Revelations and growlers

We're all shuffling around on the Ashby Canal with the water now free flowing and this is a good thing. Unfortunately, as of the other week, I am now half a century old and this is not necessarily a good thing. On the up side, Lisa bought me a Kindle ebook reader. Like everyone else who has one, I was a little suspicious that I wouldn't use it, but it has been a revelation and I Haven't read so much. I have downloaded over fifty free books and I may even buy one if Amazon are lucky. Although that won't happen for a while so, Amazon, don't get your hopes up and don't do any unnecessary investment.

We have also bought some new batteries and these too have been revelation. You forget how good new batteries are and it improves life greatly. We no longer have to moor in the middle of nowhere so we can run the engine to ten and just to watch the telly to half past. Power to the people (or at least the couple). I wanted 135amp batteries but the cost was not worth the extra amps.  We have to budget for cheap new batteries every year as they never seem to last longer. Cheap and nasty, that's just me.

We are currently at the terminus of the Ashby and, since our last visit, there has been a bit of work done on the extension. An extra hundred yards have been completed. This includes a small footbridge made from lightweight aluminium that won't be there the next time we get here. The problem is that if you want water, and since the existing sanitary block has ice damage to the pipes and cannot be used, the alternative pipework is in a framer's field opposite. You have to moor your boat, bow against the bridge.

It's already dented and the fittings are from your garden gate. I thought about taking a photo but was so amazed by the builders/planners incompetence, I forgot. See it while you can as, by the summer, it'll be on the side covered in mud and weeds having been crashed into, fallen into the canal, been hauled out and left abandoned in the hedge. I wonder how much it cost? Probably a lot more than the foot bridge at Stretton Stop at Rose Narrowboats that has been there for years but doesn't look as nice (my English teacher always told me never to use the word 'nice'. No idea why)

A new sine wave inverter and a new toilet system are also on the cards as Lisa wants to wash her smalls on the move and sit on a china bowl while she's doing them. It's in the hands of the gods whether she can convince me and she may have to complete a cost/benefit analysis including flip charts, graphs, Power Point presentations, written reports and a small group of skin headed growlers armed with baseball bats to change my mind. It's more likely in the hands of this group rather than of the gods.