Well here we are at the end of another year. This one has been much better for me and another year I have not seen the inside of a hospital ward! Hopefully this year will carry on the way it will start and things will continue to improve and I can spend more time doing the things I enjoy and less time working.
So, a Happy New Year to you all and I hope you will continue to enjoy my posts
31 Dec 2013
30 Dec 2013
A Bit of a road trip
This weekend has seen us on a 600 mile road trip. We hired a little Chevrolet Spark as we only have a little 'run-around'
We started off going to Beaconsfield to visit my family. this is the town where I was born and spent my childhood in fact until I got married and moved to Slough. It is rather different now mainly due to large amount of gated houses, some costing several million pounds. However, the roads resemble what you would expect in some third world countries. You have to wonder where all the council tax money goes. Anyway it was a very pleasant day spending time with my parents, sister and her family.
Next, it was off to Govilon where my in-laws live. The last few years have been difficult as my Mother in Law suffers from Alzheimers. However, she has moved to an excellent ,friendly care home and they are both looking very well. It was great to see them and spend some time in this beautiful part of the country.
After this it was off to Stratford upon Avon. This is where our two God sons and Fiona's cousin lives. It is also of course the birth place of William Shakespeare it is also the place where my Wife spent much of her childhood and is yet another place that has changed over the years. Again it was great to spend time with family we don't see very often.
Given the weather we have had over the last week we were fairly lucky to avoid any serious weather conditions.
I am now a little tired having spent a lot of time on Motorways which is something I do not do very often.
I did have the APRS tracker running during the weekend and you can see the track here.
We started off going to Beaconsfield to visit my family. this is the town where I was born and spent my childhood in fact until I got married and moved to Slough. It is rather different now mainly due to large amount of gated houses, some costing several million pounds. However, the roads resemble what you would expect in some third world countries. You have to wonder where all the council tax money goes. Anyway it was a very pleasant day spending time with my parents, sister and her family.
Next, it was off to Govilon where my in-laws live. The last few years have been difficult as my Mother in Law suffers from Alzheimers. However, she has moved to an excellent ,friendly care home and they are both looking very well. It was great to see them and spend some time in this beautiful part of the country.
After this it was off to Stratford upon Avon. This is where our two God sons and Fiona's cousin lives. It is also of course the birth place of William Shakespeare it is also the place where my Wife spent much of her childhood and is yet another place that has changed over the years. Again it was great to spend time with family we don't see very often.
Given the weather we have had over the last week we were fairly lucky to avoid any serious weather conditions.
I am now a little tired having spent a lot of time on Motorways which is something I do not do very often.
I did have the APRS tracker running during the weekend and you can see the track here.
25 Dec 2013
Loads of memories
One of the items I bought Fiona for Christmas was a negative scanner. We have thousands of photos and Fiona has always wanted to get them on the PC. We picked one box at random and the memories were amazing! Photo's of work, family events and radio events I thought I had no record of. I will be posting them on Facebook as many are of friends and family.
https://www.facebook.com/chrisg4kvi/photos
https://www.facebook.com/chrisg4kvi/photos
Storms
We have been lucky here with the storm down mainly to our low elevation. However, on my dog walking today the results of the storm was evident, with fences down and the occasional roof tile missing. I have spoken to friends at higher elevation and people in Bath and the situation in places has been and is very serious. The tweet below shows just how deep the depression that produced the storm was.
RT @bbcweather: Stornoway reported a barometric pressure of 936.4mb at 1230pm today. Lowest recorded anywhere in the UK since December 1886.
— Met Office Storms (@metofficestorms) December 24, 2013
23 Dec 2013
Weather Station update
The weather station suffered a total loss of it's external sensors last week when the mountings holding it on the fence broke. I fortunately I had some spares and it is now back on line again. Where we are located is fairly low down and that is reflected in the current wind speed records. I have also been struggling with data loss between the laptop and the base unit. I have now traced that to a fault in the USB extension lead. There is still the problem with signal loss with the outside transmitter. This seems to be a combination of interference, low battery level and distance between the base and external transmitter. With the current storm still battery us I hope the new fixings will be man enough to ensure the station is still active in the morning.
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