hard rubbish

Out it goes
Unclogging the yard

Every year, local government offers to take away hard rubbish that has been gathering. Stuff like old TVs, kettles, chairs, you know? Nearly anything too big for the wheelie bin!

I just do not have the patience or front for garage or yard sale. There you go. Maybe a few grand to replace, but any old junk just, to me now, has to go on the street.

The previous collection managed to clear some stuff up, like a huge old tent that was on its last legs, sorry dad, but it was finally given away, or crumbling away? I did not keep track of the steel poles, but I imagine it was gone quick!

The renovations of the spouting around the veranda a year ago or so left a lot of crap around, and which missed that last collection for the dead spouting somehow- or forgotten? Clogging up the yard. It could have been taken it to the local dump, for a fee... And no trailer at the time did not help.

But! It is all out on the street this week, earlier than required, sure, as... as it is old iron, and maybe someone could take it for recycling? A fine example of hard rubbish anyway. and the yard is unclogging slowly but surely.

Along with that stuff, there is also an old garden table or two, lots and lots of old bike stuff and wheels, gear that Son#2 has... left? For me to clean up...

The basketball pole assembly was a complete waste of time, some teens ruined the counter-weight, and it was used at the most just a few times and had fallen on the hoop a few times and thatt had broken off too. It was put out, and--- was MIA by brekky time!


All the old cookware, electricals, radios, teapots, anything I cannot keep any longer, mismatched twenty year old cutlery. A year old but rusty microwave. My first TV. Three LCD monitors- Dead ones. PC peripherals- obsolete. A coffee drip machine, waffle maker. The list is long. I mean, twenty year old stuff! Out it goes! A 35 year old radio that had stuttered to a hiss and wheeze, Tarn's.

I look in the shed, and oh dear, there might be some junk in there I have been keeping for too many years, like as in Just In Case, you know? Old bolts, hinges, jars of screws and nails, nearly junk, boxes, luggage, but not... The "timber" collection may end up in a bonfire.


The BBQ is looking haggard, to be nice, and is on notice... Anything else?

Maybe an old trampoline frame, a forty year old swing set... but still thinking on those- steel tubulars...

So someone's junk and trash is definitely someone-else's treasure.

The veranda is starting to look better, as well as the yard. Maybe this time next year, there will be only a graveled block left. I mean, I may even get rid of the lawn and garden, just pure minimalist upkeep!

Just me and a tent...

winning and losing

The last few weeks are not going to be greatly remembered for anything more than me making it to the winning old age of fifty. Greys through hair and beard, little pot belly annoying the aching back. Need a trim as well. Bothersome bloody life. Maybe I should be auditioning for St. Nick!


If anything, losing a bit of weight would be nice, but choc covered liquorice and a block of chocolate, a few rum and lite-colas is too much to pass up! And the new dinner plates are bigger than the old, and so I have to add a little more to make it look enough...

I noted to Son#2 today that I have not been at all busy with my model boats. Scratching time out for that is harder than I thought lately, or my enthusiasm has been quenched- been there- done that. Nearly full PVR[s], so I am not entirely stuck in front of the idiot box mindlessly sipping coffee or liquor or dozing off. Much.

However, minding the collection of pc's takes up a bit of time too- looking for needs to upgrade on the net, or googling and wiki-peering things also manages to distract and procrastinate things a wee bit. A bit of blogging and associated research and reading other peoples doings... I hated researching stuff at BCAE for a report or essay, but if it interested me, well!

Updating the genealogy... A death and birth in the family jungle meant booting up the older pc for a balance. It takes ten minutes to be warm enough to start pecking away! And marked off my mum's cousin Cutch, the first along that side of my grandmother's neffs-n-neeces. I think. And then added my cousins girl in the births ledger. Losing and winning.

The family wagon is back in use as the school taxi while daughter#1 recovers from a chipped fibula. It sounds terrible as I crank it up and move it down the road. The mechanic I used  for a service on the blasted thing last year was required to report back if it needed fixing- no report- so must be okay? Winning? Poor old car, been abandoned while using the van for nearly everything else. Long road trips aside of course- the van does not fit the family! Only me, work trips and HOBBIES and SPORTS equipment!(This is the Old Adelaide collection- similar in size to current, imagine nearly all of it on a Maza 323? No?, then here you go then)

The garden, as noted elsewhere, is starting to piss me off. The weeds and shrubs and trees all need a complete make over. Long live a concrete yard please. Or gravel. The grapevines have been looked after, a bit early but while the sun shines and I do not have to bend over- bugger it, cut it. The baby hedge is "still in nappies". The plan to make a new gravel path and reduce the greenhouse effect (using the lawn mower LESS) is still fermenting near the front of the brain, rising to the top of it as I trudge to the post box to collect the next bloody bill. At least on that front I have reduced some insurance costs due to being half a century old now... winning!

#2 sons pc

#2 sons pc was taking toooooo llllooonnnggg to boot up- and then was really slow as well. Like an old truck, took a while to get up to running speed.

I wonder whether it was all the bike and skateboard web crap he had been through, leaving nasty piles of stuff in there since the last exercise of formating his pc. Or the anti virus rechecking everything. And rechecking...

The computer shop would like nearly two hundred dollars to back me up on that.

That's nice I said. We did have proper anti this and that, thanks. 

He only had 5mb left out of 38gb, now really!

Out with old crap. Did that help? Nah. Took out a photo album collection- (a backup- 10gb)

Back up all the stuff you really want to keep. Okay. Weeks later- All backed up? Think sooo. 

Ah well. Bite the bullet, and bad luck as I am going in.... at two thirty Sunday afternoon. Start the format of said pc ( and have a shower while waiting- It was getting warm again) and started re-installation of the OS, AV and of course Chrome and to be done later--- iTunes. 

I was not going down the path of a five hundred dollar pc or netbook! No way! All the kid "needed" was music and a browser for hotmail and facebook... and maybe a wordprocessor. 

So, Microsoft still supported XP so there was monstrous downloading. Rebootings

In the meantime, after a time away for my TV time, and even after I said No Not Yet to iTunes because I was trying to get the little box going properly, there it was-  a search for music by iTunes- ARGGGG! 

Rebootings. Ad infinitum! I think there was duplication in there, but really, so much time.

And then, this morning. Finally, a last patch download and Hi Nibs Music finally transferred from the backup, and another rebooting...

But. NO SOUND, dad, iTunes did not work! 

So was the speakers plugged in- yes. Ok then, after work I will check it out.

Get back and... smaller speakers jacked in... and not working. 

The sound board was not included in the installation for some dang reason. So back to the hoarded boxes of old pc gear, haul out the motherboard installation cd, another Rebooting and LO and Behold, SOUND.

Eight hours at hundred bucks an hour... maybe that's why it is so expensive- psychological couch time for the experts after fixing up a dang machine......

Any thanks?  ... waiting.