Wet dog and house bricks

This week has been relatively uneventful. Firstly there was a problem with the electricity as it seemed to run out very quickly from the inverter. I eventually tracked it down to a cheap battery isolator switch which had melted internally. It was not letting through all the power that it should and the inverter started working solely from the starter battery. Seems a little strange as the Sterling inverter is supposed to prevent this. All sorted now but Charles Sterling was in my bad books for a while.

The other item we are very happy with is a 240 volt fridge running from the inverter. Yes I know that everybody says that you should buy a 12 volt fridge for a variety of reasonable reasons but as usual I ignored all advice and went the other way. It all works perfectly and uses very little electricity and only cost £100.

Our new mooring has new neighbours, as you would expect and indeed is why we own a boat in the first place. Dave is eighteen months down the line of a self fit out and I eye his boat up jealously. Glynn plays the accordion and in the evenings whilst running his engine and his French cafe music drifts over the canal. In fact, if I close my eyes I can imagine sipping a petit cafe in our favourite piano bar in Montmartre. Unfortunately the dead badger drifting by on opening my eyes brings reality back with a start. Play us another one Glynn.

The dog fell overboard the other day. One minute she was lying in the sun on the counter at my feet and the next she was swimming for her life. A passing boat ran her over before I could call out but she emerged from the depths again and made her way towards the bank. Unfortunately this was piled, as was the other. She then decided to swim towards the steerer of the boat that had ran her over but the women couldn’t reach her. I reversed to within several feet, clapped my hands and shouted her name. She turned mid stream and swam to me. I lay on the counter and picked her little bedraggled body from the filthy water. It’s more than my life’s worth letting anything happen to her. Bloody dog. Ten minutes later she was back outside again, this time a little more cautious.
At the moment we are again down at the Rising Sun at Shackerstone waiting to meet some friends for lunch tomorrow. The outlaws were down last week at the same place and time. Pearl had a little too much red wine much to all our amusements. Except Ken of course who had to drive her home. While we were eating, there was a thunderstorm and hail stones the size of golf balls. No they were the size of house bricks. There or thereabouts. Maybe.