Thursday Continued

NotCat’s poo is now stowed under the car. Tomorrow I shall take it with me when we leave. That’s not because I have some weird retentive fetish about holding onto NotCat’s body waste, there are no rubbish disposal facilities here. I’ll get rid of it at the earliest opportunity. Even wrapped in newspaper and inside a bag, it still packs quite a punch.

It is still raining, but it feels like it might stop soon. There was a mighty noise a while ago and I nearly spilled my cocoa. Wet weather is such a good opportunity for cocoa appreciation. Anyway, NotCat growled, I looked out, and there was a heron. By the time I got my camera it had moved away, but I hovered hopefully, wondering if it would come back or if one of the kingfishers might appear. No such luck, so here is a photo of a distant heron. If you look carefully, you’ll see it.

My interest in ornithology continued for several minutes and I watched this bird, who was considerably happier swimming around the marina than I would be.

When the kingfisher didn’t show up, I watched the rain bouncing on the water.

I am also keeping an eye on a boat across the marina. I earned my good deed badge this morning when I noticed it behaving oddly. I realised one of the ropes had become detached and it was swinging about. At first, I couldn’t see any spare rope, then spotted a loop that was far inferior to the rope at the other end of the boat, waited for the wind to blow it towards the pontoon again and reattached it. So far so good.

I dug about in the glory hole which is the hold in the bow and found a red duster. Or maybe that should be Red Duster, as it’s a flag, not something for cleaning the surfaces. It could do with a wash. I also found an attachment for the hose that may make boat cleaning easier. Although I am pleased with the new pump, it is hardly jet washing. In case you worry that I am being profligate with water, this is a pump that you immerse in the river, attaching a hose to it so the water spends very little time out if its element. It was nice not to have keep dropping and raising a bucket to rinse where I had cleaned, but a bit more force would be welcome. The previous owners had left a hose in board that I have never had the opportunity to use before. The idea of standing on the pontoon directing a high speed blast of water at das Boot and seeing all the grime disappear is immensely attractive.

I haven’t solved the problem with the oven. For some reason, probably the risotto we dropped down the back some time ago, the gas will not stay alight when you take your hand off the button. I’ll keep trying. Sitting on the floor with one hand glued to the controls is not my favourite way to spend half an hour while dinner cooks. I have stuck the drawer front onto the drawer that is too narrow for its runners that lives under the oven. That may stop it falling onto my foot when I am cooking. I shall take the measurements and get my friend Andrea to make me a proper drawer.

I have made a good start on Bring Up the Bodies. I know some people didn’t enjoy Wolf Hall, but I don’t understand why. Hilary Mantel’s writing is sublime. Her descriptive passages are jaw droppingly wonderful. She paints the public and private Cromwell so convincingly I feel she knew him in another life; was him in another life. It all reads so effortlessly. Maybe that’s how she writes; perfect phrases passing through her fingers from her brain, coiling and unfurling across the pages, like the hawks of opening paragraphs. There she sits, looking out of Cromwell’s eye. Maybe that’s her secret; Cromwell, with his incisive eye is her editor. I don’t know, but writing like hers makes me almost believe in magic. Or witchcraft.

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