So, it’s traditional for me to post something after my nights. I was vaguely thinking about looking at my essay* but I am seriously exhausted**. I am quite pleased though, despite the two days of awfulness having failed an essay (where Kathryn spent much time putting me back together and making me feel like a human again), and the exhausting shifts I managed for the first time since I started the job to get on my bicycle at the house and get off my bicycle at the bike rack at work. I didn’t push her up the final hill, I rode up that hill all smooth like. Well, okay, smooth might be overstating it.
But I rode up the hill. That’s still damn good. Not least because it was my FOURTH shift. So I’d ridden 18.5 miles already in addition to 4 busy shifts. I, therefore, am the win. Although my thighs might disagree.
Anyhow, I also did the same on the way home…sort of. Because I did hop off for… breakfast. Whee. I’ve realised that after a run of nights on the day that I need to stay up, I can stop on the way home in St Nicolas’s Market and get breakfast. I can do that and enjoy the sun…
Sadly you can see the sign for the cafe where I wanted to eat breakfast, and after my discovery today I’ll just be a bit slower leaving work – because they opened while I was sat eating my adequate-but-not-brilliant bap. Also, they do what I really wanted…proper breakfasty stuff.
I also spent some time photographing the decals on Molly. This is because looking for bits for the new bike I came across a few decal/transfer sites, and noticed that none of them had BSA decals, which is upsetting because (a) I rather like the ‘Keep Fit’ one, and fear it wearing off and (b) err, see (a). I actually even gave Molly a wash today, which is positively unheard of (but she had mud on her).
In other news, Adam came around today and dropped off some rather exciting things. See, a year ago I agreed to buy some bits to convert Rebecca into an EV. I finally actually paid a little while ago, and he’s dropped off a motor, a controller, a DC-DC convertor, a vacuum pump, everything except the batteries and charger. He also dropped off a variety of spare bits which might be useful or which I may flog off to raise money for the project.
I’m really, really quite excited about the prospect of this. Especially having spoken to NetGain who made the motor now residing in the garage. I really want this to be a project I do *well* and don’t want to hodge it together like so many of my other projects.
Indeed, looking at the god-awful remnants of the conversion from the car that they were stripped out from with their hacksawed non-square edges, and their clearly hacked about and filed to make it sort of fit hunks of metal I’m more determined to do it properly. Rebecca’s been on (and off, I suppose) the road for 43 odd years. I’d really like her to keep travelling for the next 40 (which’ll take me 70 years old) at least.
So I’m keen to involve people who actually know what they’re doing with this, and not just me dinking about on the edge of my knowledge.
So I’m very excited. But I can’t do anything apart from accruing parts until I finish this course, which is lots of nice motivation for me. My prize for finishing the course is getting Rebecca sorted.
And also, our vertical garden is doing well.
So that’s good too.
* I failed an essay on my course. Again. This does not give me great faith in my abilities, but Kathryn keeps reminding me that most people don’t try and do a Masters course at the same time as working full time, changing job and renovating a house, and that perhaps I should cut myself some slack. Also***
** Work last night was really, really tiring. I may have fewer patients to look after, but I think I now actually generally do a better job of looking after them. And given that the night before last my foot made a crunching noise and went on to remain painful whilst I slept, and thus I spent most of last night trying not to limp I think I did quite well. It’s also really painful and achey now. Ouch.
*** I’m not a hugely academic person. I mainly learn by doing. It’s not that I can’t learn by reading, I just…don’t find it as easy as learning practically or by experimentation. I make a better engineer than researcher. Sadly my course isn’t targeted that way.
