Hmm, it was the third dog that done it, you know. The other two were in their cages and there was a liquid offering in front of the dishwasher, so Goldie was guilty. However, other than this once it has been a pee-free week at nights.
It was -3 degrees C as I was driving to Waterford yesterday, though luckily it was dry. It was a long, but calm, day at committees. I'm glad it is over as now I can concentrate on the selection of a new Principal.
I really am too tired to think... Sorry. I'll be back another day.
Sunday 30 November 2008
Sunday 23 November 2008
It's all go!
Well, it's all go at the moment. I'm just back from Dublin. Tomorrow evening I share myself between 2 committee meetings, Tuesday I will be in Dublin on a work excursion, Wednesday is Brussels, Thursday is a night out with Avocent friends, and then I'm free on Friday evening before Newtown Committee on Saturday. Last week wasn't much better, and I had to leave poor ol' b with his nasty cold and no nursing. I managed to walk the dogs on a few occasions, but was otherwise useless. He seems to be surviving, though, and is gradually getting better. I'm not a good nurse anyway, so he was probably as well off without me being there.
I stayed last night with my parents. My father was a host spectacular, feeling he had to fill in for the fact that my mother was running a prison workshop by cooking a meal for me and insisting on doing washing up. I just about managed to wangle my way to carrying a couple of things to and from the dining room table, and doing drying up.
This morning I made an appeal to Leinster QM to help Munster QM through its difficulties. This was purely a personal request, but it was nice to be taken very seriously, and a couple of wise Friends were asked to see what they could do.
Yesterday morning b and I called in to Harvey Norman (I still have difficulty with a shop with such a name, but don't know why it is any worse than, say, B&Q). The Toshiba laptop I had my eye on was no longer there, but they agreed to order it for me. I now get a 10% Vistakon discount, so it was worth waiting a couple of weeks as this has only just been offered. I'm glad I brought b with me as we had difficulty establishing the wireless network offering on other alternatives, with the assistant claiming we would have to buy an HP laptop to get 802.11n. However, we knew it was available on the Toshiba, and it is, so there is no need to for us to spend 400 euro extra.
Both Pippa and Leavy have had to be banished to cages at night as they are both producing offerings on the floor on a regular basis. Hopefully nights spent in their cages will put manners on them. They are happy once they are in them, and unlikely to soil their own beds.
Anyway, gotta go now. Chiz!
I stayed last night with my parents. My father was a host spectacular, feeling he had to fill in for the fact that my mother was running a prison workshop by cooking a meal for me and insisting on doing washing up. I just about managed to wangle my way to carrying a couple of things to and from the dining room table, and doing drying up.
This morning I made an appeal to Leinster QM to help Munster QM through its difficulties. This was purely a personal request, but it was nice to be taken very seriously, and a couple of wise Friends were asked to see what they could do.
Yesterday morning b and I called in to Harvey Norman (I still have difficulty with a shop with such a name, but don't know why it is any worse than, say, B&Q). The Toshiba laptop I had my eye on was no longer there, but they agreed to order it for me. I now get a 10% Vistakon discount, so it was worth waiting a couple of weeks as this has only just been offered. I'm glad I brought b with me as we had difficulty establishing the wireless network offering on other alternatives, with the assistant claiming we would have to buy an HP laptop to get 802.11n. However, we knew it was available on the Toshiba, and it is, so there is no need to for us to spend 400 euro extra.
Both Pippa and Leavy have had to be banished to cages at night as they are both producing offerings on the floor on a regular basis. Hopefully nights spent in their cages will put manners on them. They are happy once they are in them, and unlikely to soil their own beds.
Anyway, gotta go now. Chiz!
Sunday 16 November 2008
A funeral
Yesterday we went to the funeral of Dan Gleeson. You may have met him during the summer when he spent some time on our boat in Dromineer and invited b to his tin house nearby. He had been ringing b with lengthy calls in recent weeks as he was interested in getting together some kayaks for the Nenagh kayaking club, a club of 35 members and only 4 kayaks that has been getting together in Dromineer recently. He felt that they needed help as a good activity for people who otherwise would not have access to water-based fun.
He fell in to the water in Shannon Harbour from the end of his boat, and drowned. A friend who was with him tried to get him out, but Dan may have hit his head as he fell and it wasn't possible to save him.
We also went to look at cars. Car dealers are a fairly homogenous lot, and I find them hard to work with. The main message they are giving at the moment is that they don't want to sell me a car if they have to take a trade-in. This means that they have no orders for new cars. At this time of year they would normally expect to have lots of orders ready for the new year. I may try to sell my car privately as I probably have nothing to lose by trying, and plenty to gain if I succeed. I'm in no hurry so may wait until after Christmas to try.
b went to the AGM of the Heritage Boat Association in Tullamore yesterday evening. It doesn't sound as if it was particularly exciting, which is a relief, as the controversies in NS continue. School Committee is in 2 weeks so it is sub-committee time prior to that. Finance Committee meets on Thursday or Friday, and I'm attending Leinster QM on Sunday to present the annual report.
Winter darkness is closing in, making for very short daylight time. I could do with some warm, sunny days!
He fell in to the water in Shannon Harbour from the end of his boat, and drowned. A friend who was with him tried to get him out, but Dan may have hit his head as he fell and it wasn't possible to save him.
We also went to look at cars. Car dealers are a fairly homogenous lot, and I find them hard to work with. The main message they are giving at the moment is that they don't want to sell me a car if they have to take a trade-in. This means that they have no orders for new cars. At this time of year they would normally expect to have lots of orders ready for the new year. I may try to sell my car privately as I probably have nothing to lose by trying, and plenty to gain if I succeed. I'm in no hurry so may wait until after Christmas to try.
b went to the AGM of the Heritage Boat Association in Tullamore yesterday evening. It doesn't sound as if it was particularly exciting, which is a relief, as the controversies in NS continue. School Committee is in 2 weeks so it is sub-committee time prior to that. Finance Committee meets on Thursday or Friday, and I'm attending Leinster QM on Sunday to present the annual report.
Winter darkness is closing in, making for very short daylight time. I could do with some warm, sunny days!
Sunday 9 November 2008
Cold and miserable
It's just like summer here - wet and miserable! It was very sunny when I woke up yesterday morning so I jumped out of bed and headed out into the garden as it was clear the good weather wasn't going to last. I dug out the sweet corn plants, cleared weeds from the bottom half (and some of the top half) of the veg garden, cleaned the glass on the greenhouse and did other bits and pieces. This was all before 10.15am as I had to go off and get my hair cut then.
Boy, I was glad I had taken that opportunity as the day turned very wet by late morning and neither of us felt like venturing outside. Instead I did the ironing (last week's!) and some tidying. B brought the dogs out for their daily walk and I managed to wash the floor behind the TV while they were out. That's a nasty job as hairs and all sorts of dirt and muck manage to get in behind the table it sits on.
I also cleaned the oven, another job that isn't exactly my favourite. There must be some way of cooking things in the oven without having them spatter all over the place.
We go through phases of baking, and not baking. We haven't done any for a while. B looked at some flour and discovered little things running around in it with gay abandon. We then looked at all the other types of flour, baking soda and such like in the same cupboard and found similar. It seems that the use-by date is there for some reason and that being 2 or 3 years out of date does matter sometimes! Today I went to Homeware and got some of those plastic click-shut jars for putting future purchases of flour in, and we have resolved to buy it in lower quantities in future. If we run out mid-recipe there is a Centra nearby that can sort us.
Oh, and I bought one of those things Ian says is great for holding spoons on saucepans. I had a choice of pink, pink, pink, .... and then I found baby blue, so bought that.
Anyway, we are all full of hope as the American people have spoken wisely. Other political news here is that the Progressive Democrats have decided to disband.
Boy, I was glad I had taken that opportunity as the day turned very wet by late morning and neither of us felt like venturing outside. Instead I did the ironing (last week's!) and some tidying. B brought the dogs out for their daily walk and I managed to wash the floor behind the TV while they were out. That's a nasty job as hairs and all sorts of dirt and muck manage to get in behind the table it sits on.
I also cleaned the oven, another job that isn't exactly my favourite. There must be some way of cooking things in the oven without having them spatter all over the place.
We go through phases of baking, and not baking. We haven't done any for a while. B looked at some flour and discovered little things running around in it with gay abandon. We then looked at all the other types of flour, baking soda and such like in the same cupboard and found similar. It seems that the use-by date is there for some reason and that being 2 or 3 years out of date does matter sometimes! Today I went to Homeware and got some of those plastic click-shut jars for putting future purchases of flour in, and we have resolved to buy it in lower quantities in future. If we run out mid-recipe there is a Centra nearby that can sort us.
Oh, and I bought one of those things Ian says is great for holding spoons on saucepans. I had a choice of pink, pink, pink, .... and then I found baby blue, so bought that.
Anyway, we are all full of hope as the American people have spoken wisely. Other political news here is that the Progressive Democrats have decided to disband.
Saturday 1 November 2008
Back again
OK, it's time to get back to blogging again after a break of a month. That month has been busy. In the last 2 weeks I have been at home for dinner twice, and one of those dinners was yesterday. It has been a mix of business and pleasure, with the highlight being my trip to London to visit Carolan, Ian and Andy.
Merton Abbey Mills area is lovely, and the market near their flat is nice and peaceful for a wander. Everything you need is nearby, and there is still some green space. I was very impressed by the cycle lanes and facilities in London and hope C and Andy get good use from them. This time of year isn't the best for getting started, but then summer may be too hot. Cycling in the dark is the hardest part, though London is lit by street lights in most places.
I should be out cleaning up the garden today as it is dry. However, it is very cold and I'm feeling like doing very little. I've got washing done, and shopping, and some cleaning, but now it is time to just curl up with newspapers and a book. The guy who cuts the hedge is finishing off the work he started last week and has lopped a very large amount off the hedge between ourselves and the Murphys, at our request. This should allow my greenhouse to get more sun.
Next week will be an exciting one. Will Obama win? I hope so as the alternative is too awful to contemplate. Everything ends up being a double-edged sword, though, as he is likely to find some way of stopping American companies making tax-efficient profits from their overseas operations. Most multinationals are in Ireland due to the tax deal, and my employers are no exception.
The dogs weren't very happy last night. There were less fireworks than in previous years but they still cause distress. Leavy is particularly hyper about them. I'm not sure whether she just gets excited, but I think some of it is distress. We were grumpy old so-and-so's yesterday evening and turned off all lights in the front of the house so that we didn't get trick-or-treat visitors. Nobody even rang the door bell, so it worked!
The cold weather seems to have caused a small stone-spot in my windscreen to extend all across the windscreen so I have to get a new windscreen. The car insurance company organises it, and pays for it, so it is easy to get done. This is the first claim I've had on my car insurance in over 30 years of driving, and I hope it is the last.
On Wednesday evening we went out with Joe and Nicki. It was Nicki's 50th birthday. She wasn't expecting us to be at the restaurant so I hope it was a pleasant surprise for her. Then, being the really sociable people we are(n't) we went out with Pat and Jackie to the new restaurant in town, The Hamptons, on Thursday. The Hamptons is full every day, not showing any signs of the recession. It is a middle of the road restaurant in terms of pricing and seems to have become the cool place to be in a very short space of time.
Yesterday was Dell's end of quarter. They let about 500 temporary employees go, and one of their suppliers is making 150 permanent employees redundant. While they always let temporary people go at the end of the quarter it isn't normally in such numbers. We're all expecting further announcements from them, though some point out that we have been expecting their closure for the last 15 years.
Right, back to my book ("Portrait in Sepia" by Isabel Allende).
Merton Abbey Mills area is lovely, and the market near their flat is nice and peaceful for a wander. Everything you need is nearby, and there is still some green space. I was very impressed by the cycle lanes and facilities in London and hope C and Andy get good use from them. This time of year isn't the best for getting started, but then summer may be too hot. Cycling in the dark is the hardest part, though London is lit by street lights in most places.
I should be out cleaning up the garden today as it is dry. However, it is very cold and I'm feeling like doing very little. I've got washing done, and shopping, and some cleaning, but now it is time to just curl up with newspapers and a book. The guy who cuts the hedge is finishing off the work he started last week and has lopped a very large amount off the hedge between ourselves and the Murphys, at our request. This should allow my greenhouse to get more sun.
Next week will be an exciting one. Will Obama win? I hope so as the alternative is too awful to contemplate. Everything ends up being a double-edged sword, though, as he is likely to find some way of stopping American companies making tax-efficient profits from their overseas operations. Most multinationals are in Ireland due to the tax deal, and my employers are no exception.
The dogs weren't very happy last night. There were less fireworks than in previous years but they still cause distress. Leavy is particularly hyper about them. I'm not sure whether she just gets excited, but I think some of it is distress. We were grumpy old so-and-so's yesterday evening and turned off all lights in the front of the house so that we didn't get trick-or-treat visitors. Nobody even rang the door bell, so it worked!
The cold weather seems to have caused a small stone-spot in my windscreen to extend all across the windscreen so I have to get a new windscreen. The car insurance company organises it, and pays for it, so it is easy to get done. This is the first claim I've had on my car insurance in over 30 years of driving, and I hope it is the last.
On Wednesday evening we went out with Joe and Nicki. It was Nicki's 50th birthday. She wasn't expecting us to be at the restaurant so I hope it was a pleasant surprise for her. Then, being the really sociable people we are(n't) we went out with Pat and Jackie to the new restaurant in town, The Hamptons, on Thursday. The Hamptons is full every day, not showing any signs of the recession. It is a middle of the road restaurant in terms of pricing and seems to have become the cool place to be in a very short space of time.
Yesterday was Dell's end of quarter. They let about 500 temporary employees go, and one of their suppliers is making 150 permanent employees redundant. While they always let temporary people go at the end of the quarter it isn't normally in such numbers. We're all expecting further announcements from them, though some point out that we have been expecting their closure for the last 15 years.
Right, back to my book ("Portrait in Sepia" by Isabel Allende).
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