Lots of Swearing

We left Cowley yesterday morning, it was nice and crisp and the lock was a bit on the dodgy side but another boat shared with us so I let the chap walk the gates. The dogs had enjoyed their stay in the snow it was nice to see them playing for once, our dogs don't do ball chasing. They were both rescue dogs when we lived in Spain (Spanish don't do playing with their pets) and we bought them back with us. We had tried playing with them out there and I think Saffie concluded that chasing a ball in the heat was a pretty stupid thing to do. The only things that Crystal chased was the odd rat that came into the garden and the birds. So to see them actually enjoying themselves was lovely. Monday lunch time we were having our lunch when a woman walking by decided to squat down and peer through the window she was quite surprised to see us sitting there, nearly asked her to join us but she had the good grace to look embarrassed before scuttling off to catch up with her friends.





Anyway we are back here at Uxbridge, we got our diesel yesterday from Denham declared 10/90, fuel was 60p. Noticed that when I went to pay there was a notice on the wall which showed price split "domestic 60p inc vat, propulsion 1.03 inc vat and duty" so that saved me working it out. On reading a letter in W.W. mag the duty has been increased from 40.66 to 42.28 but at the moment isn't being enforced.



We have been noticing over the past week that the water pump has been getting noisy so as we have to stay here till Friday Paul decided to investigate. Of course it was leaking so Paul has spent this morning disconnecting it, checking it, taking it apart, putting it together, and still it leaked, tighten up everything leaked even worse. The language was awful, good job I'm taking my pills. Paul gets so frustrated with poor workmanship,also everything is in a confined space Paul reckons they built the boat round the pump. Any way decision was made to buy a new one, a quick call to Denham Marina and they had one in stock. So Paul has had to go and buy it (wallet working overtime at the moment). The lad is back now with his new pump so now all he has to do is fit it. If I could have gone out I would have, he has such a short temper when things don't go how he wants them to, any way I had to stand by the fuse box to flick the switch on, then run to the tap turn on then off, run to fuse box turn that off and wait for the next set of instructions. With his head buried under the bow the instructions were muffled to say the least so I got shouted at more than once as I couldn't hear a word he was saying. I'm pleased to say pump is now up and running with no leaks. However Paul has stripped down the old pump AGAIN and using instant gasket we now have a spare for emergancies


Have to go and pick up the prescription in the morning, then hopefully Friday morning we can get on our way. Have noticed the BW barge loaded up ready for the stoppage at Denham Deep. Just need to be on our way again have spent too long in this neck of the woods.