Michael's Meanderings

This last week has been filled with good (and bad) things.

Bad first, I think I've been getting flu / a cold but I've been medicating and the symptoms have mostly gone away. I've also had occasional very bad pain down my left leg and less bad but still painful in my left wrist.

The much better news is also more extensive. D built me a new bookcase under the stairs last week and has nearly completed a further one in the lounge / Library. I really need to organise my books, now I have somewhere to put them!

Last Wednesday I went to see ABBA - The Show I think it's the closest we'll get to seeing ABBA again, two of the original ABBA backing musicians were on stage, and with the choir and orchestra it was impressive. There were about 30 people on stage most of the time. Though I did think that those tribute bands who manage close to the same effect with only 6 people were even more impressive.

On Saturday evening I went to the Hawth to see Wyrd Sisters, the second time I'd seen it on stage, it was very good. The following day I returned to see Mitch Benn & the distractions. As I'd heard there were engineering works between Haywards Heath and Three Bridges (the Hawth stop) I decided to give myself extra time, I also needed some cold medication so added extra time for a stop off at the chemist. However the engineering, works only affected traffic stopping at Redhill so instead of the 2 hours I'd anticipated the journey took 20 minutes, and then I discovered the clocks had gone back. So I arrive at 3 o'clock for a 7:30 performance! Luckily I had two books with me so the time wasn't wasted.

Bought 2 CDs after the concert, both signed and had a few words. Mitch recalled the Eastercon performance fondly. And then home.

My brother in law installed the last two shelves for my floor to ceiling bookcase on Tuesday. I now have 43 new shelves, most of which are already full!

However double stacking will give me enough space for about seven thousand books.

Photos should follow shortly.

On Saturday it was raining and I decided not to go shopping (since I did have enough stuff to last the week) and instead was persuaded (by my sister) to defrost the freezer.

This was a fairly lengthy job. It required everything to be extracted first and stored in cool boxes (and the small freezer in the garage) powered off and left for a while for the ice to loosen.

Eventually I got out a wooden spatula and attacked the clinging ice. I managed to detach large lumps from the sides and scooped it from the bottom (it's a deep chest freezer). The resulting mountain of ice/snow filled the kitchen sink.

My reward, the knowledge of a job well done, and then watching the season finale of Doctor Who. Which I thought was great (and yesterday I re-watched it with commentary).

When I got home yesterday, my brother-in-law had fitted the last bookcase into the remaining wall space. All that is needed is the wood (to be ordered) for the shelves. Photos to follow.

When I got home from work yesterday my brother-in-law had completely built one of the two remaining bookcases in my living room. That's the fastest he's done it and was possible because he was able to work outside and the warm weather caused the stain to dry very quickly.



I would have uploaded pictures but my ISP has capped my current usage as I've managed to use up this months allotment of data uploading / downloading before the end of the month, so for the next week I'll be somewhat limited.

The LibraryThing site has been been suffering over the last couple of days and has been unavailable. It would appear I've become a bit addicted as I really wanted to add the new books that I'd just shelved.

Oh I just found this on the Bujold Mailing List and it was so appropriate
Critical Mass: the number of books required before it is quicker
to buy another copy of a title then to find your copy.

More wood arrived yesterday, so my Brother-in-Law was able to make a start on adding the final two, floor to ceiling bookcases, in the back room / library / lounge. In addition he installed a nice small shelf, above the door which will hold about 30 paperbacks. A most excellent use of space. Photos to follow hopefully.



I've nearly completed cataloging all the books on the ground floor (current total 2369, I'm now in the top 500 libraries on LibraryThing, out of 215,981 members, currently at number 476!)