Yes - just a week to go now. We've got our tree - Jo and I drove down to Dess on Sunday and got it. It now sits on our balcony, unadorned and seemingly unloved. We need to unfetter it and bring it in to the warmth of the house soon.
Today (Tuesday) is Inverurie/Luca day and we're at Rae Circle for a change as Gary's not feeling too well, so we took Luca back to his Mum's. Talking of Luca, Jo's going in to panic mode as we still haven't got him a proper Xmas present. Perhaps we need to take a trip in to the city soon.
I've got 4 mini "projects" on the go just now. We got the old carpet removed from our en suite and had vinyl fitted instead. The issue I now have is with the wooden ledge that the shower tray sits on. The original plan was to paint it the same colour as the skirting boards, but Jo then suggested we could just treat/varnish the wood and leave it as is. OK - the only problem is the dark water staining. I've tried everything to remove the marks - sanding, even resorting to the dreaded Cillit Bang, which managed to bleach the wood but not remove the heaviest stains. Still a work in progress:
Project number two will probably have to wait until the spring - or at least a prolonged spell of dry weather. The summerhouse/hut is now complete but we want to reinforce and treat the floor to avoid rising damp. The external wood will need treated as well.
The 3rd job is replacing the broken shaver light above the mirror in our en suite. I've searched in vain for a similar sized replacement - it looks like manufacturers' built-in obsolescence at work again. Anyone got a spare one of these?:
The last job on the go is one I've made a bit of a mess of - again. I decided to have another stab at brewing some beer for Christmas. The materials I got this time were better quality and everything was properly sterilised beforehand and the temperature control was good - it's brewing in our en suite. My error was much more fundamental - I had materials to brew 40 pints, but my fermenting vessel only has capacity for less than half of this. I realised this half way through the process, by which time I'd used all the malt. Even at this stage, I probably could have retrieved something but I then went ahead and added all of the yeast, which naturally brought about a huge over-reaction in the too small fermenting vessel. I had to break the airtight seal umpteen times to avert the brew blowing the top off, thus probably allowing the brew to become contaminated. Nonetheless, I'm ploughing on until the hydrometer tells me the SG is low enough.
That's my trials and tribulations just now. The Xmas cards have all been written and posted in good time - just - so that crisis at least was averted.
We're still working our way through the Wine Advent calendar. We do have a few non-alcohol days during the week, so we always have a bit of catching up to do at the weekend!
Looking ahead, we're out for dinner on Friday night at Keith and Annette Gray's - that should be nice - and, on Monday, it's the annual get-together of our old football crowd with a match to celebrate Dave Williamson's Xmas Eve birthday. Of course, I stopped playing in this when I got my metal knee 5 years ago - as did a few others in a similar plight - but this year we're experimenting with something new - Walking Football - and it's indoors! We'll see how that goes. Meanwhile, I'm trying to get as much cycling in as the weather allows before the excesses of the next couple of weeks.
This time of year tends to be when families get together. I can remember when I was young I never quite understood exactly who was who when distant cousins, uncles, aunts etc all gathered - I wish somebody had drawn up something like this for us all:
