No dental appointment

With all the snow about, my dentist who lives out in the Lincolnshire Wolds was unable to get to work so no dental appointments for anyone today. The roads were very good here at the seaside, with the strong easterly winds the salt seems to lift the temperature just enough for the temperature to be above freezing. Most of today it was about 37f or 3c.
I guess this is one of the pluses of living in rural Lincolnshire, mind you I have to pay an awful lot for my heating. I went to Grantham last Wednesday and my sisters were comparing their bills. One pays about £60 a month and the other just a little less, this is for their combined heat and light. I just told them that although I was pleased with the £250 winter fuel allowance, my next LPG bill would be in excess of £350. also I would have at least another 3 more bills of the same sort of price and that I had already had a fill in early September. They do not know just how lucky they are being on the mains gas. I wish was.
My American friend has just painted his front door, it looks good too. He tells me that he employs someone to cut his grass as he is too lazy. I told him it is sensible to get someone to cut his grass. I sorted my garden out so that I have NO grass at all, unless it is in weed form.
Anyway, back to the painting. When I had my bungalow built in 1992./3 I had wooden double glazing windows, it had been mandatory to fit those sort of windows for about 5 years. Anyway I could not afford a large bungalow but insisted that I had the best windows. I had fitted Magnate and Southern cedar wooden framed windows. I originally had a conservatory on the rear of the property facing south west. I used to get home from my work to an oven, I decided that as soon as I could afford it I would have the conservatory demolished and have an extention instead. This took me about 2 years to find the money. The man who did the extention told me that John Carr windows were very good. I mentioned this to my mate who also told me that they were the best. When all was done, I looked at the windows, they were rubbish. I compared them to Magnate and Southern being a BMW and John Carr being a Lada. My mate had to agree that they were not in the same league as Magnate. This made up my mind, I would gradually change all of my windows and doors for UPVC windows which by now had become popular. To keep my wooden windows looking good, I bought Sadolin Extra cedar which is not cheap and had to paint the windows and doors every 2 years. To be continued tomorrow I hope.

I found a couple more photos. Looks nice but stops me from getting any vegetables. I guess that it will give the fruiterers an excuse for putting up the prices. I can understand the reason for increasing the price when the weather is like it is now but can not understand why they never drop the price again once the temporary bad weather relents. That's my little whinge.

Snow in November

Fancy this! snow in November, at the seaside too. This is outside my front door on Sunday afternoon, it is below freezing.
I was worried that it would get a lot worse as this morning I was to have a blood test at 9.20am. The weather was a little better though, I left early for the surgery about 4 miles away as I did not know what the conditions would be like. However I was surprised, the easterly wind lifted the temperatures enough for it to not to freeze. The main road was not bad and when I arrived in the village, the roads were better and when I turned into the side road and parked. All was well because the snow was not icy. I even had time to call in at the local shop and get some milk and bananas. Mind you I was pleased to get home again. Now tomorrow I have to go to the dentist to have at least one tooth extracted and it is twice as far away and the weather forecast is not good. Still I will wait and see what tomorrow brings. More soon.

Horrendous traffic

On Wednesday I went to Grantham to see my Sisters. I will not be going over there again this year. The traffic was absolute hell. I could not understand just why everywhere was more or less gridlock. It took me 30 minutes to get into the Supermarket from the outskirts of town. It then took 15 minutes to get out of the car park after getting a few bits and bobs. Eventually I called at Asda filling station. I know the lady there and mentioned the traffic. She then told me that there had been an accident on the A1 and diversions were being used. I think every car came to Grantham. I eventually went to see my Sisters, they confirmed what the lady had told me, they also noticed that the local bus was running very late. I only stayed there for about 30 minutes then headed back to the main road. It was nose to tail all the way, I was lucky as immediately I was at the junction a woman let me in the queue. It still took me over 30 minutes to travel about 1/2 mile, 800m. I eventually arrived home, it took me more than 30 minutes longer than normal. as I did not feel 100% I was glad to get home and in the warm.
This morning I got up early to watch a little cricket. I noticed that we had a smattering of snow, however as it broke daylight it started to snow again. As it was fereezing it settled and we soon had about an 1". Around 9.30am the temperature rose a little and the snow started to melt. Unfortunately about 30 minutes later we had a heavy snow storm lasting about 45 minutes. When it had finished the main road was completely covered. I was so pleased that I had gone to Grantham yesterday. Later in the day, most of the snow had gone, but I suppose there will be more soon as the forecast is not good for the next week or so.
Finally the cost of petrol at Asda in Grantham was 115.9p per litre. Here it is 1.22.9p. I guess that is why the country is becoming less populated. Mind you it has it's advantages. More soon.

Teething problems

As most will know who bother to read this will realise that I have an illness that means I lose most of my calcium.
It was because of this that on Friday I suddenly found I had swallowed a portion of one of my 5 remaining teeth. Unfortunately, this was a front molar, anyway I immediately rung the surgery and managed to get an appointment for this morning bright and early. 8.45am. This is several miles away but it was no problem. I decided to do several jobs while I was out. I went to the bottle bank, only to dispose of a coffee jar. I then went to the Medical Centre to put my repeat prescription in then booked a blood test. I am due at hospital next month and my consultant wishes to see that my blood is O.K. as I am on a toxic drug. I only have to go for blood tests now every 3 months, it started off by being every 14 days but has gradually decreased.
I went to see the dentist, thinking that he would confirm my worst thoughts, both teeth would have to be removed, one at the top and one at the bottom. I was surprised when he suggested that he would try to fill the top front tooth but admitted that the loose tooth on the bottom would have to be removed. He duly filled the top one and we are both keeping our fingers crossed. He then asked me to find my old lower denture so that he could have a false tooth fitted where the loose one is coming out, he told me that he did not know though just how long it would take. I have found the old lower denture but it has some scale on it. I will try to get something from Grantham as I hope to go there tomorrow. The next appointment is for Tuesday next week.
Finally for M. I have been in touch with my friend who was supposed to be here last week and does not know if he will be here this week either as his Mother is suffering from vertigo. I will keep my fingers crossed though. He has a lot of coffee for me. More soon.

Shares

This morning I ws up a little later than usual. I lay in bed not knowing the time, I eventually decided to get up and check the time. It was about 8.15. I am normally up and about before 8.00am. I went through my usual routine, after I had finished turned on the T.V. wanting to watch cricket on Eurosport. I was surprised to see nothing of the sort was on so I turned to CNBC to check on the Stock Market. Much to my surprise the headlines was about National Grid, stating that profits had increased and that the dividend had also increased. I immediately went online and checked out the National Grid web site. True enough the interim results were posted, I downloaded them then read them, they were good.
I went back to CNBC then went on Bloomberg there they have a ticker every few minutes giving the up to date prices of the Ftse 100. I was surprised to see that N.G. had fallen a few pence. I went back to CNBC to watch the ticker tape going by. It gives an up to the minute of transactions of decent sizes of stocks. I was horrified to see that the shares in National Grid had fallen by over 10 pence from yesterday's close. I did no more, I immediately rung my broker and bought a few hundred more shares. I do mean a FEW hundred as they cost over £5.70 a share. The broker was surprised when I asked him if they had suddenly gone EX Dividend as the fall was so surprising to me. He told me he had not even had any notice that the interim results had been announced. Anyway I thanked him and still bought the shares. At one stage the shares in National Grid were the worst performing shares in the S.E. 100. Eventually though thyey gradually went back up so that eventually they reached parity on yesterday. Finally, they were 2p better than yesterday.
Anyone who is considering buying securities, I would suggest that a close look at those of N. G. The interim dividend is 12.9p. It is anticipated that the total dividend will mean an overall dividend of about 6%. Far more than any Bank or Building Society would bring. Mind you, share can go down as well as up.
A final footnote was that the compare was interviewing a man, I think from Barclays Wealth. He suggested that they were a buy on his list and that over the medium term, he expected the share price would rise so that the annual income would be a little less than the current 6%.
I think tomorrow, I will be acting more normal. Hopefully.

Catering Exhibitions

I will tell you about one or two of the Catering Exhibitions I went to. They were set up to get you to use their services during the season.
The best venue I ever went to was the Petwood Hotel in Woodhall Spa. There is so much nostalgia regarding the Dam Busters and all that surrounded 619 Squadren. I do believe that the Officers Mess was at the Petwood. It was, when I went to a frozen food company that held it's exhibition there. Just about large enough for them.
The best for another thing was held at the Festival Pavillion in Skegness. There was another held in Skegness. It was called Caterex. I think it is still going. It was a large concern and covered the Embassy and Festival Pavillion with a bus shuttle available. The trouble was that there was little security so that lots of strangers went to Caterex so it was crowded.
Now to the best one. I will start by saying my Restaurant was unlicenced. There was a licenced restaurant about 6 business away. Well the salesman called to see me, I told him I was unlicenced but he could have a cup of tea with us if he wished. He did so then asked if we sold soft drinks. I said yes, so he said he could supply with us with soft drinks at a good price. Anyway I agreed and during the season we got on well together. At the end of the year, he told me that he would send me 2 tickets to go to his exhibition, to be honest I had been told about this and also told it was the best one going.
I didn't think about it and closed for the winter, I had a young man who helped me who was at college and would see me regular during the winter. Early Rebruary I duly received tickets to admit me and a friend to the Festival Pavillion. I just left them lying around, when the lad, who was approaching 18 came to see me, noticed these tickets, asked me if I was going, I told him probably not. I could see he was disappointed, so I said O. K. we will go.
At the outer door was a couple of men asking if we had tickets, I told them I had, they then opened the outer door. This led to another door just before entering the hall. I was then asked to produce the tickets. They were inspected and one of the men told me that they had to be careful as nobody who did not have a licenced premesis was allowed in. He then allowed us in with a curt, enjoy yourselves. The first thing we saw when we went in was a stand and this man asked us if we would like to taste some real ale. We both refused, I did not drink much and Freddie. I will call him liked lager. This was around 1981. There were about 60 stands. As you can imagine. most of them were beer stands, there was also about 4 whisky stands 2 rum stands, and I think a couple of wine stands. The wine was not given so freely but the whisky stands were well supported and there was plenty of spirits offered to taste, generous portions too. I was really interested in a dry Bain Marie, I had a wet one, well I found a stand and made arrangements for the rep to visit me, as soon as I had left, I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was the rep from Hobart. I had known him for about 5 years, having bought a microwave, mixer and steamer from them. He asked me how I had managed to get into the building as it is strictly for licenced premesis only. I just griined. He then produced his Diary and pointed to the note in red. It stated the time and date of the exhibit and underneath was "A great free piss up". He then told me that all the reps looked forward to this one as it was the best of all.
Anyway Freddie enjoyed his time there he was well cut by the time we left.
The first time after the show the rep asked me if I had been to the show. I told him I had, he then told me something that surprised me. He told me that no orders much were taken at the show as most went there for a good piss up and what happened was that when he called on them, they felt obliged to stay with them for the coming season. I told him I had made arrangements for a salesman to call on me. He grinned and told me nothing would come of it. He was correct.
He enjoyed calling on us and in early May I think it was, he told me that Skegness had been chosen to play the game "It's a Knockout" only this year it was going continental and the Skegness was going to go to France. I can't remember exactly where. He then told me that he was on the team, but only as a reserve. I think the team was 6 plus 2 reserves. He then told me that the BBC had told them that they would have to wear the same clothes. I think the BBC supplied the blazer which they had to pay for, they had to wear grey flannels. I can't remember though if they had to pay for their own transport and hotel costs. The disappointment for him was that he never appeared on T V as he was only a reserve. I think he was disillusioned especially having to pay for the blazer. He did wear it once to show us. I think it had BBC It's a Knockout on the top pocket. Hope I have not bored anybody More soon.