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Follow ups and beyond
26 February 2016 21:50


I visited the bank, as mentioned in my last post, to provide them with another specimen signature. Interestingly, they didn’t check that it matches the signature on my bank card. I was also told about the bank’s latest promotion: “pay us £3 per month and we’ll pay you £7 per month”. Er … ok … what’s the catch? “No catch,” I was assured. In that case, what’s the point? Why not just pay me £4 per month and cut the number of transactions in half?

I was in Eastleigh today to act as a responsible adult when the heating engineer came to power-flush the central heating system. This was supposed to have been done last week when the new boiler was fitted but wasn’t, for some reason that escapes me. [the new boiler is tiny, btw – takes up probably less than half the space of the old one]. However, a couple of minutes after I got up ready for a potential 0800 start, the engineer phoned to say he couldn’t make it owing to illness. CGF took the call and arranged for the office to rebook.

I’ve got commitments on my next non-working Friday but have already booked another day off in a couple of weeks, so I get a chance to play at being a responsible adult again (even more so: CGF is away so I’ve got to hold the fort overnight and get CS3 to school). Full credit to the engineer though. He phoned back a few minutes later to say “are you sure you meant to book a Wednesday; I thought you could only do Fridays”. I was impressed.

I had a few messages to run around Eastleigh today, and as it was a dry (if not very warm) day I got the bike out. Tyres were a little flat, so I pumped them up before leaving. I’d not got out of the drive before the back one was flat. Oh great, a puncture – I must have run over a thorn in the garden.

Brought the bike in and found the puncture repair kit I’d bought a few weeks ago. These new style tyre levers are rubbish – couldn’t get a grip on the tyre at all. I was considering giving up and using teaspoons.

Seeing as the tyre had deflated so quickly I figured I wouldn’t have much problem finding the hole – assuming the tube didn’t deflate before I found it. So I was somewhat surprised to find nothing. I put it all back together – and still no puncture. I can only guess that I didn’t tighten the valve up after I’d inflated it.

On my ride one of a pair of young mothers asked me for directions to Xxx School. “Easy”, I explained, “just follow this path and you’ll get there”. As I was speaking her colleague pointed out to her “we don’t want to go to Xxx School”. So why did she ask for direction to there, I wondered. They then asked how they could get to Yyy Road, so I just guessed that the road we were on would lead there eventually.

Another young mother, walking an infant school-aged child, was paying more attention to her phone than her route and walked out in front of me. No great danger – I’d already anticipated that this was what she was likely to do and prepared evasive action. But I was annoyed. If she wants to risk her own life by not checking for traffic before stepping into the road, that’s up to her. But not her daughter’s. What sort of example is she setting? And shouldn’t she be paying more attention to what her child wants to talk about rather than the latest farcebook trivia.

Compare this with a mother and (younger) child we saw last week. Mother was reading out the names of roads for him, and asking him to identify car makes. Then asking him to identify the numbers painted on the parking spaces. Much better use of the walk.

Because I was off work today I was on victualling duty. On their way home CGF told CS3: “Ruby said he would cook tonight, but I don’t know whether he has”. Of course he had. Dinner was well in progress when they got in. All freshly prepared too, and loads of it. Lemon chicken escalopes (one of my signature dishes as it’s fun to make), mashed potato, stir-fried sprouts with garlic, ginger and cashew nuts (the nuts were an afterthought, because I found some), mock roast parsnips, and kale. For mock roast parsnips, boil/stream the parsnips until cooked, leave to cool, and then shallow fry. I did realise as we were eating that I’d shot myself in the foot – they’re going to want a meal like that every time I'm in Eastleigh on a day off.

Can you have more than one signature dish?

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