Preparing for cat sitters

I’m travelling again, and that means a cat sitter. And a cat sitter means getting the house ready. And ready means clean and tidy. 

This fits perfectly with my recent initiatives, partially inspired by Neil, to get the house tidier. It is super dull to be cleaning so much, but maybe it is worth it to put some good effort in. It will be easier to maintain it at a higher standard if beforehand I've done one big push to reset that standard. I hope it will work out this way!

Clean!

I also know that no matter how much effort I put in, it will never be impeccable. I suppose the house doesn't really lend itself to that. With its way too many rough edges where dust can pile up, and too much access for spiders and slugs and whatnot, and because it is subdivided into so many little rooms, there are so many surfaces. But I'll see what I can do! At least there is an end to this. As soon as I go to bed the night before I travel, that's it. The next morning I have an early train, so no more cleaning then.

House-sitters tend to leave the house clean as well, so I can enjoy the fruits of my (and their) work when I come back!

More small steps towards tidy house

I would love my house to be tidy. It is just that I would like quite a lot of things, and a lot of them cost time. One has to pick one's battles, and this one isn't always picked. But now that I am taking some annual leave, there is time to make some progress on this. And I already had; some of it to do with repairing the damage caused by the installation of my infrared panels. Some of it to do with the inside of my kitchen cabinets. And some of it to do with their outside. Some of it just on the initiative of Neil.

There is more going on! One of the things I have recently done is empty out my wardrobe, going through everything that was in there, deciding what should not be in there, and put everything that should be back in an orderly fashion. That hadn't happened for a while. It feels good! And I will be ready to either give some clothes to a charity shop, or put them in one of those clothing containers. 

I don't think any of my efforts will ever live up to Neil's exacting standards, but I feel better about every little improvement. Onwards to the next part of the house!

Tidy! At least by my standards. 

Yet another new toy: mini chainsaw

My firewood sawing has become a heck of a lot quicker since I got a mitre saw.  But there is a limit to what it can do. Firstly; it is mounted, and there is only a fixed thickness of wood you can fit underneath. Wood with sticky-outy bits is also a problem. And you can't so infinitely long bits of food, as the platform you put it on is only so wide. And of course you could hold it in position, but you also need hands to work the saw. With relatively short bits of wood that is ok, but if they become long, and thereby heavy and unwieldy, they might make you stray into the slightly risky territories.

Neil has a small battery-powered chainsaw for this purpose. He once bought one, and it had some functionality where it lubricates itself. That functionality didn't work. When he told the manufacturer, they sent him a new one. He still has the old one! And other than that you have to lubricate it by hand, there is nothing wrong with it. So he gave it to me.

The new toy

The garage when I started

I've now tried it! It is very small, but it can do miracles. I got rid of a lot of the firewood from the neighbour's tree, and my own willow. That is unseasoned wood, and it can be a pain to saw by hand. Your saw sticks in it. The chainsaw has enough power to rip itself free.

The bits that were still doable by hand I still did by hand, but it was great to have the chainsaw for the rest. It is small but it made easy work of the bigger trunks. 

There also are the two stringers (the big diagonal bits) of my old outside stairs. Too big for the mitre saw. I finished dealing with one, and I'm not far off dealing with the other. But by then, which took two days, I felt the chainsaw had lost its power. I figured I might have used it so much I had already blunted the chain. I decided to have a break and give it a new chain the test my hypothesis. 

The garage when I took a break (remainder of stringer still on the saw horse)

Changing the chain worked, and I finished the job a day later. It feels really good to have dealt with so much of the firewood that had piled up over the months. Everything that is left now can also be done by the mitre saw. Or by hand. The natural wood will have to rest for a year or two, but these two stair stringers will, in addition to what I still had lying around from last winter, probably get me through the coming one!

Second trophy shelf

When I made a trophy shelf early this year, I pretty much immediately filled it with the trophies I kept in suboptimal places. So it was clear that before long, I would need another one. And when I won in my category in Deganwy, and what I won was indeed a trophy rather than a pair of socks or a bottle of wine or whatever, there was no way I could fit it on the old shelf. Time to snap into action.

When I was taking some time off after term finished, I finally came around to it. It's up now, underneath the pre-lockdown medals. I decided to put the 2026 trophies on it. So basically, my category win and team win from the Pier to Pier race, and the Deganwy trophy. My other wins this year have been a runner pack (gels and such), honey, booze, medals, and nothing. 

I hope this self will fill up soon too! I enjoy looking at my trophies when I walk past them. Gives me a sense of achievement! 

Organising the kitchen

When I moved house, I think I at some point ran a bit out of steam. In the kitchen, I had one drawer that was basically all sorts of stuff that didn't belong anywhere else, just chucked in. And I had another one that was mainly full of a cutlery tray where all the cutlery (in the wider sense of the word; is also includes tin openers and corkscrews et cetera) that I have but not use very often, just sits. It mildly irked me over the years.

Now I had three things coming together that made me finally do something about it. The first thing was: having Neil, who is very tidy. The second was: Alan, the neighbour, who told me he had become a bit intolerant to gluten, and he decided to stop making bread. He gave me his supply of flour, yeast and bread improver. The third was: a Saturday with nothing otherwise planned.

I didn't really have anywhere to put Alan’s supplies! Bread paraphernalia had been in the esoteric cutlery tray drawer, and there wasn't any space left there. And I had wanted to do a big declutter and tidy of my house for a while, and this was made stronger by Neil. So I decided to use my Saturday to rethink this situation.

I started with the arbitrary drawer. I took everything out, cleaned it, threw away some of the stuff in there, and then put everything that was left back in a more or less organised manner. Success! 

Next up was the drawer with the esoteric cutlery tray. I decided that some of the esoteric cutlery could live next to actual cutlery tray in the top drawer. Three matching utensils could hang from the wall. I made a note to buy me some suction cup hooks. And I decided to make a special box for the rest.

I made the box. It was a lot smaller than the original tray, that went in the bin. And that created a lot of space. I first cleaned out this drawer as well, and then put the cutlery box in, and lots of stuff associated with baking bread. Everything fit in!

This won't look organised in other people’s eyes! But in mine, it is.

I was quite chuffed with the result! And I want to do several kitchen cupboards as well. It will take a long long time before I get through the whole house, but there is progress, and that is great. Neil was impressed too! I think I will manage to keep some momentum going until I have made serious improvement. Watch this space!

Stress of marking combined with leaving

When the teaching stops, things get less hectic. A lot of stuff still needs to happen, but it isn’t important anymore at what time it does. If you have a lecture at 10, a meeting at 12, and a tutorial at 3, you may only have 3 hours timetabled, but you will be busy at least 4 because you also have to get to the venues, and the rest of the day is very fragmented. Once teaching stops, you can often just spend hours working on a task with little interruption. 

It can still be hectic. We have a sharp deadline for the marking of all the work by graduating students (3rd and 4th years). And there is a lot to do! Especially if you are also the academic integrity officer. If everyone is marking, you get a lot of suspect cases directed your way. 

I had started my marking with the 1st year essays as they came in first. Then I proceeded with the 3rd year dissertations of the students I had supervised myself. Only five of them; two didn’t submit. Then the first exam came in and I marked that. 

Then my two remaining dissertation students submitted after all. You just never know! Students get a week from the deadline, and if they then still don’t submit, they get a zero. Except that they can just get an extension at any time; even after that week. So I had to go and mark them after all. Im glad they submitted, but I’m not glad you never know how big your marking load is. 

I am also quite aware that I am the module organiser for the dissertation module. I can't moan at people to do their marking on time if I don't do it myself! So I have to be exemplary in my dissertation marking discipline.

I was going to the Netherlands, and I had arranged a cat sitter. That meant preparing for that as well. Clean the house, make sure the bed she would sleep in had clean sheets, hide a key, give her all the information she needs. It doesn’t sound like much work! But I wanted to clean bathroom and kitchen, and hoover the rest of the house, and that does take a while. 

I also had to pack. So it was a bit stressful! But I got it done. And then I was ready to not think about work at all for a few days in the country of my birth!

Clean kitchen

Bed improvements

I have no strong opinions on beds. If it’s meant to sleep in you can sleep in it. So when I bought my current double bed, I wasn’t fussy. Nor, as it so happens, when I bought my single bed. They serve me fine. 

Neil is fussy. He wants a firm mattress. He doesn't sleep well on a soft one. And by coincidence, mine is rather soft. You can see the problem.

I was quite happy to go and buy a firm one for him, until he said he wasn't sure if it was actually the mattress that caused him to not sleep very well when he is at mine. Maybe it is the room! Maybe it is the cat! It could be all sorts of things.

We decided to go for an easy solution. He has a spare bed he doesn't sleep in it. It's for guests. Guests might have all sort of preferences. In order to verify if it was just the mattress, we decided to just take that mattress to my house. If he would sleep well from then on, it wasn't the mattress. Problem solved!

When we were juggling with mattresses anyway, he addressed a different issue: my bed is a bit squeaky. And he figured he knew what to do about it. The cause must be different parts of the bed rubbing against each other. If you put some rubber in between them, it should stop. So he identified where the squeaking happens, and put strips of old bicycle tube between the various parts. That didn't take very long.

Then we put the mattress on, made the bed, and were ready to try it out. And the result is: no squeaking! And a happy and well-rested Neil in the morning! It has only been one night, but I have faith this was actually the problem, and he will sleep well in my place from now on. Fab.

For some reason, he wasn't keen to take my mattress home with him. Maybe he objects to soft mattresses in his entire house. This is a situation that we should resolved later. For now I will just see if someone in the community wants it. And if not, it will have to go to the recycling centre. There's nothing wrong with it! But few people can keep something as big as a double mattress in store without issues. But sleep is very important. If that thing can’t offer that to Neil, it is not fit for purpose, no matter how good it is for anyone else!

Old mattress for now hiding behind my single bed 

Ps someone in the community did want it! It now lives in Trefriw. 

Blitzing the house

I have mentioned before that Neil is a lot cleaner than I am. He really likes his environment clean. And my house isn't! I mean it's not disastrous, but there is quite a lot of dust, and there are many cobwebs. And we decided to do a bit of a reset. Admittedly, he did most of the work. But I will try to maintain the level! It's a bit like when I have a catsitter. Then I spend quite some time cleaning the house, and thinking I should really keep that level of hygiene up. So far it hasn't worked. But maybe a regularly visiting Neil is better motivation than just me, after the catsitter has gone.

Time will tell how this will pan out. But the intentions are good!

I dusted a shelf with lots of stuff on it - we were that thorough. More impressive maybe that Neil moved all the furniture for hoovering! 

New fridge, out of nowhere

I bought my fridge when I arrived in the country. It was second-hand. It has served me well! A few years ago, I had to change the door from right-hinged to left-hinged,  as the hinges on the right collapsed from sheer old age. I had started to wonder if I should replace it. It probably wasn’t very energy efficient. The little freezer compartment didn’t freeze very well but frosted over all the time. But some googling suggested the most efficient thing to do was just keep it going until it would break. 

Then I talked with the neighbour. He asked if I happened to want a fridge. I sort of did! I verified it was newer than mine. And it was a bit bigger! And had no freezer compartment. That would save energy. And time. 

Together with Neil we brought it in. It fit like a glove. Better than the old one! I had to clean it, but that wasn’t a big job. And then I could bring it into use. 

The cat took the opportunity to explore some new terrain

I am actually quite chuffed with this arrangement. I have a lot more space, and I don't have to worry about unnecessary freezing going on. And because it fits better inside the slot, even looks tidier. The light doesn't work, but I don't mind that very much. Altogether I I am happy how this all came about!

Inspired visit to recycling centre

I mentioned before that Neil is a very tidy man, and that that is rubbing off on me. Together we cleaned my car and my kitchen extension. And I’m not messy for the sake of it; I just tend do have more important things to do than tidying and cleaning. And I find it difficult to throw things away. Maybe they could come in handy one day? But I do feel some background rumbles in my head about that several aspects of my house(hold) should be tidier and cleaner. 

Recently, thinking of Neil inspired me to do some long due tidying and cleaning in the living room. But last weekend I took a bigger step. I went to the recycling centre for the first time in years. Some of the things I got rid of were my old bread machine that had served me enough by now, and my old worn out foot pump, and a mirror Rose had left, and loads of old lightbulbs. I forgot to take a picture. 

It’s not Earth-shattering, but it might be one step in a greater shift towards a tidier house. I have also been thinking about things I can get rid of via other means: either the bin, or eBay. Would I manage to raise the general tidiness of my house on the longer timescale? 

Faffing with the stove

I hoped I had it sorted! After lots of frustrating gluing back of the fire rope that is supposed to seal the door and keep the fumes in, I bought a fire rope in a different shape and size. I glued it in position and hoped that it would stay put for a while. The original rope seemed a real mismatch! 

The new rope undeniably fit like a glove in the little gully on the inside of the door. But after using it a few times, it became clear it didn’t stick out enough. It wasn’t sealing! 

For the time being, I just swapped the doors of the two stoves around. The other stove had been sparingly used, and its original fire rope might stick for a bit. In the meantime, Neil (who has similar issues) bought some other sizes. Hopefully, one of them would fit! 

The first (and bigger) size was clearly too big. And by the time I found that out, the door with the original rope  started peeling. I had to glue it back to keep it going for a bit. 

Gluing the original rope back

The other door, with the too-thin rope in position, and the too-thick stuff for comparison…

The next step will be to try the smaller size. I hope that will do the job! Otherwise we might have to rip out the door and take it to a shop that sells all sizes to make sure we get it right. These doors are heavy! Or otherwise; just get used to doing a LOT of gluing…

Looking back on 2025

The years 2024 and 2023 were years of working too hard, and dating and running. That's how I summarised it in my previous year overviews. I don't think it's too much of a spoiler alert to say that you could characterise 2025 like that as well. 2025 didn't have anything spectacular like Athena Swan applications or promotion applications, so this year was clearly less bad than 2024, but there still was a lot of work. It started badly: a student appealed against a whole array of grades. It was quite some work to respond to every accusation they made. In the end none of their appeals were upheld. That seems a lot of work for nothing. And we could just go back to marking, and preparing for the new term. That pretty much went without incident. The only unusual thing was that I got nominated for a highly unexpected teaching award; needless to say, I did not win. 

Work did get stressful for reasons other than workload again; there was another Business Case for Change (a nice term for making budget cuts). This time, our School was doing so well we were not threatened with forced redundancies. We were all eligible for voluntary redundancy though; for me that worked out well, as my nemesis, who had taken me off the Thursdaynighters email list after I had spoken out against misogyny, took the bait and left. It is a pity for the School as it doesn't have a photographer anymore now, but for me it is good. 

Another thing that happened this year was the further rise of AI. In my function of academic integrity officer, I now deal a lot less with students who just copy and paste text from their sources, and a lot more with students who let AI do too much of their work. Next year will be another very interesting year in which we will continue to have to adapt to this! 

In summer, I was very briefly appointed to deal with student extension requests, but before I had properly started, this task was transferred to administrative staff. I dodged a bullet there!

Then the summer, which is always too short, was over and we started teaching again, kicking off as usual with the fieldtrip. I hadn't made much progress with my application for senior fellowship of the HEA! That will have to wait until next summer. 

Term started perfectly doable; my plan for not letting the students creating their own dissertation topics get out of hand this year had worked. And the new way of doing the allocation also helped. But then the marking hit again. And that was basically quite hectic until my birthday. And then there was still quite a lot to do until the Christmas holiday. But at least this year, I could travel to the Netherlands without having to stress too much about the marking that would be waiting for me when I would get back. And just before the University closed, we were told who would be our next head of School, when our current one would retire in late January. In the New Year will find out how he does...

So that was work! What about the dating? Well! It is safe to say the 2025 was a rather spectacular year. I actually started it in a relationship, but we were only five days into the year when that came to an end, through a text message. I was not impressed. I got back on the dating scene, And quite soon found a man who turned out to have made a profile especially to woo me. He had wanted to do that before, but Nick had got in the way. But Nick was gone now! And we had a series of rather enjoyable dates, but he decided in the end that we weren't compatible after all. Back to square one. I was getting disheartened. I suppose I had some dating site burnout. Until when in summer, I suddenly had an urge to have another look. And came across the profile of a certain Neil. He looked like my kind of guy! So I sent him a message. And soon we went on dates. We really clicked and made it official in September. No signs of getting tired of each other yet!

What about running? It was an intensive year! And very enjoyable. Although it started with an impediment: I had some ankle issues at the start of the year. I had seen the physio late 2024, and I was doing my exercises. By February I was back on the hills, and in early February I had my first race. That was Sbrint 'Stiniog; a lovely low-key local race! A good start. And I had also got myself a new toy: a Garmin, without which I rarely leave the house by now. 

In spring, When my Tuesday night Welsh class ended, I started running on the track, and I have become a rather regular participant. I enjoy it! It's good training, and it is quite social as you run with other people, and most of the drills involve breaks, during which you can socialise. It is also logistically easy as the athletics track is quite close to my office. And it turned me into a numerically interested runner. I never paid attention to my pace! I just ran almost everything on feeling. I sometimes kept an eye on my pace, but then I did that the old-fashioned way: just look at my watch and at the kilometre markers (or mile markers) and do some arithmetic in my head. Just looking at your watch and it just telling you what pace you are doing is a lot easier. And sometimes it saves me from starting a race too quickly.

Through my membership of the Eryri Harriers I became aware of the club road championships, and I started registering for all the races that came up in that context. That boosted my race participation. I also added the Borders League. I'm hooked now! In the end, I ran 26 races in 2025, compared to 13 in 2024. I already thought that was much! But 26 is a lot of fun to be had. And was a good year? Well! That depends a bit on how you look at it. I didn't win many medals. I only had two bronze medals in the whole year: at the Pentir Fun Run and the Breakwater 5 mile. The previous year was a lot more prolific: in 13 races, I won 1 gold medal, 2 silver medals and 1 bronze medal. And then I had 7 category wins, when this year I had 11 in twice as many races. In that sense it looks like I am losing my mojo. But it doesn't quite feel that way. One thing was that I ran PBs in 4 out of the 5 distances I compete in. But you could argue that that is just a result of running more races. I didn't break my PB in the 10k; my most frequently run distance. Several of the other distances I just rarely run, like 5k, 5m, and 10m. I suppose the only thing that showed off my increased training was my performance on the half marathon. I ran three of them; all of them I had done before, and I improved my time on every single one. Two of them by 6 minutes. And I wasn't even chasing PBs. I will do that in the new year! And I have faith in my quest for breaking them all in the new year or beyond. 

One of my last races of the year

On other running notes: I spent an evening with a running coach in order to see if he could give me advice that would lead to me getting fewer injuries. I think it worked! Unfortunately, it did not stop me from spraining my knee during a fell race. But I recovered. And I got me better running bras. Far from trivial!

What else happened this year? Well! I became a stem cell donor. And I needed an emergency repair on my roof. Henco and Maaike visited, and we went camping on Anglesey. I also camped with Kate and Bryn. And the biggest camping adventure was our annual Swamphike. We went back to the Peak District.

Daft Swamphike pic

 

It was not the best year for hanging out with Martin, Susan and Dean. They all moved house; Martin first, and the others later. So now my social circle is a lot more spread out! And moving house takes a lot of time, especially if you move to a very big place, so they were all quite busy. 

In summer I left the cave rescue team. And immediately afterwards, I joined an actual caving club, so I could go underground with their female only group. I did several trips with them this year, including a whole weekend; that was fab! I hope to do more with them in the New Year. And with me not having to spend time on NWCRO any more, I joined the committee of the Eryri Harriers. 

I also tried to use this year to get my entire house fitted out with infrared panels. That didn't really work out! When the year ended, I was still awaiting compatible thermostats for several of them. And I had a hole in my wall. This really should be sorted out in the New Year. At least a problem with my solar panel inverter was solved in between the other work.

In the last few weeks of the year I turned 50. I didn't celebrated big; my birth is always in the busiest part of the academic year. But I think that, except for Kate being ill, it was as good a celebration as that time of the year allows. And I'm enjoying being 50 so far! And I hope to have more fun with it when the racing season starts again.

I suppose the last thing that happened this year that will reverberate in the new year was that a new Head of School was appointed.

So altogether, I think it was a good year! Work was not too bad, running was fab, all was well with the cat, and I found Neil. That's good enough to make it a good year. And what about 2026? I hope that it will be similar. I suppose some things that I know will be different are that I will now be doing secretarial work for the running club rather than for the cave rescue team, and at work I will have a new and completely different line manager. We'll see how that all pans out! For now I am optimistic. Anything I should aspire to? I have already revealed my running ambitions. I will try to be a good committee member for the running club. I will do strength training as I am too old for only running. And I really should send in that application for senior fellowship of the HEA this summer. All of that while still having lots of adventures with Neil!

The infrared story still continues (and how)

Well! The story, that should have ended in August, is still ongoing. The last thing I blogged was that the initial appointment for finishing it, in mid December, had been postponed to January. But then I got another phone call. Could they move it back to December? There had been a cancellation. That was fine with me. And I hoped that would be it then. I made sure the electrician would have full access to the cupboard with my consumer unit in.

He showed up very punctually, and set to work. I was working upstairs. And without further issues, he wired it all in. Success!

The wiring in progress

The next thing on the agenda was installing the thermostats. That’s easy; they link in no time, and then you only have to screw them into the wall. Job done. You would think. 

The first thing that happened was that the electrician realised that several of the panels were a different model to what he expected. The thermostats he had with him were not compatible with them. Oh dear. More bad preparation. But at least he could sort out thermostats for three of the rooms. 

I so far have my thermostats by my light switches, so I suggested we continue that way. The electrician was happy with that. So he drilled a hole for a screw. And then we heard a funny sound. And then water started gushing out of the wall. He had hit a water pipe! 

We stampeded downstairs to close the stopcock. I was so happy now I had spent considerable time back in the days making it more accessible! And oiling it, as it was rather seized up. We could close it. And I was glad I had some water in a flask. I could still have a coffee! The electrician got on the phone to his employer to request a plumber. One was going to get to us in about half an hour. 

We started mopping up the water by the drill hole. And I checked the kitchen. Water was coming through the ceiling. It wasn’t good. 

Dripping kitchen ceiling

While we were waiting for the plumber I continued the mopping, while the electrician did some testing. I also asked him why he wasn’t using a pipe detection device. He wasn’t sure. He started googling how expensive they were. Not very! I said he could make a good case to his employer they should buy him one. 

Soon the plumber arrived, and he set to work. He needed to replace the piece of pipe, and in order to do that, he needed to expose it. Cue a big hole in the wall! But it had to be done. And the electrician finished off his stuff and left us to it. No need for him to hang around. 

The culprit 

The plumber, who turned out to be a former Cybi Strider, put a new piece of pipe in place. Then he had to solder the junctions. Doing so immediately set off the fire alarms. I hate these! I was glad he was tall enough to switch them off standing on the ground. With all windows open he finished the job. And then he left.

I had to do a bit more mopping. It was supposed to be finished now, but instead I still had three rooms without a thermostat, and a big hole in the wall. Oh well! Bring on January. Surely it would get finished then? 

Back home

All went well with my travels back to the Netherlands so I was home on time! That was great. I popped into the shop on my way to my car. And soon I was snuggling the cat again. 

Back home! 

I had happened before, the house was cleaner when I got back then when I had left. I suppose I wasn't the only one who wanted to make a good impression. The cat sitter would also benefit from a good review on the house sitter website, and she sure deserved to get one. (The day after I came back I wrote one.) And the cat was relaxed. I couldn't ask for more!

She had also left some foodstuffs in my house. A full box of eggs, and a bottle of milk with a tiny bit left in it. I don't normally buy eggs, nor milk (although I have oat milk), and I saw my chance. The first evening I was home I just cooked something very quick, but the second one I decided to make pancakes. You can have these with spinach and cheese and then it's a meal! And if you end up with more pancakes than you can eat, you have leftovers for lunch. What's not to like.

The most important thing is a happy cat, of course, but it's also nice to find your beloved house in good shape when you come back from a trip. And if it ends in pancakes it's even better!

Cleaning for the cat sitter

I would be visiting the Netherlands again, and that means cleaning the house. I got me a house-sitter again. And I want to make sure these feel comfortable in my house, even if they have higher hygiene standards than me. Which is far from rare. 

There was a lot of dusting, and cobweb removing, and sweeping, and hoovering, and soaping, and unclogging. And laundry. And window cleaning. I was satisfied with the result. I hope the cat sitter is too. 

There were some last minute issues; the cat was chasing a mouse through my bedroom at 4:15 on the morning of my departure, and I don’t know what happened to it. There were no signs of it having been eaten. It might still be around!

I also evicted a very large spider from the kitchen sink before I left. Not everyone would be pleased finding it. I didn’t discuss views on spiders with the cat sitter. She does know my cat hunts and is ok with that. 

Generally, you get your house back even cleaner than you left it, so I expect to come back to a still impeccable house. It’s dull doing the cleaning beforehand, but I seem to need the external motivation. My thoughts on maybe keeping my house at pre-cat-sitter-standards that I formulated last time didn’t result in that actually happening. Oh well!

Not sure it’s obvious but there is a conspicuously low amount of cobwebs (indoor) and dirt (on outside of window) in this picture

Vanity project with medals

I had run myself another finishing medal. And the silver medal. Since my first medal in the 2011 Plymouth half marathon, I had just put my medals in the box and kept the box in a cupboard. But the box has become too small. And I have been thinking about just finding another box. But is a box really the best place to keep them?

I wondered if I should just hang them somewhere. And I considered if my storage space would be a good place. I could just all hang them from a bamboo stick; I have lots of these for garden purposes.

The next Saturday I started on my plan. I picked my biggest stick, and got my box of medals out of the cupboard. I figured I could for now hang it from the pipes running along the wall. That would have to be temporary, but it would do as a proof of concept.

I started to hang them up. Obviously, in chronological order. Soon I had to go up to my computer to get out my spreadsheet with all my races. I didn’t know off by heart in what exact order they came! Most medals give a year, but not even all of them. And if it's many years ago, you might have forgot when in the year. And one metal didn't give any information at all. Luckily, I remembered which race that was. 

Starting with 2011 and 2025, for balance

I managed to get them all in order, and it fits without effort. I know there will be still more coming in, but I can always shuffle them a bit closer together. For now I left a gap between Plymouth and Wales, and a gap for lockdown. My year in York did not result in any medals! I didn't find many races, and the ones I did find must have not done medals.

 

 

Concept proven! Races displayed…

 

I figured I probably should add the podium medals I have won as well, to go with the finisher medals they are associated with. That already means some shuffling around. But it makes sense to display them together.

I also should just drill two holes in the wall and put up fixings just for the bamboo rod. That's for the next weekend. I think it will be quite tidy in the end! And if I do so many races I run out of space, I might just have to choose another wall for an additional rod…

Pre-cat sit clean

I was planning on coming to the Netherlands again. I had to book it a bit late; the reason why I would travel then and not at any other date was the annual family reunion. And first my uncle was a bit in denial about that he had volunteered to host it, and then he was a bit in two minds on which weekend he would do it. But he had decided, I had booked, and the next thing to do then is to sort out arrangements for the cat.

I put my trip on the trusted housesitter website. And then nothing happened! I figured I was going to have to do without and I already asked the neighbour, and Susan, and Chris. Chris is the colleague/fellow Eryri Harrier/fellow cat person in the neighbourhood I had already done cat sit duties for.

Then I got an application after all. And I video-called with the lady. She seemed nice! And we agreed she would take on the job. So I could call off the other people. But now I did have to make my house look acceptable. I am barely a domestic goddess! But there was suitable rainy weekend day, and I made the whole ground floor and lower floor look impeccable by my standards. I didn't quite get to the top floor! But on one side that's just the bedroom she wouldn't sleep in anyway, and on the other side it is the office. She might very well use the office, but I hope she can work in a room that hasn't been hoovered in a while.

Look! The plank some of my bathroom plants live on, without dust!

I did consider to have it done professionally, but decided against. I should probably just get used to doing more of this myself. And telling other people what to do also takes time. 

In the end, I was happy with the result. I hope the cat-sitter is too. Let’s hope this works out well again! 

Dual chairs

I like comfortable chairs. Who doesn’t? The cat does too. But I especially like comfortable chairs that fit through my narrow doors. 

I had imagined a comfortable chair in the upstairs bedroom. And one day, Neuadd Ogwen was chucking away some chairs, that looked both fairly comfortable and fairly small. I thought ‘this is a sign from providence’ and nicked one. And I temporarily put it in the conservatory. And as things happen, then I didn’t get around to moving it. 

Then we had some stunning spring days. The cat considered the conservatory again. She loves snoozing in the sun on the resident chair there! And then I realised that maybe, the new chair is exactly where it should be. She can have the original comfy chair, and then I can have the other one, and stroke her while doing whatever else it is I want to do there. Drink coffee and read the newspaper, for instance. Perfect! That chair stays…

Using eBay to tidy up a bit

When I decided I was happy with my new fitness tracker watch, I obviously had a now redundant old one lying around. It is absolutely no use to anyone if it lies around in my house. So I disconnected it from my phone, erased all the data, and put it on eBay. I did specify that the battery life is very short, but even so. Someone will have use for it! And that was clearly true. People were bidding on it.

That inspired me to be a bit more proactive. I have a bit of a policy that I can't increase the amount of shelf space for my books. If you move house, books are a menace! And how many of the books you have will you re-read? So I for instance put Memorial up. I didn't intend to read that again. I'm sure someone else will like it.

It's not as if I have made enormous amounts of space in my house now, but I think I have set something in motion. I think I want to keep listing things that are no longer of use to me. Let's see if they can have a new life somewhere else…

Increase oven capacity

I have quite a big oven. That can be very handy if I have a lot of people visiting. But I can only put in as much as I can fit on one oven shelf. I'm not using it to full capacity!

This has been the case since I moved in, but was only now that I figured I should try to find out if I could buy an additional oven shelf. And it turns out that there are extendable shelves on the market. Buy them, adjust them to size, and Bob is your uncle. So I did!

When they arrived (I found a pack of two for sale) I saw that they came with tiny little bolts and a concomitant tiny little hex key. Very cute! And it was a question of seconds extend them to size.

Now I should really do something with my extended capacity. Maybe make a pizza in my oven tray, and bake a cake on another floor? At the same time? And it will sure come handy the next time I cook for a bunch of people. I always like being ready when they arrive, and just opening the oven when we decide it is time to actually have dinner. Stay tuned!