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| Chosen as dark grey for an obvious reason |
Needs an answer (NAA) 1. My Skoda was bought in 2016. Due to the pandemic and various medical imperatives it has only travelled 50,000 miles. Regularly serviced, it is always garaged at night and the engine starts up first whir. The battery is original; should I change the battery now or wait until I find myself cursing?
NAA 2. I have worn this heavy jumper (see pic) continuously since early autumn 2023. Still unwashed. When will it become, unmistakably, a social disaster?
NAA 3. At my own request I was given Barbra Streisand’s autobiography for Christmas. The turgidity of Long Hard Road (qv) has delayed my tackling her but I’m now done with lithium-ion stuff. Barbra runs to 970 pages and weighs 1.3 kg. I have a damaged rh shoulder; has anyone any appropriate ergonomic advice to counter future stresses?
NAA 4. Only sympathetic responses for this one. My op for mouth cancer in August 2021 left me with weakened muscles at the lh end of my mouth. Putting things bluntly – when I drink, I dribble at the left. Any suggestions?
NAA 5. Here you need to know what a stud-wall is. Suppose you wanted to hang a picture (weighing, say, 1 kg) on such a wall. What hook fitment would be guaranteed secure? Note: the one that opens up as a parallelogram when tightened isn’t – in my late mother-in-law’s words – “worth a light”. Also, finding and screwing into the stud-wall’s solid framework is beyond my diagnostic competence.
NAA 6. Should all outdoor pot-plants, withered into crackly brownness by the first sharp frost, be cropped down to, say, 10 cm?
NAA 7. Why am I the only wine-drinker on Earth who knows that whites from the Southern Rhone succeed best in the cost/flavour equation?
NAA 1: I'd get the battery changed sooner rather than later in case there is an emergency situation.
ReplyDeleteNAA 2: When it starts to smell, or your fingers stick to it.
NAA 3: Is there such things as adjustable book holders?
NAA 4: Bring the drink to your mouth with one hand, bring a napkin to the other side of your mouth with the other hand.
NAA 5: I don't know.
NAA 6: Google about when and how to prune each type of plant.
NAA 7: Well, now the cat is out of the bag and you are not the only one who knows this.
Colette: 1. Yeah, but I could be discarding a battery that's still working
Delete2. Difficult to smell oneself.
3. I'm the one asking the questions.
4. But suppose I'm dining out at someone higher up the social scale than I am.
5. I guess if you don't know you don't know.
6. I'm trying to profit from those who know.
7. Aha, smartyboots
NAA 2: When the Irish writer Dervla Murphy travelled several months in Nepal she noticed that the people she stayed with in remote areas only washed themselves and their clothing once a year. So you have a way to go. But maybe confirm with people who you want to spend time with regarding appearance and smell. Also, considering your NAA 4, have a closer look for possible spills.
ReplyDeleteNAA 3: Audio books are the answer, especially with large volumes. But now that you're landed with it, persevere in small doses, grin and bear etc.
NAA 4: Fancy napkins, fancy stainless steel straw.
NAA 6: From what you have written regarding gardening expertise so far, I suggest chucking them out and going for new plants come spring. I doubt you have any mulching material such as leaves at hand?
Sabine: 1. Have you ever asked someone else: "Do I smell?"
Delete4. Spills do occur.
3. As you say, it's ex post facto. I do have Ulysses read by brilliant Irish actor Jim Norton on 22 CDs but if I opted for any other audio book I'd have to be very OK with the reader's voice and style. As to your "self-immolation" suggestion, I have a bad shoulder.
Parenthetically my younger brother, now dead, then suffering from Alzheimers, confessed he was unable to concentrate enough to read my novel Out Of Arizona. As a treat I investigated having the book recorded for him. A recording studio said they would charge £10,000. Fact is I didn't love my brother that much. I asked a professional actress if she fancied the job but a test run showed such a job requires very special skills and not all actors have them. This can be a particular problem with poetry: a mannered voice or one that over-exaggerates quickly grates and one discovers one can be very picky about this sort of thing.
4, Straw no good with hot drinks. Can scald.
6, I'm trying to reduce my workload not add to it. And yes, I do have compost. Sorry to gainsay your doubts.
The audio book of her memoir is read by no other than Barbra Streisand herself.
Delete1) A good mechanic should be able to discern whether the battery is functioning properly, and should know he will eventually get your business.
ReplyDelete2) I say burn it at this point!!!!!
3)Rip every third page out--making it a reasonable 300+ pages and read them in the loo.
4) A straw entered in the left side, liquid should then go to the right and possible slosh down properly.
5) I'm not sure of the construction of your home. Here older plaster wall homes often had a picture molding run across the wall about 5-6feet up off the floor horizontal. Clip hooks then slid behind the molding allowing you to hang paintings by wire or ribbon...anywhere, even changing seasonally---sounds like a lot of work, but very functional.
6) Yes, google for each plant, but do not cut any until the last frost time has past. The dead parts protect the stems/sticks that are still live. Then cut a bit below the damaged part when it begins to warm up.
7) I'm allergic to wine, now a nice Lithuanian Lager is lovely as is any Danish beer.
Sandi: 1. Although it's months away I was pondering the implications of a flat battery when I'm in France. So, yesterday, I called the car's accredited dealer. Yes, modern batteries do last yonks longer; plus - this was new to me - the battery's efficiency is checked during servicing and no deterioration had been detected. Bring the car in two months before the holiday and the battery could be assessed, I was told.
ReplyDelete2. Bang goes my entire wardrobe.
3. Do I detect an antipathy towards the great Barbra?
4. See response to Sabine.
5. Stud-walls (used indoors for obvious reasons) consist of plasterboard on both sides of a framework, with diagonals, in 2 x 2 wood. Plasterboard is not thick enough to hold most screw-in systems. Obviously the 2 x 2 struts are strong enough to take screws but it's difficult to identify how they run, hidden, as they are, by the plasterboard. There used to be a system that used magnets to locate the metal screws that held the struts together but this was a bit hit-or-miss. However a picture rail, fitted later, could be screwed at either end into the vertical struts at either edge of the stud wall. Such a rail could either be decorative or coloured to merge with the wall. I'll bear this in mind.
6. Aha. Now I see why gardeners get the heebie-jeebies about trying to guess when the last frost has occurred.
7. But have you tried beer from the Czech Republic, southern Germany and - suprisingly - Japan. When you say you're allergic to wine does it bring you out in spots or do you mean you simply don't like it? Last visit to USA (three decades ago) I discovered that Washington state whites matched those from California and were less expensive. Alas, they're also rarer.
Differences in taste between various types of lager all disappear when you shed your skis, find a seat that overlooks the snow-covered valley, drink deep of a grand pression assuming you're in France (And why be anywhere else?) and watch others find ways round the moguls.
Ah, my lost middle-age. In fact: Ou sont les neiges d'antan?
Sandi: grand should have a final e.
ReplyDeleteAs to 5: Any “hollow wall anchor” designed for the thickness of the wallboard will hold a kg. I’ll say a 3cm screw, angled downward through the wallboard only, will suffice to hold a kg. If it’s paper backed wallboard (aka Sheetrock here) even a nail - just angle it downward. A longer nail or screw will give the advantage of penetrating any wood or electrical wiring you might hit. Use a course threaded “drywall” screw if possible. One that is threaded all the way to the head.shall I come and take care of that for you? I have a screw.
ReplyDelete