The next chapter....what will it be

We are on the boat tonight, it's been a bitter sweet couple of weeks, and we now have a weeks holiday. We were planning to have Rachel's mum on board but the weather forecast is not too great so we may have to revise that plan and also where we go to. Stone was the destination but we may just take it as it comes....

Callum our youngest is away to Kent today to start a new job as a trainee stockbroker, he has done so very well to get his 2:1 and a full time job in his chosen discipline. Tom our eldest moved into his new house last weekend and we helped him achieve the next stage of his life plan.

So now it leaves us looking forward to the next stage of our life journey. Work has some questions to answer for both of us that may form part of our decision making. Our home is now a large house that we need to spend some time on to get it at least ready for the market if we decide to sell.... Then it could be anything from reinvigorated careers to chucking the lot in and doing something completely different. All bets are off so we could do anything .... Who knows.

Tomorrow we go boating so it can't be all bad ?


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Location:Fradley

Morning has broken

Beautiful just beautiful.

We are hopefully taking the boat out next week so I came over yesterday and gave it a good clean. Just needs winding and water.

Last night we were watching the tv when the boat started to make some interesting bubbling noises. We were either sinking or settling into the mud. Luckily it was the latter. The speedy Drayton hire boat that went through left paddles up at common lock emptying our pound. Kev and Barry sorted it by running water down three locks off the Coventry.

Off to help my eldest lad move house today and Rachel is at work, so no loafing about as Bruce might say !













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Beer and wind... thankfully unrelated

So Leia wanted to go for a walk and the pub was on the way. What are you supposed to do, we need to keep these local pubs going.

I scrabbled around in my pockets and found just enough for a pint so the Mucky Duck got a bit of my custom. It was cold and windy out on the benches but knowing I'd be warm and fed up 24 hours later when back in my office I went for the beer with a view experience.

True to its reputation for a gongoozlers paradise a boat came very slowly up the Coventry and turned north onto the T&M. They then tried to moor just up from the pub but very quickly got into difficulty with the wind. As the fella was off the boat the front end caught the wind and soon had the boat across the canal. At this point I stopped being a gongoozler and became a boater again and went to help. Eventually we got the boat into the bank and moored up. The lady companion told me they had been to the shipyard (!) to have the boat checked out and they had only owned her for a week. It was a Teddesley plastic top just like Comet our first fully owned boat. I was somewhat humbled when she told me the fella was 70 and his dream was to own a narrowboat, this was it. I gave some comforting words about boating in the wind and practice makes perfect and left them to a cup of tea, they both looked frozen. It did so remind me of out first trip out to Streethay... 

Anyhow prior to the walk the grass got cut, I am really pleased with my £50 mower, does the job and it is always there. I ran the engine this time while mowing and it took 3% from the batteries rather than 27% last time.

I still could not get the cap off the chimney so it will be destruction next time after buying a replacement on the way from MC.

Stuck solid !

Well I made it to the boat.... to cut the bloody grass again. I thought it would be nice to light the boatmans stove but the chimney cap is stuck solid. Lesson learnt there, apply a smear of oil before capping it next time.

I have given it a blast of easing oil and will look at it later. Plan B is destruction !




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Location:United Kingdom

It could not be more opposite

If our initial plans had been realised we would have been chugging off to Great Haywood today. Instead we were looking at flats in London. The trip on the boat was for Rachel's mum who is not too well. It turned out her health and the predicted weather stopped that plan short, and coincidently our youngest pans for flat viewing in London had changed so we drove down, completed a loop of the M25 and saw three flats !

That life is so opposite what we are aspiring to, its a young persons life with so much to offer that has no attraction to us. We look forward to the day we can visit by boat to see him.

Glad to be back but sad not to be on the boat.

Nobody will talk to me....%-( (PS NB Rock and Roll is for sale)

I read and hear of recession. However the I think the canny are scaling back to increase the demand, or certainly not expanding and chasing business.

I have asked for contact by personal visit and email for boat painting quotes and internal reconfiguration quotes...... all quiet. At home I have chased three arboriculturists for quotes to remove three big conifers from my garden, chase being the operative word.

It is hard work trying to get work done, especially when you have a day job.

Anyhow, work (slow) in progress on that one. I should have booked Norbury for painting when I had Percy blacked but they were quoting September at the beginning of the year.... and today's date !!

Anyhow what can I say, part time boater me. I can't even blame the bike, its just lots of life things penning me back. I was on a treadmill at the Royal Derby covered in electrodes last week, thankfully the problem is not a problem, well that one was not. Other scans and visits make me feel old age (51!) has little to commend it.

Anyhow I'll stop being a moaning old bugger and look forward to the day the trees come down and the wood I'll have to burn on my patient lonely stove. It is one of the blessings of boating a wood burning stove and the autumnal colours on the cut (before the leaves drop and stop your progress).

Two final thoughts. Read Les & Jaqs blog, challenging times but no better fighting force than deep love and affection, you are in my thought every day you pair.

Another blogger seems to be onto other things (edited now as I have read they are having a widebeam built so staying on the cut) resulting in the sale of their boat. Link here to the blog with the details and link here to the Apolloduck ad. It is a fantastic liveaboard boat. My loyalty to Percy was tested for a short while, but the green tint has gone and the old lump still hold my affection and fascination.

Just need to get aboard, but off now to talk to a man who hopefully will turn up to discuss replacing some misting up double glazing and the house.

O and some plans are forming.... watch this space !