On a go slow.

Hi Friends.


We are creeping ever closer to Christmas Day and the weather is pants today it has to be said. It is cold and damp here today. But if the forecasters are correct, we will be back in the freezer again by the end of the week, so I am making sure we are stocked up on everything.
This morning began like every other morning, so I am not going to bore you with those details again, I can already hear you yawning, or did you have a late night?
Yesterday I ordered some new wheels with anti-puncture tyres, and they were due to arrive either today or tomorrow, so having walked the mutt and eaten breakfast I was all set to wait for the delivery, should it have been today. The back stove fire was on a go slow, so I left it to decide on what it wanted to do. I loaded up our small fold up trolley with a full toilet cassette and rubbish and headed for the sanitary station, once that was all sorted out, I stood in the drizzle by the hire boat office waiting for my wheel delivery. I was not actually expecting it to arrive today, because knowing my luck I could have been stood waiting for hours and nothing woulod arrive. But it must have been my lucky day, because 10am my phone rang and a gentleman on the other end said "I have a delivery for you madam and I will be with you in 10 minutes". Woooo hoooo it was my lucky day. True to his word he was no more than 10 minutes. So thank you Tuffnells for a prompt delivery service. I now have two sack trucks to deliver coal with. It is such a relief to have trucks which actually do the job.
Back at the boat, with the new wheels stowed away, the phone began ringing for coal orders, so it was going to be a busy afternoon. But before all of that I needed a coffee and a thaw out. The drizzle and the cold had got into my bones.
Keith wanted to get a job done in the engine room, so we stripped out all of the shelving, tool boxes etc. He has added a non-return check valve to the back boiler to calorifier pipework. This should stop the hot water in the calorifier gravity feeding back into the shower room radiator when the circulation pump isn't running. His first attempt ended with a leak, so we had to strip it all down again and reseal the joints. The problem with any job, is you then have to put everything back from whence it came. But it does look tidier now, so a good job was jobbed once again.
After lunch I began delivering coal to customers in the basin and on the towpath. it seems everyone around me is ill at the moment, with colds, sinus infections or tummy bugs. I really do not need to get any of them, so I am staying at arms length, because the last thing I want is to be poorly. Like with any delivery I make, I like to stand and have a chit chat. More often than not we end up putting the world to right, but that is the fun of my job and living on the canal. I feel so lucky.
Yesterday I spoke about Oxtails cooking, well they did cook and last night before bed, I stripped the meat off of the bones. In the back stove at the moment the veg, onions, potatoes and gravy are all cooking and before dinner tonight, I will add the meat and dumplings. The smell coming from the back cabin is very scrummy.
Paddy is as I type having his paws trimmed, which he does not mind. It means he does not get the mud clogged up in between his pads.
Right off to make a coffee, so see you tomorrow xx.