Marty

Happy Saturday, gang!

Smells are like sounds in a way... Unless either is extremely loud or obnoxious, once they become familiar they often stop being noticed.

I don't know if it will ever be finished, but I can see the upper part of the cottage becoming a self contained apartment, with the larger room being the living area, and the smaller room a bedroom. You may notice there's a blocked up fireplace on the dividing wall between the two rooms. There appears never to have been a staircase leading from the ground floor rooms, which makes me suspect that originally the ground floor was used for housing livestock which, in the winter months, would have helped heat the living quarters above. This, I have read, was a common practice in rural Ireland in days gone by. There is no doorway between the two downstairs rooms, and nor does it appear that there ever was. The only thing that confuses me about this is that there is actually a fireplace in the smaller room. It's really quite a small room, with originally just one small window, so why it (and not the larger downstairs room) needed a fireplace is not immediately clear. I actually know one of the daughters (through a camera club) of the old woman who last owned this place. That daughter is around my age, and was actually reared in the main residence. So, once the social distancing restrictions are over and the camera club can meet again, I may ask her if she knows anything about the history of the old cottage.

Well said, my friend!

Beautiful, Gary! ❤️ Stay upright You mad old fool. And scream and sing, And be that king.

Here's my week 5 offering of my challenge to upload a new black and white photograph every week for 52 weeks. Taken yesterday, it's a view of the inside of the upper story of the old cottage. You'll notice light coming in through the left hand side of the roof. That's because of the missing slate that I mentioned last week. There's also a slate missing, and one broken, in the far room on the same side of the roof. The roof timbers themselves don't look to be in too bad a shape, so initially I'm planning to just get the missing and damaged slates replaced, just to make the roof watertight. The ceiling looks a mess, but it should be easy enough to strip all the loose ceiling slats that are hanging down (easy, but potentially very messy). Most of the mess on the floor is the old plaster from the walls. If you think it looks bad in this photograph, you should have seen how bad it was before I swept the most of it out!

Hi, Page. All good here, thanks. Yourself?

Well, here in Ireland Friday's almost over, so I'll not bother with a Happy Friday image this time. I got a text to say that my monthly prescription was ready to be picked up, so I drove the twenty miles to collect it, and managed to buy some fresh provisions as well. Yay! Next Tuesday (5th May) the Irish Government were due to start lifting some of the social distancing restrictions that have been in place for over a month now, but the Taoiseach (Prime Minister) announced this evening that the decision has been made to keep them in place until Monday 18th May, when they will start to be lifted in 3 weeks phases. The only slight lifting on Tuesday will be to allow people to exercise within 5 kilometres of their home (it had previously been 3 kilometres), and to allow the over 70's to leave their homes and gardens to exercise within 5 km of home. If there is a significant increase in covid-19 cases during any of the planned phases, there will be a stepping back of the restrictions. He said school's and colleges will not reopen before the start of the new academic year starting in September (schools) or October (colleges). I'm sure that will please some of my friends' children, although I can see many of the parents not being so pleased... One thing he said will reopen on 18th May will be garden centres and hardware shops. So I know where I shall be going on that day! All in all, I think the Government are making the right choices...

I'm thinking healing thoughts for you, Gary

Hi, Albert!

And I've a plentiful supply of disposable razors and hot water...

I'm not that picky! Well, not when it comes to accepting help in the garden.

A couple of those ingredients mean absolutely nothing to me...

I haven't put any videos of it on YouTube yet, Albert. Might do sometime. Not sure, though.

Not done a lot inside, except for the treating of the floor joists I mentioned the other day. Although I am expecting a handyman to come and do some work in the bathroom in the next day or so. I need a handrail to help me exit the bath (not as young as I once was...) The weather's staying reasonably good, so managing to get more garden work done. Finally planted my onion sets today, and have continued digging my vegetable plot. Will hopefully get the seed potatoes planted next week sometime...

But has he got enough facial hair for our Gary?

Mounted? Like a stag's head?

Hi, young man! Hope all's well in Albertville.

Go, clo!!!!

From dictionary.com: yarn: noun thread made of natural or synthetic fibers and used for knitting and weaving. a continuous strand or thread made from glass, metal, plastic, etc. the thread, in the form of a loosely twisted aggregate of fibers, as of hemp, of which rope is made (rope yarn). a tale, especially a long story of adventure or incredible happenings He spun a yarn that outdid any I had ever heard. Hopefully you're going to spin us all a few incredible yarns, clo, as per definition 4 above.

Enjoy. And don't forget social distancing. Hopefully the fact that the text is part of an image means it won't trigger the "Naughty word that upsets Google" flag this time.

Hi, Page! How goes your day?

Have to say I quite like his interpretation of Aquaman... And I loved this quote from him in the article: