19 July 2025 (Saturday) - Two Resuscitations and an FTF

Between the heavy rain beating on the window (several times) and Treacle whinging to get back on the bed (several times) I didn’t have the best night’s sleep.

I made toast and saw I’d had a message overnight. A hint on that puzzle I’d been struggling with recently. And with that final hint I had the solution. There’s no denying that I’d needed one or two hints on this one. In retrospect I’d massively overthought the puzzle. I won’t give any spoilers, but let’s just say that having a degree in maths (which I have) gave me several completely wrong ideas.

 

As I scoffed toast Steve was on the radio doing the “Guess the Lyrics” competition. “You’ve been waiting much too long now. It looks like she’s not coming home”. No? – “Substitute” by “Clout” from the late 1970s.

Despite the weather forecast we got ourselves organized and drove over to Dog Club. Threats of thunderstorms had put people off, but we still had a dozen dogs in attendance and we all had a great time. We had maybe ten minutes of rain, but only ten minutes.

Seeing the rain was holding off I thought we might drive out to get that geocache whose puzzle I’d solved. We drove out to the back of beyond, had a little stroll, and soon had the thing in hand. And seeing how no one had found it in eighteen months that was one I could add to my list of resuscitations.

 

We came home. There was one shower as we drove, but it only lasted for a few minutes. We came home to glorious sunshine, and I had the hump. Having not planned anything for today because of supposed constant torrential rain we had the possibility of a wasted day.

So we went on a little outing.

Over brekkie I’d had an email about a new geocache just south of Canterbury. It still hadn’t been found. Could we be first? We loaded up the dogs and set off, and after half an hour we were on Stelling Minnis common by an oak tree with a blank geo-log in our hands. First to Find. Go us.

And with the weather still holding I reckoned it wasn’t *that* far to Margate and another geo-Treasure.

It wasn’t that far really (!) We parked up and started searching… And searching. Some geocaches are blindingly obvious. Some aren’t. After twenty-five minutes I messaged the friend who’d hidden it for a bit of a hint. We found it, but it took some finding; it blended in incredibly well with its surroundings. And it was another resuscitation for my list too.

As we drove home we had the third rain shower of the day. It was quite heavy but only lasted for five minutes at most.

 

We got home, fed the fish, gathered dog turds and had a late lunch which we scoffed whilst watching a film. We recorded “Everybody’s Talking About Jamie” ages ago, and finally got round to watching it today. It was rather good.

I followed it up with my twenty minute chair workout which again left me a sweaty lump, and I looked out of the window at a glorious evening. We thought about taking the dogs to Orlestone, but they were all fast asleep.

 

When I checked the weather forecast yesterday evening it was for torrential rain all day today. That was the same forecast when we left home this morning for Dog Club.

In all we’ve seen three passing showers today. I counted them. Admittedly heavy showers, but none lasted for more than ten minutes at most. We’ve had a rather bright sunny day; I think I’ve caught the sun.

We cancelled a garden party planned for this afternoon because of meteorological incompetence.

If I was as good at my job as the weather forecasters, people would die… But we put up with it. No one expects the weather forecasters to get it right; we all laugh about them. And we pay them a ridiculous amount of money with no expectations of them ever getting it right.

Who do I get my money back from?

18 July 2025 (Friday) - Another Busy Day

My piss boiled (again) as I peered into the internet at toast-scoffing time. Our local MP has tabled an Early Day Motion to celebrate Victoria Park in Ashford which has received a Green Flag award. The Green Flag award being awarded because of other people’s efforts and having nothing to do with our local MP.

Like his predecessor our current MP seems to be very good at being seen to take credit for other people’s efforts.

Yesterday we saw a strange turd whilst on our walk. Could it possibly have been from the arse of one of those wild black cats that get seen from time to time? I asked on the Facebook page about sightings of those cats locally… This morning there were quite a few replies. As is always the way I got several stupid answers. Some from people trying to be clever, and some from those who couldn’t be clever if they tried. But it turns out that the most likely dropper of that turd was a wild boar. I’ve always known that Kent has one of the highest populations of wild boar in England, but I’ve never seen one in the woods. Mind you I’ve never seen a large black cat there either and I’m quite convinced there’s some up there. Could there be wild boar? I shall keep an eye out. For boar, as well as more turds.

And I saw a new geocache had gone live which would qualify for the new Treasures thingy. At just over twenty miles away that is on the list to be done soon.

 

I tried to Munz, but after a couple of caps I got kicked out of the app and couldn't log back in. Wass there an issue? I Wordled instead, but my phone wasn’t having it, so I pressed the re-boot button and got dressed.

 

I took the dogs to Orlestone woods for a walk. We did probably the longest walk we could do in those woods, and it came in at just under two and a half miles. As we walked we met the yummy mummy joggers. We’ve seen them before in their skin-tight lycra. Call me an old puritan if you will, but they might as well jog round the woods in the nip for all that their (so-called) clothes keep secret.

Their dogs and mine all played nicely as they do. And I realized that I’d done the yummy mummies a disservice. When I saw them I automatically thought they had far too many dogs. As we chatted I counted that between the two of them they had seven dogs… that’s three and a half each compared to me with four.

And I tried the birdsong app again. Having found nothing the last couple of times I tried it, it found birds today.

 

We came home for a cuppa and I tried the Munzee app again. It worked. As did Wordle; albeit with a rather stupid word (loris). I then had a little look at a geo-puzzle that Gordon said he was struggling with. After quite a bit of brain strain I wasn’t getting anywhere. I’d like to have the thumbs-up on that one as with that, this morning’s new geocache, and one at Cranbrook that I’d been planning on doing for a while this latest batch of geocaching Treasures would be looking a lot more possible than it originally was.

 

I drove “Daddies’ Little Angel ^TM” and Pogo home, then set about some CPD. I got the garden ready for later, then did my chair fitness routine. Again I ended up as a sweaty mass at the end of it. I sat down for a little rest… and woke up an hour later as the Iceland man arrived with the shopping. I had a go against the chess bots, lost twice then went and had a shower.

 

Sadly many people weren’t able to join us this evening, but it was rather good to meet up with those that could. A few drinks, a little scoff… we had a very good evening catching up with friends in honour of Chris’s birthday. Admittedly his birthday isn’t until tomorrow, but the weather forecast is for thunderstorms all weekend.

Will we have thunderstorms all weekend? Time will tell – it always does…

17 July 2025 (Thursday) - Rather Busy

I slept through till half past seven this morning, but was rather aching when I got up. I suppose this chair workout lark is slowly taking effect? I got up, made toast and had my usual look at the Internet. There was upset in Hastings Old Town. There are two major hills there – East and West – with funicular lifts on each. The one on the west hill takes you from the heart of the sea front to a residential area. The one on the east hill takes you from a car park to a field. The west hill lift (the useful one) has been broken for some time, but in compensation the owners are offering holders of season tickets for that lift   free use of the other one. Not that it’s of any good to them.

And I saw red when I checked my emails. Someone couldn’t find a geocache I’d hidden by Singleton Lake and had suggested I go check on it… Someone who has found over thirty thousand of the things and only ever hidden three (and none of those in the last ten years).

 

I Munzed, then took the dogs to the woods. We did a slightly shorted version of our usual walk; cutting out the bit where the rancid thing is. As we walked we saw slow worms, and then there was an interesting episode. All three dogs flew to the edge of the path and stopped. Twenty yards into the woods was a herd of deer. The dogs watched the deer; the deer watched the dogs. Bailey made a half-hearted move toward the deer. The deer looked at her, as did Morgan and Treacle, and after she’d gone forward five yards she stopped and came back; looking rather sheepish.

As we walked I realized that it was rather quiet. Quiet as in silent. I ran my birdsong app for two separate ten-minute sessions and didn’t detect a single bird.

And I found a frankly epic turd. What can there be in Kings Wood that does turds the size of tennis balls?

 

We came home. I made us a cuppa then cracked on in the garden. I harvested dog dung, hung out the washing then ran round the lawn edges with the strimmer. I had a go at the lawn with the lawn mower, then had a go at the gravelled areas with the garden vacuum. I swept round the yard, then emptied the last of the wreckage from when I cleared out the bog filter. And whilst I was at it I loaded up the car in readiness for a tip run.

So easy to type, two and a half hours to do, and the garden looked just the same at the end as when I started.

 

I came in for a little break and got Wordle on the fifth attempt. “Modal” – what a seriously stupid word.

I then drove over to… I won’t say where, but a friend had hidden a geocache somewhere relatively locally which would seem to have gone missing. Could I replace it? Of course I could. And with that replaced I drove on to the tip to unload. As I got rid of rubbish I also got rid of the old kite buggy. I felt rather sad about getting shot of it but we’ve not used it in over ten years, it takes up a lot of storage space, and the tyres had perished.

I came home and did my twenty minute chair fitness workout. I’d already walked four miles round the woods, spent two and a half hours gardening, loaded the car with rubbish, and unloaded it all again, and all of that was peanuts compared to sitting on a dining chair waving my arms and legs about. I made us another cuppa to calm my nerves.

 

I then drove down to collect “Daddies’ Little Angel ^TM” and Pogo and we drove to Orlestone woods where we met “er indoors ^TM” for our evening walk. Our three dogs walk better when Pogo is along; he seems to take over as pack leader and they all follow him.

 

We had pie and chips for dinner. Arguably not that much of a diet food, but what with all the stuff I’ve done today, my diet app said I still ended the day having scoffed one thousand five hundred calories less than I could have had.

I walked over twenty thousand steps today…

16 July 2025 (Wednesday) - Dumbbells

I didn’t sleep very well last night; Treacle was at the foot of the bed and pushed my legs over the edge a couple of times.

I gave up, got up, made toast and watched an episode of “Orange is the New Black” then had a little look at the Internet as I do most mornings. It was still there. I sent out birthday wishes to the friend having a birthday today. Sadly the last posting on her Facebook page was from me wishing her a happy birthday last year. I wish people would use Facebook more; being a nosey person I want to see what people are getting up to. It is too easy to lose contact.

 

There was a very strong smell of farmyard and manure as I walked up the road to my car this morning. What was that all about? I found my car where I'd left it yesterday. It is usually where I leave it; if only I could leave it in the same place every day.

I drove round to Sainsburys to get petrol only to find their petrol station was closed. That was a pain in the glass. So I set off up the motorway to try the Sainsburys nearest to work. As I got on to the motorway so my car flashed an alarm and told me I had forty miles worth of petrol left. Woops.

 

As I drove the pundits on the radio were talking about the Anglican Dean of Gloucester. He's gone into business with the Gloucester brewery who make "CathedrALE", and the Dean is now formally blessing the stuff to raise money to renovate his cathedral's cloisters.

Not that I'm in any position to take the moral high ground  here, but you would have thought that the Dean would be aware of what the bible says (specifically Proverbs 20 Verse 1), wouldn't you?

Mind you those same cloisters which he is trying to renovate were used as a filming location in the Harry Potter films, and I know of several self-styled Christians who won't watch Harry Potter because their priests have told them not to. Seriously. 

Some see it as occultism; but from what I can work out it strikes me that the average priest would rather kids didn't read or watch Harry Potter as the priest then has a hard time trying to explain what bits of made-up claptrap is made-up claptrap and what bits the kids are supposed to believe. A Chrismation and a lumos both seem equally implausible to me.

 

I got to the Aylesford petrol station with a few miles to spare and topped up. Unusually they had quite a few sandwiches in. Generally they don't in the mornings. I commented about that only to be told that the one I'd just bought was one of yesterday's leftovers. Ho hum... 

But it tasted OK when I scoffed it. Far better than yesterday's piri-piri thing that gave me something of a guts ache.

 

Another early start made for another early finish. I came home, did the “Feed The Fish” ritual, then once “er indoors ^TM” finished with work we took the dogs out.

We went to Orlestone as we can get there in less than ten minutes. We had a good walk; the dogs behaved themselves… right up to about the last minute when Treacle and Bailey both waded through rather rancid mud. I wish they hadn’t.

 

“er indoors ^TM” scrubbed the girls whilst I sparked up my Amazon app and learned something. My Amazon delivery was only seven stops away and was round the corner in Francis Road. Seven stops – that’s hardly anything. It took an absolute age for the counter to drop to six stops. Twenty minutes later when the van came into sight I realized that when the Amazon app says your parcel is seven stops away, that’s not seven deliveries away, that’s seven stops. The poor driver is probably making half a dozen deliveries at each stop.

 

But my parcel arrived. Less than a day after ordering them, I had my lightweight dumbbells. Once we’d scoffed dinner and let it settle I had another go at the Hasfit 20 minute Chair Exercises for Seniors Workout at Home with dumbbells rather than bottles of tomato ketchup.

It’s great – I spend the entire time in a dining chair and at the end I’m absolutely knackered… If I can keep this up I’m going to be ripped. I wonder how long it will be before the novelty wears off… Am I being hopelessly optimistic in hoping to get below thirteen stone in weight? After all, that’s only trying to lose another two stone and I’ve done that once this year already.

Mind you *if* I managed it I would still be two stone overweight…  

15 July 2025 (Tuesday) - Early Shift

My alarm woke me this morning. That rarely happens. I got up, and scoffed toast whilst watching half an episode of "Orange is the New Black", then got ready for work. I tried to be quiet; I don't know why. “er indoors ^TM” and the dogs would sleep through anything in the early morning.

 

I drove off and it wasn't long before I was very conscious of an idiot on a motorbike who was far too close behind me. And then I was very conscious of an idiot in a car who'd misjudged how much room there was to the side of a dustbin lorry and was coming head-on at me at speed. I emergency stopped to avoid going straight into this car, and in my rear-view mirror saw the idiot on the motorbike swerving sideways at ninety degrees. The idiot in the car drove off, and I carried on with the idiot on the motorbike now keeping a sensible distance behind.

I stopped off at the co-op to get a sandwich. Again their fridges were all but empty..

 

As I drove up  the motorway to work so the pundits on the radio were talking about the government's new scheme. You can get a bung of up to four thousand quid towards the cost of a new electric car (provided it's not one of those Chinese ones).  But even with the government's bung the leccie car would still be far more expensive than a proper car, and I for one still have nowhere to charge the thing.

 

I got to work and had a little look at the Internet. I had emails The geocaches I put out yesterday had gone live, and I had got my hider souvenir. And I saw there had been a Munzee event in Dover on Saturday that I missed… or not so much “missed” as “knew absolutely nothing about” I was rather miffed about that… until I saw that only four people showed up for it (including the organizer and her husband).

If you are going to go to the effort of putting on something like that, why on Earth don’t you publicise it?

 

I got Wordle on the fourth attempt, then made a start at the early shift. As I worked I got a message that one of the caches I'd hidden had been found... but only one. At lunch time I had a message to say that I'd made a mistake in the formula I'd used in the other one. I'd actually written "DCE" whereas what I meant was "ABC". A subtle difference, but the difference between doing the happy dance along Beaver Lane and sulking in front of a lap-top screen. Which presumably is what several people had been doing this morning. I managed to put my mistake right, and then had lunch. Sadly the co-op's piri-piri chicken sandwich wasn't all that good.

I had an email. There was a job being advertised at the Medway hospital. Did I fancy being the lead for staff training there? A few years ago I would have jumped at the chance. Now...? I'm tired. I really can't be arsed with it any more. Not so much the training as I actually enjoy that. It's all the paperwork and meetings and being in charge. Been there, done that. It's all a bit like hard work. These days I'm quite content to just do my bit. 

 

Being on an early made for an early finish. I came home and we took the dogs to Orlestone woods where we walked for a couple of miles. The dogs were good; but there was a dodgy five minutes when a rather stupid rabbit ran out of a hedge and found itself nose to nose with Morgan.

Treacle had a wallow in the mud remains of a swamp. I wish she hadn’t.

 

We came home. “er indoors ^TM” gave Treacle a serious scrub whilst I had another go at the chair workout. The nice man in the video said that if you don’t have dumbbells then you could improvise with what you’ve got. I improvised with a couple of bottles of tomato ketchup.

Once I’d recovered (you’d be amazed how knackered you can get whilst sitting down) I spent a little while looking at dumbbells on the internet. eBay was flogging some second-hand ones but the adverts were rather misleading. Not charging for delivery but expecting the buyer to collect is a tad cheeky when collection would cost over twenty quid in petrol. Especially when you consider that you can get a pair of brand-new ones from Amazon for less than a tenner which should come tomorrow with free delivery…

14 July 2025 (Monday) - Hasfit

I slept reasonably well last night. It helps when it’s not so hot. I got up and stood on the scales; I’d planned to go back on the diet today. Mind you, I was rather pleased to see that after last week’s holiday I’d only put on four pounds.

I made toast and a cuppa (two hundred and seventy-seven calories) and had a look at the internet as I do most mornings. This morning my Facebook feed was filled with adverts for cruises; something I feel would bore me senseless. On the other hand, someone I know through dogs was posting photos of her road trip along Route 66 from Chicago to Los Angeles. Now I think I’d quite like that… because you can stop off along the way. The people who took us to Uzbekistan do a Route 66 tour.

Maybe next year?

 

I munzed and unlocked a qrate, got Wordle on the fifth attempt (undid), and took the dogs out. As we drove to the woods the pundits on the radio were interviewing the Chief Secretary to the Treasury who spoke a lot without actually saying anything. Politicians charged with running the nation’s finances are on a hiding to nothing. The Labour ones are full of ideas and suggestions until they actually have any power to do anything at which point they realise it is all rather expensive. The Conservatives sell off anything over which they might conceivably be expected to have any responsibility so nothing is ever their fault (the water debacle springs to mind)…

 

We got to the walk and did what used to be our standard walk before we extended it, but we covered three and a half miles in just over an hour this morning. As we went we met a couple of other dogs, said hello and walked on past. We found no swamps or dog poo or squirrels. We chased a woodpecker, but it cheated by flying off. All rather dull.

 

We came home. “Daddies’ Little Angel ^TM” wasn’t back from her appointment so I cleaned out the pond’s filter, chucked out the last of the plant wreckage from the bog filter and voomed round with the bionic burner. After an hour I was knackered, so I made us both a cuppa then pondered geo-puzzles.

Yesterday I hit on the idea that since there are precious few geocaches within a hundred miles that qualify for the latest series of geo-Treasures, I might create some. Last night I planned one such and wrote the web page for it. I checked that I’d got the sums right – I hadn’t but I think I have now, It always pays to check. And flushed with success I devised another.  

 

I took. “Daddies’ Little Angel ^TM” and Pogo home, then took a circuitous route home via the locations of my new geocaches and put out some nanos. As you do.

Once home I gave the two cache web pages a last once-over and sent them in to the geo feds for their assessment with the request that if all was well they might be published tomorrow or later so that I get the International Geocaching Day 2025 hider souvenir.

 

I wrote up some CPD, fed the fish, and then had a look at the chair yoga workout I found yesterday. It played for eighteen minutes; I turned it off after six. It was bollox. I was rather hoping for an actual chair workout; not to be sitting on a chair and waving my hands in the air whilst trying not to forget to breathe.

I had another look on-line and found the Hasfit workout for seniors. It took twenty minutes to work through, and for all that I spent the entire time sitting on a dining chair it wasn’t long before I was rather sweaty. I shall have another go at it tomorrow, and wear shorts… I think I might have some somewhere.

I then rewarded myself with a cuppa and a slice of lemon drizzle cake (two hundred and fifty calories), and after an epic battle I eventually beat the chess bot.

 

“er indoors ^TM” went bowling. I considered another run-through with the chair workout, but thought better of it. I don’t want to overdo it just yest. Instead I watched a couple of episodes of “Orange is the New Black” whilst the dogs snored.

And then I saw that we’ve achieved the second of our three Munzee Clan challenges for the month. Result.

13 July 2025 (Sunday) - Taking It Easy

 I slept well; last night wasn’t so hot. I made toast – you can’t beat toast with peanut butter and marmalade (try it!). And I had my usual peer into the internet. My Facebook feed today was seemingly full of adverts for old men’s chair yoga. Apparently you can sit on a dining chair and thrash about and build muscle whilst losing weight. Apparently. All these adverts took me through ten minutes of preamble before asking for money. I suppose enough people must stump up the akkers to make it worth the while of those paying to put up the adverts – I found something free on You-Tube that I might start (together with the diet re-launch) tomorrow.

 

I Wordled (gnome on the fourth attempt), Munzed, and planned a little Munzee expedition. We need to get a lot of a certain sort on Munzee for this month’s Clan War, and going round the block would get us well over half-way there. So we went round the block and got over half-way there. As we went I opened a gold qrate and got a mini squid cubimal as well. Go me.

Seeing we still had time on our hands we drove out to Charing to hunt down a geocache. The latest geo-Treasures need us to find rather difficult to find caches which need a special tool to get to the paper log.

We parked up and walked for half a mile to a bridge over a sand quarry where we hunted for over half an hour. It was just as I said we should give it two more minutes that the thing came to light. I was glad it did. That gave us our first “Tools of the Trade” treasure and we’ve five more to find. The next closest is in Cranbrook. After that we’ve something of a mission.

There’s one in Hastings… possibly. It hasn’t been found for eighteen months.

There’s one in Sittingbourne… possibly. It hasn’t been found for two years.

The one in Heathfield hasn’t been found for four years.

After that the rest are quite a bit further away.

 

In a novel break with tradition the weather forecast had been right; a cloudy morning followed by a sunny afternoon. We’d been right to go out in the morning. “er indoors ^TM” boiled up another rather good ploughman’s lunch, then we had a lazy afternoon in the garden.

As it cooled I fed the fish then looked at those plants I’d salvaged from when I’d chopped back the bog filter a few weeks ago. Sadly nowhere near as many plant had survived as I thought might, but I put the two that hadn’t totally croaked into floating pots in the big pond and I shall see if they take. I shall clear the wreckage of what I pulled out of the bog filter tomorrow. Probably.

I then came inside and solved geo-puzzles in the hope of getting more of these geo-Treasures. Sadly they are few and far between and many of them are up trees. And then I struck on the frankly genius idea that if there’s not many suitable caches available, put some new ones out. So I posted to the local geo-Facebook page. People might put a few out… five would be nice.

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up a very good bit of dinner which we scoffed whilst watching “Canal Boat Diaries”. I don’t think I’d get on with a canal boat. There’s a very limited amount of places you can go (i,e, along the canal) and you can’t go very fast. Mind you I’m thinking more and more about a camper van.

 

I then spent a little while working on a new geocache which will allow others to get this new Treasure…