Seeing the light

Another week passes, and again, lots happening... so lets go back to the evening of Friday 1st July, which I think is where I left off...

...I managed to rebuild the ots remotes, boxed, wired neatly, great. Really spent the weekend finishing off things before taking a break from the radio station.

Had a night off the curry on Saturday, and ended up on a hilltop somewhere in Lincolnshire, enjoying a few beers and playing with a radio. Called CQ on 80m for 10 minutes, heard nothing, went back to drinking.

Did the usual organ playing thing on Sunday, alerting me to the fact that I'd need to fetch my synth from Grantham... more kit I don't have room for.

I made an effort to go ringing on Monday evening - first time for many many weeks. Mashed my brain trying to remember Norwich Surprise and Oxford.

Tuesday was a more interesting affair with the training session at Chesters, bringing up a few points that I hadn't considered.

Wednesday was the first of three days I took off work to paint some of the external woodwork on the house. Started by replacing a rotten bit of wood on one of the window frames, and then proceeded to undercoat the two lounge windows, before managing to gloss one of them. I considered undercoating some of the upstairs windows, but the wind was too strong to consider using the ladders. I stopped work early, considering that I'd have to leave the windows open while drying, and I wanted to go out for the evening session. As it happens, this was probably a good idea, as it started raining later in the evening - fortunately, the paint was mostly dry by then. For the evening session, I decided to not go to the hospital radio station, and spent some more time teaching the new bell ringers in Barrowby. Some progress being made, but as always, it takes time... something I don't seem to have much of. Collected my keyboard from my parents for Sunday's "performance", and grabbed a KFC on the way home.

Thursday was a bit of a washout. Wind still too strong, and too many showers to allow any painting to be done.

Friday was nice enough to allow me to gloss the second downstairs window and to undercoat the master bedroom windows. Not as much work done as I could have done, but a start on the difficult jobs.

Saturday was more promising, starting early to remove the guttering, and undercoat the eves. The weather now getting quite hot. Had a Sky engineer visit to relocate our dish, since we've been having increasing difficulty receiving the BBC stations on satellite as the trees along the A1 have been growing. I'm going to have to investigate getting them topped for next year. Had an indian take-away in the evening. Works out quite a bit cheaper than eating in, and the food is just as nice.

Sunday was very busy. Playing the church organ in the morning. Then doing some shopping (having used up lots of supplies from being off work for most of the week). Then glossing the master bedroom windows and the eves. A break to ring a date touch before the evening's open air service, with keyboard in tow. Then back to refit the guttering, and to bed early for work on Monday...

End in sight

Since last Tuesday, quite a lot has happened.

Most of last week was fairly standard, Wednesday hospital radio and bell ringing sessions. Thursday training with Matt, and helped to get the webcast back up and running.

Friday was a bit unusual. Rather than my usual training session, I went to see The Beautiful South at Sherwood Pines. A great night out, despite getting very wet in the rain. Stopped right to the end, and we managed to make our way forwards during the encores as people began to leave. Took ages to get out of the car park afterwards, and it was well gone 1am by the time we got home.

This wiped out Saturday morning pretty well. Dave turned up with a new ham radio antenna for me... which I must get round to paying for. Decided to give the indian a break this week, and had a quiet night in, and placed another order with Maplin for some more plugs and bits for the mixer.

Sunday, being the fourth Sunday in the month, was devoid of organ playing duties, so went shopping in Grantham. Then went to homebase to buy some long ladders for me to paint the windows with... and to sort out that antenna. Then had a bit of a bombshell moment with the website, as some flaws in the access rights were pointed out. So I sat up until one 1am again sorting out the new battle plan... and less than happy that something wasn't said several months earlier.

Monday night was just hard work. Started putting bits together for the new studio computer, and set it ready for an install.

Tuesday started off with a surprise to find all the station's website and services down. Turns out that someone had turned the power off at the distribution. Managed to get everything back up and running for the photo shoot later that night. The Maplin order had arrived, so I wired up the MD remote. The monitor amp had been returned, so that was re-installed. The evening ended with a massive thunder storm.

Wednesday was rather quiet. Decided againt going to the hospital radio station, as the guy before me was off, and I see little point in opening up for 90 minutes. So went home after a rather successful ringing session, and ended up having a drink with Duncan, tying up some loose ends.

Thursday was more hard work. Didn't bother going swimming - far too tired. I noticed that the entire rack installation was exceedingly hot, so I spent an hour moving things around the rack to spread the warm devices about a bit. Did a little training, and then went home for a few drinks. Was hoping to have had the new website installed, but the project is now running a bit late after the shuffle caused by last Sunday.

So, by today, my task list is getting shorter and shorter, and I think things are coming to a point where I can have the next 2 weeks away from the radio station, without things falling apart by the time I get back.