No trace of damaged water pipe anymore

It has taken a long time, but the work is finished! I had already blogged about the electrician drilling into a water pipe, after which the whole pipe had to be extracted from the wall and replaced. That obviously left a big gaping hole in my wall. And the first step of doing something about that was packing it with wood. Then the work stalled. Then I filled the remaining depression up with filler. The next step was to sand the filler down, but it turned out the sandpaper I had wasn't up to it. But by now I have bought new (coarser) sandpaper, sanded it all down, touched up the paint, and then put the light switch back. And now you can't tell anymore that an emergency took place! You can still see a bit of a scar in the wall, but this wall is full of scars. It's just the nature of the wall. I'm happy with the result!

Watching football

Yes you read that correctly. I have been watching football. Why? I am not interested in football. I am also in a relationship with a man who is not interested in football. But. He actually is marginally interested in football, and he figured that now that his national team was in the World Cup semi-final, this would be the moment to watch. He also says that by the time it gets so spectacular that he watches again, England loses.

After our walk we went back to Llandudno and had some pasta. And then it was time to watch the game. I watched the first few minutes, and then I sneaked away to phone my mum. I was perfectly comfortable not watching everything. And when I came back, there still were no goals.

I am hardly a football expert, but the game struck me as not particularly pleasant to watch. It looked tense on the field. The players didn't look like they were enjoying any of it. It was a bit scrappy.

I wasn't too focussed on the game; I had a lot of water to drink, and I had Neil to my left and his cat to my right, so enough other things to deal with. But I was involved enough in the game to get quite some admiration for the English goalkeeper. If I remember correctly, the Argentinian goalkeeper didn't have an awful lot to do. The English one did! And I was very impressed with how he kept almost everything out. But almost everything is, of course, but not necessarily good enough to win a game. And they didn't.

When it finished, Neil wasn't overly disappointed. But he hadn't liked how the Argentinian had played, and he spontaneously became a Spain fan. And he had another data point in line with his expectation of England losing when he watches. In case you wonder: no he didn't watch the game against France. 

I remember having watched football when I was in Norway. That gives me an approximately once in 20 years frequency in which I watch football games. I'm sorted again for 20 years! Suits me fine…

Anniversary hike and swim

 In July last year I went on the first date with a guy called Neil. Two dates later he made his rather muted debut on the blog. And I suppose the rest is history. And now it is July again. I thought it would be good too do something to commemorate the anniversary of that first date. It has been in the middle of a heatwave, and we had gone for a walk, with a little swim in a lake to cool down. 

Last year, the lake in question had been Geirionnydd, but I prefer my lakes a bit less busy and polluted. I suggested  Cwm Lloer this time. Neil was up for it. And because of where it is, we could take the bus in. So Neil came to me first, and then we went to the bus stop together.

It was quite nice walking weather. Warm, but not scorching! And we walked quite leisurely up in the direction of the lake, along the stream. I was trying my hybrid shoes as hiking shoes. I was wondering if that would be more comfortable on my feet, while still being sturdy enough. 

By a stile Neil suggested we have a little break. He was a bit warm. I was up for that! We didn't intend a huge walk, so we had all the time in the world. And after a while, a lad appeared, and decided to have a little break there too. He was from Wolverhampton, and had fairly recently started to explore North Wales. We had a really nice chat.

Then we went on. Not a lot later, we came to the lake. There was one small cluster of people already there, but that wasn't very surprising. On a day like that! And the lake is big enough to accommodate two small clusters of people, and still give everyone a sense of privacy.

Lake selfie

It is such a gorgeous area! You look right at the cliff of Pen yr Ole Wen. It is quite quiet. We put our bags down and decided to go for a swim first. And the other cluster of people was so far away, and there was no sign of any additional people, that I went in the nip. Neil was too British for that. It was lovely!

Our view (pic doesn’t do it justice)

We had our lunch there too. We took our time. And when we finally got onto our feet again we hadn’t decided yet we would do after reaching the summit of Prn yr Ole Wen. We would see.

When we go to the summit I figured I preferred to go straight down to the road, and catch the bus back, rather than walk all the way back home. I just didn't expect water to materialise anytime soon. And I didn't have a lot left. Neil was fine with that, so we accepted the descent. 

The top of the descent 

It is quite a steep descent, and some of it has a lot of loose rock. That is a bit trying, but the shoes did a fine job. I did wonder if the main issue here was that I was wearing them out a bit quickly. Might be worth it though, if it is better for my feet.

When we were right by a steep cliff I suddenly spotted a bag. A bag? There was no accompanying person anywhere in sight. We called out, but no one materialised. Sometimes finding a bag in the mountains is really bad news. It might mean that someone has come to a sticky end. But this was absolutely not a dangerous part of the route. What would have happened? 

We decided to leave it there, but make a note of its location, and take a picture. We could notify Mountain Rescue.

We continued our way down, and got to the road without issues. We still had a bit of time before the bus would come, so we checked if there was a water station by the visitor centre. There wasn't, but there was a National Trust warden's office there, with the door open. Neil stomped inside, and asked the person in there, a young man called Rhys, if they perhaps knew anything about someone missing a bag. Strangely enough, the answer was yes! 

We heard the whole story. A bloke had been in the mountains, and put his back down at some point. Unfortunately, it wasn't stable, and it started rolling, and fallen down a cliff. He had been looking for it, but never found it. That was a problem, as apparently, his wallet, phone and car keys had been in there. It turned out that he had had to have his car towed home. And that was quite some distance away. Rhys had his contact details. 

Where we had found the bag it wasn't conspicuous, simply because it was muted green, but it was on the main path. We wondered if someone else had found it and put it in a more obvious location. I suppose everybody is hesitant to remove a bag just in case the owner is coming back for it. But now we knew that the owner had gone home. We could safely remove it.

I thought it would be silly to leave it on the mountain knowing what we knew, so I created a quick plan. What if one of us would take the bus home, and the other one would go and retrieve the bag. We could bring the bag back to the National Trust office, and the person who had gone home by bus could pick the other one up by car. The bus only goes every two hours, and we didn't want to wait that long. And with Neil blocking me in, it had to be him who went home. He was OK with that. 

Rhys offered me some water, but he only had it in a water cooler, and that gave me a massive brain freeze. Neil let me drink some of his leftover water. That would have to do. I gave him my bag, as I didn't want to carry two of them, and went back up the hill.

It only took me some 25 minutes to get back to the bag. And a similar amount of time to come back down. When I came back to the road, Neil was already waiting for me. When he had got back with his car, he could see a little dot descending the mountain, and had come to welcome me. With a full bottle of water in his hand! He knows me a bit. This water wasn't brain freeze temperature.

We brought the bag back, had an additional little chat with Rhys, and then went home. I hope the owner of the bag is glad it has been retrieved. He might have some more adventures with it now. But I think he will be more selective where he puts it down.

I could tell I had done that last bit of the adventure with not enough water, but it has been worth it. Even if the bag never finds it way back to the owner, at least it is not confusing people in the mountains anymore. And if it would stay there for too long, it would become litter and that is not good either.

It hadn't panned out as I had expected, but it had been a worthy anniversary walk! Onward, to the next year with Neil!

Marshalling 18 youngsters

When I was at the Pentir fun run, Arwel approached me. He said he had a race that Sunday. He still needed people to help him out. Was I available? Neil was going to go into the mountains with a friend, so I said yes. It turned out that the race was the Junior mountain running championships in y Fron. I thought this was the same event as one I had marshalled with Neil the year before, but I wasn't sure, as that had been in September, and championships don't tend to move around the year too much.

It wouldn't be a big commitment! There were three races initially planned, but they had decided to combine two of them. So there was one race starting at 12:00 and one at 12:30, and neither of them would be more than 7 km long.

He had suggested I explore the course before it would start, but time moved faster then I could keep up with, so by the time I got to race HQ, it was too late for such shenanigans. Oh well. 

Ann teamed me up with a local lady called Sheila. When she appeared we headed into the hills together. Along the way we chatted a bit. She was almost 80 and a fell runner. She had been an Eryri Harrier in the past. Her partner would also be marshalling, but he would appear later.

We would be a bit spaced out as marshals. I suppose I would have preferred to have a three people where there was only me. There was some ambiguity in the route on both sides of me. I figured I would have to be a bit dynamic. Make sure I was in full sight of the runners when they started to run away from Sheila, so they knew they would have to run towards me. I also had my Siabod cowbell, which would help.  That would sort the ambiguity before they would get to me. But then I could run up a bit with them, and also point them the way just after my station. There was a steep hill and a sharp turn straight behind, so you couldn't really see what was ahead from my marshalling station. And once the first one was pointed in the right direction, the rest could just follow.

The first race, which was for 12 and 13-year-olds, only had six runners. Would parents have withdrawn their child because of the weather? We were still in the heat wave, even though this day it was quite breezy, so I wasn't overheating. My marshalling strategy worked. And the kids, who were in club shirts (not national shirts), looked as grumpy as last year. I have marshalled several junior races now, and you don't actually see a lot of smiles! I do look very happy than I'm racing. Probably because I am.

View from my station

Soon after these six were gone we got the second race. This one only had 12 runners. This was the combined race of the 14 and 15-year-olds, the 16 and 17-year-olds and 18 and 19-year-olds. I was a bit confused when I saw 13 people running. The 13th wasn't a junior, though. I understood from Sheila that this was a Welsh Athletics official who just got carried away cheering the kids on. And the kids were still in club shirts. So probably regional championships, unlike last year's national championships in September. And still few smiles.

With all the 18 runners of the championships having gone past we could take the markers down and return to headquarters. Unfortunately, we did have to walk past one of the runners who hadn't made it to finish. One of the youngsters had collapsed in the heat. By the time we got to him, he was surrounded by people looking after him, and we heard him say he was feeling ok again. I have faith he would be fine.

We put the markers and hi viz vests and whatnot in Ann’s car and that was us done. A nicely brief marshalling experience!

Trying to un-sag the kitchen cabinet doors

When I was working on the kitchen cabinets anyway, I decided I should really do something about the fact that several of them are sagging. I had tried to deal with it before, but with no success. But I had another look at a YouTube video about how to deal with a situation like that, and gave it another try. And this time I figure I made real improvements.

It is a bit of a dark art! But I am quite happy with how it has turned out. Maybe Neil will give me a hand making it even better. He is a perfectionist, after all. And more experienced with this sort of matter. But I am not in a hurry anymore. The way it is now something I can totally cope with!

Before

After

Giving two kitchen cabinets a new look

When I bought my house, the kitchen was in a relatively good shape. I turned most of the rest of the house into a building site. In the kitchen, I basically only did painting. It was not as if there was nothing else to do, but at least everything else functional. But I didn't like the fitted kitchen. The big gripe were the kitchen cabinet doors. They were basically made of MDF with a plastic liner over the top, in an ugly non-colour. And the handles were dull. And to make things worse; the plastic lining of the two cabinets underneath the sink had split. And there was minor damage to the lining of some other cabinets.

I have been dreaming of redoing the whole kitchen. But that is quite a thing! And I know that I don't have mainstream taste. I would really love to have it custom-made from reclaimed wood. Where do you find someone who can do that? And how expensive would it be? If I would try to do it myself, it would take forever.

I had also been dreaming of somehow getting the liner off, and then just painting what would come out from underneath. But I was worried that it would only be easy to remove the plastic where it was already coming off. And that you would end up with the edges refusing. A bit like trying to get a sticker off. It's hard to get the whole thing clean off! And if you don't, you've made the situation worse. 

The big change came when I saw online someone taking a heat gun to a cabinet just like that, and taking the plastic off without any effort. Would it really be that easy? It was worth finding out! It turned out that heat guns are actually quite inexpensive, and also not overly big. It was well worth trying.

After its inaugural task of getting my bicycle mirror fitted again, it was time to be deployed for what it was really bought for. I took off the handles cabinets to get ready.

The original state of the cabinets (except that I had already removed one handle)

It really was as easy as I had seen it online! Point that heat gun at the plastic and it comes off just like that. 

With the plastic off

I then had a rummage in the garage for some paint. I had thought about what colour I would do. The colours already there are white, yellow, and green. I first thought of green on the outside and yellow in the middle, but then I thought it might be a bit dark. Maybe yellow on the outside and white in the middle? But I first needed to put a coat of primer on anyway, so I had some time to think.

With primer

I had some indoor wood primer but it was old and quite lumpy. I put one layer on, which obviously wasn’t very tidy, and then I decided I probably should chuck that stuff away. And then improvised with some outdoor primer.

I had some white eggshell for the inside, but that turned out to have dried up. The yellow paint I had used elsewhere in the kitchen was still ok. So I painted the outsides, and bought some new white paint for the insides.

Finished! 

Two coats of yellow and three of white later, and the handles reinstated, and I could put my new design to the test. Would the paint be able to cope with the kitchen environment? If not, I might sand them down again, and buy some more hardy paint. Once I have decided I have something reasonably sustainable I might do all the other cabinet doors as well. I don't like any of them! I might even do a bit of green somewhere because I can. We'll see! But I am quite chuffed with that I don't have to look at these split sheets of plastic anymore. They were an eyesore!

Heat gun

I have a new toy! A heat gun, obviously. I bought it because I had seen a video of someone very easily stripping the plastic lining off the doors of cheap kitchen cabinets. And I have cheap, plastic-lined kitchen cabinets. And I had been thinking of getting the plastic off. But until I saw that video, I wasn't sure if that was feasible, and if so, how. 

New toy

The first task I made it do was not kitchen-related, though. Many months ago, Neil bought me a little present: a little rearview mirror for my bike. It is really handy! And it is mounted on some sort of ball-and-socket joint. So you can aim it precisely how you want it.

One day my bike fell over, onto the little mirror. It popped out of its joint. I didn't manage to push it back. And when I got home and tried it with less distraction, I still didn't manage. Neil couldn't do it either. I suppose the ball has to fit quite snugly into the socket for it all to work.

It came off

As the construction is made of plastic, I then tried heat. Surely that would make the plastic softer? (Yes I know, not all plastics work that way, but I suspected these would.) Maybe then I could fit the mirror over the ball socket? I dipped the little mirror in boiling water and then tried again. Still no success. 

But now I had a heat gun.

I laid the mirror reflective side down on my oven plate. And then aimed the heat gun at it. I had my oven glove nearby so I could pick the mirror up and try to whack it back over the ball socket when I thought it might be hot enough. Lo and behold, in two or three attempts I managed it! The mirror is back where it belongs! I already like this heat gun thing! And I barely got started…