The Wrath of the Gods

Head Rambles Posted on by 13

So Melbourne has had an earthquake terrifying the locals?

This somewhat belies the concept of the “Crocodile Dundee” hard man? A few bricks fell off a building? Big deal, A similar thing happened in Skobieville a few weeks back, with no earthquake whatsoever. I presume the bricks just decided to call it a day and die. Anyway the locals just shrugged and just went back to swilling cans of lager, shooting up heroin and backing horses. They are real Hard Men.

The people I feel sorry for are those poor sods in La Palma.

I don’t think I can imagine anything more terrifying than watching a fifteen foot high wall of molten rock slowly oozing its way towards my home with the knowledge that there is nothing whatsoever that I can do about it. It is the ultimate epitome of helplessness.

Flooded homes can be dried out and a lot of belongings saved. Fires are worse but in a worse case scenario you still have the land to rebuild. Volcanic eruptions though are one of the few areas where there is fuck all anyone can do except stand back and watch the mayhem. A lot of people would say you shouldn’t build in an area that has had previous geological upheavals? I’ll let you debate that with the residents of California.

I really feel sorry for those poor bastards of La Palma. They have lost everything except whatever they managed to grab before running. I suppose technically they still own the land but seeing as it is now buried under fifteen feet of rock, boulders and ash they’d be lucky to even determine where their land was, let alone having any use for it. I don’t think I’d want to rebuild there?

The Manor is built on [and of] igneous rock [granite] but that goes back a million years or so and wasn’t even volcanic in origin. The worst fear is a very minor fault line off the coast of Wales which gives an insignificant burp every few decades. It once even rattled the radiators on the wall and woke me up. I just went back to sleep and discovered the next day that it had actually been an earthquake that had toppled one chimney in Wales.

Just look on this and tremble.

 

Around the water cooler

Head Rambles Posted on by 4

Today is one of those days I am positively ecstatic that I no longer work.

Their tedious restrictions have been eased and people are allowed to return to the office after fifteen [or is it sixteen, or eighteen?] months of working from home.

First of all there is the problem of commuting. So far as I know there are still some restrictions on public transport so buses and trains will be full before they even reach your stop. Good luck with that. And if you are driving, roads will be chaotic as people have lost the rhythm of the regular commute.

Assuming everyone eventually arrives at the workplace, the fun really begins.

Is everyone vaccinated? The boss can’t ask as it is deemed illegal. Rumour will therefore spread like wildfire throughout the office that Brian in the corner over there is an anti-vaxxer. This may be true but more likely isn’t. Truth doesn’t matter though and poor Brian will be shunned to within an inch of his life. There will be frantic displaying of smart phones assuring each other that they are “safe”.

Then there is the small talk. Everyone will have to recount in great graphic details all the terrible horrors they endured during the lockdown. There will be stories of visiting Granny in the old folks’ home and how she died roaring and alone. There will be babies born where the mother hadn’t even been pregnant at the start of the Pandanic. There will be “funny” stories about the chaos some Zoom call caused when the recipient wasn’t dressed in time.

Of course restrictions still state everyone has to wear a face nappy and anti-socially distance and they will all probably be separated by plastic screens so they’ll all have to shout. There will be no peace and quiet in the office.

The face nappies of course will lead to problems. At that meeting where you are all “socially distancing” around the table, how can you judge other’s reactions? Is the Boss leering, laughing or about to explode in a fireball of wrath? Only the eyes can tell. Someone will doubtless suggest removing all face coverings at which point half will leave the table in blind panic.

At least the men needn’t bother shaving in the morning. My bet is that a lot will have grown beards which they will be anxious [ or too embarrassed] to display. That probably goes for a few women too.

Yes. I shall sit here in my mountain-side retreat and revel in the joys of retirement.

Who needs work anyway?

 

Living with chaos and absent friends

Head Rambles Posted on by 5

Life has been somewhat upside down here at the Manor for the last couple of days.

Normally our routine is quiet and undisturbed with just the odd trip to the village to upset the rhythm of life. That all changed on Friday.

Actually the ripples started on Wednesday as we were expecting Good Friend to call and she didn’t. Both of us get a little edgy while waiting for a visitor to arrive especially if they are late. So the edginess lasted all Wednesday. GF never arrived. This didn’t worry us too much as she can sometimes call on a Thursday or even Friday at a pinch.

The edginess persisted through Thursday and still no sign of GF. I texted her but of course got no reply.

Friday I set my alarm to get up early for the Oil Tank People. Naturally they didn’t turn up at the appointed time and I missed a lie in. They eventually arrived and we had great fun reversing a massive Mercedes van into the front garden. They set to work pumping out the tank into a holding tank in their van. I left them to it. In the meantime I was concerned that GF would turn up and find the gate blocked. I sent a text message explaining what was going on. No reply of course.

The lads eventually finished. I now have a brand new tank with new filters and stopcocks and piping. Very impressive. It’s also full again of my freshly filtered oil which they had replaced. The gaffer was a very nice but chatty bloke who then started raving about my acreage. Like most visitors he thought the North Wood was the extent of my little plot and was amazed to discover I had all the rest and had to explore it. In the end I had difficulty getting rid of him.

Yesterday we had an invasion of Daughter. She arrived with Navan Man [the boy man friend] and two of the Grandkids. She attacked all our windows while he got very trigger happy with my hedge trimmer [which is a bit of a beast and is more of a tree hacker than a dainty hedge trimmer]. All the front hedges have been tamed after a year of wilderness and I can park the car properly and can actually see out the front windows now. Actually I can see out of all the windows as they have been cleaned and polished to within an inch of their lives.

Got a text from GF to say she’d be here on Monday. Right!

Sadly I was in no fit state to entertain the Grandkids as I have no energy whatsoever these days. Also, while the Shingle Bells has abated and all the crusts have fallen off to litter the floor I still have a lingering problem. I looked it up on Dr Google – Postherpetic neuralgia – a lovely name for a bad bastard. Apparently it fades in months. Or years.

Sweet.

 

It never rains

Head Rambles Posted on by 13

but it pours.

We have a little nest egg, or rainy day fund if you like. In the early days of pensionable age the fund was reasonable enough. It was an ostrich egg in the nest.

Since then I have had cause to dip into it a few times. The new garden gate wasn’t cheap, nor was demolishing the beech tree. There were a few other minor items like a new car but the fund remained and was a grand source of mental security.

I ordered central heating oil on Monday. It was expensive but there was enough in the account that I didn’t need to dip into the savings. After all is said and done, I have to do my bit for Warble Gloaming so a good supply of non-renewable CO2 producing oil is essential.

Yesterday, I was sitting here contemplating my navel when I heard noises from the garden. Grand. I now have a full tank of oil.

Except that I don’t.

Normally they deliver without bothering me. I have already paid online so they deliver and fuck off, just leaving a receipt in the letter box. They usually text me afterwards too just to confirm they had been.

Yesterday however I got a phone call. It was a very pleasant young man from the oil company’s office to explain that there was a bit of a problem and they hadn’t delivered as much as I had asked. Apparently the delivery fella had noticed a crack in my oil tank and didn’t want to fill in case the whole thing split wide open.

Fuck!

Nice Young Man was very understanding and a little impressed with my vocabulary. We discussed the options which wasn’t hard – there was only one. The tank had to be replaced but they had a bloke who fixed just that problem. He said he would pass on my number to said bloke. This was a specialised task so I wasn’t going to employ some gobshite who had advertised on Farcebook.

About an hour later the phone rang again. It was another Nice Young Man who was going to solve my little problem for me. He seemed to know what he was talking about as he asked all the pertinent questions about the size of the tank, what exactly it was supported on and how accessible it is. He was somewhat alarmed that the tank is nearly full as it means he has to pump it out before replacing it. I said there was no hurry but he disagreed – the fucking tank could split open at any time! So he’s going to do the job on Friday as an emergency.

I must say I don’t relish the thought of eight hundred litres of kerosene flooding the garden. I reckoned it might be a bit of a fire hazard. Herself reckons it would add value to the house, having our own private oil-well on the land.

I went out to examine the tank. Sure enough, there was the crack. It was quite a respectable one so at least I knew the whole exercise wasn’t a scam. The only problem is that the garden has grown somewhat around the tank so I had to do some judicious pruning and hacking of tree branches. It’s reasonably accessible now provided the Second Nice Young Man is a contortionist.

Friday is going to be expensive. Fuck! On top of the oil delivery bill it’s a bit of a sting.

Our ostrich’s nest egg is now a wren’s nest egg.