A Cat Trap

Since Dave found out that he could get on to the top of the fridge freezer we can't keep him off it. Yesterday he was sitting up there on top of a pile of my talking books with his head almost touching the ceiling, looking down at me in a very superior way. I don't want him on the kitchen surfaces and I certainly don't want him up there, but obedience training for a cat is rather like obedience training for Robbie - futile!

I am 5ft and the fridge freezer is 6ft so I can't lift him down, but there are two things that will get him down there from there very quickly, food and the cat carrier. If he sees me opening his food he will be there in an instant and if I get the cat carrier out he will vanish without trace for hours. I have to get up there to disinfect the surface and I plan to sprinkle some cat pepper up there to make the area unattractive to him. Baldric Burgess had a much more fiendish plan to deal with the problem, it involved containers of water among other things. Quite apart from the serious danger of placing water on an electrical appliance, I foresaw other dangers too. I have heard of flying squirrels, but I was not comfortable with the prospect of a damp cat landing on my head closely followed by a pan of water. The plan was vetoed.

This morning I was just in time to see Robbie armed with a tea towel, jousting with the cat; Robbie's language left something to be desired and Dave was swearing back at him. Suddenly Dave lost his footing and tumbled down bringing a shower of cat crunchies and sundry items with him. Robbie scuttled off to work leaving me with a cantankerous cat and a kitchen that looks like a war zone!

The dead fridge freezer was taken away for a post mortem today. Bosch want to work out what caused the plug to burst into flames. I already have a written report from the tradesman who came out on Christmas Day, it was a wiring fault in the plug so it will be interesting to see how they try to put a positive spin on that. I have sent the plug back as requested, but as you can see from the photo there is not much left for them to examine. A new fridge freezer has been delivered to replace the one that spontaneously cremated itself. I insisted on a different model but I am still struggling to overcome the urge to turn off the electricity every time I go out, it has really frightened me.





Robbie was finally able to travel to Birmingham from Northampton today. The handover was not problem free, Robbie rang me with updates on delays and diversions but it is far too boring to detail here. I feel really sorry for Virgin, they must be wondering if things will ever get back to normal. I went to visit some relatives today and they enquired about the train problems and the impact they were having on Robbie. My sister in law said she had seen a rather charismatic man from Virgin being interviewed on TV. I don't know who it was, but I would hazard a guess that it was probably Chris Gibb. You certainly have to give them full marks for managing the media. When it comes to spin Virgin make the Labour party look like amateurs. Beware 'the Dark Side' are taking over the world!!

This article makes interesting reading. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/money/2008/01/04/cnvirgin104.xml

Sparks Fly at Christmas! 27.12.07

Robbie has already written about his Christmas presents, but our Christmas was extremely eventful even by the standards of our rather unconventional household. We always spend the couple of days before Christmas with my mum and step father, then they come to us on Christmas Day and Boxing Day and my brother usually joins us as well. We'd had a lovely couple of days at my mums and we'd worked our socks off to have everything ready and just as we wanted it for Christmas Day. I went to bed just after midnight on Christmas Eve/Christmas Day which is fairly early when compared with past years, but I had to set my alarm for the morning to be sure that the huge turkey that my brother had brought was put into the oven early enough to be ready for lunch time.

In the morning with the turkey safely in the oven we all gathered in the lounge to watch the children open their presents. Sam holds the record for 'speed opening' but he seemed very pleased with his presents which included a telescope and a lamp in the style of a blue light from a police car. Laura was pretty speedy in the opening stakes too, her presents included clothes, perfume and an external hard drive for her computer. Emily's presents had a mixed theme, several useful things for university including a special textbook that was top of her Christmas list, she also had perfume, bags and various fun things. The children also had a Nintendo Wii as a joint present which has proved extremely popular. You already know about the contents of Robbie's stocking, and I had a bottle of my favourite perfume from Robbie and a lovely necklace from the children. It was a brilliant start to the day.

The day went down hill rapidly after that. Robbie decided that the shirt that he absolutely had to wear needed ironing, so I was installed in the kitchen with the ironing board while Robbie went to have a shave and shower. We had taken the decision to replace the fridge freezer because we had been worried that the old one may let us down over Christmas, so the shiny new Bosch fridge freezer that had only arrived the previous Thursday was now installed in place of the temperamental hotpoint. It looked really smart and I liked it because it wasn't quite as tall as the old one, so it was easier to reach the things in the fridge. I had finished one shirt and was part way through the Boxing Day shirt when without warning there was a crackle and the fridge socket burst into flames! The kitchen fire blanket was hanging close to the cooker and I grabbed it and beat the now fierce fire frantically with it. I yelled for Robbie who arrived just in time to see me put out the fire, I was so shaken that I didn't even moan about him not being dressed. The side of the fridge was burned, the sockets were charcoal, the wall tiles were cracked and the paper had been burned off the wall, the kitchen roll holder was burned and black and my CD player (which had been on top of the fridge) was a write off. So, it looked as if Christmas was cancelled!

The fridge freezer and its contents were lost, but we managed to get on with Christmas regardless. Thankfully I have home emergency insurance and I was able to get an electrician to come and make the wiring safe. He checked and said that the fault had been caused by faulty wiring in the fridge freezer's sealed plug, it was a relief to know it wasn't our wiring! He made everything safe, but the smell of burn still lingers and the shock really upset me. I can't help thinking what could have happened if we were in bed or if we had been out! The one good thing was that our smoke detectors worked perfectly!

Stress! 06.12.07

Do you ever get those times when life seems like a cruel joke. I shouldn't moan really because none of the incidents are especially serious in themselves, but all together they have left me wishing that I could hibernate until spring. To make matters worse i have been struggling with a bad back for days, it makes everything more difficult.

The fridge freezer went wrong at the weekend, the freezer section was working perfectly but it was warmer in the fridge than in the lounge. It is a Hotpoint frost free, top of the range model that is not especially old and has proved to be an expensive mistake, it is almost impossible to get anybody to repair them, as soon as you mention the make and the words frost free engineers run a mile. Last time I had to find a person to repair it there was only one person in the area who would deal with that model and he turned out to be extremely odd so I didn't want to repeat that experience. I had almost decided to cut my losses and buy a new one from a reputable company, but then I decided to make use of the vast resources of the internet and see if I could understand what the problem was and put it right. I won't bore you with all the details but - I DID IT!! It is working perfectly, and even if it only works for another few months it will be worth the effort. I was just congratulating myself on not having to afford a new fridge freezer just yet when the next problem popped up. We had a problem with the wiring to the bathroom light which resulted in all the lights not working, we had to call out an electrician. He came fairly quickly and he fixed the problem but judging bu the cost he must have replaced the defective parts with solid gold! Oh well, at least we are not sitting in the dark.

Robbie was feeling unwell on Tuesday afternoon, he said hewould try to come home early, but the railways dictated otherwise. Sadly there was a fatality somewhere and it caused a knock on effect in terms of delays and he it took him over three hours and four trains to complete a journey that usually takes an hour on one train. He was still feeling dodgy and as the evening progressed became very poorly, so much so that he wasn't able to go to work the next day. We had thrown away all the perishable stuff from the fridge when it went wrong, but I couldn't help worrying about food poisoning. I knew he must be feeling really rough because he never misses work unless he is dying. He is feeling a bit better now and went back to work this morning, so hopefully it was just a bug rather than food poisoning.

Today was 'the day' that Oreo was due for surgery. He was really miserable yesterday evening and we were convinced he knew what awaited him. This morning he seemed fine, but he was a bit miffed when he asked Robbie for breakfast and wasn't allowed any food. He came up to the bathroom to ask me to feed him, but his demands fell on deaf ears and he gave up. Robbie left for work a few minutes later and I busied myself with the usual morning routine. We all had to leave at least ten minutes earlier in order to get Oreo to the vet on time. Robbie had left the cat carrier out and when the time came to get Oreo ready he was nowhere to be found. We searched everywhere, even under beds and behind the bath (places that he is not allowed to go) but he was missing. I took Sam to school and came back to continue searching, but Oreo didn't even emerge when I fed the others. By this time I was frantic and I guessed he must have got out when Robbie fetched the cat carrier from the shed. I walked around the streets looking for him and I kept going into the garden to look for him without success. Then at about 10am there was some very loud meowing from the end of my neighbour's garden - a soaking wet Oreo was stuck up a tree. After considerable indignity I rescued him and took him back to dry off, I was wet, muddy and in need of a bath too!