30th June 2019 The Big Hot!

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Sunday 30th 73-84F and bright and breezy at 8.00. With 86F, 30C promised around lunchtime. THG has been moving her plants out of the greenhouse in preparation for "The Big Hot." Nothing we have tried so far in the way of shading has helped very much. Just spread the blinding light out a bit so welding goggles aren't quite so necessary.  Don't believe the adverts when they show real people in greenhouses on a sunny day. They are probably shop mannequins and even then they would have to whip them out after the photo shoot. Before they, quite literally, melted away.

My back pain keeps hiding and then sneaking back again. A walk will probably help. Though I worry about getting half way and then having to crawl back on my hands and knees. All walks must inevitably involve an "out and back." That is once I am allowed out of the gate at The Servant's Entrance with a 2 hour [conditional] pass.

It could be much, much worse! THG was talking about having me "chipped" back when I'd think nothing of going off for a 7-8 hour ride "to the shops" on the trike. Imagine the embarrassment of being returned as "lost property" in a marked police van. I don't think I could have lived with the shame. So I took up compulsory morning walks instead.
 
Stepping outside the back door into blinding sunshine, to don my walking boots, was like stepping off a plane in some tourist "hot spot." Not that I can hold a discourse on the subject from first hand experience. Our last holiday was well over 30 years ago and involved two frosty nights in a tent on a sheep's field in Snowdonia.

Which probably explains why we were in absolutely no hurry to repeat the mistake. It could be fairly said that we are not "people" people. The mere idea of sitting on a beach with several million, corpulent basking bods in a state of undress, is now totally abhorrent to both of us. We tried that once, too, but I wasn't allowed to look.

My back behaved itself today as I plodded steadily under a baking sun to the village and back. A solitary Mallard was following the advice in the newspapers. By cooling off with his feet immersed in the church pond. It is coming up to to 10.am as I wait for morning coffee and hot marmalade on toast and it has already reached a sweltering 78F. There is a good breeze going. So I risked condemnation by the neighbours in raising my arms to simulate a chick cooling off in the nest. Surely nobody would be daft enough to think I was hoping to fly? It topped out at 84F or 29C.

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29th June 2019 Roasted Frogs suffer at 45.9C = 115F!

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Saturday 29th 56-73F, uniform grey skies despite the promise of an endlessly, sunny day. France has broken its all time, highest temperature record with a rather half-hearted 45.9C = 115F. Any proud nation, worth its salt, would have gone for the full 46C and hang the expense in taxpayer's money. Fortunately we have it on the highest scientific authority [Proff. Herr Chump Née Koch] that this isn't remotely due to global warming.

My back is improving slowly but I still have to be careful about lifting bags of compost over my head. I kid you not! The Head Gardener had asked me if I had my military grade, exo-skeleton in the boot when she let me out of the servant's entrance. Of course I lied and then duly suffered the consequences for gross insubordination. I should have sent our domestic robot instead, but had begged to be allowed out just to get away from the endless household chores. Though, of course, I hadn't mentioned the real excuse.

The supermarket stack of compost bags was literally above my head height in my best, sling back sandals! I should have gone next door where it was a penny cheaper. And, the stacks were more human-orientated. All thanks to adult supervision of the miserably paid, prepubescent staff so typical of today's, Danish, supermarket chains. Have you noticed how they always have [badly] handwritten and badly faded recruiting notices for new, under-13 staff by the checkouts?

Which probably explains why you never see the same innocent face twice. There they are in the sweet-buying queue one day. Then serving their junior school chums the next. The shock may be too much for many of them! How will they possibly cope without the constant support of their 'phones? I do hope the supermarket chain is offering PTSD therapy to those staff affected by the shocking transition to an [albeit temporary] "hands free" existence? Perhaps we should be told?

The Danish news media was smirking at the fleet of huge, Germanic, ministerial cars lined up for the Newly Green Government Ministers. Not a Tesla Roadster in sight! Do you think they are saving that one for me? I have registered an interest in being the first to own a Free Tesla Roadster under the Newly Green Government's Trade-in Policy For a Much Greener Future. After all, I think I have done my bit for the planet in pedalling my trike for 16,000km / 10,000 miles per year to the shops. [Albeit with a few minor detours.] There surely never was anybody more deserving, than I? Though I do hate to blow my own trumpet.  😇

Being the unsung hero of my own legend I was urged on my way this morning by THG wielding a sharpened, garden cane. Simultaneously, Her well-polished megaphone provided gentle advice on posture and pace as I limped away. Not daring to glance back to avoid a certain charge of insubordination.

At first the traffic was completely absent. The utter silence leading me to suspect foul play. Further suggesting a careful glance behind every hedge for lurking Triffids might be wise. Alas it was not to be! Humanity soon reared its ugly head in the form of a young woman driving while talking the usual bølløcks into her mobile phone.

The next example on the conveyor belt of doom was a young family of four. With the male driver managing a perfect owl impression. As he reassured his doting passengers in the rear seats that, yes, he could drive with his head on backwards. Even if it meant mowing down the odd, composting septuagenarian in full, but painfully limping, flight.

Needless to say I have returned all but unscathed. Or you would not be suffering this continuing diatribe. Though there was some minor drama. As a combine harvester hid behind a roadside signpost as a car drove the other way. Of course it had to happen just as they were due to pass me going in opposite directions. It was ever thus. I duly dived for the crops on the other side of the narrow verge and was rewarded with a temporary stay of my near-death experience.

The descents were the worst part of today's walk but went unseen by THG's powerful binoculars. Overcoming my suffering in record time for the walk to the lanes and back required ten minutes of intense interrogation on my return. How could I possibly argue against the video evidence? Even if it wouldn't stand up in a Danish court.

Any chance of a ride, do I hear? Yesterday's major faux pas was returning without butter even though THG [Praise be Her Name] had crossed butter out on the shopping list. She told me that she had carefully explained that she meant that I should buy butter. Sadly this had escaped me by the time I had endured my quarterly, close shearing. Besides, She was talking into my deaf ear as I sat in the car, heart pounding, just waiting for Her to drop the flag. Which, of course, is to initiate the timing of my escape outing to the nearest hundredth of a second.

Fresh from my "miracle cure" in reaching the lanes on foot, I sprang onto my trike for a shopping trip. On my return, 7 miles later, I was ready for a short triathlon and I can't even swim. I had ridden like a maniac at 18mph and 150rpm towards the village shops. Returning into more of a headwind at 16mph. Rumours of my recent demise were obviously exaggerated. The only tricycling superhero in the village rides again!

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27th June 2019 Excused boots!

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Thursday 27th 61F, bright periods but rather cloudy. A cooler day in prospect but plenty of sunshine is offered. Temperature records, for June, were broken yesterday in various places including Germany and Czechoslovakia. More heat expected.

Excused boots! No walk today. I've hurt my back lifting heavy compost bags in and out of the car boot. I could hardly reach the gate let alone walk for miles.

Friday 28th 65F, sunny with only a little cloud. Mobile enough for my quarterly appointment with the sheep shearers. So now I look at least 120 years younger and my head is so light they want to use me for research into hot air balloons. I can confirm that my completely deaf, left ear worked just fine by conduction as the razor removed 3 months' worth of snowy, baby "down."

I have registered to be first in the queue for my free Tesla Roadster once the new government gets its "climate" act together. My '90s Japanese car is out there gibbering away to itself. It doesn't know whether to be sad at its early retirement or grateful to go to its final resting place.

I saw the lady, who is well into her 80s, shopping on her bike again today. She gardens constantly between tours up and down a half mile stretch of "her" bit of main road. Collecting litter from the gas guzzling Choker Metal Cleaner [Secret formula: H2O+CO2+C12 H22 O11] baby bottle suckers and McSlob's Throwaways. She does this because the council can't afford litter pickers when it has so much original [Danish] modern art [aka. hideous daubs] to buy for its palatial offices.

The main news is on Japanese knotweed. Clumps of which have been "sewn" by the council verge mowers. Spreading it far and wide. A single plant can cover a circle 14 meters [52'] across and is all but indestructible by any normal means.

Another online, box shifter is using false advertising. An item, promised for delivery, from stock, within 2-3 days, is now expected next week. i.e. A completely fraudulent 7 days minimum from ordering. That's if I am lucky and their remote supplier gets their finger out. NO stock means NO bløødy stock! There is NO OTHER interpretation! Not even if their lying sales website says otherwise.

In many cases, in my own, direct experience, "foreign" online dealers can deliver far quicker from Germany and the UK. Than a Danish online dealer can deliver from just down the road.

The honest stockists miss the sale to the lying crooks. Who only order from the importer/wholesaler when they get an order on their own sales website. Fraudulent advertising of stock should be a punishable, criminal offense with a hefty fine. A repeat offense worthy of a prison term.

It is now far too late to order the tool elsewhere and nothing will be gained if I do. Because the weekend intervenes and there are no deliveries in Denmark on the weekend.

Now there's an opening for somebody enterprising with the capacity to provide a reliable, national, Weekend Delivery service. Guess what? Most Danes are at work during the week and are never home to receive their parcels. Most Danes are at home on Saturday or Sunday morning because few Danes work on the weekend. There's a glaring imbalance in service there somewhere.

I wonder if the new Danish government will invent consumer protection? Probably not. There obviously hasn't been any need for it so far. After all, the politicians never need to do their own shopping. There has always been some security lackey or unpaid Au-pair to do it for them. So they won't care about the endless fraudulent advertising by Danish household names.

Click on any image for an enlargement.

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