Another Christmas has come and gone, I'm convinced the older one gets, the quicker the years go by! And this December was not without its dramas, the main one being what storm Darragh did to our bungalow!
We happened to be at Milton Keynes, Toffee was the main reason for going, she was coming to stay with us until January 4th. It was as we were leaving on the Monday morning to come home that our tenant phoned with the news of a tree having fallen on our roof. It happened on the Saturday, questioned why we hadn't been told until the Monday! The tree had damaged tiles, there was a hole in the roof, and it had rained during those two days! Anyway, first stop on our way home was to see the damage, it looked bad but could have been much worse. The fallen tree was dead, one of two Maples planted many years ago along the disused but watered Derby and Sandiacre canal. Consequently, the branches were brittle and broke easily. Had it been still alive, unyielding branches would have caused extensive damage. As we arrived, the owner of that bit of canal turned up with a ladder and chainsaw. Not wanting to get the insurance company involved, he, with help from his son, removed the tree, mended the roof and all at his cost. As to why we weren't told? A bang had been heard, our tenant didn't venture out to see what it was, and it was only when the owner of the tree turned up to tell her that she informed us.
Forward then to Christmas, it was spent with Christine, Kev, his mum and dad and the grandkids. A slight worry on arrival, how would the new puppy take to Toffee? Anyway greetings over the puppy River was introduced to Toffee. Then the unexpected happened. Instead of the puppy being fearful of Toffee, Toffee was fearful of the puppy! It was laughable, Toffee trying to hide, the puppy being barked and growled at but did she back down? No. We had to keep them apart for a while but it all came good in the end though, although Toffee was never really happy with River being to near.
On the other hand, Toffee loves Christmas. To her any present is fair game, and they all belong to her!
Once presents had all been opened, Christine made us a wonderful Christmas dinner, the King's speech was watched and then the games came out. We ate too much, drank too much and had a fabulous time, well that's what Christmas is all about.
Our return to the boat was also not without incident. Went to fill the kettle and the water pump wouldn't switch off. At first a problem with the water pump was the initial thought but when what water we did manage to get out of the tap turned a slight colour of pale brown, we realised we were out of water. It was much to dark for us to water up, it would mean a walk to the Great Northern Basin, attach the hose to another by the feeder, come back to the boat and join the end with our hose which was lying under the swing bridge by FS, go back to turn on the tap and wait 30 minutes until the tank was full. So the evening was spent drinking beer and wine instead...such a hard life! But that wasn't the end of our woos. 2 am and the CO alarm goes off, freaking the dog out and frightening me nearly to death! Turns out, our batteries were venting gas! We had allowed the batteries to get under 50 percent charge, had forgotten to make sure the switch was on to shore line when we left and leaving the TV on standby as well as the twinkly lights attached to the outside of FS, drained the batteries! The act of switching over to shore line had for some reason made the batteries vent!
So now we await NYE and the inevitable firework displays at midnight. Toffee will freak out again, hyperventilating. panting and shaking. Oh, what joys are yet to come!
No comments:
Post a Comment