Tag Archives: printer

Great-grandmother a housemaid in London

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Dot near the summit of Snowdon in the early 70s
Dot near the summit of Snowdon in the early 70s

Have suddenly started feeling very tired for no apparent reason and have been looking up things like post-polio syndrome on the internet. Of course I’m probably just tired, but I do tend to suspect the worst. It’s one of many character flaws. My mother said I had polio (mildly) as a child, but I don’t really remember anything about it.

Walked up to the Millennium Library today for a talk on researching family history and felt shattered when I got back, despite having walked a total of only a couple of miles. Spent most of the rest of the afternoon researching family history and discovered my great-grandmother was a housemaid to noted chemist Charles Savory in Regent Street in 1861.

Of course there has been a certain amount of stress recently, which might account for the tiredness: I’m still in the midst of trying to change the church account to another bank. Went into Nationwide, and they said they didn’t do it. Went into Natwest, and they gave me a phone to speak to someone in Rotherham. I am now awaiting a letter and a phone call at home, hopefully in that order.

Still no news about Andrew’s money. Rang Minster Lodge today, extracted a promise of a ring back, but nothing happened. Meanwhile Dot and I went to Swinton to discuss travel insurance, and they said they couldn’t deal with people over 64 in the office; that had to be done by phone too. What is wrong with these people?

Then went to Currys against my better judgement to look for a new printer, but the two assistants we spoke to clearly knew absolutely nothing about printers. This reminded me why I stopped going to Currys many years ago, and we made our excuses and left. Have now realised we don’t need a new printer, because Dot’s is in the same room and perfectly OK. We have even saved quite a bit of space.

The weather has been reasonably mild (compared with the United States, for instance) but with a tendency to rain. On Sunday I was down to preach, which I did, but had to lead too as Ruth was not well. Quite enjoyed it.

On Monday Dot and I decided to go the cinema for a change (instead of just talking about it);  we found ourselves in the vicinity during the afternoon and bought tickets. We saw Hobbit 2: The Desolation of Smaug in iMAX, and it was stunning in very way, even including a very good song by Ed Sheeran at the end. The screenwriter introduced a new elf, played by Evangeline Lilly, and she was wonderful: great action scenes too. Tolkien is brilliant on the nature of evil.

Have been transferring quite a few slides to computer, using my Christmas present. Not great quality, but what can you expect from 40-year-old slides? Some very nice ones of a young and gorgeous Dot. Not that she isn’t gorgeous now. Oh no.

Rain threat and hidden printer

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threeplusadrian
Old family picture shown to Sam, featuring (left to right) myself, Sam's father, Andrew and our cousin Adrian. Taken at Dovercourt, I believe.

Annoying day yesterday. It looked very much as if it was going to rain, so I kept putting off going for my usual walk. Then it didn’t rain, but it kept looking as if it were going to. The people of Norwich should thank me for not going for a walk, because if I had, it would certainly have rained. Annoying element of day part two: my printer went missing. Not literally. It’s still upstairs, attached to my wife’s computer, but now my computer can’t find it. It’s looking for it, it keeps assuring me. It just can’t find it. It has the right name, and when I don’t want to use it, it tells me it’s ready, but when I try and print something, it just looks for the printer. So everything I want printed has to be e-mailed to Dot first, which is tiresome. Checked on Google for solutions, but they were either incomprehensible or didn’t work. One was so silly even I knew it wouldn’t work, and it didn’t.

Still, by way of compensation, I did get a few things done. Nicholas came round in the morning to talk to Dot about organisation of the John Bell visit while I had a look at the draft of his book (in which I figure among the thanks). After that we discussed changing the liturgy as the first stage in a consultative process which may or may not turn out to be interesting. Later, in the evening, nephew Sam came round and we had a catch-up chat. Also showed him some photos of Wales and some old family pictures, which I’m sure he found rather more compelling. Lucy had been out all day with her mother at Norjam, which is not a new local preserve for spreading on toast but a gathering of Guides, and she didn’t get back in time, so I took Sam home around 11pm.

Oh, and I updated my website, partially rejigging it at the same time.

On Monday we went to Hempnall for lunch at Sue and Roger’s. Lovely house and lovely meal. Made the mistake of rearranging carpet cleaning man for 4pm and had to leave earlier than we would have done. Got back just in time, largely because there were no vehicles on the road between Hempnall and Stoke Holy Cross – a rare phenomenon – and I was able to eat up the miles in the MX5. Nice to drive that for a change.

Tuesday started with a trip to the surgery to get my blood tested. Waiting room packed, which meant of course that when the first name was called, no-one responded. Why does this always happen? Got in 20 minutes late and blood was removed. Now the wait to see if it’s behaving itself. As I had predicted, I was a bit late returning to get my hair cut by Linda, but no-one seemed to mind. In the evening the Tuesday Group was down to five, and knowing that our resident vegetarian was going to be absent, I cooked chili con carne, which I have to say tasted pretty good.

Today is bright, and I shall be going out shortly to see if I can get my eyes tested (get it?). Dot has already been to Park Farm, and she is following this up by shopping at Morrisons in preparation for our friend Jennie’s arrival this afternoon. She will complete the morning with a visit to the dentist, which sounds like fun. I have just rung the hospital in Coventry to confirm that Andrew is Ok to go out for a meal tomorrow, and it seems he is doing well.

10 January 2009

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Just been putting together a mixture of old and new pictures for a photo book for A Ethel’s birthday as a surprise (unless she reads this, which is pretty unlikely, as she doesn’t have a computer and wouldn’t know what to do with one if she had). This picture features her and U Ted together with Dot and David, and a little bit of me. Must be around 1980, I should think – perhaps earlier. Dot and I had to research some old albums, which was interesting: quite a number of unidentified people emerged. The process was interrupted (a) by problems with the printer, which I think have now been fixed after many abortive attempts and (b) by an unexpected visit from Joe and Birgit, who got a puncture on the way and eventually stayed for lunch. They bought us a bottle of pear liqueur from Germany, which was very welcome though stronger than I remembered it. I’m not sure “though” is the right word.

Very cold today – a couple of degree below zero – so no real desire to go out. Yesterday I helped Annette take the Paston book to the Millennium Library (meeting Lisa there), where it has a display cabinet to itself. The cabinet was embarrassingly big, actually, but one of the librarians managed to find some relevant books to make the display look half-decent, and they also printed out an information sheet I provided – on disc because our printer had just “broken”. The breaking turned out to be a blessing in disguise (pretty heavy disguise, it must be said), because they printed it out at A3, which made it look almost professional on a stand in the cabinet. I could not have done that.

The printer “breaking” occurred at a difficult moment, because Sue and Roger Eagle were here discussing philosophy for children with Dot at what sounded a pretty deep level. While I lured Dot away to look at the printer I gave them some mini-baguettes which I’d bought from Budgens on the way back from the dentist’s, together with some cheese, a few crisps and a cup of tea – all in a huge rush because I was late to meet Annette. Aargh! It worked out all right in the end, though. Annette came back for a warm drink (she had been working at freezing Bally) and I put off my visit to the post office to retrieve an undelivered piece of mail. Dot then returned her to Bally and went to the supermarket while I caught up with various stuff.

Dot is now printing out some stuff for her P4C visit to Terrington St Clement on Monday. She’s been very busy over the past few days, and Norwich City have just lost again, which doesn’t help.