......is lovely but expensive, I don’t know if it’s a man thing or
just me but I see all these shiny fittings and gizmo’s for doing things and I
just want to spend, take me to a shoe shop and I don’t want to even think about
spending (although eventually I have to).
So, apart from me being stupid and not realising that the
Chandler would be open on Sundays and closed on Mondays, this morning I walked
to the Uxbridge Boat Centre (having done the same yesterday to find out the
aforementioned fact) who have an amazing range of all things boaty it’s like
walking into a sweet shop but better (I’m not really a sweety person).
You know when you walk into a supermarket and ask the ‘colleague’
do you sell “xyz” and they look at you blankly (no offence intended if you
happen to be a ‘colleague’ no doubt you are not like this at all), well when
you go into a Chandler and ask the person behind the counter the same type of
question they not only know the answer but they also know of alternative
options, and are there to help you buy the right product for your needs, make a
profit, and hopefully see you again or someone you have recommended.
They did not have the identical pump to my defunct one, but
with a bit of searching came up with one that would do the job, mine was a
Flowjet, I now have a Jabasco, slightly less litres per min but for my
requirements it does what it says and the box. It is quiet, I believe now I
have heard the difference that the bearings or something similar were worn out in
the old one causing the noise I thought was normal and eventually the downfall
of the pump itself.
A real bonus was the fact that it was £72 compared to around
£125, whether it lasts as long will remain to be seen. I bought a spare
windless (the windy thing we use for opening the lock sluices) and a spare
facilities key (used for opening the padlocks that secure some locks, lift and
swing bridges, water taps and many other things), so that’s another century or
ton gone (£100), my boat maintence budget looks pretty pathetic have overspent
in Nov, Dec, Jan and now already in February, but I did allow a contingency for
the unforeseen initial purchases, ropes and anchors etc, and hopefully it will
start to level out soon.
I fitted the new pump straight away with just the actual
fixing position needing changing, I re-used the strainer from the old pump,
remarkably they were interchangeable and the Chandler knew this and told me
thereby preventing me from purchasing a new one unnecessarily, and all is good,
I have water flowing where water should flow.
I now have to think about whether to move on or not, the
weather is the primary decider, I woke this morning to find that it had snowed
overnight, just a dusting really but it was bitterly cold when I ventured
outside, so it’s back to the old “Do I, Don’t I” meanwhile I have walked the
towpath for a couple of miles in each direction, visited the town centre
(bought myself a Kindle), fitted some cling film type of temporary secondary
glazing (works quite well), cleaned the bath pump filter again, and spent a few
hours wandering around Lidl, cheap it may be but where is the ‘order’? it feels
like they just put things wherever there is a space.
Time for tea, I have taken to boiling the kettle on the
stove, it doesn’t make the tea taste better it just feels good.
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