Well it is Boxing Day the 26th of December we spent the last two days with Caroline's parents and it is very nice to come home to a house that is freezing.
An electrician has come out twice, but as the fault seems to be in the new meter that is sealed off and owned by the power company he cannot do anything. They will have to come and look at it. we hope it will be some time this year as we have been without heating for a week tomorrow, now
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
FIRE!!!!
Actualy it was a few nights before Christmas the night of the 20th-21st of December....
We were just about to go to bed when we smelled this electical fire smell. And I didn't think much of it, but thought it would be best to check the cabinet with the electricitymeter and the fuseboxes anyway. To my horror we discovered the cable shown above was charcoaled for a good 2 inches.
Our immediate reaction of course was to do a quick mental inventory of which items are worth saving (computer, photos, etc.) and where they were just in case...
then inform the landlord and when he came over he just yanked that cable clear out of the meterbox??!
Lucky for me the electrician of our powercompany came just before 3 AM to say he was unable to fix it that night. I was not amused when I had to go to work that morning. Coming home after work that day I noticed they had replaced the whole meter.......
Unfortunately now every evening at 23.32 exactly, on my watch, we have a power failure and the main fuse trips.
The only way to get the electricity back on is to turn the power off leading to the storage heaters (the white box on the right with all the little switches). We do have some electrical heaters but they are no way near capable of heating the whole house not to mention they are not very cost effective. We were heading not for a white Christmas but a freezing Christmas.
Thursday, December 14, 2006
P.E.T.A. -man
People Enjoying Tasty Animals
Here is a video of Roger Thoma a man who shares my surname and is a crayfishcrazy as well as I am but is from Ohio USA instead of Holland. I learned to know him while I was running my own crayfish site www.CrayfishInHolland.com (no longer existing) His crayfish enthusiasm is more on a professional level not shown in this particular video however =) . Unfortunately I do not have the time to pursue my crayfish enthusiasm at the moment, while I am living here in the UK, although I hope this will change again once we are granted a visa for Australia and we settle down there sometime in 2007? Anyway I think we both enjoy irony as much as we do sharing our name.
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Man on the moon
Man on the Moon
After all these years NASA is finally planning to put a permanent base on the moon!!! (BBC News)
I am 29 yrs old and cannot believe that in my life time no (wo-)man has walked on the surface of the moon. Not again since December 1972 that is 34 years ago now, a timespan I cannot comprehent. I know it costs billions of Dollars/Pounds/Euros but I am sure we can all benefit from its scientific discoveries in the long run. All these years I have been wondering. Why? I never thought it was a hoax but....? Why haven't we gone back?
After all these years NASA is finally planning to put a permanent base on the moon!!! (BBC News)
I am 29 yrs old and cannot believe that in my life time no (wo-)man has walked on the surface of the moon. Not again since December 1972 that is 34 years ago now, a timespan I cannot comprehent. I know it costs billions of Dollars/Pounds/Euros but I am sure we can all benefit from its scientific discoveries in the long run. All these years I have been wondering. Why? I never thought it was a hoax but....? Why haven't we gone back?
Great Christmas Idea
Christmas is coming up quickly and that can only mean one dilemma.
What shall I get Caroline this year for Christmas?
Finally I thought of giving Caroline a large canvas print of a picture taken at one of the places we have visited when we were traveling for 10 months through Australia New Zealand and America together. From over two thousand digital photos I narrowed it down to around eight in the end. I couldn't just order any canvasprint as we have to like them both and it is her present after all.
Caroline narrowed those eight down to four. I wanted to give her an A1 size canvas so it wouldnt look lost on the wall but that became an A1 canvas and 1 panoramic in the end. Give her an inch and.... (just kidding).
Rick (the printer) helped us in the end choose from those four pictures which would work best when enlarged. And also informed us to what size enlargement they would still make a nice result. (That's when you realize it was false economy not to make those holiday shots in the highest resolution possible, just because you wanted to save some more space on your memorycard.)
The whole process of ordering went very quick from emailing the initial photos on Sunday evening, getting feedback to ordering them Monday evening and have the A1 in by Wednesday and the panoramic on Thursday. If you shop around you will find that the price isn't too bad either. Therefore I can higly recommend him: Rick's Printshop
Why Sydney?
Hopefuly this will be our home again as soon as our visa come through
sometime in 2007.
What shall I get Caroline this year for Christmas?
Finally I thought of giving Caroline a large canvas print of a picture taken at one of the places we have visited when we were traveling for 10 months through Australia New Zealand and America together. From over two thousand digital photos I narrowed it down to around eight in the end. I couldn't just order any canvasprint as we have to like them both and it is her present after all.
Caroline narrowed those eight down to four. I wanted to give her an A1 size canvas so it wouldnt look lost on the wall but that became an A1 canvas and 1 panoramic in the end. Give her an inch and.... (just kidding).
Rick (the printer) helped us in the end choose from those four pictures which would work best when enlarged. And also informed us to what size enlargement they would still make a nice result. (That's when you realize it was false economy not to make those holiday shots in the highest resolution possible, just because you wanted to save some more space on your memorycard.)
The whole process of ordering went very quick from emailing the initial photos on Sunday evening, getting feedback to ordering them Monday evening and have the A1 in by Wednesday and the panoramic on Thursday. If you shop around you will find that the price isn't too bad either. Therefore I can higly recommend him: Rick's Printshop
In the end Caroline choose these pictures both of Sydney:
Why Sydney?
Hopefuly this will be our home again as soon as our visa come through
sometime in 2007.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)