The motorhome is in hospital

If you read of our South Island adventures you may remember my writing about leaks in the lockers on the internal walls adjacent to the awning brackets. We thought the problem may have been solved by Luke down in Cromwell, but when I got up on the ladder and looked, it was clear that with the awning on, there was no way to access the brackets and make them water-tight.

We decided we would get Freeway in Plimmerton to sort it out thoroughly - Luke only had an hour and we couldn't leave the motorhome overnight as we had a few time-dependent arrangements on our way back up to our ferry booking.

And since coming back from the South Island, we had a few days away in Kuratau with the Zero Degrees Club, where it rained and the leaks manifested themselves markedly, dammit. 

And while we were getting ready to head up to Kuratau, I noticed that the mechanism that holds the monitor for the rear view camera on to the windscreen had let go, and all that was holding it on was the tape I'd left on from the last glueing - and that was supposedly the strongest glue around. Nope! 

That made three glues that failed: Araldite, Superglue and the windscreen glue. Rather than having David hold it for me all the way to and from Kuratau, he was dispatched to the toolbox to find the electrical tape and I wound the tape around the driver's side sunvisor and the monitor. It worked and was what would be described in NZ as a number 8 wire solution - not elegant but functional.

So there were a few items on the list for Freeway:

• construct a dashboard mounting for the monitor and
• re-route the monitor's wiring so it is as invisible as possible on its way to the new mounting
• remove the awning and its mounting brackets
  
• sort out the leaks and seal all brackets with new sealant
• test for water-tightness and remedy any other leaks found
• and leak test them too
  
• warn me of the possible price so I could have a lie down in private...
• and go AAARRRGGGHHH!!!
   

The leaking was more substantial than we had thought (the sealing strip that goes from the bottom of the portside wall [passenger's side] up and along near the top and then down that wall near the rear was taken off and they found water; they also found water between the skin of the roof and the skin that goes from the side of the roof over to the aforementioned sealing strip; and I asked them to check the same locations on the starboard/driver's side - it's fine; they have replaced the sealant and the fixings for the solar panels). 

Note that it is not surprising that the sealant has broken down after 7 years - NZ's sun is vicious and the UV here plays havoc with northern hemisphere sealants.

So the mh has been in hospital for about 3 weeks now - not always being worked on but it looks like I will be able to collect it on Tuesday or Wednesday next week. I think we can just afford it, but no new toys for David for a while, and I may have to slow down on my kindle book purchases...
 

There is a difference between cayenne and paprika ...

The other night I decided to try a recipe I had seen on facebook. It was spiced roasted potato and cauliflower with chickpeas on a layer of hummus. It sounded yummy as well as being protein rich.

So I set about getting it prepped and had to guess at the spice quantities because the recipe didn't give them - it was a video with commentary but no written instructions. So I was quite generous with the paprika and the cumin, and when it said to add more after the original tossing of the ingredients together to coat them evenly, I did so, also generously.

Into the oven it went and then I put the ingredients away. WTF?! What I thought was paprika was actually the cayenne pepper, dammit! All of my spices are in square jars with red lids, and the cayenne lives on the top of the rack on the far left. It's the one I use most because it's in my cheese scones.

I had automatically reached for it and not even checked its label...

Sure enough, the roast veges and chickpeas were too hot for me - I knew they were going to be because I had to turn the rangehood on to remove the chilli choking phenomenon that occurred when the heat of the oven released the pungency of the cayenne... 

I did give it my best shot at eating them - smothered in plain yoghurt! Even so, I had to give at least a third of what I'd served myself to David.

The next night, he had the leftovers (I still have not mastered cooking veg meals with a quantity suitable for two) and I had roasted a kumara, a small carrot and a small parsnip with a little bit of paprika (yes it was) and thyme from the garden. I made a guacamole to go with my plate of veg with just a small amount of hummus. I didn't need yoghurt ...

Another cooking blunder that I made a couple of weeks ago was when I made pastry in the food processor. I was so enraptured with how quickly it whizzes into breadcrumb-like texture that I kept whizzing. Doh! The pastry tasted fine but it was a bit tough. And we had guests that I wanted to impress, dammit.

To be honest, I am not sure if it was over-whizzing or if egg wash and cooking the pasties at 190 deg C were the problem. I'd usually cook pastry a bit hotter and faster than that. Either way, I'll be whizzing for a far shorter time in future!

My sister came to visit!

 From Friday to Sunday we had my sister Dee come to stay, and it was just fabulous to have her here.

We didn't do much to entertain her but she did get to sample life here in Parkwood:

• on Friday afternoon, shortly after she arrived she came with us to a talk by a Bank of NZ man about the latest scams and how to avoid them - it was very well attended and extremely interesting. 
• Apparently the latest scam doing the rounds is being phoned by someone impersonating a police officer who instructs you that your bank is involved in fraudulent activities and that you need to withdraw money from your credit card account immediately. You mustn't tell anyone and you certainly mustn't tell the bank staff why you are doing so. You are to lie and say you need the money for renovations of somesuch, because the bank staff you interact with are very likely in on the fraud. The banks are aware of this scam and are making sure that their staff interview customers to find out why they are withdrawing so much cash. Obviously some customers get tetchy and are anxious that they are being stopped by fraudulent bank staff, but the staff have to persevere because otherwise people will be scammed out of a lot of money.
  
  
• on Friday evening Dee came to drinks and quiz night - a lot of fun. I tried to be well behaved and quiet, but failed spectacularly in that endeavour... It appears that I cannot stop myself yelling Yes!!! when we get an answer right.
  
  
• on Saturday as a committee member, I was on Notices at the weekly morning tea, so while I did that, Dee and David went for an extensive walk around Parkwood, stopped and spoke with several people, and generally enjoyed the sunshine and lovely grounds.
  
  
• I had promised Dee cheese tart for Saturday dinner, so I made a large one - she loves cheese tart and so do we...
  
  
• Dee was keen to catch up with Bruce and Gary so I got us invited for afternoon tea. I got a chocolate brownie cake out of the freezer (actually the half I had abstemiously frozen to save David and I pigging out on it after the other half had been consumed when we had friends around for dinner).
• Gary though had made delicious cheese scones (the MoF recipe that I use) and pikelets and other friends had turned up with plain scones, so we ate heaps.
   
• We agreed when we came home that we didn't need dinner because of the piggy nature of afternoon tea consumption. But an hour or so later we agreed that a small piece of cheese tart would be in order.
• so I cut each of us a small piece and heated it and delivered it it: Dee and I were in the lounge and David was taking advantage of Dee not being in the office/bedroom to do a bit of work. Dee and I were happy with the portions I provided but ACP felt very short-changed. So out he came and asked if he could have more. Trusting that he was too full to want much, I said yes.
• Later I went to cover and refrigerate the cheese tart only to find his SMALL extra piece was the same size as the piece that had fed all three of us originally! Dee and I agreed he would have to have less for brunch the next day...
  
  
•  On Sunday morning we had brunch - not the usual breakfast fare, but cheese tart and coleslaw. We kindly let David have an equal share, by the way. I made a batch of cheese scones for Dee to take back to Kurt and Charlotte.
  
  
• Dee headed away just before noon - it was a short but very lovely stay with us. 

Some non-Parkwood stuff:

• Mel slept on her bed - Dee and Murray were big fans of Mel, so of course Mel needed to be supporting Dee while she was here.
  
  

  

  💙💚💛💜

  
  
  
• David and Dee have a longstanding close sibling-in-law relationship - it's 50 years since Dee came to live with us for a bit. And they are very close. However, she also gives him a very hard time, just as I do. So if he thinks he'll have it easier while she is here - WRONG!!! Although she does offer him more sympathy than I do.
  
• Dee slept on our new armchair sofa beds in the office. David turned off all of the computers/screens/printer and relocated the huge digital clock that can be seen from outer space, so that she wasn't sleeping on the bridge of the Starship Enterprise.

We both had a nana nap after she had gone - the young tire us out ...

We have lost John

 When I wrote about  our Zero Degrees team get together in the third weekend of June I mentioned that it was likely that if we didn't get together again soon, we would lose someone before another catch up.

Well, it has happened - John, who I noted in that post was pretty poorly and incapacitated then with pulmonary fibrosis, leukemia and oedema, died on July 22 - a month after we had all got together. He was the 4th one of us to get Covid after the weekend, in spite of Adair's efforts to keep him isolated from it. And with his co-morbidities, it was the final straw.

So David and I and Jim and Judy went up to be there to support Adair and the three lovely daughters (Lynaire, Levonne and Danielle) whom we have known since they were toddlers. John hadn't wanted a funeral, so we had a wake instead.

In John terms, it was very quiet - if he'd been there in person the rock music would have been belting out, there'd be dancing and lots of alcohol consumed.  

However a number of people had come from work and a lot of us were old - it seems the days of raucous parties are over, more is the pity!

But we did sit around and talk about him and our times together. 

John was a stalwart for me when I headed to London to work three months before David finished up his job at Learning Media. John and I spent most Saturdays together, at first constructing Argos flatpack furniture for my apartment: a bookcase, a table and chairs, a bedside cabinet and a TV stand, then followed by a late lunch and wine at La Perla in Maiden Lane, Covent Garden. Lunch was always vegetarian fajitas, the wine was always a chilean sauv blanc - usually one bottle between us but occasionally two. That was always a mistake, especially the late afternoon when I came out of the Leicester Square tube station by the wrong exit, and headed down Oxford St and on to Regent St instead of the other way which would have got me closer to the route on foot back to Pimlico ... When I realised my error, I decided a black cab was the best solution! Home I went giggling about being drunk and loose and alone in London... 

Note: the reason John was available on Saturdays was because Adair worked nights caring for elderly rich people, and on Saturdays she needed to sleep. J&A lived in a house in Golders Green that was full of bedsits rented out to a myriad of people, with one kitchen and two bathrooms. So John had to be out during the day. A win win win obviously!

It is even more important that we increase our get-togethers - the number of them with a quorum could be severely curtailed, so any opportunity needs to be seized upon!

Big hugs, John.