Happy New Year one and all

Can Paul and I wish you all a very happy 2011 and thank everyone who follows our blog, hopefully this year will be less stressful for us than the later part of 2010.

What have we been up to over the past few days, well probably like a few of you not a lot. Wednesday evening we went out for a meal to the Stag and Pheasant with Dave and Karen which was nice it was a shame we were the only ones in the pub so not a lot of atmosphere but the evening went okay.

New Years eve we popped over to Badsey’s for a drink and managed to stay until 11.15 then saw the New year in on the boat. New Years day my son Jack his wife Clare and the two grandchildren came to visit which was nice as they were able to see the new look Piston Broke. They bought us a really lovely book “The Times Waterways of Britain” which not only goes into the history of the canals but has some lovely photos and lots of information will take me a while to read but its the kind of book you cant rush.

Of course Paul hasn't let a day go by with out doing something, the shower taps definitely needed sorting as while I was in the shower the mixer tap decided to give up the ghost and I was treated to freezing cold shower. As the tap is one of those thermostatic ones Paul took it to bits fiddled a bit put it back together and we have managed hot showers since. It appeared that a circlip had come dislodged off of the thermostat spindle. But it was strange that it was when I was under the water  it packed up. Today the canopy is being adjusted, we were having problems fitting two sections onto one swivel catch Paul has now noticed that the wrong pot rivets have been used, they are too big, so protrude thus not allowing two pieces of fabric to cover over the catch. Paul will have to get some smaller rivets drill out the big one and re do all the catches. Yet another thing in a long line of cock ups!!!!

The canal is slowly thawing  although we still have a couple of inches of ice here, I am sure out in the country it will still be quite thick, we wont be moving until the ice has all gone.

We are coping with the water situation Paul nips down to the tap and does three journeys with the 25ltr carrier just to keep us topped up.