Weekly Chat (Non-Osprey), 6 November 2022

HAPPY NEW WEEK and HAPPY FULL MOON and HAPPY TOTAL LUNAR ECLIPSE!

The eclipse occurs in the wee hours of the morning on Tuesday. It will be visible in the U.S. and Australia, but not in the U.K. However, many sites will stream it online with commentary.

I'll put a link to a nice list of online streaming science sites in a post below.

This is the last total lunar eclipse until 2025.

Everyone have a joyful week.

  • LINDY Lovely pics, thank you. We spent our honeymoon in Keswick. We were married near Edinburgh and going to live in Uxbridge so it was on our route. We were only in Uxbridge for a few months before we moved to Shropshire. The sooner you hear from "awful Cousin" the better......then you can be prepared!!!!

    We had a great catch up at our local garden centre yesterday. We hadn't seen Jo for about a year so there was a lot of talking to be done.
  • HEATHER – get help soon around the house – don’t wait for pains to get worse!

    RUSTY – J isn’t with an agency – this is a direct contract with the council education department! Glad the weekend went so well – and with the visit to Keswick too!

    LINDA – photos from one trip and now off on another – you are getting around! Glad the tiling is almost done!

    On Tuesday, the two of us went to our more usual garden centre for lunch and some Christmas items, then stocked up at the nearby butcher/deli. I woke before 2 am this morning and coughed and sneezed right though the early hours – and have sneezed all day too. J is struggling to move – constant pain all over! So not a very happy house at all, since finally getting up at 10am! OH went to town just for my prescription; notice on door said they are so busy with prescriptions that they are having to close from noon till 3pm – don’t know whether this is a one-off or every day! We have been considering a few Christmas events, but look at one another and decide we just can't be bothered!
  • HEATHER – I intended to reply that 30 C is not hot enough for air con. . . but then the weather became humid. Storms, thunder, heavy rain overnight – quite unusual when we expect dry heat.

    RUSTY – Wow! What a delicious cake.

    LINDA – Oh no, not Awful-Cousin calling. Can you suggest you are not allowed visitors since you had covid?

  • The saga of our lost internet. Yester-morn a strange message on our computers that we were not connected. This is a double problem since our landline is linked through the so-called marvellous NBN. So phone is not working either. Also OH at last realizes the disadvantages of internet banking.

    Much later OH informed me that one of his pictures fell off the wall in the night and perhaps it knocked the powerpoint plug below. It is, of course, behind a cabinet. He reaches in and checks connection. Still no internet, no lights on modem. Then the landline rings; it is my friend who wants to chat. Weird. We have phone but no internet. OH must have restored something.

    I laboriously type a text on mobile phone to s-i-l as I do not want to disturb him at work (he was actually in a meeting!). Twice, because I lost it before “send”. I suggested s-i-l phone me, when he has time, to talk me through fixing it. Mid-pm he rings, his suggestions half work – we now have modem lights but still no internet. He decides to drive nearly an hour after his evening meal to fix it. After much checking This and That, he is surprised to discover a button that apparently needed to be pressed. Yeay, we have internet.

    Moral of the story. Life was much simpler before internet.

  • Hallo all:  Been a busy few mornings here.

    Rusty: There are a couple of menaces lurking in Florida in addition to the Orange one.  Oh, glad you clarified the cake-baker.  Phew.

    Lindybird:   Lovely photos.  What was the highest elevation from where you took the shots of the island?  That shot of the restaurant makes it look huge especially as the tables seem so far apart and the people so tiny.  

    AQ:  How sweet of SiL to come and fix the problem.  I assume he showed you where the offending button is for future reference?   Stay cool.

    We are holding our breath here for election results, but it looks like some Trump loonies lost out and the much-vaunted Red Tide turned out smaller than anticipated, but still. waiting for final Senate results; meanwhile was very happy with the Pennsylvania Senate race.

    OG:  Hope everyone there does better and that you at least get a good night's sleep.  Did J ever find out why they didn't need him - and why he didn't hear about it sooner?

    Take care all

  • ANNETTE – S-i-l is very willing to help with tech fixits, house repairs, gutter cleaning, pruning, etc. Besides his m-i-l, he has a mother, an aunt and, oh down the list, a wife. Hence I hesitate before calling him. I did thank Dau for “lending” him yesterday!

  • Just a thought

    You know what rhythms with Friday? Wine.

    If my boss knew how unproductive I am on Fridays, he wouldn’t want me here either. (James Johnson)

  • Good Morning. Relieved to hear last night that for Trump
    things are not going all his way. Apparently people have finally realised that a lot of their freedoms could be at stake if things progress the way it might have been predicted.

    AQ - Three cheers for your hero s.i.law! Everything falls apart without a connection, as we have discovered to our cost.

    Annette, Not sure of the height of the cliffs -- but it's really scary looking down and the island is dramatically laid out like a map, below- only the sight of small boats pottering around and graceful yachts sailing between islands makes you realise its real. As we flew home, I was on the right side of the plane to see it all again and wished I had a camera and a window seat!

    Edit:  The cafe was indeed large and roomy, but I think the space was exaggerated by my trying to get all of the huge light fitting into the picture! I should have said that it was all built into the cliff itself, with stairs inside which I climbed with difficulty to reach the rooftop. A popular attraction for those with transport, as otherwise rather off the beaten track.

  • We haven't heard from Awful Cousin again yet - she left messages on our phone and also on Sue's. She is unlikely to expect to visit us in winter thank goodness.

    A young person in my OH's wider family has upset everyone by announcing that he's changed his surname by deed poll. Shocking decision with no thought of how he is denying his heritage- thank goodness his grandparents are no longer with us as they would have undoubtedly have been dismayed.