Olympic closing ceremony

Well what did you think of the closing ceremony? I,d like to say it was excellent as the rest of the games were but, I don't know, Geoggios Kyriacos Panayiot had two songs, personally I wouldn't have given him one I can't imagine him still having the fan base he used to after all his exploits in the parks but hey. Emili Sande has a great voice but personally I wouldn't have had her sing the song she did twice, the best of the entertainment for me was Eric Idle, the Who, John Lennon, Jessie J , Queen, Annie Lenox, and wow I never thought I would say this the spice girls. I think there are some british bands much better than some that featured but it would be impossible to please everyone ehh. Anyway it didn't take away from a great Olympic fortnight, I have never watched as much sport in my life and most of it was riveting viewing I think the bbc did an awesome job of coverage with the red button allowing people to view sports that would not normally get airtime wtg. 

Things are getting back to normal here now, the Galway races have finished and the Volvo cean race,so no doubt the builders will be back from their holidays and I might get my wiring done and floors laid and the fire surround finished, probably my website work might progress too as I have been waiting for photos etc from customers. 

A mountain named after me

Well I think it's great they have named a Marsian mountain after me, as usual they forgot the "i" but hey what's new I normally have to repeat my surname spelling 5 times and I,m often asked "are you sure"

Just harvested / cleaned and froze half a squill ion carrots and also some spuds and onions and yet more zucchini the veg beds I made from used scaffold timbers last spring have been great. Next year I shall be even more organized and put down heaps more spuds and maybe try some different veg.

Today is less hot than yesterday but very humid, I managed to cut the rest of the grass and put down fertilizer before it rains so that's me done for the day. My brother in law in Sydney was telling me that they have had severe winds for the last few days and there is dangerous surf on the beaches, I think the USA has had a real dry summer, so bad infact that the price of bread is about to rise dramatically as their crops have failed, Australia was very wet this year, we had a great spring and a woeful summer up until this week anyway, my pal in Canada was saying they have drought conditions. I think the weather has to be the most whinged about thing out there.

Sailing and a galley awash with water

Well I,m just back from a sail which wasn't that enjoyable, Jessy was a real pain, for some reason recently she gets really scared on the boat and tries to escape, so she had to be tied up down below. Then I had far too much sail up for the conditions so the boat was heeling and rounding up in the gusts, I looked down below and the galley was awash with water so we just came back in. Turned out there was just about 10 Ltrs of water that had spilled out of the fresh water container under the sink so I just mopped it up with a towel when we got back in. Reminded me of the 1 st element of seamanship keep the water out of the boat. Gus jumped over the side after we berthed and near strangled himself as his lead got caught. I knew I should have just done some gardening today lol.

The whole country here went mad when Katie Taylor won gold in the boxing And IRELAND jumped to 39th in the medal standing. it could be enough of a boost to end the Eurozone crisis, or maybe not. Well I dont know wether to go for a swim or do some mowing, I know what I should do.

New phone

Well my trusty old iPhone gave up the ghost a few weeks ago and I made the leap and got a new one on a plan with Vodafone the plan gives me unlimited off peak calls to the UK on the home phone and free calls to other Vodafone mobiles. The new phone is a Samsung Galaxy 2 and I have just being setting it up. As far as gizmos go it has them all including voice commands that actually seem to work ie I can ask it to send a text to someone in my contacts or look up frogs on google or set an alarm. It doesn't feel as classy as the iPhone but it is fast and has lots of good features including an 8 MP camera, I can remember the first digital cameras that came out that had 1MP and they didn't have a phone attached.

It's another glorious evening here weather wise although the day was overcast. Finally we are getting some heat it was 26C today. Hope to get out sailing tommorow.

Shins vs Marble, Marble wins 2-0

Well I was making a firepit out of the marble fire surround that was taken out in the renovations and managed to take the bark off both shins at the same time when one of the blocks tipped over, gladly my neighbours are a fair distance away as the air turned blue. We had the first taste of summer today withthe temp climbing to about 22C and sunny and calm so i took time out to do some work outdoors, no midgies around so I have all the windows open for a while. Jessy is lieing outside in the sun probably remembering Australia.

If its nice tommorow I might try and get out for a sail as the weekend looks dreich again.

Apparently there was a Twitter frenzy today when a newspaper refered to Katie Taylor (Irish boxer ) as British lol it sounds like a not very frenzied frenzy ehh a twitter frenzy, anyway the whole town of Bray where she comes from is stopping for her next match at about 1400 today, good on her hope she wins, ohh her Dad is from Yorkshire btw.

Well lunchtime is over so I better get back to it.

First use of the range oven

Well we are having roast leg of lamb tonight so the oven is getting its first workout and all seems to be going well, the smell from the kitchen is awesome.Harvested and gave away some more veg today, the zucchini are over a foot long and we also have a huge crop of carrots and  onions. The day has been sunny intervals and torrential showers and I spent it painting the hall ceilings and walls as well as doing other wee bits and bobs. 


Angie was at the reposing of one of her workmates Mothers who passed away earlier in the week, basically the coffin is out on show and folks come and show their respects, the que was right up the street. There is a Mass tomorrow in the local chapel and I think she is going to that too. 


I hope the weather improves this week so I can get out sailing, watching all the Olympic sailors has me in the mood for a sail. Having the boat alongside has been great no hassles with moorings and rowing out and worry about the weather but unfortunately the summer has been pretty woeful so I haven't been out in her as much as I would have liked anyway maybe we will have an Indian summer he says with fingers crossed.


Marks car is still sitting outside, I put an advert on Done Deal but there hasn't been any response yet. 

Heating finished

Well the central heating is installed and working great guns I'm sitting here in a pair of shorts blogging, I put the shelves back in the hotpress today and almost finished tiling the wee shower room, it looks well.

This used to be two rooms both pokie and dark, I took the photo from inside the shower which is also a huge improvenment as they put a pressure pump in the water system so the shower has a great pressure  now.

The new stove sends hot water to the tank below, it holds 500ltrs of water and as well as being future proof with all these different places solar and different methods of heating can be plumbed into it also has all these failsafes and valve thingies and buttons and stuff.  

We couldnt afford a new kitchen so I painted up the existing units and renewed a worktop, there was nothing wrong with the carcasses anyway and it would have been a waste to scrap them.

The floors will get laid after I finish painting which will take a couple of weeks anyway but  I have the carpets and tiles lifted (the carpet is on top on my percolation area suppressing weeds till next spring) and we aim to put hardwood flooring in the sitting room and tiles in the kitchen. I'm going to try sanding and varnishing the hall cork tiles I think.

Because I'm home renovating the Olympics have been on in the background and what a brilliant coverage there is too, the BBC has up to 19 different sports on the red button and ones like the sailing and archery have been grabbing my attention between jobs. I think the UK has 8 medals so far one ahead of Australia.

Summer hasnt arrived yet although yesterday was nice it was back to showers today.