Away in the Caravan....

Morning All!

I had an excellent weekend in Waldringfield camping with the missus. We got there on thursday and stayed till sunday. The weather was fine, no rain or anything... Maybe I should change my name back from Rainman.... This here is me quaffing a pint of fantastic Adnams Broadside.
This stuff is seriously nice. www.adnams.co.uk To me this is the only real ale that is consistently good. Needless to say I drank it till the ground got wobbly.


This is the view from the beer terrace of the Maybush Inn, a pub on the banks of the river Deben in Suffolk. Loadsa people messing about in boats, kids swimming in the river etc...


The sunsets were quite spectacular, just a pity I only had my wife's camera with me. My Konica Minolta has got better colour differentiation on low light situations... This is just a view over the river of the boats bobbing about...


It was a very nice and relaxing weekend with the exception of the trouble I had with my caravan. I will update you with that story in a bit.... More later,

Alex. 

Last Thing...

Morning All...

There is one thing that I promised to do after Mickey passed away. I was going to post a picture of him in his favourite place. This was where he used to stand waiting for me to unpack the shopping in the hope that there was a morsel in there for him. (Strange, there always was...)


And this is also the place where we laid him to rest. He would have liked it.


We put fresh flowers on there once in a while... Bye bye boy...

Alex and Jackie. 

First walk without Mickey...

Hi there,

Last night me and the missus went out for a walk in the countryside. This was the first walk out in the fields that we have done since Mickey died. It was a bit weird not having that big gangly white dog running up ahead. This was one of his favourite walks. The wheat is all ready to be cut, yellow stretching out as far as the eye can see...


Of course now we don't have Mick with us we run into lots of his favourite prey. We must have seen at least 8 big hares...


Plus a little munckjack (Is that how you spell it?) buck was grazing about. He loved to chase them as well...


This was the sunset over the river Stour valley looking towards Lamarsh from the Bures side.


The main reason we went walking was because since we have stopped smoking and Mickey died we have started to put on weight. Time to start some exersize. And if exersize is this pleasant, bring it on!

Mr Motivator. 

Inspector Clouseau strikes gold!

Morning all!

I was trawling through my digital camera files and I think I have found the reason for my week of 'Egyptian flu'. (The shits...) On the friday morning before I was due to fly home I had some food with the Egyptian technicians. One of the guys brought this stuff in from home...


It was some sort of brown bean stew that you ate with pitta's and some other rock hard bread. As we all ate from the same tubs and the place was riddled with flies I think this must be the prime candidate for giving me the squits....


Don't get me wrong, the food was nice and much appreciated but still, I did pay the price...
Do I get a prize for helping a plane run out of toilet paper?

Cheerio,

Alan B'stard. 

Result!!!!!

Wheyhey!

Finally something is going right with this rebuild of the kitchen. If you have been reading this Blog you'll know that we had a leak from the shower upstairs into the new kitchen. We tried to claim of the house insurance cause stupidly I believed that that was what house insurance was for. The insurance company we are with now told us to bugger off as we had only recently changed insurance companies. They referred us back to the previous insurance company. Of course they weren't to thrilled with the claim since we left them. They sent out the gestapo insurance claims loss adjuster or whatever the f&^%*&^%ck these people are called. That person told us that the replacement shower we needed was not covered only the remedial work like new floor boards was gonna be paid, wonderful..... We took that up with the old insurance company. They wriggled, whinged, whined and tried to get out from it but today, 4 weeks after the last contact with 'em, we received a big cheque for the whole amount! Wheyhey!!!! Finally something that went right!

A big thank you to my missus who pursued these ringpieces to come up with the dosh! Jackie, I guess you wore 'em down, bloody excellent!

More later!

Alex Indoor Shower Man.

Shower Al-Fresco...

You gotta hear this...

Yesterday me and the missus noticed that the floorboards under the shower still are getting damp. This is after the plumbers put in a new shower tray and cubicle for 700 quid. That was supposed to have cured the leaking problem into the kitchen. And yes, it does not leak into the kitchen anymore as far as we can tell but still if the floor gets damp it must be leaking somewhere... So Jackie called the plumbers yesterday and they came out this morning. They told us yesterday not to use the shower for 24 hours to dry it out completely. That left us with the problem of showering today.

So this morning the missus and me went outside armed with shampoo and shower gel and had a shower in the garden. Luckily it is the hottest day of the year today so the weather was playing along nicely but the garden hose of course only uses cold water, bloody heck it was cold. Needless to say we both had a short and cold shower. Don't worry, my back garden is quite sheltered so I don't think I offended anybody with my big white arse... hahahahahaha....

More later,

Nudist Alex.

Excellent news!!!

Hi there,

I was just on MSN talking to Rob's partner and wheyhey, they are having a baby! The sly old dog kept that secret, its due the 14th of october. Excellent news. Jo has got Rob plastering the stairs at the moment as it is only a 100 degrees in Wigan at the moment hahahahahaha! So all the best to you guys, drop us a line when you drop the nipper!

Cheerio!

Alex. (Hmmm, I guess that calls for a piss up tonite.... excellent!)

Sunday Barbeque...

Afternoon!

Yesterday had an impromptu barbeque with Gary the neighbour. It was boiling hot so I was in my backgarden doing what I do best. Laying about in the sunshine. Gary and his mate Carl were doing the same next door. So we pooled our beer and had a bit of a garden party. James, my stepson, had a bunch of mates over and were jumping around in the pool. I got in Gary's pool next door, which is more like a jacuzzi, and we drank like the clappers. When we were suitably pickled my neighbour suggested putting his trampoline next to my pool. That was bloody brilliant. We did back flips and all sorts into the three foot deep pool pissed as a newt. The missus took care of doing the barbeque because I was having trouble standing up, the floor kept moving backwards and forwards, hmm, odd... I managed to completely thrash Gary's picknick table by falling all over it and breaking it. We basically drank whatever Gary and I had in our fridges... can't remember much about later that evening. When I woke up this morning there was an awful lot of rubbish laying about in the back garden. Ah well, I'll clear that when I get home from work. I did have quite a sore head today... strange that is.... Jackie was complaining of a sore head too this morning. At least a good time was had by all.

More later,

Alex Sorehead.

Kitchen progress...

Afternoon!

The kitchen is nearly done! I'll do a proper update soon but here is the outline. The kitchen has been build. All units are in, the dishwasher works, the cooker works, all that is left is a bit of painting and making good.

This is the kitchen fitter Keith wrestling with a worktop.


This is an impatient Jackie getting in the way while Keith and I are trying to finish the job.


And this is the nearly finished article.


More when I am not so knackered. I was still suffering from 'the egyptian flu' the whole week so a lot of running to the crapper in between jobs!

More later!

Cheerio, Alex and Jackie. 

Happy Birthday to me!

Hi There!


Hi there!

I made it home from Egypt OK despite Air Puke, I mean Air France's, best efforts to derail my journey. On the friday, the last day at work, I got a bad case of Tutankhamens Revenge, also known as the squits. I was not very well through friday and saturday. Having to travel by rickety old clapped out cars, busses, planes, airport lounges, more busses, planes and taxis while all the time looking for the shitter is a lousy experience. I nearly missed my connecting flight in Paris because of the disorganised security checks at Gate 2F. These, I'm sorry but there is no other name for it, idiots from the French authorities must have been responsible for a load of travellers missing their flights. I have nothing against these checks, in fact with the amount that I travel, they keep me alive, but these tossers take being an arsehole to a whole new level. Never mind, they don't even deserve space on my Blog, sod them. (I hope they lose the worldcup final, Come on Italy!) I got home at 4 clock in the afternoon. My missus was there to welcome me and to congratulate me on my 39th birthday. She gave me the best birthday present ever! She had a coffee mug made with my name on it and a piccie of my mate Mickey who died 5 weeks ago, as people who read this Blog know. The missus found a piccie of him, laying in the garden eating a bone and she had it transferred to the mug. I am notoriously difficult to buy presents for, as what I need I have and what I don't have I don't need. But she did great there! The rest of the afternoon I spend gobbling down laperomide to stop the squits. By the evening it was at manageable levels so me and the missus went to our favourite Thai restaurant in Halstead 'The Thai Lights' and had a huge meal. It was fantastic and we had a great evening. Today I'm not doing much as I'm still feeling a bit fragile. Tomorrow the fun starts on the DIY front. The gas man is coming to lay the new mains and the kitchen fitter is gonna start assembling the kitchen. We'll see how it goes.... More later...

Alex.

Soammy the Driver Part 2...

Hi There! This is my newest bestest friend Soammy, or that is what I think his name is, that is what it sounds like... Today had a right laugh with him. For the last three days everytime I get in the car to go to work or to go back to the hotel he offers me cigarettes. I keep telling him that I have quit but that does not get through. So today I showed him the Nicorette patch I wear on my arm for the nicotine cravings. He laughs his head off at this but after a suddenly he has this great idea that he should have patch too, so he can quit too. So me, being the kind soul that I am (Yeah right....) give him a 15 mg patch. I tell him he should put it on in the morning and it should stop him from wanting a fag for the day. He seems to be taking this in. 5 Minutes later while screaming down the road at a 100 mph he decides that he is going to wear it now. He sticks the patch on his arm and after 15 minutes all hell breaks loose. He is swearing at every other road user, he is as high as a kite. When we get to the toll booth he has a barney with the clerk and refuses to pay and drives off. Why he should pay is a mystery anyway as there is not much tarmac holding the potholes together... When we get to the hotel he asks if I can give him some more patches but I don't think so. He has already sparked up twice so they don't seem to be really doing him any favours hahahahaha....

This here is the man with the longest name in the world. His name is Ahmed Abdel Tawab Kamel Moustafa. He is the guy from Egyptian Cement that has been working along side me to get the job done. He has been a great help and both systems, the Thermascope and the Shell Scanner are working fine now. All we have left to do is some operator training.
This is a view from Kiln 5 and as you can see its dirt, rubble, dust, sand, rocks, stones and more sand. When the wind picks up in the afternoon you eat more cement dust than is healthy for a human.

OK, two more days here and then its off home for my birthday. I don't know what the status of all the work in the kitchen at home is and I think I don't want to know either. According to Jackie it is still pretty much a mess with the gas leak and all...

One of my mates Mick O' C. is in Cairo for a telecoms job. I was trying to get there for the friday but I don't think that I will make it. The customer here is squeezing all of the possible commissioning time out of me and I guess as they are paying they are right hahahaha...

OK gotta go, its dinner time here, more grilled rat hahahahaha...

Alex in Ain Soukhan. 

Alex in Egypt...

Morning all!

Just a quick entry from Egypt. I still haven't been able to get an internet connection in my hotel so I'm posting this from the cement plant via their network, which is rather slow to be polite. The work is going well. It is absolutely boiling here. It must be well over 40 degrees which makes working on the back of a kiln that runs at 1400 degrees rather sweaty... I have heard from Jackie that the kitchen saga once again has backfired. I don't believe it! (again in a Victor Meldrew voice...) Ah well, being this far away from it I must leave it to my more than capable better half to sort out this new problem... A f&^%$%^ing gasleak? Every time we fix something we think that surely that must have been the last problem something else blows up. Still the new cooker has been connected and is working so that is something I suppose... I hope that nothing buggers up my flights on the saturday as that is my birthday. Jackie will be seriously annoyed if I don't show up for my own birthday.... I'm staying in a rather nice hotel on the coast. www.stelladimare.com . There are loadsa pools and the sea is right outside the front door. Unfortunately I haven't made it there yet as work has been over running. My new best mate is the instrumentation engineer here. He has got the longest name in the history of names. He is called Ahmed Abdel Tawab Kamel Moustafa. That has got to go down as a record. He has been working with me getting the systems up and running. The factory here is something else. They have 5 kilns and the place makes a mountain of cement every day. The location is rather plain. We are surrounded here by sand, dust, rocks, ruble, stones and more dust in 300 shades of beige. I will post some pictures later when I get my internet connection sorted in my hotel. The driver that picks me up from the hotel every day is extremely funny. He is called Soammy or something like that. He speaks only arabic which I don't speak much. That does not stop him from having long discussion with me about all sorts of stuff ( I guess...), he just jabbers and jabbers. His driving style is rather amusing. This man can do 7 things at the same time. Drive the car, answer phone calls, clean his dashboard, smoke a fag, talk to me and overtake at the same time. Sometimes after overtaking he forgets to return back to the side of the road where he was driving. He then swears, flashes his lights and honks at the other cars as they try to persuade him to go back to the normal side of the road. All very amusing and very helpful for waking up in the morning. At least he is friendly. OK, time for me to go, I have some work to do...

Cheerio from Egypt!