Rusty New Year

We took Rusty for a New Year’s day walk out to Tweseldown today. A huge wooded area with all sorts of things for a pup to get excited about… Mud, sand, grass, trees, and plenty of water.

She’s just turned 21 weeks old and is already 22″ tall to the shoulder, and weighs in at 24kg.

I didn’t get a chance to take many photos before she took to the water… over and over again.

DAMN I’M GOOD LOOKING!

DITCH JUMP!!! HELLS YEAH!

YAY!!! WATER!!!

SAND!!! OMG!!! I BLOODY LOVE SAND!!!!

WHAT? You still have the ball? THROW IT, DAMN YOU!

CAN’T…BREATH… BUT MUST FIND STONE…

MORE SAND!!!! AND I SEE WATER!!!!

COME ON IN!!! IT’S FREEZING!!!

GOT IT!!!

THROW IT ALREADY!!!

WA… WAIT… JUST CATCHING MY BREATH…

LET’S PLAY MORE!!

OKAY… NOW STOP THROWING MY STICK AWAY ALL THE TIME…

I’M DONE…

More photos HERE (Lots more…)

Sniffles, Lake and Golf

Little lad suffering from the sniffles today. He didn’t sleep very well, and we were up properly at around 6am.

I think this will be his worse day, as it is streaming out of him! A walk around the lake with some fresh air should help.

Loving the Lake

We went out yesterday (he asked) – but he tired suddenly halfway around…. I had to hoick him up onto my shoulders for about 3 miles!!!

Off for a lake walk yesterday...

3 Miles with a passenger... OOOOF!

In other news – My new job is going really well. It is fast moving and constantly changing – One of those jobs that has more to do in the day than the hours allow!

My first sale that I quoted, calculated, planned out etc went through on Friday – so that gave me a good feeling. There have been others – but that was my first “cradle to grave” order. Next week the item will be in build for the customer – so that will be cool to see!

Boss gives lots of constructive chats, so that’s great for me. I can’t stand jobs that have zero praise or zero critique. How can I improve if I don’t have feedback? How can my morale grow if I don’t get praise? So yes – I am very happy where I am!

I’ll need a new car soon too. We are down to just the Berlingo – and that isn’t greatly economical, seeing as I do over 100 miles a day. Money is still tight, so a new car is out of the question…. but there is one second hand car make that I trust well past 150,000 miles – and that is VW… Those things are bullet proof – I had an old Passat that just ran and ran. My idea is to get a £1000 -£2000 VW Diesel Golf 1.9 – It does around 60mpg+ on motorway trips and there are plenty of them about. One thing is for certain, Alex will love it as he really likes the VW badge!

Relax. BOHICA (look it up).

Parting with over £400 has left me with heating…. but I have had to turn it off because the “fixed”  boiler is making a hell of a racket.

Whilst looking to see where the noise could be coming from I ventured into the loft…. only to find the main water tank has been leaking from the stop cock. This was a repair a plumber carried out over a year ago – and the drip looks like it has probably been going on for that amount of time (I don’t go in the loft that often). The wood beams under the tank are saturated and the board it sits on is swollen.

I tightened up the nut, but it is still seeping. It has a vase under it to catch the drips for the mean time. I shall have to call the plumber tomorrow – and the boiler people again….

Roll on 2010.

BOHICA – thanks to POGO57

A Peaceful Walk

I went out for a gentle potter on my Nordic Poles today. I have noticed a problem with these autumn/winter walks…..leaves.

The bottom of the pole is fitted with a special metal tip. This allows it to dig into loose gravel and dirt, but isn’t so great on paved areas and roads. There are attachments for the pole tips to fix this though – curved rubber boots. These quieten the tap tap tap of the pole and give better grip. They work quite well on unmade roads and firm packed dirt too.

Due to my route I generally use the rubber boots, as they are better suited for most of the distance – but now the leaves are on the ground the boots have a tendency to slip (not great for a bad back).

So, I’ve had to go out with just the spikes. This is okay now I’ve got to grips with using the spikes on Tarmac, but not ideal. Luckily LEKI have bought out a new innovation that should solve this problem. I’ll be getting some of these new feet and will review them for the blog.

As for the walk today, it was taken at a much reduced pace as I had slept awkwardly. I’m still glad that Nordic Walking is allowing me to at least get away from laying on my back all day, but I am getting a bit depressed about my reduced abilities. I want to take my exercise up a notch, but I just can’t right now.