Welford

We're here at Welford now since Thursday. Lisa left at 6.30 for work and I'd up'ed sticks by 6.45. Not a very exciting journey but it was a little hill'billy until the morning sorted itself out, the current bun made an appearance and the whole thing warmed up a tad. As usual, we met no-one else (I say 'we' as in me and the dog) which suits me just fine as it was too cold to take my hands out of my pockets at an attempt at pleasantries.

The Welford Arm is very pleasant with the one lock near the basin. The basin is also very pleasing and unmodernised (ie a muddy lane beside the mooring) although we are not used to being in the near proximity of so many boats as close as they are. Indeed one give me the evil eye when I was in the front deck emptying my ash into the cut. I prefer this to chucking it in the hedgerow as that always seems to me to be rather unsightly and ugly. Ash is used to seal wooden slats that are dropped in the canal to enable watertightness for the use at dry docks so I reckon I'm doing BW a favour in waterproofing their system. I got him back later when he was running his engine whilst in gear. Those evil eyes really are effective.

Andrew Denny from Granny Buttons has never had Pickles No 2 on his blog roll and I had assumed (as a conspiracy theorist) that this was deliberate and he had something against Pickles (and Pickles No 2 has never done anything to Granny). I mentioned this to Andrew and he came back with an instant response, an immediate apology and an amendment. Bugger. I wanted a conspiracy. Cheers Andrew.

We may move to a quieter area just back along the cut at the weekend or soon after as there is virtually no signal of any kind here. I'm very conscious about engine/generator noise which I normally run well after eight o'clock as there are rarely anyone else around us (that should annoy the 'rules is rules' brigade).

One of the timbers I am working with at present is Santos Rosewood. It had been in the corner of my workshop when I cleared it out to move everything onto the boat last year so I brought it aboard intending to make bows from it but I couldn't remember why I had originally stopped using it. Well I remember now. I'm allergic to it and since I was cutting it the other day my eyes are all puffy and have swollen up considerably. There are several bowyers I know who are allergic to certain timbers and this is not uncommon but painful nonetheless. Yew nearly killed one.

No photos due to the slowest connection we have ever had. And I mean EVER.