All ready for Christmas

This week: A run ashore; All ready for Christmas; Some more open heart surgery; You CAN teach an old cat new tricks;

The weather has changed to something more normal for the winter here in Dol.

There is a cold northerly wind blowing and with just a few short hours of sunshine each morning, the orchard plants have prepared themselves for winter.

Only the weeds still seem to grow. I dug some out from my vegetable plot and planted a row of Broccoli. It will be ready for picking at the end of February.

There are always plenty of jobs to do though.

I have got ⅔ of the side protection on the citrus trees. Although the temperature is around 12°C during the day and 8°C at night, I have yet to put any top cover on the trees.

It is usually either side of New Year that we have the coldest weather of the year and this is when a strong Bura and low temperatures could damage the trees.

Citrus have been grown around the Mediterranean for millennia and they are cold hardy, to a point. It is the Lemons which are the least cold tolerant and I have couple of nice sweet Meyer Lemons which I especially do not want to get damaged.

Leaving the top of each frame open mean that any rain we get will wash in the compost I have laid around the tree’s trunks.

There are also the small fruit which have formed on the lemons, so I want to try and let them get what winter sunshine they can, while they can.

I use a lot of lemons, picking some today to have for tea as a caper and lemon sauce with fish.

A run ashore

I needed to go to Split to pick up some supplies and presents for Christmas.

There is never a “Good time” to go, so I just picked a date and went on Tuesday. It did lead to a ‘light bulb moment’ though.

The island is poorly supplied with all kinds of things, from anything beyond basic nuts, bolts and washers, to certain seeds and plants.

I’ve always had a sweet tooth and like certain Christmas treats, for example Stollen – and the only place to buy it is in Split.

When I’m working on a project, I try and plan ahead, having everything I need in place ready because I know that if I don’t, I will not be able to get exactly what I need on the island.

So I have a permanent list in Notepad on my computer of what I need to get during next trip. When the list gets long, I plan a visit.

The day is a long one, starting with the alarm going off at 04:00 then catching the 05:30 ferry which arrives at 07:15, planning a route of places to visit and rushing round to get to all the various stores. Then it is back to the ferry port to embark at 14:05 and arriving back home at 16:40.

The light bulb moment was that I spent a good proportion of Monday measuring up for things like timber, checking what fixings I needed and going to the shops for a picnic and to buy the tickets.

So it isn’t one full day, it is a day and a half to two full days out of the week!

I did achieve most of what I intended. One major item I had to collect was a 220v petrol generator, from a Black Friday sale.

Across Europe Governments are preparing their populations to be more resilient. What happens next in Ukraine is of course a great concern, but also so are major weather events.

We have an unstable power supply at the best of times, but if we were to lose electicity for more than say 18 hours, I want to be ready.

Needing electricity to pump water around the central heating in winter is one use, but also to keep a full deep freeze powered up is an important second one.

The motto of the wise is, be prepared for surprises…

All ready for Christmas

I needed to get some things for Christmas while I was in Split and quickly found what I needed. Then it was off to the Bauhaus DiY centre.

There were just a few things on my list, one of which was replacement pine poles to replace the ones which have rotted in the Arbour. They didn’t have any!

I dug up a patch of Daffodils last summer and I wanted a nice clay pot to plant them in, to go near rear the kitchen window.

That wan’t a difficult quest, but on the way out of the garden section I passed the “waifs and strays” bin.

There were some brightly coloured Cyclamen so I had an idea I would put two in the pot with the daffodill bulbs.

Then there was a bright Button Chrysanthemum too. Marked down to €4, that came home with me as well. I’m afraid that I am a sucker for the “waifs and strays”..

After getting back home, I potted the Cyclamen up along with the daffodill bulbs into the pot. I had some bulbs left over so used a second pot and brought it into the dining room, to try and “force” the bulbs to flower early.

The bright yellow heads of daffodils always brighten dull spring days.

Chrysanthemum flowers are placed on graves here on All Saint’s Day and this bright group were unsold.  I will plant them out in a flower border. 

After getting the car into the queue for the ferry, I walked into the Green Market in Split and saw there was a stall selling Christmas Cactus, Schlumbergera x buckleyi, so I came home with one of those as well, just for good measure.

So that’s it. I’m now all ready for Christmas…

Some more open heart surgery

On a very cold (for here) Wednesday, I was under the sink in the kitchen again and removed the pump from the water filter.

I only needed two sizes of Phillips screwdrivers to remove the pump compartment off the motor.

There is a problem though. The pump is of a type called a “Diaphragm pump”, and as I mentioned last week, I have no plans, drawings or even instructions about how the system and the pump should work.

It is a low voltage 24VDC design, with the power supplied by a transformer. The principle of a Diaphragm pump is that it uses compressed air to draw water into the pump chamber and then expel it.

Stripping the pump down was not difficult because there are few moving parts.

I did discover that on the wet side of the single diaphragm, there were calcium crystals all around where the water entered and exited.

Using a standard cleaning solution, I removed all the deposits and then put everything back together. Switching it on, the pump seemed to be working.

However, when I had the whole system reinstalled, the water flow at the tap was no better. And I had a small leak on one of the pipe joints, although that was easily fixed.

I need to get some microbore plastic tubing so I can see if the pump is actually pumping when it is switched on, rather than just appearing to operate.

The pump was manufactured 15 years ago and has been in operation since 2011, so I would not be surprised if it was time for a replacement! Time will tell…

You CAN teach an old cat new tricks

I feel sorry for my senior cat Callie in winter. She is an Arab Mau, a breed of cat from the Arabian Peninsula, so is used to heat but not cold.

The breed also has just has a single layer of fur. Most breeds of cat have two layers of fur, a dense undercoat and a longer layer of fur which they molt in the spring.

Callie is now 14, so definately a “senior cat” and because of her breed I bought her a winter coat and an electric blanket for her box.

I’m not mean giving her a cardboard box, she has several proper cat beds to choose from, but prefers curling up in her box.

The coat and blanket arrived this week and I easily installed the blanket, which was clearly appreciated. The coat is a different matter.

She has had collars in the past, but was never comfortable with them and they were usually removed and lost fairly quickly. So she is not used to wearing anything.

I have started getting her used to the coat by just draping in across her back. She has not objected, walking around with the coat draped over her shoulders until it fell off.

I have also found her sitting on it, so it must feel comfortable.

The next step will be to fasten the buttons

I does just go to show that even very senior cats can learn something new! NCG