Medical Mystery

After an obviously 'dangerous' bout of washing up, wondered why my left index finger felt stiff and swollen - then over the course of the day it turned a lovely purple colour (except for the finger tip).

Self-diagnosed (via the Internet) something called Achenbach Syndrome, which fit my symptoms (the photos were a very good match!) - and which was reassuringly described as 'benign'. 

Took myself to the doctor after the bank holiday, but they were stumped, and as the blood flow through my finger was ok, sent me away with the instruction to come back if it spread / got worse. 

Luckily it 'self-resolved' as the internet articles suggested it would within a few days - hopefully that's it!

. . . That End's Well

Having finally got through the last of the oil - time to say goodbye to the old oil tank, and hello to the new one (being delivered here over the front hedge).








Next job was to remove the old tank - awkward and heavy - and upgrade the base for the new tank, which is bigger, awkwarder and heavier!



And, a few hours later - one new oil tank, just awaiting the oil . . .









Oil delivery arrived today, and our heating man was back to connect everything up, run the oil through, and test it was all working.


Feeling a bit chilly out, so we may leave the rayburn on for a few days!

Last Blast of Winter?

Hailstorms in Aberystwyth left our primroses sitting in a bed of ice yesterday . . .

. . . and travelling to London today there had evidently been snow in mid-Wales overnight.

Hopefully that's it for winter now!

Rhubarb to Jam

With fresh rhubarb growing in the garden - and only one jar of rhubarb and ginger jam in store - time to use up last year's rhubarb from the freezer.








Cue jam making . . .

. . . and jam!

Not the Full Wheel

Another trip across country to visit family, stopping off in Stratford along the way to break the journey.


Walked round by the river, where they were busily putting together the ferris wheel (presumably for the summer season) . . .





. . . had a few pints, and polished off a curry!

Moved on the next morning for a couple of days with the folks - more sorting through cupboards, clearing out things from the garage, enjoying time with family - before heading back to Wales again.

Power-less

Our electricity supply has been interrupted a few times recently - after an actual power cut back in January, we were officially switched off for a day in February while the electricity people did some major replacement of the local infrastructure.

Now today we're off again as they rewire us to the pole . . .

We're reliably informed (by an electricity man) that they aren't actually allowed to switch us off again now for another 12 months - although hopefully they've done all they need to do now.

For today's 'outage' we had also invested in a small leisure battery and inverter - which kept the freezers running, and will in due course be used to power things in the garage using the solar.

One Tree Up

The solar has been in almost six months now, and I'm pleased to report that we've made our first tree . . .