Sunday Supplement

There was a pesky mynah bird nearby, out of the reach of Jass and she did not like its presence. I've never heard a cat make this kind of noise before but have you?

The quiet life of a retired gentleman

Friday:

My fifth visit to the new Melbourne State Library station saw me finally work out how to get out and in without accidently going into the god awful Melbourne Central Station shopping centre. 

I bought a couple of things in the much more civilised QV shopping centre, and then walked down to Bourke Street, caught a tram one stop to Elizabeth Street and made my way up the steep hill to Corner and Bench for a chicken and coleslaw slider, and coffee of course. Gosh, I was a bit whacked, with the temperature at about 30/90.

I walked on to William Street to catch a 58 tram home, with a big gap between trams, and a friend from the country called. He was at Anzac Station and would I care to meet for coffee. He was outside my building when I arrived home, met Phyllis and Kosov and then assisted as P & K dragged and carried the old dishwasher down to the car and got it into the back of the car. Don't accelerate quickly Phyllis, or it will smash the back window. 

I took my friend across the road for coffee, which extended to an hour. Kosov messaged me to say the job was done. He called to ask if they could take the car to a shop, then Phyllis called to ask the same. Where, I asked where. Somewhere on the route 57 tram line. My friend found these messages and calls all highly amusing. They returned home after making the car back to normal, with a 12kg/26lb watermelon, plus a quarter of a watermelon, maybe 3kg. 

I heard a noise something like a key turning in the door lock. It happens when someone gets the wrong apartment number, or is trying to rob us. It was Jass, out on the landing scratching at the door. A neighbour had put a bowl of water and a bowl of food for her next to the door. She had slipped through someone's legs, not mine, and gotten out for what must have no longer than twenty minutes. I left a thank you note and quickly after, the bowls were gone when I went out again at 6.30 for dinner, with a note explaining that the person was concerned because of the heat, and their cat had once done the same. I think it was our neighbour to the front. 

I had to miss the building's Christmas barbeque because I had been invited out by my former workmate for dinner at Victoria's Swiss Club restaurant, Edelweiss. (Insert Mary Schneider yodelling clip) The meal was fine and the staff great. My friend had dined there before and was remembered by the delicious German waiter Michel. He was very sweet indeed and a right charmer. 

I could not believe how busy the city was, busier than daytime, I think,  heaving with people out on the warm night. All dining venues seemed packed and no doubt the hidden laneway bars were booming too. 

So, it is rather nice to be a retired gentleman with time to read Proust and Dostoevsky... maybe I'll make a start tomorrow. 

Did Jass think the old dishwasher should stay? 

Feline Friday

We had three cats, Millie, a rather wild and free spirited cat who only saw us as a source of food. She was rarely inside and was hit by a car one night, and fixed up by a vet, but shortly later hit by another car and deaded. A neighbour found her body beside the road. I would imagine Jass might be like her if she was an outside cat. 

We inherited Thomas and Scruffy, both boys. Scruffy could be affectionate but not as much as the beautiful gentleman Thomas. We loved him and he loved us. He was a large black and white pussy.

None were hard work like Jass. Perhaps it is because she is not out in a garden roaming. She took a hate on Phyllis for a while, because he was too loud and noisy, and he picked her up, which she does not like. She would hide away when he was around. She seems to be over that since he has stopped picking her up. Because I am home more often with Jass, slowly I have earned her trust. I never forced things, but let her get used to me.

I introduced her to the balcony, which I was quite fearful about, mostly because there is a gap below the balcony glass wide enough for her to fit her body under if she flattened out, but she has been good, just sticking her neck out. I must say, she is a very 'interesting' cat with a strong mind of her own. I expect she would be an excellent hunter and a good mother. 

Rub her belly, and her claws will come out. 

Phyllis can't easily pick her up here. 

She will sleep an awful lot during the day, if it just me and her here.

Jass was interested in the falcons who nest on a city building, and this year successfully reared three chicks. 

She finds all sorts of places to sit, and then never goes there again.

Thanks for that Jass.

Kosov had a bubble maker. She was not interested. 

She gets up, I tell her to get down and she does, until the next time she gets up.

The Christmas tree was a work in progress and overnight, Jass quite damaged it. She had sore eye the next day, I guess from being stuck in the eye by a fake pine needle. 

Monitoring Rover. She is quite confident with it now and would not move, which upset Rover as he couldn't find his way to the Cook's Area.

Kosov closed the toilet door overnight, where Jass' litter trays are. Luckily she hadn't needed to go until I was up the next morning and noticed the door was closed. Jass left a note.

Bosh and botheration, and Bosch

My dishwasher is eight years old and if it washed every day since it was bought, it could have washed a load of dishes nearly 3,000 times. Obviously when we were away from home, it wasn't used. Occasionally it missed a day because we had dined out, and rarely, it did two loads a day. Since Phyllis and Kosov moved in and I insisted they use the dishwasher rather than washing dishes under running water, it was probably averaging three loads every two days. 

It was a Bosch (note past tense, I'm building momentum) and one morning I rose to unusual pumping noises and displaying an E15 fault on the display panel. Google quickly told me it was water present in the base tray under the unit and a float mechanism, like one in your toilet cistern or horse trough, for reasons to prevent an overflow of water, had caused the fault. 

Turning it off and on again at the powerpoint did not help. Kosov emptied the dishwasher and washed its contents by hand. Next morning I arose and pressed the on switch, and thank goodness it switched on like normal. Just a minor glitch, and now fixed. 

About two weeks later, the day after I bought Rover, the iRobot, the same thing happened, but it didn't fix itself the following morning. We learnt it would work if we turned the inlet tap off it had finished washing, it would work again. That is clearly not going to work long term. I called an appliance repairer we had used before, a long time ago though, and no, they won't service Bosch appliances. 

I called Bosch, and arranged for a bloke repair technician to visit and repair. The cost was $200 for half an hour, plus parts, plus more if it took longer than half a hour. After pondering for a few hours and looking at prices for new dishwashers online, I decided to cancel the appointment and buy a new one. This is a rather unexpected expense, but what else can I do. 

The Good Guys had a cheap price for a replacement, also a Bosch and much the same as the old one, I was prepared to pay for delivery, removal of the old unit and installation, until I was told the delivery company would no longer take away old dishwashers as they leaked water on to the floor of their precious vans. I paid just for delivery. 

What I also learnt, which both the old and new dishwasher have, is the as I described float to cut water off if the float rises, but also that there is an electric wire running up the inside the outer casing of the inlet hose, to a cut off valve where the hose connects to the tap.

The machine was delivered around 5pm last Sunday. I was is no mood at that hour to deal with it so, it messily sat in the 'eatery' until the next day when Kosov installed it under my instruction. 

It is not an exciting appliance, just doing the job the old did. But it has completed the transformation of the kitchen from white goods to stainless steel; fridge, microwave and now dishwasher, all in twelve months. 

Jass helps to remove the plastic wrapping on the new dishwasher.

After unwrapping, the dishwasher sat there overnight.

Compared to hand washing, whatever the ratings, it uses less power and water. 

Jas viewed the installation of the new machine from a place of temporary comfort.

Voila! Well done me and Kosov. 

But we now have the old unit to get rid of. My bedroom is ahead and while Phyllis' and Kosov's door to the left is ajar. Jass can enter if she wants, but prefers to just guard the room. 

iRobot for I

Off and on Ray and I used to talk about the merits of robot vacuum cleaners and buying one. We could never justify the expenditure when we had a perfectly good stick vacuum cleaner to clean not such a large area. Unlike getting out the old barrel model, unwinding the extension cord and putting the hose into the vacuum shaft and head, the stick vacuum cleaner was simply taken off its wall mounted charging stand and it was ready to go. For here, with just the two of us, it was perfectly adequate.

The lads will vacuum whenever I ask them but they are rarely proactive about doing so. At times they have a cleaning burst and it will be done.

I confess, me getting one though would be nothing but a toy to play with, however with two people and them cooking a lot, along with Jass' fur, I was thinking about it. Then a blogger mentioned she had one, and although there is just the two of them, a lot of fur will be shed in their abode.

The straw that broke the camelus back was when Ex Sis in Law mentioned she had bought one. Now she doesn't have money, but maybe there is some kind of cause and effect thing happening there. Right, I want one.

I researched and found the one I wanted for a good price, so meet what Phyllis named, Rover. 

We firstly sent it off on a mapping run, which it did successfully, and has been continually adjusting the map since. Kesav worked on putting names to the rooms. 

My room is Andrew's Chambers, with my ensuite called Andrew's Retreat. Their room is simply PK and the spare room is called Rover's Room, where the robot's base station is located.

The main bathroom is called Shower with the toilet called Potty. The kitchen is Cook's Area, the dining area, Eatery and the lounge area, Jass' Play Room.

The machine is great and continually refines itself, doing less strange things than it originally did. With water and a couple of drops of detergent, it also mops the tiled areas, as directed by how you set up the map.

Jass initially followed Rover around, always keeping a safe distance but its path is not always predictable. Then she started to ignore it, but once again as I made this video today, she was on watch.

Rover returns to its base after vacuuming and mopping the kitchen floor and then empties itself into a bag within the base unit, which is when it makes a loud noise. 

Had I known what would happen a couple of days later, I may not have bought Rover. That will be in a later post. 

Marysville 3.1

I meant to include a photo with today's post, but I forgot. 

As I've already shown, Steavenson Falls now. It's worth right clicking and opening the very large version.

The same falls after the 2009 fires.

Marysville 3

The Taggerty River flowing over the Keppel Falls has this interesting mini falls. I noticed on the Google map, the head of the river, with me assuming the rivers in the area flow south to eventually join the Yarra River. How ignorant. The Black Spur is a watershed and rivers flow north to eventually join the Murray River and not south as I assumed. 

It was time to leave Marysville and I drove the Black Spur, in misty rain. It was rather atmospheric. While I drove faster than Phyllis, still I accumulated cars behind me wanting to travel faster, so I pulled over once to let them pass. 

We stopped off at Maroondah Dam and after parking, we walked to the dam base. Under a shelter, I guess it was a family group together having a barbeque early lunch. While I have a couple of umbrellas in my car boot, there was no indication of rain, but down the rain came. We took shelter under a tree. "Kosov, there is no point in all of us getting wet. Just you run to the car to bring back umbrellas". By the time he returned, the rain had stopped. Someone among the family group was playing a guitar and singing an Asian song. It was nice to hear. I would have liked to visit the top of the dam wall and walk across, but rain had dampened our enthusiasm. 

While we sheltered under a tree, I noticed these interesting fungi. 

The next stop was a small shopping centre on the approach to Healesville for food and coffee, with a surprisingly good double espresso from a terrific bakery. The misty mountain was where we had driven.

While petrol was generally selling for about $2.15 a litre (AU$8.14 a US gallon), in Lilydale there was a self service unstaffed outlet selling for under $1.60. We filled up going and returning. 

Here we go, artwork at the other end of the Mullum Mullum tunnel. We are approaching home. It was a lovely time away and I could have stayed longer. 

So, two nights away with Phyllis and Kosov went very well. While I have spoken strongly to them a couple of times when I was unhappy with things around my home, we've never had an argument. No one has sulked or gone no speakies. I do bite my tongue at times over minor things, thinking this is really not so important.