Jan 2015

With sunny days and blue skies once the wind dropped winter doesn't seem that bad. The house dropped to 14.5c due to the wind chill getting in through the ventilation for the fires and cookers, although we didn't feel a draft, but running 3 fires soon brought the temperatures back up to between 16c to 17c with 3 layers is fine. We remember running the gas heating in the Uk at 21c but we were wearing the same things as we did in the summer.

We didn't venture out unless we had to, we got on with sorting out our communication issues. 1st Mike set up the Voip phone using the converter box he'd found on Amazon.it, it arrived with the New Year. Plugging it into the new modem we then plugged the Dect phones into it and there you go. We could have just purchased a Voip phone but at 89 euros we were worried about dropping it and we'd need 2 one for each floor, so buying a “converter box” for 49 euros so we could use our existing cheap phones seemed a better option.

Researching the motherboard Pat had brought us we discovered several things, 1) we couldn't find the fan and heat sink needed to fit the processor, 2)there wasn't enough Ram, 3) the wiring for the board now comes with the desk unit and we've nothing to match. Lots of head shaking, web searching and laying out of all the bits we have Mike decided to give me his computer with all the upgrades he'd made and I had to put the Ubuntu HDD in an breakout box to extract the files.

Mike then bought a new motherboard, processor with heatsinc & fan, 4GB Ram and desk unit with some sata leads. It arrived a week later and he added the 2 dvd writers, Sata hard drive & card reader Pat gave us and we had a Sata graphics card in stock giving him a great upgrade for under 200 euros. The new system also got an O/S upgrade to Windows 7. It took a weekend to get it all together and most of a week to get the “essential” software and files Mike needs on to the system as well. Its not quite as fast as the very new computers, but he's not playing “live” gaming, so this is as fast as it needs to be., which is enormously faster than the one he has gifted to me and its going to take a while to relearn XP as I've been using Ubuntu for 6 years and transferring files and favorites across.

In the meantime I did get to refurbishing the 2 leather coats, the brown one I discovered a tear but that was easily fixed with the kit and both look amazing, they'll keep going for another 20+ years. I also got to grips with the quilt I'd cut out and sewn into blocks before Xmas We discovered PK has taken to sharpening his claws on the leather suit, much to our horror, so had to refix 2 seats and kept an eye on him and locking him in our bedroom area at night, with his loo, food and a bed under a radiator he didn't seem to mind very much.

The weather perked up and got quite a bit warmer in the middle of the month, hitting 20c in the sunlight, we even had to water some plants, and we cut up the tree that fell in the gale and repaired the fence with it, poetic justice. The latter part of the month brought more seasonal weather, -1c at night and up to 9c in the day time then it dropped to -4c and zero during the day – we burnt wood on all fires to keep the house warm – and the wind picked up, along with the soft ground we had 4 more trees collapse into a wigwam formation about 10” around but 20-30 feet long.

PK's abscess that has healed had just turned inwards and his leg doubled in size, new stronger antibiotics and lots of fun getting them down him, and in a week it had re-burst, leg back to normal and he was looking 100% better but poor cat does look bedraggled and very thin as its a month he's been ill and he didn't pick up quickly either, sleeping most of the day, eating very little, and having a little fresh air but he's just not thriving, we take each day as it comes and keep the wood fires burning.

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