Christian Ainley my day to day

  The Long Walk Windsor It’s my single rest day this week, it’s pay day and I have the day to my self which means I can go for a long hike and treat myself to lunch out on the way home. One of my favourite places to walk to is up the long walk in Windsor to the statue of George III on horseback. There’s a sense of accomplishment as you start out on the long walk there are lots of people milling about but the soon thin as you get further and further from the castle. Destroyed traffic light I waited in for most of the morning because I was expecting a parcel. The text message I received told me it was coming between 08:11 and 10:11 which isn’t so bad, I heard the postman delivering the rest of the post and expected the door bell to ring but instead I received a text, we tried to deliver your parcel but it appears you were not home. Obviously I was home and went to look for the postman but he was long gone. So I set out on my walk I had to walk through Slough town centre which I’m sur...

 I hope that you will indulge me but I want to look back at some of the places I’ve visited this year. I was looking through my camera roll on my phone and the Teufelsburg just on the outskirts of Berlin really stood out.  It started out as a place to dump rubble and dispose of the ruins that Berlin had been turned in to by allied bombing during the latter stages of World War Two. Gradually this grew into a very large hill that over looked the city below.  American intelligence agencies saw the potential in building a listing post to pick up radio transmissions from east Berlin and the GDR/DDR below as all this was inside the British sector at the time they also built a listening post.  With the fall of the Berlin Wall, Germany reunified and the ending of the Cold War the listening posts became redundant and were abandoned. The option on the lease was purchased by developers but lapsed before it could be used.  The listening station became a home for artists and...

  Moleskine notebook After a month of writing in the cheap Castelli notebook it’s back to Moleskine and is nice smooth paper the takes the ink so nicely, it’s also bigger being just under A4 so it will last me for months well assuming there are no more dramas like the washing machine ! 

    The test of the Bosch washing machine didn’t go all that well a puff of smoke from the soap draw and it’s jammed shut, luckily it’s only a flannel in side so it can be sacrificed. Also lucky it’s Black Friday tomorrow so a Quick Look in the sales and I’m going back to zanussi I had my last one for 8 years but in fairness I lived alone and only used it once a week ! 

  While washing a load of clothes last night and as we were waiting for the washing machine to finish before getting ready for bed the washing machine throws an error code E:18 on a Bosch washing machine it’s a drainage code so I get on my knees open the little flap unscrew the inspection hole and what did I find, the inside of a biro the plastic bit that has the ink in it. I be pulled it out and put the machine on for a quick was and another E:18 code.  It’s now the following day and I’ve had another look in the inspection hole, spun the impeller and it seems fine. So after putting it all back together I put a flannel in for a quick wash and a test 5 minutes E:83 control board error. I consult the Bosch website and the solution is to turn the machine off wait and the turn on and test. I’m most of the way through the test and all seems fine. Well it’s 4 in the afternoon so it would be, I think it’ll hang on until a midnight wash then put all the lights on like a disco just to ...

You can sit at home and earn $100 a day just download solitaire clash ! Someone’s going to have to explain the economics of this to me. How many adverts would you have to sit through to earn $100 and I’m guessing you would be splitting it with the app creator. It’s pennies for views so you must have to constantly watch adverts for hours to get anywhere. Your brain would turn to mush !  S

 I write a personal journal everyday and I get through a lot of note books, I like to write with fountain pens as they give great feed back and are very tactile.  I saw some of these Castelli note books for sale and for a very good price, well that should have been a clue the paper isn’t very good. I might be fine for ballpoints or rollerballs but for fountain pens forget it hopeless. The ink sits on the paper for a long time and pools when you have a heavy stroke. “It’s your pen !” I hear you all shout in union, well I’ve used lots of different fountain pens and they all smudge from low cost school pens to top of the range piston fillers with premium ink. 

 When I’d finished work it was a quick drive over to the gym. After my walk yesterday I’d developed a few niggles at work today, some hot spots on my left knee were a bit of a concern but I thought I’d play it by ear and see how it went.  I started with cross trainer intervals for 30 mins if the knee was going to give out this would surly put it under the most pressure but it was fine. It was on to a chest workout narrow machine chest presses to start not heavy 25 kg and building up from there. It was on to cable flys I would normally try and stay on machines to start with as it’s less dynamic and stressful on cold muscles but they were busy so it had to be cable flys, again a light start at 13.5kg a side and building up from there. The decline chest press station was free so it was on to there just starting with 10kg a side and building up. It was the incline station as it was next door and a similar weight nothing too heavy. The fly machine was empty so on to that a bit heav...

Since visiting Berlin earlier this year and falling in love with the biggest little city in the world (their words not mine) there has been a growing surge to watch tv shows set in and around Berlin. Yes we’ve looked at Berlin station the spy drama set in and around Berlin and it was fun. So when this mini series was recommended on channel 4’s online app I thought we’d give it a go.  The first thing I have to point out is that it’s all in German (duh) so you’ll have to read the subtitles. But its worth it. You’ll follow three generations of the same family in the latter stages of the GDR/DDR (East Germany) the older generation has political influence the middle is a cautious rebel and the younger is much more overt in their rebellion. You’ll see how eastern Germany was exploited by the west and how eventually under a collapsing economy East Germany was forced to admit defeat and open its borders. Of course there’s romance, violence and manipulations a long the way.  If you hav...

 Back to work this morning and allowed extra time as I didn’t cover the windscreen yesterday so had to wait for the windows to defrost, lucky it wasn’t that thick so I was soon on my way.  I was listening to a Chat eau pod cast I had the last 8 minutes to finish off from an episode I started yesterday. When it finished it was All I want for Christmas on the radio it’s November 26th surly it’s to early for Christmas, I think it should only start in the media on December 1st what do you think ! 

 Post apocalyptic thrillers are here Apple has Silo and Amazon has Fallout. Apple were first to screen with Silo. Apple doesn’t do things by half and they have put in a lot of money and effort in to Silo and there are even a few Easter eggs in there if you’re of the right mind. I’m sure the space suits are clones of 2001 a space odyssey !  Rebecca Furguson ( Mission Imposable Fallout, Dune )is brilliant as Juliette and you’re soon routing for her and her battle against authority and politics. It’s a thriller with many aspects and multiple threads and even a few dead ends but it’s well worth a look. Oh I would recommend watching it in a darker environment as it’s a very dark print to emulate being under ground. 

  As it was drawing up to mid-morning and the sky outside looked clear and blue with white puffy clouds I thought I should take the opportunity to go for a walk and get some fresh air at the same time having stuck inside with the bad weather. I thought I might also be able to get some dramatic photos of the aftermath from storm Bert, ripped up trees blocking a footpath or road way maybe even collapsed into the lake.  Sadly by the time I got to the park it had all been cleared away and was now sitting as piles of logs by the side of those footpaths and road ways so the dramatic pictures didn’t come to pass.  However I did start listening to a new book on Audible at the moment it’s free if you have a membership, Bush war operator by A.J. Balaam. At the moment there are a lot of books on Audible about the war in Rhodesia during the 70’s and the white minority trying to cling on to power and what it was like to fight in the special forces that were trying to counter the commu...

  I’ve been on a reading binge lately and I’d got to the point where I started looking for my half read books and came across this one in a draw.  I feel it deserves a post, I’m sure most of you will think this looks incredibly dull but you. Would be wrong, yes there’s lots of technical information about construction and legal segments but it’s all broken up and presented in a fascinating read. It’s really light and easy to get through the chapters in fact you’ll even look forward to the next. 

  Last night I started watching the second series of Tracker. It stars Justin Heartly the ripped triplet from This is us. I watch the first season of Tracker and it was ok it had some good story lines and a little bit of depth here and there. In its second season it’s trying to progress by adding an antagonist to the plot line. Yes this makes the series more viable going forward but it’s not very strong and a bit scatter gun. Am I watching Tracker, X files, The outer limits ? Just return me to those charterers with their backstory’s it was good and develop it slowly 

Welcome to my blog it’s my second attempt at a blog and yes I’m 25 years too late to the party but hey you have to start somewhere. Ok just a shortt one to start !  What am I up to at the moment ? Well I’m trying to get back into the gym after a heavy cold and I’m listening to a podcast by Dick and Angel Strawbridge from Escape to the Chateau. It’s called Chat eau and it’s worth a listen and you can also try to watch Escape to the Chateau .