Day 863 & 864 - Another Weekend

Day 863...

Simon was up and out early this morning for a 7.30am barbers appointment! After he arrived home we had a coffee before popping on our walking shoes and venturing out for a longer walk than normal. As it had been a bit wet overnight we kept to the pavements and headed in the direction of a local garden centre that has a lovely cafe called Piptree Cafe.

It was a 2.2 mile walk which we managed in 40 minutes and then we had the same journey home again. The day was rather grey and looked like it could rain at any minute so we went out armed with an umbrella and rain coats and needed none of them! Typical!

After a bit of brunch we had a decidedly lazy afternoon. It was raining off and on and Simon had his latest piece of digital art that he was desperate to get completed. I had a few online bits to do but then spent the remainder of my time just chilling and watching some TV and some YouTube.

After a very lovely keto dinner of black pepper chicken stir fry we settled down for the evening to watch a couple of Drag Race shows. We had the final of All Stars Season 7 which has been phenomenal to watch and in our opinion the right queen won. And then we started watching the second series of Drag Race Down Under.

Day 864...

The day started a little later than usual and after a coffee we decided that a walk was very much needed. Not sure what was up with me this morning (and the majority of the weekend if I'm honest) but I was struggling to feel motivated and actually felt quite grumpy. I'd hoped that getting out for a walk might have lifted my mood but I'm not sure it made any significant difference. 

It was another grey day following rain over night and again looked like it could rain at any moment, although it was surprisingly warm. We kept to a flatter route and tried to avoid too many wet fields but we still clocked up 3.5 miles in 1 hour and 6 minutes.

While I had the exciting task of updating our online grocery shopping ahead of collection tomorrow Simon was focused on cleaning up his recent set of 3D prints. This involves sanding the pieces to remove any lumps and bumps that shouldn't be there along with smoothing out the lines that appear with a 3D print, followed by the application of a resin filler to fill in the gaps and help create a smoother surface.

I made a start on my newest jigsaw which by the power of Amazon was ordered yesterday and had arrived by late morning. I have still not found the missing piece of my last jigsaw so have packed it away in the hope that it may show up at some point in the future. But today I was able to get the edge completed of my new Winnie the Pooh themed one...

Simon has been able to hook up a special camera to his 3D printer which means that he will be able to keep an eye on the printer from wherever he may be, which as the printer is at the opposite end of the house to where Simon normally works is going to be pretty useful. He can even control the printer from the app that runs along with the camera! It's a nice safety feature to have in case a print gets too hot (although it should shut down automatically) or if it starts to misprint. This way Simon will be able to avoid unnecessary errors and the waste of printer filament.

And then for the first time in like forever we had our Disney Dream Girls Sunday meet-up/quiz. We started doing a weekly quiz on a Sunday sometime in 2020 when the world was going mad and we'd been pretty good at making it a regular weekly occurrence but as life became more 'normal' and our lives resumed it had become harder to find time when everyone was free to 'meet up'. Since out last meet-up it would appear Zoom have reduced the amount of free time you have to chat and so our little chit chat was cut short and we didn't even get around to having the quiz element! But we have put next Sunday in our diaries and so hopefully then we will be able to chat and quiz!

OK, I think I will sign off and see you all tomorrow.
xx

Sunday again...

Day 214...

Well it was a slow start to the day but after all it was Sunday and we didn't really have anything planned.

Once up and about I had what is the now usual Sunday morning job of updating my online grocery shopping order ready for collection tomorrow. And while I did that Simon was tinkering with the mouse droid he is building as he is working towards getting the electronics working so that it 'beeps and boops'!

We then got on our walking shoes and set off for a little Sunday afternoon stroll...well we managed 3.5 miles in about and hour and 15 minutes. We took a walk that we haven't done for a while and it was interesting to notice the change in the scenery. We commented that when we first started walking back in March everywhere was just starting to bud and come to life. We have then seen everywhere blossom, get very green and very overgrown and now we are seeing it all start to die back, change colour and are seeing a whole new range of colours emerge. We really are getting to see the circle of life in full effect.

Once home we decided to enjoy a coffee, and a small piece of dark chocolate, outside in the garden. The only downside to this was a few wasps that thought we were fair game! So a little internet research ensued to find out whether there was any particular way to ward off wasps. Well, apparently they don't like the colour red and they are also very territorial. So one way is to make a fake wasps nest as then they won't approach...so thanks to the power of Amazon we have, for £3.00, ordered a fake wasp nest to see whether that will actually work!! I will let you know!

The rest of the afternoon was spent with a little more Ebaying, some online shopping and some more mouse droid tinkering for Simon....and here is said droid...

An MSE droid to name it correctly

So we have working sounds but, as I understand it, Simon wants the sounds to be linked to it's movement and that is what he is currently working on...apparently it involves accelerometers!

The day was rounded out with our regular Sunday evening Disney quiz, hosted by the podcast I co-host, the Disney Dream Girls. Today the quiz was all about the animated classic The Adventures of Ichabod & Mr Toad and we need pretty well...in fact we won! Which means we get to set the questions for next week and I think we have agreed to set them around the movie Hocus Pocus which means I will need to re-watch it this week I think.

While me and Molly were quizzing Simon has been immersing himself in more of his VR games, getting to grips with Vadar Immortal...a Star Wars game...and he's loving it by all accounts.

Another Sunday done and another day where we have managed to stay clear of real world antics...

Stay safe, take care out there...wash your hands, keep your distance and wear a mask.

xx

Lazy Autumn Sunday

Day 207...

Today turned out to be your quintessential lazy Sunday.

A very slow start to the day and so lovely not to have to be woken by an alarm! Once up and about my first job, as usual for a Sunday, was to update my online grocery order ready for collecting tomorrow morning.

While I was doing that Simon has restarted his project to get all our home video off tape and into digital format. He has had this as an on/off project for a while and is something that he can set off running while he does something else. We have taken plenty of video over the years as we have either owned or had access to a video camera going back to the late 1980's or early 1990's.

Simon is able to take old video and transfer it all onto a server so that we can watch it easily whenever we want. I think today's capture was from Christmas of 2008! We have lots to go through but it's great to know that all those memories can be preserved onto a format that won't deteriorate over time and will be there for our kids to look back on in years to come.

We then took advantage of a lovely Autumn afternoon and took a walk over the fields near us...5.5 miles and an hour and 52 minutes later we arrived back at home. This was the first decent walk we have had for a fair while and it was lovely to be out and about in the fresh air, although I suspect I may feel the effects of it tomorrow.

Once home it was time for coffee and one of Simon's signature sweet omelette's, sat outside enjoying the outdoors while the weather allows. I just love these omelette's that he makes full of cinnamon, nutmeg, dash of cream and yummy extra dark chocolate and relatively healthy too!

The afternoon was rounded out with the Disney Dream Girls podcast Sunday Disney quiz via Zoom. This was, as it is always, great fun and lovely to be able to chat with people from all over the world about what we are all up to as well as attempt to answer some Disney questions...some easier than others. This week Simon had come up with some number based questions and only one of them involved Star Wars!

And I think that's where I'm going to leave it for today as I'm sure there is going to be much COVID talk over the next few days as our government are set to announce a new 'tier' system along with rumours of possible short 'circuit breaker' lockdowns and all the while we still haven't got an effect test and trace system...or as I was calling it track and trace! Just goes to show that there is so much information out there that we can't even get the name of the systems that are supposedly in place right!

So as always look after yourselves and do what you can to keep yourself safe. Wash your hands, keep your distance and wear a mask.

xx

Ebay & Disney Quiz

Day 172...

So last night turned into a bit of a marathon session on my jigsaw, hadn't intended to but the 'I'll just put a few pieces in' turned into 'quite a lot of pieces' and although not yet done I have made a fair bit of progress but it was rather a late night!

Which meant it was a slow start to the morning with the first job being to update my grocery shop online ready for collection tomorrow. And with that out the way I had the task of setting up more items for sale via Ebay, another 13 items. Plus as the day moved on I started to see sales coming through for the items I had put online last week!

Simon has made contact with a couple of relatives who we can now send a stack of family photographs to. But the lovely thing has been making a re-connection with family members who, for one reason and another, we have not been in touch with for quite awhile. They have expressed their gratitude at being thought of and are looking forward to being able to add to their own families memories. As a result we now have excuses to go visit different parts of the country.

Mid-afternoon I took a coffee outside to soak up some sunshine and prepare for this evening's Disney Dream Girls quiz as I needed to come up with some questions. So as it was Pluto's 90th birthday I decided to produce some Pluto based questions along with a couple about the iconic attraction, as well as one of my favourites, at Walt Disney World; the Carousel of Progress.

Simon has been busy casting parts for a helmet order that he received this weekend as well as a bit more work on the 3D parts he has printed for his R2D2 build. Although at one point he did have to rebuild part of the 3D printer as a print he set off this morning decided to not print as it should, but a quick replacement of a part and we are now back up and running.

Amongst the items that we have inherited from Simon's mums house we found an old audio tape that was made when some of Simon's relatives were living in Australia which we have tracked down, by way of his Dad's diary, to 1974!. We think the tape, once it had been recorded on one side was sent out to Australia and was then returned with their recording on the other side. Thankfully we had a tape machine that Simon could hook up to his laptop to then transfer the audio. The amazing thing is that Simon has been able to 'clean up' the audio track and cannot only hear his own voice as a child (which sounds remarkably like our own son did at the same age) but he can also listen to his parents, aunts, uncles, cousins and his grandparents; it's all been quite emotional at times. But thank goodness for modern technology that we have been able to preserve this and, like the photos, make a digital copy that we will now be able to listen to whenever we like as well as share with other relatives so that they can hear themselves and others who are no longer with us.

The afternoon was rounded out with the now usual Sunday Dream Girls Disney quiz which was, as always, lovely to chat to people from around the world, share what we have been up to, our plans for the coming week as well as attempt to answer a few Disney questions. I think my score this week was just 4 points, but it really isn't about the points but the connections and the giggles.

Stay safe out there, keep your distance and wear a mask.
xx

Shopping, More Ebay, More Photos & Disney

Day 165...

So today has mainly been spent attached to my laptop. First job was to update our online grocery shopping order ready for collection tomorrow before pressing on with more items for online sale.

Simon rescued a couple of TV's from our other house as we can make use of one of them here, although I think the smaller one will probably find its way to our local recycling centre.

Molly was able to deliver some more cards that she had had produced of some of her sunset and beach photographs. This was another request that she had received from a friend so she has now ordered a selection of cards to see if she can sell some more via her Etsy store.

I had not long started posting items for sale when the Ebay site decided that it would throw a wobbly at me...repeatedly! So I decided it was time for a coffee, sat outside and away from the laptop in the hope that things would be working better after a short break.

Well only after switching the laptop off and on again did I seem to make any headway and managed to work methodically through all the items that I'd photographed yesterday and then later this afternoon I took more photos and was able to get another half a dozen items listed later this evening.

Simon has spent most of his day working his way through the family photo albums we have inherited and is now up to about the year 2002. Although there has been a lot of mumbling and swearing from his end of the room as the order in which the photos have been put into the albums has not been chronological at all! But as I type he has now managed to scan in and organise into date order 2254 photos!!

I took part in the now regular Disney Dream Girls Sunday evening Disney quiz and was quiz master for one of the rounds using questions set by Molly as she wasn't able to take part tonight as she was travelling down to her boyfriends house to spend the next couple of weeks there. The quiz was a great escape for an hour and was as lovely as always to see familiar faces and have a bit of a giggle.

So although my day has been mainly spent hunched over the laptop I have managed to sell a few items so it hasn't been a pointless exercise!

Right I am in need of red wine and dark chocolate...so take care out there, keep your distance and wear a mask.

xx 

Day 102

Day 102...

So we decided that we would make the most of today and rather than have a lazy Sunday we would set to and get some jobs done.

Today's job was to make a start clearing out Simon's mum's house. His mum passed away at the end of last year but because of probate and then delays due to Coronavirus we had not been able, nor compelled, to get down there and start clearing out.

Thankfully his mum lived close by so after only a couple of hours we had managed to get down there, pull out a load of weeds and fill the 'brown' (garden refuse) bin. We were able to go through some of the more obvious and easier drawers to clear out which resulted in the recycling bin being filled before we then went through the wardrobes. We must have filled about 20 black bin bags full of clothes, handbags and shoes.

We decided to drop all the bags in at a local clothes bank with my first choice being the hospice in our village, but knowing that their collection bin can be rather full we decided to try a couple of other locations that were on our way home first. And while these locations had various clothes banks for different charities they were all overflowing with donations, so we headed to our local hospice expecting to see the same scenario there and began researching where else we could take the bags and when. But when we got to the hospice we were pleasantly surprised to find a pretty much empty donation bank and we were able to leave all of the bags there. All the clothes were in really good condition so hopefully they will be able to generate a little income for the hospice which I know will have been struggling these last few months.

The afternoon was then spent doing a little online research as we have some ornaments and memorabilia that we would like to dispose of so just needed to figure out what we have and the best way to deal with it. 

I was able to add to my grocery shop ahead of collection tomorrow as well as add to my local dairy delivery as this week we are having a treat of ice-cream; lots of lovely flavours to choose from and although I don't indulge I do let the 'kids' from time to time.

The afternoon was rounded off with what has now become our usual Sunday Disney quiz via Zoom as part of the Disney Dream Girls podcast that I co-host. This week Molly and I set twenty questions and I think we did a pretty good job mixing some tricky ones in with some relatively straight forward ones.

And that was our day, another in this strange new world. Another as we attempt to get things up and running in some shape or form. We have things that we had hoped to achieve this year and whilst not all of them are going to happen we can perhaps get back on track with some of them...small, tentative steps to start and let's see where this takes us.

Take care out there, stay safe,

xx