Home...and back home.

So, just to confuse people I refer to my mum's house as home and also Bristol as home. So, I nipped down to my mum's yesterday, just for a quick visit; did xmasy things, sorted a few things for her. The drive back was manky, so much salt on the roads... Rebecca's actually go salt on her *roof*.

And I've come back, and for some reason Azureus is maxing out my processor (well, Java, I think) periodically. And I mean 100% processor usage full on take no prisoners maxed out. It's a bit frustrating.

Anyway, I got some nice shiny presents; some makeup (! Still, I'm single now... so I guess I need to get on down to those clubs, or something... ), a couple of books and some biscuits. I've also now got an *entire* Xmas cake to eat; so anyone want a slice? I also took down the harder Xmas decorations for her; did some car stuff (the car door had jammed, just needed lubrication), faffy stuff, y'know?

And now I'm home and the house is chaos; I can't even see my desk (again), I've got a good idea where I want to go with my dissertation though, which is good news. I've got to tidy up though. And nip out now and get some milk... I think. I wonder if the postpoffice is open, I know it's a bank holiday but I've got a letter to go... Meh.

Annnyway. Yes. I should get on, really.

Let me tell you about my day...

... so I've got back, and I'm just starting to ponder a quick wander to the shops; get myself some milk and see if the post office is open; I've got some glitch with my PC which is irritating me...

...and I'm writing an e-mail, a longish one to James.

And my mum rings. The plumbing in the bathroom at home has started to leak; if I'm lucky (which I should be) it'll be simply a loose joint on a pipe I can just do up. If I'm unlucky it'll be a failed yorkshire (or worse, proper sleeved) joint, which will need a blowtorch, the water off and drained, and solder and me to reprise skills not used since I was about 14.

Still, it's 100 miles of driving on salty grotty motorways I could do without.

...and then, just to round it off, my PC fails with a Kernel fault of some description. An importal BSOD. Some piece of hardware in this machine is crashing it. And so I can't even leave the fucking thing on while I'm away, and I've no idea which thing it is, but I'm suspecting that DVD-Writer that's never worked properly since it arrived.

*sigh*

Lunch, pack car, go. I like the ominous grey rain clouds which have decided to surface over Bristol now. That is a nice touch.

Before I go...

I thought the Alaskans in the audience might get a kick out of this (taken from the met office website):

...and back *again*

So, I'm back. It turned out that it was (is) leaking from the drainer, the plastic nut which seals the sink to the drainer seems to have developed a leak on one side, but the sink - unlike the last sink is actually supported by the pedestal underneath it; so I'm not 100% sure how to repair it.

At any rate, without taking the pedestal out (which I couldn't do by myself anyway); I attacked the nut using the screwdriver on the peaks and hit it with a weighty object method. This... well, improved matters. At least, I thought so, until I found that it was now leaking from the opposite side of the nut *rolls eyes*

Still, now we know what it is, so she can call the plumber in who put the sink in to fix it - and he can deal with the pedestal / sink issue. I've put a jam-jar underneat the leak, so it should be okay for minimal use anyway. The leak isn't *terrible*. Not the way my mum was describing it...

Rebecca rolled over 10,000 miles (or 110,000, actually, but the 1 at the beginning is invisible). I have a thing for the big mileage rollovers, and since I do so many miles I actually get to see quite a lot of them, which... well, it makes me happy. There's something enjoyable about people's faces when they ask how many miles it's got on it and you're able to give a *really big number* in return. I realise that 110,000 miles isn't a lot for 35 years; but it's growing quite quickly, and when we reach 200,000 then I'll be mightily proud!