tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55895882010-01-09T13:56:22.288+01:00A Bavarian Farmhouse The point is to change it.Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.comBlogger102125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-43688604181041738652009-03-11T13:20:00.001+01:002009-03-11T13:55:44.841+01:00 I'm not locked in here with you.You're locked in here with me.noui consilia et ueteres quaecumque monetis amici,'pone seram, cohibe'. sed quis custodiet ipsoscustodes, qui nunc lasciuae furta puellaehac mercede silent? crimen commune tacetur.prospicit hoc prudens et a illis incipit uxor."I am aware of whatever councils you old friends warn, i.e. "throw the bolt and lock her in.” But who is goingJurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-47480000923523841072008-10-10T22:01:00.006+01:002008-10-10T23:44:35.376+01:00All Power to the Soviets!Massed Plumbers on Home Front!Mario Brothers arrive in a full offensive line-up!Power tools to the fore!Mario, Luigi, Yoshi, Koopa and Tom of Finland arrived early in the morning with a complete set of pipes, elbow joints, radiators and huge power tools.Tom and Luigi proceeded to cut giant mouse holes in the walls and Mario and Yoshi manhandled copper piping, soldering Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-70910036416962307952008-10-06T18:04:00.005+01:002008-10-06T19:37:46.664+01:00Power on - Power - off - Power OnSonic to the rescue!Today the electricians quietly turned off the power and said it was only going to be off for half an hour. 5 hours later having zapped all the circuit breakers, Sonic the Hedgehog, Dagobert's genius 12 year-old electrician turned up at the apartment and helpfully pointed out that the circuit breakers had clicked. Then his mum shouted on him forJurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-20401110016770710112008-10-04T09:04:00.004+01:002008-10-04T10:26:18.797+01:00Saturday: Ikeaday alreadyAlmost a hive of activity.Workers have entered the building!The electricians are in the old cellar (diagonally opposite the blue paper bin in the photograph) doing whatever Sparkies do with Combined Heating & Power systems. The are probably making sure the grid credit meter is working first.After that they will think about providing us with heating.Dagobert appeared with Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-72710705415474934662008-10-03T23:41:00.004+01:002008-10-04T00:04:57.369+01:00FridayNothing is happening.We are now almost professionally qualified microwave-combi cooks.Basmati Rice Recipe:1 standard cup Basmati rice.2 cups of water just off the boil.pinch of salt.couple of strips of bacon (optional).place rice in a microwave bowl with a lid that allows steam to vent.Add the water, salt and bacon.Microwave on full power for three minutesleave to stand for five Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-50390306406860562822008-09-30T12:41:00.002+01:002008-09-30T12:49:51.625+01:00Tuesday. Nothing is happening today.Nothing at all.No DagobertNo MarioNo LuigiNo Tom of Finlandand no YoshiSo here is a picture of the "Office".It is presently serving asbase camp and galley.Note the essential coffee machine and Microwave Combi.Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-56054533022226434162008-09-27T11:12:00.003+01:002008-09-29T10:20:09.545+01:00Saturday (ikeaday)I'm sure it was barely more than 7 °C last night and as usual it was warmer outside. Today the thermometer reads 15 °C but it feels pretty cold in the living room.7:30 Dagobert timidly buzzed the doorbell, but so lightly and for such a short time that I decided to ignore it. About ten minutes later he re-appeared with Tom of Finland, the concrete man and someone else. One of Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-69608603457296359082008-09-26T20:59:00.006+01:002008-09-29T09:56:54.101+01:00TGI Friday7:30 am. The man that does the concrete turned up as bright as a button and finished off all the holes with their second coat of R-Bar and concrete. Almost as soon as he was finished and another member of the Dagobert Demolition team appeared with a Hilti Power Chisel that was worthy of Tom of Finland (NSF!) and he proceeded to cut the bath and the bathroom doorway to very small chunks.Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-87495254633059942532008-09-25T12:33:00.005+01:002008-09-25T16:46:21.887+01:00Builders working like Trojans this evening17:33 and some of the builders are still here. There repairing the holes cut during the last few days with reinforced concrete now that the drains and pipes have been installed. The base for the shower and the heating pipes are already in the offices waited with baited breath for their installation.4:30 am Dagobert knocks on the living room door and when Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-77742909052539524672008-09-25T07:51:00.006+01:002008-09-25T10:08:55.770+01:00Dagobert Cometh. Temperature 15°C8:25 am A delivery man rings the door buzzer looking for Mario. I suggest he might be upstairs in the old Lion's Den.8:30 Dagobert Toadsworth appears, rings the door bell and runs away. This children's game is known as "Rap, Tap, Ginger" ( though goodness knows why) or "Monkey come down the close" (which is more informative) in Scotland . It has a Bavarian Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-57826953098607207282008-09-24T08:41:00.007+01:002008-09-24T19:16:38.725+01:00We've had the builders in.Well we are in the middle of having the builders in. That's in the middle (possibly) of the whole project and at the start of having the builders in. The builders were supposed to begin at the start of August- at exactly the moment we were off on holiday. However, contrary to the popular stereo-type project management is more often observed in South Germany by it's Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-79094750812012593442008-02-11T19:48:00.000+01:002008-02-11T21:08:18.476+01:00Snowboarding on the NebelhornWe were on the Nebelhorn at the weekend and quite an impressive sight it is. Since you have to pay 31 Euros for the day ticket it meant it was a great opportunity to practice riding the stupid tow system. I have been reluctant to practice on the tow, because everytime you fall off you waste a credit. However since the Nebelhorn ticket covers all the chairlifts, Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-63286472675090816422008-01-05T19:28:00.000+01:002008-01-05T20:09:03.593+01:00Leaning on a lampost at the centre of the universe Well it would be reasonably difficult to resist the temptation especially in a place likeBrandenburg Gate (Brandenburger Tor) where the Berliners, on November 9th 1989, seemed to follow Ronald Reagan's advice and tore down the wall.It has changed immensely since I watched those events live on televison and leaves one with the sensation that you Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-67401160046609346982007-12-14T19:53:00.000+01:002007-12-14T19:58:08.780+01:00Dreaming of Snoqualmie FallsI was thinking about the tv series Twin Peaks the other day and just considering how difficult I find it to watch these days. I have the first two seasons on DVD and although I have started watching them, I never seem to find the time to complete that activity - despite the multi- faceted reasons I might profess to have, including Major Hammond searching for the Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-88424699852275749902007-09-18T13:48:00.000+01:002007-09-18T14:46:49.689+01:00The Siemens Dishwasher model number SE24E236EUWe ordered this machine from Amazon.de because we buy a lot from Amazon, an awful lot.It was a complete disaster.Firstly, We were promised a delivery period of up to ten days - this is just another way of saying not less than ten days. Then we called the customer service to tell them we had a holiday from the 9th day and they told us not to worry, theJurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-6713327159825365072007-09-18T13:39:00.000+01:002007-09-18T13:53:23.459+01:00The Siemens Dishwasher model number SE24E236EUI guess this industrial looking bash may appeal to some who admire spartan simplicity in their dishwasher but I am not one of those.Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-49813008220255505332007-06-01T20:17:00.000+01:002007-06-01T21:09:02.042+01:00Prad in Süd TirolThanks to that marvellous German educational institution -The Excursionen Woche- when students go on trips apparently, we spent the first week of May in the small town of Prad, which is just 50 km outside Merano (called Meran in German). To get there we had to drive through miles of road tunnels and then over the Reschenpass a journey that is quite spectacular with peaks rising Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-17217790067263292982007-05-04T23:11:00.000+01:002007-05-04T23:21:53.977+01:00The Scottish ElectionsMy daughter, being the child of a Stirling CLP secretary, is not ignorant of the voting system in Scotland. However this morning she told me that the ballot paper was so complicated she thinks that she voted for the Labour Scottish MP but got the whole council section wrong and probably spoilt her paper.Along with 99,000 others says the BBC. And she only voted Labour out of Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-50649415800282621632007-03-31T23:53:00.000+01:002007-04-01T18:22:39.755+01:00Bailing at the Grassgeheren in the Allgäu Grassgeherren: where everyone learns to snowboardThis is the off-piste element of the day, if you look carefully you can see that I am exhausted, eating Wurst and drinking coffee.Christian gave us the basics of snowboard training and then gradually took us higher and Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-63722544296375103832007-03-31T22:25:00.000+01:002007-06-01T19:15:24.956+01:00The Little Piste at EschachEschach is one of those little pistes that is sort of halfway between a practice slope and a... well just a wee totty slope. The tow was an effing nightmare and I managed to get up it once - the next two times I was totalled. From then on I went up with Susi as a clinging monkey.Susi and I had a long discussion on the subject of ski-slope production lines where I Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-82890733297560299492007-03-31T20:38:00.000+01:002007-04-01T18:17:22.289+01:00Boarding at StubenLast time we went to Lech it was such a fantastic day that the whole resort was full to overflowing. However further down the mountain range there is a place called Stuben and the practice piste is absolutely top notch.The ski tow is well designed circle type and not the deadly knee-breaking hook that I have managed to get up about twice on my own. Stuben has a nice easy slope Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-41566128916882396912007-02-25T21:03:00.001+01:002007-06-22T16:16:38.937+01:00Breaking Snowboarding News almostWe were in Lech in Austria on Saturday - No pictures, we left the camera in the car - and we spent four hours on the completely free practice slope! (while our friends paid 46 euro to go up the mountain and ski!)The piste was solid boiler-plate (fancy snowboarding term) and not at all powder, so when you fell over, some of those bails were bonecrushing.Susi says Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-7331985575592684242007-01-12T23:00:00.001+01:002007-01-12T23:19:35.426+01:00What do Belgians wear underneath the kilt?I may have mentioned on occassion that I ended up in Ulm when I came here on a student exchange trip between Fife College (deceased) and the FOS BOS. It was indeed a nightmare but there were some rather hilarious moments, in particlar when Hugo Aerts our lecturer in German(!) did his "What is worn underneath the kilt" show.or alternatively:http://Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-24582039980377140032006-12-23T18:57:00.000+01:002006-12-23T18:59:05.497+01:00Life's A Beach & Then You Fry!One of the best Christmas presents I ever received - besides an X-Box, was this Body Shop Towel that my kids gave me in 1992 or 1993. That towel is has travelled to almost as many places as Camera Teddy and if you look carefully in the photograph you may observe that Camera Teddy is in fact in my right pocket. I have searched the Internet for a replacement but no Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5589588.post-87497908316323849022006-12-23T17:57:00.000+01:002006-12-23T19:02:48.726+01:00 Yes Picasa works now!Jurrassosaurushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09717952416052376431noreply@blogger.com0