Christmas time...

Unless you didn't notice, it's just been Christmas.

My family at the gathering

Yeah, I don't pay much attention to it either but it is a notable occasion to give me an excuse to write about it as a "for the last time" blog series post. The more important thing that happened "for the last time" before I leave is I had the family gathering of my mother's side.

Three people we all miss very much

I spent most of the day talking to people about this whole adventure and it was really nice to be able to explain to people who care about me, and who are all so excited for me. I know a fair few of them read this (or at least they said they did) so hi there, thanks for reading family and please come visit me when I get out there!

The day was good; we had great food, good conversation and laughs, a nice walk and the location was lovely where I was able to go outside and sit in the sun on a bench and enjoy the peace and quiet a couple of times.

A bad picture of the sun dial

One thing I really enjoyed was the church tower had a sun dial instead of a normal clock; I haven't seen one before. I did notice that it didn't take into account of daylight saving, however.

So I was only down in Birmingham for 24 hours including the do, and then straight back up to Blackpool this afternoon to get on with everything I want to get done.

As last time the first thing I did was to drag the power extension cables from the studio over to the storage unit and get the dehumidifier running again. I also took a little electric heater over to put inside Julian and get running. I was able to get the power all the way across with only one join outside and this I have put in a plastic bag, and also positioned underneath Thomas. Hopefully (though it isn't as stormy so maybe there won't be any rain tonight) I won't have a fuse problem this time. I have left the dehumidifier running overnight, but more of that later.

I also checked the state of the battery and it was down to the lowest level; this having just been sat there with nothing plugged in at all; it could be a defective battery I suppose but I'm not sure. Is there a way of detecting the drain on a battery? Anyway, I plugged the hookup in to put charge back in the battery.

I've sealed the gaps in the boards

I have come to the studio to focus on my overtime work however there was one thing I really wanted to get done this evening which was to use the silicon to seal between the boards which I put on the trailer last time. This did not take much time at all as my technique is now polished.

After finishing this task I locked the unit and left the heater and dehumidifier going while I cracked on with some software work. After a few hours I decided to turn the heater off and lock the gate for the night. A quick check of the roof shows me that I have nearly got rid of all the water inside which is really good. The battery was showing full as well, which is good; once again I'll pay attention to the charge and see how quickly it gets to zero.

This is where I made a really big mistake. I was trying to unlock the padlock on the gate (I lock it onto the gate when it is open, so I can take the keys with me) and it has recently been getting slightly stiff to turn. With it being so pitch black, and me being a bit cold and in a hurry, I struggled to turn the key and suddenly I thought "ooh it is turning" and so kept putting effort in and it wasn't until it was completely done did I realise I had actually twisted the key off inside the lock!

One snapped key

Not a good thing.

I have managed to lift the gate and wedge it shut so it looks locked but this will have to be looked at tomorrow morning. I do have a spare key so if i can get the snapped bit out of the padlock all is not lost; if I can't though I may have to get a chain and another padlock as I wouldn't be able to lock the gate any more.

Male Pattern Baldness, maybe

Finally, I spotted over the weekend that I am going bald HAHAHAHA.