Imprisonment - Day 89

Imprisonment - Day eighty nine
Thursday - 18th June 2020

Cars - 35
Motorbikes - 0
Bikes - 0
Dog walkers - 5
Walkers - 0
Runners - 0
Horses - 0
Horse walkers - 0
Molehills - 0
Cycling temperature - 12.5c

Enough is enough Roger you must have had too much rain for your allotment it must be in grave danger of being washed away. It's the first wet ride for a very long time. There were several floods and large puddles and the rain thrashed it down relentlessly but it did not stop Lotsa and Ginge who were both out with their dogs. Paper Chick was also out delivering the newspapers. I'm surprised I don't see her more often as I only used to see her at weekends. Not long after seeing Paper Chick I looked down and noticed that my digital speedo had gone it must have rattled loose over the rough ground created by the torrential rain. Fortunately when leaving the house I add 13.76 miles to the current reading so I know what the mileage will be when I get home so if something goes wrong with the speedo I do not lose my Cumulative miles. So I know on my winter bike I've ridden 123.96 miles so far this month. My first job after breakfast was to buy a new one off eBay but tomorrow I can use the one I fitted to the Austin Seven.

It was too damp and horrible for the Motor House and there's now little to do on the Bentley. The only thing I can bring to mind is cleaning and painting my four spare wheels. I've got theses extra wheels and tyres because when we go on our Grand European Tours we can't go with part worn tyres as they would be bald by the time we got home. So I keep a good set for travelling and swop them for more warn tyres when we're home to finish them off.

So I decided to dismantle Ashley's old bed instead of taking it to the tip. This kept me occupied all day as there were a number of wood screws which had rusted in the timber and were hard to shift. There were also endless steel staples holding the springs in place. I took the cover and padding off first and was amazed to find it was made of fiberous coconut matting which was nasty and dusty stuff with a cotton/textile mixed topping. I took the staples out using a tool I made for removing staples from fencing posts. I used it when I replaced our fences five or so years ago. This ate through the staples and slowly the springs were free from the frame which I dismantled bit by bit as the staples were removed. The matting ended up in the black bin the springs will be taken away by the scrapman when he next comes and the cleaned up timber I managed to get to my Greenhouse Woodstore between showers. I used Ros' hoover to tidy up and as usual I ended up emptying the bag and generally cleaning it up. It's amazing how much better it works when clean. I'm pleased I decided to paint the new bed on Monday the only good painting day for a couple of weeks so with the old bed all but gone Ros and I put the new bed together. It's such a slick and clean bed especially compared to the dusty old thing I dismantled. It would be interesting to take a modern bed to pieces to see what they are currently made of. We put the old mattress on the new bed and lay on it and instantly understood why Ashley wanted us to get a new bed as the springs dug into our backs. Ros has ordered a memory foam mattress which should be here by the end of the week.

It was good to here from Hayden that Nevan and Ari's Corona Virus checks came back negative. After this little episode they have decided not to send them to nursery for the time being.

I'm now hoping for better weather tomorrow. Roger!