General Witterings -
'Rosy' on Ice

Brrrrrr!!!!!

Lots of adventures on the ice, which was 4 cm thick.  The was a stream of clear water running through the basin, from the lock bywash, where the swans, ducks and geese paddled about.  I've mentioned the swans (black ones) before, but not the geese.  There is a flock of some 30 of them, maintained by the town as a tourist attraction.

At one point, the clear water makes contact with the bank, and it as this point that most of the visitors feed the swans, geese and ducks.  A few days ago, some of the geese clambered out of the water to get their bread ration, and then went for a meander.  Enter an aggressive woof from stage right, and the geese head for the water.  One chose the wrong entry point, and flollopped down onto the ice, fell over, and couldn't get up.  The woof didn't follow, but the goose was left floundering about on the ice.

After a couple of hours, Rex and I took boat hooks and narrow boat shafts, and headed off to do something about it.  Half way through our rescue operations, it became obvious that we were working at cross-purposes.  After a full and frank exchange of views, it transpired that one of us was trying to ease goosey away from the bank, and towards the open water.  The other's short term aim was to draw goosey in towards the bank.  The long term aim was enjoy goosey at the Christmas luncheon table.  I won't say who had which view, but I am prepared to state that, as the geese often spend the night alternately roosting and honking outside Rosy's back door, it is my opinion that there are a few too many of them, and a cull is in order.

('Honking' being used in the sense of bird 'song' and not as in lager).

When the ice started melting, life became rather uncomfortable.  If the wind blows Rosy towards the bank, she merely bounces off the judiciously placed fenders.  If she is blown away from the bank, the elasticity of the mooring ropes prevents a jerking when the rope reaches the end of its scope.  So that, although Rosy moves about in the wind, the movement is all very gentle and relaxing.  When the ice started melting, it initially freed Rosy, but left her floating in a little pool of water.  When the wind blew, Rosy stopped moving, with a jerk, when she nudged into the sheet ice.  I found it almost impossible to sleep.  waking up at each jerk.

When Rosy was being fitted out, we wanted to install a diesel stove.  I was initially attracted to a Deville.  This is distributed by one of the chandlers in the midlands at a very good price.  Unfortunately, they had only just started distributing it, and knew very little about it and had no descriptive literature.  I still don't know very much about them, except that the Deville company is no fly by night organisation.  Deville stoves are stocked beside Godin in all the hardware and DIY stores.

(WARNING: This following paragraph is in poor taste).  Further to the cold weather, I've been brewing up porridge during the last few days.  Not the 'instant', Quaker variety, but the proper oatmeal type.  I'm reminded that, recently, one of the yachting magazines ran a survey to determine which breakfast tastes as good coming up as it does going down.  Porridge won, of course, though Weetabix gave it a close run for it's money - Weetabix being voted as being marginally better going down, but considerably worse coming up.

Test Match Special has enlivened the day on BBC World Service.  For the non-cognoscenti, England are playing a series against India.  In India.  Blowers (Henry Blowfield (or however he spells it)) launched off on a chunter about Lords Cricket Ground, and its Head Groundsman Michael Hunt.  In UK, Mr Hunt is always referred to as Mick Hunt, but over in India, the commentators standards dropped, and Blowers referred to the man as Mike Hunt.  Tee!!  Hee!!!!!

I hope everyone has a very happy Christmas.  Over here we're planning on duck for Christmas dinner - lemony rather than orangey - with Christmas pudding and custard special (custard with cream whipped into it).

We're also hoping for a New Year with a bit more tender loving care towards folk that we don't necessarily agree with.

HFC

Toodle pip!!

Bill xx