Sandbox
The light side of the finger[edit] |
| Posted by Nad on 24 July 2016 at 20:13 |
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This post has the following tags: Our forth year on the land
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We went to the hospital in Canela a few days ago to get the stitches taken out, and the doc said it's healing very well. After the stitches were removed he gave me a piece metal with foam on one side which is used to stop the finger from bending so the bone can start to heal.
The bright side of being out of commission is that I've had lots of time to make a good start on my book and I'm really getting in to the flow now. Also it's led to our neighbour Vladimir having to take over the fence repair and he's completely remade it instead of just fixing what was there, so we have a really nice solid fence all the way along that side now! Beth's had to take over a lot of my jobs now, but there's a bright side to that as well which is that she's learning to use a lot of tools that she was a bit timid of before even though she wanted to be more independent. She's been using the post-hole borer in the field and chopping up fire wood with the chainsaw and axe :-) 
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Some more photos of the house improvements[edit] |
| Posted by Nad on 19 July 2016 at 16:21 |
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This post has the following tags: Our forth year on the land
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| I think we've finished our new feng shui improvements which we've been chipping away at since we got back to the land. Here's a few photos so you can see things from all the angles.
I've made a stand for my tablet to make the desk tidier and to prevent me from having to be hunched over to see the screen when I work, and Beth's varnished some old wooden crates to use for the vegetables under the kitchen bench and the shoes next to her desk. We've also finally felt like the place is in a tidy enough state that we deserve to have our nice cosy rug in the lounge area :-) 
I've added these latest photos the our house article to bring it up to date with the current state. |
Winter interior decoration[edit] |
| Posted by Nad on 11 July 2016 at 20:41 |
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This post has the following tags: Our forth year on the land
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| It was a horrible stormy day today with torrential rain and lots of thunder and lightning all day and last night. We were pleased to see that there were no leaks even after hours of very heavy rain and a friendly visit from the river :-)
Beth decided that since she couldn't do any work on the new vege patch that we'd do some interior decorating instead. So the first job was to connect up our new sink with a pipe so we could actually use it instead of just looking at it! We have a plug that only allows liquid to pass through and that goes through a PVC pipe straight across the lawn into the swamp - we'll bury the pipe soon so it's tidier. 
The next job was to put up a curtain to hide the messy content in the loft shelf. We've also put the bed the other way round and put a book shelf up along the edge of the loft with some material over it as a divider so nobody accidentally rolls out of bed onto the floor below! 
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Don't call us, we'll call you[edit] |
| Posted by Nad on 10 July 2016 at 19:02 |
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This post has the following tags: Our forth year on the land
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We've been noticing ever since the recent tower upgrade that we'd occasionally receive TXT messages on our cell phone in the house, so we decided to stop being so antisocial and get a phone! Here in Brazil you can get cell phones that look like ordinary land-line phones, but they can run off mains or an internal battery and they have better reception than a normal cell phone. These phones also allow connection of an external antenna, so we installed our old net antenna on top of the house so we should have a reasonably consistent phone connection!
Due to our power constraints, the phone won't be permanently running though, so we'll only be calling out on it usually and not receiving calls unless it's a nice clear day :-) |
Never let a good crisis go to waste[edit] |
| Posted by Nad on 7 July 2016 at 23:31 |
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This post has the following tags: Our forth year on the land
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We adopted Winston Churchill's policy, "never let a good crisis go to waste", by taking advantage of the need to hire a car and visit the doctor over the last few days, to buy some more supplies. Most importantly was a huge bottle of gherkins, and a few other bits and bobs such as a new solar battery :-)
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