1st August 2016
Barry removed the 90% shade cloth from the bedroom
courtyard as it was cutting out too much light that wasn’t appreciated by the
plants.
9th August 2016
Richard arrived in the afternoon for a short stay
with us which was very conveniently timed to help Barry with the new shade
cloth job.
10th August 2016
Between Richard and Barry the new 70% shade cloth
was fitted over the bedroom courtyard with Richard doing the bulk of the
crawling around on the top.
11th August 2016
Barry attempted to overcome problems with the front
lights on Richard’s recently purchased second hand BMW. The only lights that worked were the parking
lights and the high beam and Barry was convinced it was a relay problem which
he successfully proved by changing relays but after buying a non-BMW relay from
Repco to install in place of the defected one.
It turned out that the replacement one wasn’t an exact copy and only
blew fuses and a globe. They were unable
to correct the problem and left it for Richard to sort out in Perth where he
had access to BMW spare parts. They then
discovered that the stop lights didn’t work either, but not connected to
anything they had done. It was expected
that the stoplight switch was defective.
He didn’t realise it but he had been driving around without stop lights
for a few weeks.
12th August 2016
Richard returned to Perth without stoplights and was
actually followed by a police car for a while but didn’t have to use the brakes
during that timeframe so wasn’t caught out and arrived home without any
problems
14th August 2016
We took a drive out into the inland areas of the
Midwest to look at the wild flowers that the area is renowned for. The intention was to visit an area known as
Coalseam Conservation Park. As it turned
out we missed a left turn which eliminated the shorter route but it was a
blessing as it introduced us to ‘Depot Hill’ just short of Mingenew which
provided a three quarter hour walk amongst the wildflowers, which included
Orchids. We moved via Mingenew - the
long way round - to several Coalseam Park areas, Erwin Lookout over the Erwin
River from the cliff tops, the Miner’s picnic area for lunch and then the day
use area on the other side of the river, all of which were lovely, but without
Orchids. From there we drove via dirt
roads to join the Morawa/Yalgoo road as we were informed during our lunch break
of the whereabouts of some of the rather unique ‘Wreath Flowers’. It was a bit of a hike but well worth the
time and fuel but left us with a 180km drive home.
15th August 2016
Richard rang us today to inform us that his relays
and switches have been replaced and all lights work correctly.
12th September 2016
We bought a small flat pack chicken coup with the
intention of keeping a few chickens which keep us entertained and frustrated
for a while. The instructions left a lot
to be desired and despite the pack claiming to include everything we had to
return to Bunning’s for a few additional items.
13th September 2016
We continued to erect the chicken coup and mounted
it behind the garden shed and then Merry bought three bantams which proceeded
to invade the flower beds and help themselves to the snow peas.
14th September 2016
The flower beds now have protective fences around
them and the coup has been reinstalled in the far corner of the garden which
offers more shade.
15th September 2016
The chickens were doing fine until this afternoon
when a visiting cat ripped the neck out of one of them. The two remaining girls are now confined to
barracks.
16th September 2016
Barry has started to build a chicken run around the
coup which will allow the girls much more room although nothing like the bulk
of the back garden.
17th September 2016
The chicken run is completed and two new bantams
introduced in place of the one that was killed without too much arguing and are
safe and happy despite being restricted to about 10 square metres between them.
19th August 2016
I spoke too soon. One of the newer chickens is not
happy and refusing to associate with the others and is not eating. Merry phone the shop where we purchased it
for advice and they offered to swap it for another one, which has on this
occasion turned out okay.
22nd August 2016
The offending grey striped cat has returned on a few
occasions to check out the prospects and on one occasion managed to catch and
kill a dove, so it definitely has killer instincts. What it doesn’t know is that it is on
borrowed time and that my instincts aren’t all freindly. We have been informed that the owner actually
has three cats, which is above the council allowance, and as we know it’s
colour as opposed to the others which, are one black and one ginger, we can
nominate which one is the troublemaker and should be dealt with.
16th October 2016
We started checking out costs, etc for an overseas
trip.
20th October 2016
We finalised the details and paid a substantial
deposit on a trip next year in May to Anchorage (Alaska) where we will do a
seven day circular tour and then Sail down the Canadian Inside Passage to
Vancouver. From there we will be flying
to Toronto for a couple of days were we have booked a tour of the Niagara
Falls, including the trip behind the water and will take the opportunity to do
the helicopter ride over it if we can.
We then pick a pre-booked hire car and drive on the wrong side of the
road the road to Lively, a suburb of Sudbury, nothing to do with cricket or the
Ashes. We will be staying for a week
with Gill and Maurice who were great friends of ours in Zambia, and are Garon’s
Godparents. We haven’t seen them since
leaving Zambia in 1979 and only tracked them down again fairly recently as a
result of coming across another of our Zambian friends by chance on
facebook. We then drive back to Toronto
and fly to Charlottetown on Prince Edward Island for a two week stay with
Merry’s younger sister Gay who we last saw in 1985.
23rd October 2016
We drove down to Perth and stayed with Ann and
Ashley, as usual, for four nights which allowed us to visit Elizabeth Quay, the
new Perth tourist attraction on the Sunday and attend Emma’s (our
granddaughter) graduation ceremony at the Perth Concert Hall on Monday. Tuesday was used for shopping in the morning for
clothes for merry now that she is considerably smaller than she used to be, by
21 kilograms, and more guitar tuition for Emma in the afternoon. Barry shows her how to play chosen tunes in
basic form and she then perfects them in the classical style that Barry
encouraged her to use even though he can’t play classical style himself. The fingers never learnt to in his younger
days and now they just can’t do it.
27th October 2016
We are back in Geraldton again and Barry is
continuing with the high kerbing around the veggie gardens and installing the
uprights of the shade cover over the central veggie bed. Meanwhile Merry planted another heap of
plants as we always go to a nursery close to Ann/Ashley’s whenever we are in
the area as they are superior to those available in Geraldton. One of the chickens decided to start laying
eggs the day we left for Perth so Ron and Pamela had the benefit of them as
they were coming across the road to feed them as well as looking after
Foxy. We arrived home yesterday and
found one egg but today we were presented with two, so it would appear that the
egg factory is slowly coming on line.
3rd November 2016
The egg factory has improved to 3 eggs a day with
one participant still a work in progress.
Barry is continuing with the high concrete kerbing around the veggie
beds. It is a long process as he is
limited by the amount of form work material that we have available.
22nd November 2016
The kerbing round the vegie beds is finally
finished. It has taken a while but Barry
can only so much at a time as he is limited by the amount of timber he has
available for the formwork. However,
whilst he been doing the kerbing he has also erected a shade cover over the
central vegie patch to help when the really hot weather arrives. Merry is just getting over a virus of some
sort that has left her shattered for a couple of weeks but is now ready to
start her walking, etc and get back to normal.
December 10th 2016
Nothing noteworthy has happened in the last few
weeks except to acknowledge that summer may actually have arrived, albeit
late. We had a bit of unfortunate
excitement a few evenings ago when Mary knocked on our door at 9.00pm and asked
us to go to her house two doors away to help Nigel up. She had arrived home from her choral society
evening and found him flat on his face on the floor totally unable to
move. He claims he had been there for
ten minutes but he might not really know, especially if he was unconscious for
any period of time. I suspect he got up
out of his armchair, possibly to quickly and kept going in dive. It took both Merry and Barry to get him onto
his feet with a real struggle, as he wasn’t able to offer any assistance so
becoming a dead weight. Mary has since
taken him to the doctor again and he seems okay at the moment but is losing the
plot unfortunately. He is about 85 years
old and has a fair number of problems such as deafness, poor eyesight, bad
balance and was born with only one kidney, to mention a few. He started riding a motor scooter about a
year ago which was not a great idea but stopped and used his car during the
colder weather. About a week ago he
asked Barry to help him get it started as he was not having any luck with it
after the lay-off but Barry only pretended to try as he doesn’t think he should
be let loose on it. If he falls off
he’ll never get up again on his own. He
shouldn’t be allowed out in his car if truth be known, and we suggested this to
mention this to his doctor who could then have his license withdrawn which
would suit her despite the chauffeur work she would have to do. We haven’t seen them for a few days so we
don’t know what the story is now.
4th January 2017
This blog was intended to be posted in time for
Christmas but it didn’t happen so we now hope you had a pleasant Christmas and
have a great New Year. Ours was
pleasantly quiet.
Nigel, our neighbour two doors away, spent a week in
hospital prior to Christmas but did have Christmas at home and then back into
hospital again where he had another fall.
He was taken to Perth just after
the New Year in readiness for his specialist appointment on the 6th
January.
On the more cheerful side, our eldest son, Garon,
should have arrived back in Perth yesterday but this hasn’t been confirmed as
yet. He was due to return in December
but was asked to stay on in Singapore a little longer to finalise the
project/contract he was working on. That
allowed him and Sue to have a Christmas holiday in Sri Lanka. Sue is staying in Singapore for a few more
months to finish her job contract so she gets the job of packing up all of
their belongings. Meanwhile, we imagine
Garon finds appropriate accommodation for her to send it to.
9th January 2017
Colleen, Emma and Abby came up from Perth had had a
belated Christmas dinner with us and we were able to gather all of the information
on Emma’s School results which are in the 90 and will get her into university
10th January 2017
We received the news via Kerry, next door, that Nigel
saw the specialist and he and his relatives were at the Perth airport and were
recalled by the hospital as they had spotted a problem with Nigel. They returned to the hospital and were told
his pancreas had failed and was re-admitted where he passed away as a result of
pneumonia. Probably just as well he didn’t
get on the plane. What happens now with Mary we will have to wait and see?
As yet we do not know if Garon is in Perth or
prolonging his stay in Singapore yet again.
Richard has got Rory with him for a few weeks but
could make it to Geraldton with her unfortunately. His son, Jack is on his way to Melbourne with
his girlfriend where they will be going to one or other university. Jack most likely in Geelong.
20th January 2017
Merry
returned home by car with her relative who proceeded to clear out the garage
into a huge skip bin. This was
completely filled and removed the next day and several trips to the tip
undertaken with the trailer.
I visited to see how Mary was and asked the
son-in-laws about the future of the trailer as we had recently had a new base
inserted and had intended buying from them as they never use it. It apparently had already been discussed and
we now own the trailer for the exchange of a carton of Corona lager.
23rd January 2017
Mary returned to Perth with the relatives and will
eventually decide what she wants to do, such as stay here in her house which
really is too much for her or sell and down size in Geraldton to retain her
friends, etc, or down size to somewhere near the relative in Perth. She is due back here in a few weeks so we
wait with baited breath.
