:: Inspector Gadget

Wah! My latest gadget doesn't work. My new car has a CD player, so I haven't been able to listen to my MP3 player via the tape-deck adaptor. Last month I went in to an electronics store and asked if a CD adaptor had been invented yet. No, it hasn't, said the nice young man (they don't have personal jet packs yet either, or Star Trek-style replicators). But! There is this gadget which is kind of illegal so we don't sell it but you can get it on the internet.

Yes!! It ticks all my boxes already and I don't even know what it is!

What it is, is an FM transmitter. You plug it in to the headphone socket of your MP3 player and it broadcasts a signal which you can pick up on your car radio. How cool is that?

So I went on the internet and found one and ordered it and it arrived yesterday. There was no manual with it and it was different from the model I'd ordered, but it seemed simple enough. I read up on other transmitters and did all the right things. That is, I sat in my car for ages with the motor idling, stepping my car radio through the frequencies looking for a gap, then tuning the gadget to that frequency and waving the gadget round trying to get the radio to pick up the transmission. I don't know what my neighbours thought I was up to.

But it doesn't work, waaaah! And the firm doesn't answer my emails, double wah! Happily I bought it through Amazon, which has a policy whereby if a reseller doesn't refund then they will. It's not the money though - it wasn't that expensive - it's the disappointment! I really wanted it to work. Bah.

In other news, I have next week off to really get stuck into the DIY. I spent a sweaty weekend getting the blinds secured in the spare room and moving furniture around ready for the new bed, which arrived right on schecule on Monday and is nice and comfy. I still have a heap of work to do though, so a week off will be perfect. I also hope to do some long walks, weather permitting (it's apparently coming over from Russia, though Scotland will miss the worst).

Tomorrow I have to visit the marina to look at the latest redevelopment plans. I'm taking my camera and will post some shots.

No winner in the EuroMillions lottery tonight: the jackpot rolls over to £100 million next week. £100 million!

:: DIY oh why

How hard could it be?

The spare room needs some work, no doubt about it. I've ordered a double bed, so couples can stay in comfort. The window had a blind, a cheap one that was starting to sag in the middle because of the width it was stretching across. So the plan was to trim the blind back and fit it into the actual window space, and put up some curtains as well, for a "window treatment" effect. Flash, eh?

So I went to Ikea on Monday for curtains for the spare room and the small bedroom, which will now house the single bed. This room used to have a venetian blind, but it came crashing down during cleaning operations last month, smashing the brackets. After much mulling at Ikea (which, it being a public holiday, was crowded with people mulling and their bored, bawling children), I chose curtains, rods and finials, plus a nice frame for a gorgeous print Mum sent me for Christmas. Got home and realised I'd forgotten to get brackets for the rods. Sigh, tsk, etc. Yesterday morning I went back thinking that at least Ikea wouldn't be so crowded, only to find it was so insanely busy that the carpark was full. It felt crazy to have to battle the crowds for such a tiny purchase.

Last night I took down the blind, cut it to the approximate size, discovered it was still too wide and cut it again. Then I unscrewed the brackets and repositioned them, after drilling holes in the surround and causing a large crack in the masonry on one side. Sigh, tsk, etc. Fitted the trimmed blind into place, admired the general effect and rolled it up. Blind came crashing down. Sigh, tsk, etc. I've put it back up but I'll have to reposition the brackets somehow to make it secure.

The next step was to put up the brackets for the curtain rods, and that went fairly smoothly, apart from having to take them down again after discovering that the screw that grips the pole is positioned so that it couldn't be loosened in situ except with a very short screwdriver, which of course I don't have. By this stage I was too exhausted and filthy to contemplate hemming the curtains, so I haven't quite finished. But it's going to look lovely.

In between bouts of Ikea and DIY, I went on a few lovely walks. One was along Roslin Glen, which I haven't done for years. Bertie loved that one - a new walk! With extra mud!



Roslin Castle, right next to Rosslyn Chapel (which is under heavy scaffolding and doesn't look romantic at all). Click here for fascinating information about the castle, including the legend of the big scary dog. As soon as I let Bertie off the lead, just under the castle walls, he went hurtling off in the wrong direction. I whistled him back and he came flying, but didn't see me and dashed past, scaring the bejesus out of a young couple coming the other way. Maybe they'd just been reading about the legend!

:: Happy New Year!

Just back in from a big long walk around Holyrood Park, plus a side trip to Linlithgow. Holyrood Park was hotching today - there was the annual One O'Clock Run, the Bicycle Triathlon and Dogmanay, aka husky racing. Bertie was freaked out by the crowds and by the husky-racing commentary, which was echoing round the hills and crags. "HIKE AWAY hike away hike away ay ay HIKE AWAY hike away ay ay YIYIYIYI yiyiyiyiyi!!!!!!!!!" Poor dog was completely baffled. I had imagined the huskies would have been running on a trail in the hills, but they were confined to quite a small oval down on the flat by the palace, running just two teams at a time. I squeezed through to watch a couple of races but they weren't very thrilling: the dogs didn't seem to be taking them seriously at all, some teams were barely running & the mushers were having to scoot their carts along. Bertie was all a-tremble with fear and excitement - "Is she cold?" people asked constantly.

As it was a nice day I drove on past Queensferry to Linlithgow for a walk by the loch. It was much, much colder there, though, so we didn't linger.



I had a quiet New Year's Eve - quiet that is apart from the sound of a dog alternately barking and frantically trying to dig a hole in a corner of the livingroom. I phoned Pinky just after the Bells and had to raise my voice to be heard over the racket. You're supposed to just ignore them, according to the dog behaviourists, otherwise you can inadvertantly reward the activity. But it's hard to ignore such a carry-on! He'd been pretty good most of the evening; there were fireworks earlier but I left the radio on (Classic FM) and all the curtains pulled and he slept on. But at midnight there was a loud volley across the road and behind the house too.

I have another couple of days off and will spend them doing a spot of shopping and DIY. Faye's coming to stay next month, and then Margaret, Jean and Rachael in June, so I've decided to freshen up the spare room. I'm going to put a double bed in there, and move the single bed into the small bedroom that was my study before I got the laptop. I'm going to shop for a bed in the sales tomorrow. I'm also going to paint the small bedroom - it's the one room that hasn't been done yet. Both spare bedrooms need curtains as well, something else I hope to get in the sales. The small room used to have venetians, but they broke with a crash last month - the brackets snapped off.

I may move the old desktop computer into the larger room, I'll see what works best. The big spare bedroom is where Bertie's bed is, so he may have to move. I remember when I decorated my bedroom and moved my furniture in there: my kingsize bed happened to go where Bertie's bed was, and he just assumed I was giving it to him and was mightily pissed off to be booted off!