behind us
we have a hot chocolate and share a flapjack
on the so-called "Buddy Bench" at the Whiskers Coffee Stand
Behind us can be seen the blonde Polish girl who serves us.
She takes time out here to chat to another customer and watch the soccer
14:00 After lunch we go upstairs to have our shower, postponed from yesterday, followed by an extended nap in bed - and, to observe our own rules, we don't get up till 5 pm. But how lazy we're becoming!
17:00 It's 5 pm, we're both out of bed, and now we've both got thick heads. Oh dear - I wonder if that's what happens when you spend too long in bed? I think we should be told, by somebody or other - and please tell us before next Friday, when we plan to do it all over again haha! Answers on a postcard please haha!!!!
19:30 A later dinner - and we feel quite sophisticated dining this late - and it's kedgeree with stir-fry vegetables - yum yum!
we enjoy a sophisticatedly late dinner of kedgeree
and stir-fry vegetables: yum yum !
If you don't believe the late hour, take a look at the clock on the wall behind Lois. See?!!!
[I don't think that would be accepted as proof in a court of law" - Ed]
20:00 We watch some TV, yesterday's edition of Winterwatch, the series that monitors wild life in the UK, with the help of a network of hidden cameras and a team of live presenters.
Tonight in Northern Ireland, Megan McCubbin weighs in on the vexed issue of explaining why many birds, including the egrets she's been highlighting for us, tend to stand around on one leg in winter, even in the most precarious positions, e.g. on a high branch of a tree etc.
With the help of one of the programme's iconic props, Megan explains that most of the egret's body is covered with insulating feathers to keep it warm, but with 4 notable exceptions: the 2 legs, the eyes, and the bill.
These four areas - the 2 legs, the eyes, and the beak, are where the bird loses the most heat. So if it tucks one of its legs under the feathers on its body, it cuts down heat loss by 25%.
See? Simples !!!!! After all the bird can't put bed-socks on like Lois and I do haha!!!!
Later in the programme, we see some more of the output of the programme's iconic prop department when presenters Chris Packham and Michaela Strachan demonstrate the differences in body mass between different UK members of the mustelid family: badger, otter, pine marten, polecat, stoat and weasel.
In a typical instance of "thinking outside the box", the presenters have chosen potatoes to illustrate the differences in body mass.
Wow - what a difference! And I think Lois and I have tended to think of these 6 species as being much of a muchness, as regards size. How wrong can you be !!!!
The big guy - the badger - is about 22 lbs (10kg), the otter is about 15 lbs, the pine marten 2.5 lbs, the polecat 3.5 lbs, the stoat 11 oz, and the teeny weeny weasel just 3.5 oz (100g).
My god, what a range!
21:30 We want to go to bed on something a bit softer, so we decide to go to a bed on a Mandy. This week, as always, Mandy Carter, played by Diane Morgan, is trying a new career to keep the Social Security people off her back.
Mandy accepts the offer of a job clearing so-called "fatbergs" out of the town's sewers. She's attracted by the short working hours - 4 hours a day - without thinking of why the working day has to be so short. My god - what a mistake !!!!!
After her first shift in the sewers, with apparently no time for a shower, she turns up late for her first date with her punctilious librarian friend Andrew.
Oh dear - I don't think this particular relationship is going to go anywhere - my god!
Neither Lois nor I have ever been down in Cheltenham's sewers, but we're agreed that if we ever do, we must take a shower afterwards. And it's surprising how many people don't seem to recognise this simple requirement as a priority.
Just recently we watched the final episode of the 1980's sitcom "Chance in a Million", where many of the guests invited to a wedding, including the bride's parents, found their way into the town sewers by mistake, just managing to emerge through a manhole in time to appear in the official wedding photographs - they had an excuse, however: they simply didn't have time for a shower, so fair enough!
flashback to January 9th: Lois and I watch the final episode of
sitcom "Chance in a Million", where many of the wedding
guests emerge from the town's sewers just in time to take part
in the photos.
What a crazy world we live in !!!!!
But it's also nostalgic tonight to see veteran actor from the 1960's, Sir Tom Courtenay, in a cameo role as Sewage Engineer Woodcock.
Hail to thee, Sir Tom! You kept us out of war haha!
flashback to the 1960's: Tom Courtenay in happier times,
acting in "Billy Liar" with Julie Christie
Take a long look at the credits for this edition of Mandy, and see a cast list of the calibre you won't see again, that's for sure. Get your screen shot of it here, and show it to you grandchildren haha!
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzzz!!!!!!!
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