Been keeping busy?

I have made up loads of end rigs,moulded loads of lead weights,
cleaned and oiled all my reels,all I need now is the word 'Go'.
Serviced my petrol lawnmower,my concrtete mixer and my whacker plate.
Got some new tyres on my road trailer and given it a splash of paint.
I'm keeping my eye on the surf forecast for Rhyl,although there isn't much point with the present isolation rules.
Perhaps the fish may have built up with no one fishing for them
(we can only hope)

VALVEBOUNCE wrote:

Perhaps the fish may have built up with no one fishing for them
(we can only hope)

I've been thinking exactly the same
Cant do them any harm

But how are the fish going to eat without someone to fillet their mackerel, snip the nose and tail off their sandeels, peel crabs for them or make lug and squid cocktails?

Been keeping busy myself, making inroads into my stash of stuff that " will come in handy one day "
Spent the day breaking some old bricks for hardcore on a garden project I'm working on, the insides of the bricks were fired black and iron hard - and as I was doing it I thought someone had lit a bonfire nearby, then realised that as I was splitting the bricks apart the smells locked in to them during the kiln firing where being released, found this quite interesting - you gotta look for the silver linings and celebrate small pleasures in the current situation!
Agreed the enforced closed season could be what the fish stocks need - maybe they will follow the lead of the goats invading Llandudno!

Notbad wrote:

But how are the fish going to eat without someone to fillet their mackerel, snip the nose and tail off their sandeels, peel crabs for them or make lug and squid cocktails?

Been keeping busy myself, making inroads into my stash of stuff that " will come in handy one day "
Spent the day breaking some old bricks for hardcore on a garden project I'm working on, the insides of the bricks were fired black and iron hard - and as I was doing it I thought someone had lit a bonfire nearby, then realised that as I was splitting the bricks apart the smells locked in to them during the kiln firing where being released, found this quite interesting - you gotta look for the silver linings and celebrate small pleasures in the current situation!
Agreed the enforced closed season could be what the fish stocks need - maybe they will follow the lead of the goats invading Llandudno!

Those bricks are probably the old Scotch Commons,the clay came out of the coal mines.They had loads of iron in them,and went rusty after they were built with.They had to change the mixture of the clay so they didn't rust.I worked on a site for Fairclough Homes a few years ago,and they had to compensate the people that bought the new houses because they had rust running out of the bricks.
I can remember the burning smell when I cut them with a brick hammer.

Logger wrote:

VALVEBOUNCE wrote:

Perhaps the fish may have built up with no one fishing for them
(we can only hope)

I've been thinking exactly the same
Cant do them any harm

Hello stranger,I thought you had exited stage left.
Paul told me about your Dad,sad times,sorry to hear it.

They have a 'no fishing zone'off the Isle of Man,for preservation reasons.
Hugh Whitenstall started it off.
It's working,the fish breed and multiply in the zone,and then spread out from the area.
We have a big zone now,so you should be alright for your Whiting

VALVEBOUNCE wrote:

Notbad wrote:

But how are the fish going to eat without someone to fillet their mackerel, snip the nose and tail off their sandeels, peel crabs for them or make lug and squid cocktails?

Been keeping busy myself, making inroads into my stash of stuff that " will come in handy one day "
Spent the day breaking some old bricks for hardcore on a garden project I'm working on, the insides of the bricks were fired black and iron hard - and as I was doing it I thought someone had lit a bonfire nearby, then realised that as I was splitting the bricks apart the smells locked in to them during the kiln firing where being released, found this quite interesting - you gotta look for the silver linings and celebrate small pleasures in the current situation!
Agreed the enforced closed season could be what the fish stocks need - maybe they will follow the lead of the goats invading Llandudno!

Those bricks are probably the old Scotch Commons,the clay came out of the coal mines.They had loads of iron in them,and went rusty after they were built with.They had to change the mixture of the clay so they didn't rust.I worked on a site for Fairclough Homes a few years ago,and they had to compensate the people that bought the new houses because they had rust running out of the bricks.
I can remember the burning smell when I cut them with a brick hammer.

Yes that is spot on Stan - thanks for that!

Hope everyone is doing ok. Some of the things keeping me busy in approximate order …

Tidied my garage (took a few days).
Attended a Boris approved family gathering - Grandmother's funeral (old age not covid) with just 3 of us attending.
Tidied my woodshed.
Rebuilt an old broken chainsaw from a box of 100 bits I put in the garage 5 years ago. Rebuilt and retuned the carb with help from youtube.
Took apart an old broken laptop, put it back together, took it apart again, back together, apart. Now have a heap of bits.
Serviced the lawnmower. Fitted new blade.
Fixed a TV by replacing the diodes in the power supply. Thanks again to a youtube contributor.
Tidied the "spiders" shed at the far end of the garden.
Took part in an international virtual fishing competition. Finished in the top 5.
Serviced the strimmer & rebuilt and re-tuned the carb just because I could.
Learnt a lot about probate, in particular it is a bad idea to have a will stored at the solicitors (6 weeks now and I still do not have the original).
Grown a beard.
Discovered "Simon's Cat" on youtube. If you like cats beware you will lose hours of your life watching these animation clips.
Cycled for at least an hour a day on turbotrainer in the garden. My current estimate is I have done equivalent of Lands End to Edinburgh. By around mid May I could have cycled up to John O Groats without leaving the garden.
Lots of gardening. Sat on the bike for so long means I keep spotting dandelions.

Might be running out of things to do by end of May.

MusselMan wrote:

Hope everyone is doing ok. Some of the things keeping me busy in approximate order …

Tidied my garage (took a few days).
Attended a Boris approved family gathering - Grandmother's funeral (old age not covid) with just 3 of us attending.
Tidied my woodshed.
Rebuilt an old broken chainsaw from a box of 100 bits I put in the garage 5 years ago. Rebuilt and retuned the carb with help from youtube.
Took apart an old broken laptop, put it back together, took it apart again, back together, apart. Now have a heap of bits.
Serviced the lawnmower. Fitted new blade.
Fixed a TV by replacing the diodes in the power supply. Thanks again to a youtube contributor.
Tidied the "spiders" shed at the far end of the garden.
Took part in an international virtual fishing competition. Finished in the top 5.
Serviced the strimmer & rebuilt and re-tuned the carb just because I could.
Learnt a lot about probate, in particular it is a bad idea to have a will stored at the solicitors (6 weeks now and I still do not have the original).
Grown a beard.
Discovered "Simon's Cat" on youtube. If you like cats beware you will lose hours of your life watching these animation clips.
Cycled for at least an hour a day on turbotrainer in the garden. My current estimate is I have done equivalent of Lands End to Edinburgh. By around mid May I could have cycled up to John O Groats without leaving the garden.
Lots of gardening. Sat on the bike for so long means I keep spotting dandelions.

Might be running out of things to do by end of May.

Sorry to hear about your Gran but
Great stuff there Mussels!
Carb rebuilding merits some sort of badge I reckon.
So far as bikes are concerned I bought a second hand mountain bike  last week ( completed handover in a very careful manner - felt like some kind of espionage exchange! - so far I've ridden it once ( all of 400 yards) nothing wrong with it but the rules say you can only cycle a reasonable walking distance and 400 yards is about as far as I would call a bloomin good walk!

Have also mastered ( ish) Zoom which the designers seem to have made unnecessarily user unfriendly.

Re-built a garden border from the slats of a bedframe.

Painted a section of garden wall white, which helped my Robinson Crusoe tan - to match my need a haircut, it also seems to have frightened off the spiders that used to be all over that wall and may have frightened off a swarm of bees that did a fly passed the other day and pulled a vertical climb as they reached the garden, or it might have been the sight of my plastic hawks ( need painting) that supposedly keep birds off our go at digging for victory.

About 25 years ago I bought a six foot side table
from the boardroom of Kwik Save's HO when it closed,  ( cost me £6 !!) at the time I peeled off what I thought was a
6 x 4 foot  formica top, only to find that on the reverse side it was labelled bakelite - wished I'd left it alone!  Anyway its gone through various reincarnations with the top of it first painted to look like mahogany
and more recently duck egg blue as it got used as a garden table, last Winter wasn't kind to it and the top was destined for replacement but in view of the lockdown and the absence of being able to pop out for inch thick marine ply  ( if it exists) I  raided my own spider shed for bits n pieces and used an unlikely amount of fillers, glues, nails, screws, bits of wood "that will come in handy one day" dried up woodstain and yacht varnish to while away far too many hours in the garden.

Went in to a shop this week for the first time since lockdown, wasn't comfortable with it really, and why does wearing a mask rob me of the power of intelligible speach?

I should be able to carry on for a while yet half finishing some DIY ( no change there then)

With the arrival of a little rain I've been on line choosing a feeder rod and now need to choose a reel to go with it - it's all go!

Did you ever finish that boat you were building in your lounge?

I also ventured out to a shop for the first time in a month last night. Up to now I have been sending the missus for the shopping  . Very late night shopping at a well known discount store was ok. Plenty of stock in and not many people.

MusselMan wrote:

Did you ever finish that boat you were building in your lounge?

Ah yeah that project! Well you know how it is when you move house and things go in boxes, I'll add it to my to do list!

This is one of those "Around tuit" moments I have lots of those now I have retired.

Masonry Painted another length of wall white.
Erected a second ( Aldi) green house.
Started refurbishing a side table,
Pressure washed the flagstones,
Baked flat bread and oat crunch  biscuits.

How is everyone doing?

Oat crunch biscuits - yum - recommend a recipe?

Getting a lot of grief around my mother's home care at the moment in honesty. Complex situation, but essentially she had a fall a couple of weeks ago so went to hospital (not her first rodeo - she has regular customer status). She has been released from hospital too early in my opinion, but this is due to corona risk to her of being in there. Care package at home. Lots of issues cropping up, bad decisions she has made over the years against my advice now becoming my problems, and she does not understand what is going on in the outside world at the moment.

On the positive side I found time to make some badminton posts out of scrap wood which I have given to a neighbours kids to play in the garden. I was impressed with myself with what I managed to make out of something destined for the bonfire. Apart from keeping me amused for a few hours their kids have also been making lots of use of it.

My lawnmower lost drive. Turns out the belt had worn out after about 10 years. New one on order. It is a sad sign that I am getting excited when something breaks at home as it means I have something to fix.

Will be interesting to see if Boris allows fishing to restart on Sunday. There was some mention of it. If he does, at least I will get some of your reports to read again :-)

p.s. still not got that will from the solicitor, but they are now at least claiming it is in the post.

I can empathise with pretty well everything you have in that post Mussels!


A letter inviting someone in their 80s to a hospital appointment last week which was turned up for at some risk, but didn't exist. ( not local)

Another confused by homecare elderly relative.

Making stuff out of whatever comes to hand and excitedly awaiting the post for bits that I didn't have and was stuck without and ordering some carp tackle odds and ends that hopefully I will get to learn to use ( coarse fishing seems to have got very complicated since I was a minnow)

Spent this evening putting V.E. day decorations up ready for a Zoom on line exercise class tomorrow ( some of the class members are in their 90s and their coordination is way better than mine!)





Regarding oat crunch biscuits, on health and safety grounds I daren't give you my recipe - with no kitchen scales to hand I had to guesstimate how many grams in a cupful of plain flour / sugar, a dollop of butter, milk/banana milk, golden syrup, baking powder and forgot what time I put them in the oven, they looked good, tasted about right but I was in serious danger of having to find out what dental services are currently available! ( might work as feeder ground bait if I grind them up?)

Oh and spent this evening sorting your bank holiday entertainment!