Well, it has finally arrived.
After painfully slow speeds in France and fairly slow speeds here in Ripon we have finally got fibre optic.
It involved some preparatory work, namely moving the phone master socket upstairs where we have my playroom the study. What I found interesting was that after an engineer came to move the master socket our download speeds increased significantly from around 5MBit/s to 7MBit/s just because he tidied up the wiring.
According to this article the average for the UK is 26 MBit/s in urban areas and in rural Britain it's 9.9 MBit/s. As we've never had anywhere near 9.9 MBit/s that would make us less than rural.
Anyway, after a nice BT engineer visited us (all the way from Nottingham) on Friday, we now get (at first look until it settles down) 75.3 MBit/s down and 13.3 MBit/s up. That's more like it.
The slowest thing around here is now me.
Having parents and grandchildren staying with us at various times last week we took a hard look at what's on offer around here, so that both parents and children would be satisfied and entertained. What we found was quite amazing and provided a week's fun and entertainment for all.
On Monday we visited Brimham Rocks which let the childrens imaginations run wild. A great place which I visited as a child.
Tuesday we had a picnic at Fountains Abbey after which some of the kids returned to Brighton.
Wednesday, after one of Jan's sons returned to Hong Kong we took the remaining grandchildren on a boat on the river in Knaresborough.
Thursday we drove up to Bedale and spent an afternoon at Big Sheep, Little Cow, where the kids could see and touch a variety of animals, after which we visited a pick your own farm for strawberries, raspberries and blackcurrants.
Friday after picking up their mother Paula from the airport we had fish and chips at the Wetherby Whaler (at Paulas request) and popped into a delightful outdoor paddling pool in Ripon and then, last but not least, on Saturday we visited Newby Hall and the excellent childrens adventure park.
Sunday the remaining folks returned to Spain and we collapsed. What a good week, what good weather and what good memories.
It was a lovely sunny morning and Jan, still recovering from last week, decided that a day in the country was in order. This of course meant lunch somewhere and as we'd recently been made aware of a very modern, unusual sculpture high on the moors, a trip to Pateley Bridge was decided. First lunch, at The Sportsman's Arms in nearby Wath in Nidderdale. It's very dependable with a good range of starters and mains but not particularly cheap. We both had a main and pudding, a couple of glasses to drink and coffee and the bill came to £62. Jan's Dover Sole was huge and fresh and my ribeye tender and tasty. All very dependable and busy but get there by 12.30 or you might not get a table.
Then, a short drive away, The Coldstones Cut an impressive stone structure set very high on the moors with the added attraction of overlooking a huge, very deep, and impressive working quarry from which the stone was cut. To give you some idea of the size of the quarry, to the left of the picture you can probably make out a lorry. The lorry was absolutely huge, with ladders needed to get into the cab.
The climb up to the 'sculpture' was steep and I had to carry Jan part of the way (just kidding) but on the way down I had some fun. I passed a youngish boy and out of the corner of my mouth I said to him, 'It's rubbish, it's not worth the climb,' and walked on.
About 10 metres behind him his mother and other children were puffing away and I said to his mother, 'I've just told your son it's not worth the climb, I bet he starts whingeing.' After a few seconds I heard the boy say, 'mum, that man said it's rubbish.'
We turned, looked at each other and burst out laughing. Children are so predictable.
It's been eating away inside me, I've got to say it, but does anyone really give a toss about who the next Dr Who is?
In search of the next bit of mind numbing news, the BBC treats us all like 12 years old and even creates a special programme to announce it. Talk about dumbing down.
Dr Who is essentially a childrens' programme and has forever featured in the early Saturday evening schedule. I used to watch it as a child. I'm now a big boy and have moved on. There are no doubt some adults who watch it, but purleese, this is not worthy of 'news' slots.
Come on BBC get your act together.
We've had visitors all week and have been taking in all (well nearly all) the attractions suitable for a five and two years old.
Anyway, as if looking after family both young and old wasn't enough, I'm sitting on the edge of my bed when I drop something on the floor. With a bit of effort I get down on my hands and knees and start searching blindly under the bed, when it suddenly dawned on me that I'd forgotten what I was looking for.
In the seconds between dropping it and looking for it I'd forgotten what it was I was looking for. Either the travails of the week were getting to me or it was a sign of increasing old age. Scary.
When we moved back from France our English phones (PAYG from Vodafone) wouldn't work because there was no signal.
Network coverage at the time was pretty poor with all the carriers but according to the coverage maps 3 Network wasn't bad and they also had very attractive data packages, so we went with them.
Over a period of time it became obvious that their indoor coverage wasn't too hot so, over the last few days, I have been talking to them about a Home Signal box. A piece of kit (femtocell) that will boost your signal using the internet.
For some reason they go through a bit of a hoo ha before they consider that you should get one but eventually they admitted that my signal was poor and sent us one. What a difference. I've gone from no signal (or one bar) to a full four. Wow, excellent.
Now all I've got to do is get the system to recognise Jan's phone as well and we're sorted.
On the subject of watching comedians I'd noticed that one of our favorites had just announced a tour. I checked to see if he was appearing near us and the closest I could get was York.
No problem it's only an hour away so I started the booking process. I chose a Friday (not sure why, just can't get out of the weekend habit) but I could only get individual seats, we couldn't sit together. So then I switched to the day before, Thursday, and there was no problem.
What's interesting about all that? The booking was for November 2014.
We don't go to Middlesbrough very often, in fact this was the second time in as many years and the reason is quite straightforward. We wanted to see Sean Lock, who we both find very funny, and couldn't get tickets, because he was sold out in or around Harrogate, our preferred venue. We could however get tickets at a venue in Middlesbrough.
Whilst Middlesbrough is only about 45 minutes by the shortest route, like the previous time, we set off for a trip across the North Yorkshire moors with a stop for lunch in Levisham and a paddle in the sea (Jan not me) at Runswick Bay.
The Horseshoe Inn in Levisham is good. It offers solid, tasty, wholesome cooking that is not too expensive. Jan's belly pork and my lamb shank were both very good. The remote village of Levisham is situated up the other side of a steep gorge from A169 and it's not the sort of place that you come across by accident. We found the pub after a bit of research and it was a good find.
The detour to Runswick Bay was a bit of a trip down memory lane for Jan who, as a very young child, used to visit Middlesbrough for a holiday (do you know anyone else on earth who would visit Middlesbrough for a holiday?) and Runswick Bay was one of the places she went to.
Sean Lock, a standup comedian, was touring with his Purple Van Man show and we had tickets for The Town Hall. Looking at life through a skewed white van man perspective, he was very, very funny.
'Help me separate these, I've tried everything,' said Jan.
'Yeah, no problem,' said he. Except there was a problem and they wouldn't shift. Somehow two ceramic flower pots had got stuck one inside the other and they wouldn't budge.
'OK, which shall I break,' said he.
'I like them both,' said she.
'OK, I'll try one last thing before I break one,' said he. 'Where's the WD40?' Frankly I didn't think it would work. After about four minutes when lots of heaving and straining I put them to one side to wash my hands.
Suddenly there was a cracking sound and then, after another few seconds, another. Bingo, they pulled apart relatively easily.
Who's your daddy?
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