Author: peterb51

9th March 2026

I took my bravery pill and returned to Trowbridge, it was a grey day which matches the place perfectly.

The bus was on time, the driver was the same miserable git, maybe that was the job description, but he did have the opportunity to put his foot down passing stops with no one waiting.

I got to the coffee shop early, having forgotten what time we had to meet, fortunately Stephen Cooper was early, so it worked out well.

I was a little bit worried how our meeting would play out, I wouldn’t say we had a close working relationship, in fact we didn’t interact all that often, so in a sense it was my chance to find out who he was. I guess it was the same for him, maybe he was brave to agree for the meet, but any reservations disappeared, and we ended up having a great conversation. I left the coffee shop having got to know Stephen, we shared a lot of common philosophy, he was overshadowed by Steve Cox, but had proved himself, and if the Brazilian project had worked out he could have been a major player in International.

We agreed to meet next time I’m around, and I wished him good health, I then left the warmth of the shop and back to the land of the grey.

There seemed a long time for the next bus, so I started to walk back, there is nothing worse than waiting for twenty minutes in the cold and damp.

I was back in plenty of time to meet Derek, my ex-brother in law and electronics wizard who always helps me when I have a computer or hardware issue. The current problem was trying to move a software license from a website to a flash drive so that I could load it onto my system back in Holland.

If my Mac was new it would be simple for me to do, but web sites get upgraded and pretty soon they no longer load on the older machines.

However this task wasn’t as easy as it seems, the menus didn’t match the instructions I had been sent, and although we eventually found the licences they couldn’t be saved to the flashdrive. That was frustrating, and eventually we had to admit defeat, but Derek would not take defeat very easily, and would continue to work through the problem in his own time.

This technology annoys me, I have to buy the software, but unlike “the old days” when there  was a DVD, I would load it, and there it was ready to use. Nowadays it’s store on my account somewhere that I can’t physically touch, and, like today there is a uncrossable chasm trying to retrieve it.

8th March 2026

I was due to meet up with my friend Rob in Bath for lunch. The Temptation Indian Restaurant has the most amazing Masala Dosa, it’s what we have every time.

I got into Bath a little early, I took the opportunity to go into the BT shop, I had a question about what I pay for the broadband in the cottage. 

I explained to the lad my issue, and we sat in the corner as he tapped on his tablet. He agreed that it was on the high side. My gripe was that a new  subscriber would only pay a third of what my bill is, so where is customer loyalty?

There wasn’t a lot he could say. He did offer to reduce it by a third, the maximum he could do in store, that still seemed a bit high.

He then suggested that I have a business account as the cottage could be classed as a business,  now we were talking. This would drop my bill to about a third of my current bill. He said he could not authorise it in store, but went to call someone in a higher position. Unfortunately that person was not there so he booked a call to ring me on an agreed day to discuss and hopefully sort everything out. Let’s hope that works.

Meeting Rob outside the restaurant, was amusing, I could see him walking towards me, his white beard is a distinctive feature that stands out in a crowd.

As first he didn’t recognise me, my hair is a bit longer, which may have fooled him, but a second glance, and that was that.

We had our glorious lunch, catching up on all the latest news.

He dropped me back to the cottage, then drove off to resume his house sitting job in Wilton. We will repeat it all again next Friday.

The evening ended with a glorious roast dinner down at Ryan and Louise’s, she does the finest red cabbage, part of a handed down recipe, yum, yum.

7th March 2026 

There was a mist in the valley, drizzle was forecast and I was planning to complete the shed.

Ryan took me to Wickes so that I could get the feather board I needed for the job.

I have always considered myself as a problem solver, and what I was faced with was a difficult area of the shed to reach. I didn’t have a proper ladder that would have made the job so easy, I only had a step ladder. 

Most of the pieces of feather board I could reach , but as I got closer to the top it became impossible. I was unable to use the step ladder at all in the conventional way.

All I can say, and it would make a health and safety person faint, I laid the step ladder between two walls, albeit at an angle because the walls were at different heights.

That was a bit dodgy, even for me, because I only had the rungs to stand on.

Then my brilliance came into its own, I laid an old worktop on to the angled stepladder beam. This solved the problem of falling through the rungs, but not the angle. I then collected most of the offcuts and stacked them on the lowest end to raise the worktop to a much lesser angle. 

Now I had a platform to reach the higher places.

As I was fixing the last of the feather boards, Mike walked up the path pushing his bike, he looked across at my “platform” tutting as he passed. I shouted to him to not report me to the health and safety police. I had no fear, Mike wouldn’t report anyone to any police.

I managed to finish the work without injury, all that is left is the door, it’s a bit ragged, and that’s my final issue. I will give that some thought, I have plenty of off cuts, I might try something creative.

6th March 2026

I had arranged to meet Stephen Cooper at a coffee shop in Trowbridge. We reconnected recently on LinkedIn, as I was in the area I thought it would be good to meet up.

He was the Director of Manufacturing at Herman Miller but left in 2007.

This meant I had to travel to Trowbridge, a place with a dodgy reputation. It’s the kind of apocalyptic town where even Mad Max would say, “ What a shit hole”

I got to the bus stop in plenty of time, the driver wasn’t a happy soul, there was a grunt of recognition, but that was about as much interaction I got.

The bus started on its journey, no sooner as it got up to speed it had to stop at the next stop.

In fact the stops were so close together you could see them. Why there were so many? Maybe the council awarded regular passengers their own stop outside their homes, it was a bit ridiculous, but it just added to the excitement of getting to Trowbridge.

I was early, so I walked around the town looking at what was left, so many empty shops and ones selling cheap junk. The place felt depressing, which was a shame, I remembered when it was quite a bustling town, it had a brewery, a sausage factory and well established department stores, but that’s all gone.

By now I was dying to use the toilet, I knew there was one at the shopping centre. Another victim of redundancy, all the good shops had moved out leaving places where people can trade things for cash.

I followed the signs for the toilets, there was a notice on the door”Closed due to vandalism” 

How bad can things get when someone vandalises a toilet.

By now the time of the meet was drawing close, I made my way to the coffee shop called Leykers. It used to be a computer shop that I had used an a few occasions. The place looked pleasant, and they had a toilet, in I went, ordered a drink and a toasted tea cake, I was letting the boat out.

I found a comfy seat, the most comfortable furniture piece in the whole place, although once I sat in it I sank below the level of the table. It must have been amazing for others to see just my hands on the table.

It was now past the meeting time, I checked everyone entering, most were old ladies, the whole of the downstairs was occupied by them, I was the only guy. I protected the spare chair in the hope that Stephen would arrive soon.

Well I waited over half an hour, and there was no sign, not even a message, so I finished the dregs of my coffee, got up and left, disappointed that I had wasted my time.

I walked to the bus stop, it arrived, I sat upstairs, then a message appeared on my phone apologising that he had marked it down for Friday of the next week. We rescheduled for another day, hopefully that will go better, but I will have to suffer Trowbridge again.

4th March 2026

This was a work on the shed day. It was a glorious day, I changed into my grot work clothes and spent fifteen minutes putting on my work boots.

The area of the shed I was tackling, was the side with the door. That had to be removed first, I also had to remove the cladding that I had already fitted on a previous trip, but I had a different idea for that.

In the distance I could hear the buzzing of the chainsaws, in fact I hear that every time I am here, maybe they do it to annoy me.

As I was busy reframing the new door frame Mike, the guy that lives behind me, and re-roofed my cottage, wheeled his bicycle down the path. He had a tree sticking out of his saddle bag. “Is that some kind of antenna?” I quipped.

He smiled, and told me it was an ash sapling that he had extracted from a wall, and was taking it to replant it. He explained about a disease that is effecting ash trees in the country, he was doing his bit to try preserve them, one tree at a time.

I carried on with my task, I used up what material I had, and as the sun went away, and the evening drew on, I finished for the day.

Satisfied with my effort, I celebrated with a bottle of Old Speckled Hen, thoughtfully supplied by Nicola, cheers sis.

4th March 2026 

This was a work on the shed day. It was a glorious day, I changed into my grot work clothes and spent fifteen minutes putting on my work boots.

The area of the shed I was tackling, was the side with the door. That had to be removed first, I also had to remove the cladding that I had already fitted on a previous trip, because I had a different idea for that.

In the distance I could hear the buzzing of the chainsaws, in fact I hear that every time I am here, maybe they do it to annoy me.

As I was busy reframing the new door frame, when Mike, the guy that lives behind me, and re-roofed my cottage, wheeled his bicycle down the path. He had a tree sticking out of his saddle bag. “Is that some kind of antenna?” I quipped.

He smiled, and told me it was an ash sapling that he had extracted from a wall, and was taking it to replant it. He explained about a disease that is effecting ash trees in the country, he was doing his bit to try preserve them, one tree at a time.

I carried on with my task, I used up what material I had, and as the sun went away, and the evening drew on, I finished for the day.

Satisfied with my effort, I celebrated with a bottle of Old Speckled Hen, thoughtfully supplied by Nicola, cheers sis.

3rd March 2026

After the hectic experience of yesterday I decided to take things easy, and build up the excitement gradually.

I had a list of things I wanted to take back, including hard drives, cables, Tapes and  microphones.

I will be restricted by weight, but with careful selection it should be okay.

I had to venture into the shed, taking my life in my hands, I lifted the large plastic boxes down and rummaging through them found just what I wanted.

There also boxes of cables, that I needed to sort out. I emptied them all out and sorted them into audio cables in one pile, power cables in another and computer cables in another.

I found the hard drives, and set up the Mac to check they were the correct ones.

However I felt there was one missing, so no doubt there will be a frantic search for that.

I did start to cut back some of the overgrown shrubs in the garden, I will need to get the incinerator going to burn them.

 I took a walk, intending to visit an old school friend who I hadn’t hear from in a while. I had emailed and left voice messages, and not got any reply.

I knew he had some health problems, so I had concerns. I didn’t receive any reply to my knocking, all the curtains were drawn, and generally the place looked a bit neglected.

I saw a lady cleaning her camper van, and I asked her if she knew his whereabouts.

Although she knew of him, she didn’t know where he was , but she took me to a neighbour who would know.

Well I did receive a very detailed account of his current location, and his state of health.

She mentioned a ruptured diaphragm or something like that, it sounded pretty serious.

That explained everything, and I passed that information on to other school friends, if there is time I might try to visit him, but sometimes hospitals restrict visitors to immediate family only, we shall see.

I was really tired, and I fell asleep on the sofa, the jet lag had caught up on me.

2nd March 2026

It was a good flight, I didn’t have to get up to use the toilet, much to my relief.

I didn’t fancy disturbing the big guy next to me, who bloody slept all the way.

Arriving at terminal 5 was different. The aircraft was parked away from the terminal so we had to get on a bus to be transported there.

I always thought the building was interesting, designed a decade before it was built, it could not be modified to meet the extra demand it now has. You entered at one level, then climb to another, then go back down to collect your luggage. Crammed into tight elevators was not my idea of passenger conveyance.

I had to wait ages for the luggage to arrive at the  conveyor number five. I watched as others collected their cases, eventually I was on my own, watching a few odd pieces taking numerous laps around.

I was getting pissed, I had to find someone who handled lost luggage. 

I walked towards a line of people waiting by a counter, obviously having the same issue as me.

When it was my turn I explained my problem.

What followed was a lot of keyboard tapping and screen staring.

Thank god for barcodes. 

The lady could see where it was loaded, transferred and offloaded.

Eventually it was discovered on a different conveyor, number eleven!

There was no explanation why, I didn’t care, I just wanted to get out of there.

My next challenge was to get to the coach station over by terminal 3. 

That part was painless, apart from having to get a ticket to travel on a free train, more control I expect.

It is always a long walk through grim corridors to get to the coach station, but I walk at a speed that I don’t really notice. There is nothing pleasant about a coach station, it’s deliberately built to complement the miserable feeling of desperation. The plastic seats are cracked, how fat and heavy must a person be to crack an effin’ seat ?

The only refreshment is an order by screen experience, another hateful experience.

My breakfast bun must have been cooked in hell, it was so bloody hot, I had to gulp my coffee to cool my mouth, but I must say, the pattern on the froth was delightful, it almost made me forgot my third degree burns.

It was almost heaven to get on the coach. As it trundled out of the station, the sun shone down on me, I had survived.

As I settled in, listening to my music I was aware how slow the coach was going, then I noticed the “variable speed limit” signs, and the gantries with the cameras, WTF is going on?

I guess that it was a way of extracting speeding finds from the daily commuters who just wanted to get home every night.

I then noticed the patterns in the sky, these are not vapour tails, this is biological engineering.

I used to watch Concorde fly over Bath on its way from New York. You could see the vapour trail stop, and quickly disperse as it slowed down. These trails hang for ages, a criss-cross of white lines, there is something going on, and people are not questioning it.

Seeing my sister Nicola and her husband Colin is the best moment of my trip, it makes all the crap of travel worth taking.

They took me back to the cottage, where the overgrowth greets me. Things that I had cut back last year had grown back, that was on my list to deal with.

I had an invite to Ryan and Louise’s for a spag-bol, my first decent meal on British soil.

That is when I learned that they had scrapped the Shogun, that was a shock, and I was a bit peeved to hear that. “The alternator had gone” Ryan explained. Now in my day you FIXED the effin thing you didn’t scrap it. That one thing had messed up some of my plans, how to get rid of the garden waste? I can’t take that on the bus.

That I will have to deal with.

1st March 2026

Well the first of the bad news has started. I hadn’t even got to the airport when I was notified of a delay on my flight from Grand Rapids to Chicago by three hours, meaning that my connection was all messed up.

I thought that everything was going well, I had a seat in premium economy, and had booked my meal. I was looking forward to a leisurely flight with a bit of space around me.

Kelli had a bit more time to get her hair right, an important part of driving me to the airport.

She had organised a collection of a dresser on the way, talk about cramming things in.

We got to the address only to find it required quite a bit of work to make it saleable.

So we left it, if it’s still available in three weeks time that’s a different story.

So we continued to the airport, where the shit continued.

Checking my bag in I was told the flight had been cancelled and my ticket had been rebooked to a different flight. 

I then discovered my London flight had also been changed to a BA aircraft, so I guess my premium economy ticket had been lost, my temperature was rising.

I then discovered that the BA flight would land at 11.30am one and a half hours after my coach leaves.

National Express are full of sympathy for travellers who miss their connection because of cancelled flights, NOT!

I had to book anther coach at additional cost, Bastards!!

Of course BA flights land at terminal 5, I would have to find a way to the coach station, it just gets better.

The flight into Chicago was okay, it wasn’t full, I had a window seat. There was a young girl on the isle wearing a mask, she was so thin, I expect she put the mask on in 2020 and didn’t have the strength to take it off.

There was the usual quick flight across the lake and then once landed, it took the same amount of time to get to the terminal.

I located the gate where the my BA flight would start from, I had plenty of time, so I thought.

I decided to find a place to get a coffee, most of the food places were closed, but I did find a Starbucks. While I was waiting, I thought I heard my name over the public address, I wasn’t sure.

Just to be sure I speed walked back to the gate, which was empty. I rushed up to the desk, and they confirmed that they were trying to locate me. I was rushed through, of course everyone had already boarded and fill all the overhead lockers. One was located in a different part of the plane, I just had to remember which one it was.

I then settled back, I didn’t get an isle seat, as I usually have, but I was seated in the BA equivalent of premium economy, so I was relieved, the seat did recline quite a bit , nice touch, I just hope I don’t want a pee during the flight. The guy next to me was quite a big fella, both he and the seat became one entity.

28th February 2026

There was a lot of running around, Kelli had found some chairs for free. Now free usually means crap, so I was not surprised. Two of the chairs were complete, one had rails missing and another had rails that had fallen out.

Normally not a difficult job to reassemble, but because I am leaving tomorrow, the pressure was on to get at least the one with all the bits back together.

We had been to both Goodwill looking for furniture that Kelli could work on that weren’t too heavy, but there was not much there.

Then we delivered the combination wardrobe/ dresser to Lloyd and Nancy. We asked them to join us for lunch, we had tried to arrange dinner several times, but there was always a reason why that never happened.

Went to Joe to go, a small breakfast/ lunch place for something modest and quick. 

We are alway aware that Winnie is locked in her cage, she doesn’t seem to mind, most of the time she sleeps, but knows instinctively when we return. We can hear her high pitched bark as soon as the truck stops, oh, and the snow is back.

We braved the driving stuff to take the dogs for a walk, they must have hated us for that.