Those that know me, know that I don’t ‘do’ illness – it’s such a waste of time! Well, I’ve picked up a bug sometime in the past week that has now absolutely crippled me! I’ve got a cough that sounds like I’m on 50 Navy Cut a day; aches and pains all over – arms, …
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Lunch with Alison W
I drove over to Peterborough today to catch-up with Alison W for lunch. We headed for The Granary and I was pretty impressed with myself, navigating around the menu and not compromising my Lent List. We caught up with others’ news and generally put the world-to-right – it was then that I noticed that my …
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Lunch with Roger H
I live such a exciting life, as I spend quite a few evenings impersonating taxi-drivers waiting outside Kettering Station. And now, life now has got much more interesting as I’ve started doing the same at PETERBOROUGH station. So, today, I could hardly contain myself when I drove to MARKET HARBOROIUGH Station!!! – is there …
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Mother’s Day comes Early!
With Mum’s health on a slow decline and with us not being able to see her on the official Mother’s Day, we visited her today. On the way there, we dropped in to Neil and Debbie, caught up with all their news, saw the boys and left Neil with couple of knackered PCs. Then it …
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Roast Lamb – Shaken not Stirred!
“The name’s ‘Lamb’, ‘Roast Lamb’”. Nick and Celina joined us this afternoon, together with David, for a food ‘n’ film evening. Ann prepared Tagliatelle with Prawns and Romano Peppers to start, followed by Roast Lamb infused with garlic & rosemary – we finished with Red Plum Amoretti Pots – a sort of exotic trifle in …
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4 Ate, Bar 4 – The Vines
We joined Janet and Jo and took a walk (yes, I walked!) to the recently opened Vines Restaurant and Bar, down the hill at the Grade II listed Barton Hall. The building itself had been unloved for many years but we’d heard that it had now been converted into a classy Restaurant and Bar with …
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Quattro to Prezzo
As I’m now sans-car, Ian and Mags drove over to ours for our three-monthly catch-up. Our destination was Prezzo in Kettering, the town’s newest restaurant sited (spookily) in the recently developed restaurant quarter. Ann was able to join us after a bat-out-of-hell drive back from Sheffield. In convoy, we headed into town and parked in …
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Aspirin vs Android – The Best Tablet?
OK, for headaches, I’d definitely recommend Aspirin, but for a truly mouth-watering techy-tablet experience, I’d choose the snappily titled: Asus Transformer Infinity. It’s my latest toy, manufactured by Asus – and even a nerdy person like me, has been blown away by its performance and capability. It looks like a laptop, but a quick button-click …
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Handbags at Noon!
Well, not quite as is was just ONE handbag and only 11.45! Carluccio’s, St Pancras I set off for London to meet up with my old friend, Peter J at our regular haunt – Carluccio’s at St Pancras. As I was waiting outside for Peter’s arrival, I noticed something a little odd about The Lovers …
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Food – Fit for a Queen
We drove up to Belton today to meet up with Ralph and Karen – The Queen’s Head was our destination, as it’s about half-way between theirs and ours – the food’s pretty good too! We’d been advised by the restaurant to get there in good time as there was a large party arriving just before …
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Radio 3
The rather clever Logitech Squeezebox Radio This has to be one of the most useful gadgets around. Imagine a radio that does everything an ‘ordinary’ radio does, but adds the ability to: play all the music you have stored on your computer give access to the past 7 days of BBC Radio (iPlayer Radio) tune …
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Lent Boy 2013
OK, here we are again, another year where I try and discipline myself to avoid certain foodstuffs during the period of Lent (starts tomorrow and finishes on the 30th March). Not sure how I’ll do this year, as last year was a real challenge (even with a slightly shorter list). So, please don’t feed …
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Cuts, Cats and Wellingtons
Biscuit Bon-Bon It’s another of our action-packed Saturdays after a relatively quiet week (I’m sure that should be the other way around!). First, I drove over to Peterborough, to reveal my ears and more of my forehead. Second, I handed over the car-keys and Ann to take the cats in for their six-weekly wash-‘n’-brushup with …
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Tech Alert (Part 1873)
Those who are ever-so-slightly ‘tech-phobic’ look away now, or click HERE for something prettier. This is my latest ‘toy’ – say hello to the Devolo dLAN 500 Wireless+. It looks ever-so-similar to the gizmo I fitted last year when we had satellite broadband installed, but there IS a difference. Those who don’t need SpecSavers will …
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DVD Review: Looper
With every review I’d read saying this was one of the best films of the year, I was eagerly looking forward to watching Looper. Sci-fi films don’t often court such consistent praise from the critics, but this one was an exception! Things didn’t get off to a good start when I realised I’d ordered the …
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That Sinkin Feeling
There was a time (not that long ago!) where the high point of my week would be working with a new group of managers on skills, where they needed to improve. These days, as the DoDO, I’m now content with much simpler things – and today is one of those days. It’s ‘Sink Day’! We’ve …
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Denis’s – for lunch
Lee wasn’t feeling so well, so it was just Ann and I driving up to Denis’ for lunch. Bev and Ady were also there having done most of the food prep (I think we’re the last in the family to meet Ady – I can’t think why it’s taken us so long!) Bev had prepared …
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Leicester – A Ring, A Pig and a Cutlery Set!
It’s Saturday, and nothing that a DoDO likes more after a hard week’s washing, ironing, car valeting and IT Support than a quiet sit-down with the papers. Forget that then! – it was off to Leicester for a mega-shop – and when I say ‘mega’, Ann’s leading the charge today, so it’ll be a biggy! …
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Broadband Satellite Comes of Age
In these parts, we need all the help we can get with our broadband connection. The pitiful speeds offered via the big players may be OK for the occasional download and checking of emails, but if you want to do big-boy stuff like watch iPlayer, download movies and maybe even upload data to websites, you’ll …
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DoDO – Easy-Peasy Creasy?
Since the major management restructure here at the beginning of the year where I took the developmental position of DoDO (De Ad) – Director of Domestic Operations (Detail & Admin), I’m enjoying the new responsibilities. After a full TNA revealed a number of competency areas where I’m overskilled (IT Support and Car Fleet Valeting to …
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Snow is like a Suntan
Honestly, we DID have snow here yesterday, but today it’s hard to tell. Just like a hard-earned suntan, snow seems to disappear much faster than it takes to appear! Today was actually a really nice day weather-wise – I WOULDN’T have predicted that as I tried to free Ann’s car from the snow and ice …
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True Grit
Some things are meant to go together: Bananas and Custard, Morecambe and Wise and of course, Ann and me! Conversely, some things should never, ever, EVER be within a planet of each other! My story began at around 6.45 this morning as I headed off to Peterborough, driving Ann’s car (for the first time). It …
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The Need for Speed
Those that know (and/or live in) the immediate area will already be aware of the crappy internet speed we get locally. For houses that are less than 20 years old, the connection opportunities are very limited. The bad news, looking forward, is there’s no opportunity to have a fibre optic connection installed here either… ever!, …
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Ann’s New Car
After almost three years to the day of faithful service, it was time to retire Ann’s ‘Fiesta – ‘Maj’. Now we’re down to one car and with Ann’s new job and position, we really needed something a little bigger and a better for long drives up-and-down motorways. Ann’s car on 24 January 2010 And so, …
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Fire and Ice
We woke to find that we’d had around 3-4 inches of snow overnight – all that on top of the ice from yesterday! Nice!!! The house felt freezing, so we fired up the err, fire and were soon ‘toasty-warm’. We postponed our drive over to Peterborough preferring to stay in and catch-up with stuff on …
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Ra-Ra Juno!
I wouldn’t normally visit RADA, but I’d been invited to Juno’s first Associates’ Get-Together since the company was formed last year. I’m acting as volunteer Tech Support for their venture, and yesterday was the first time the two owners: Shirley and Sally, had met all the Associates together in one place. It was a great …
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Snow!
First snow of 2013!
Life of the DoDO – Iron Man
It’s been my first full week as the DoDO (Director of Domestic Operations) here – having retired on 31st December. A year ago I’d be ironing out performance problems – now It’s just the performance of the iron that gets my attention! Well, what’s it been like. Early days yet, but no signs of ‘cabin …
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Farewell Insignia
Those that know me well, know that I always have a emotional association with my cars – not sure whether it’s a ‘bloke-thing’, or just a ‘me-thing’, but today is a sad day. Now that I’ve retired, I’m saying good-bye to my Vauxhall Insignia (19100 miles!) as it’s returned to the Leasing Company – it’s …
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PCs are Go!
After picking up the two new PCs from Neil’s last Sunday, I’ve spent the past week on-and-off reinstalling software on both machines. The reinstalling is normally the time-consuming part, but I think I’ve just set a new personal best having got everything that was on the old PCs reinstalled and working on the two new …
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