Bargains from the car boot.

I did a stall at the car boot (Burgh castle in Norfolk). The weather was poor (this has been a pretty awfull summer) and things were quiet.
I went for a wander round not really convinced that I'd find anything worthwhile.I spotted a huge Record vice laying on the floor at one stall.It was seized but the rust looked reasonably light and the oil and grease was dirty but still should have offered some protection and for £10 it was a potential bargain.It was heavy enough not to want to lug it too many times round the field and when I got it home a half hour with releasing fluid and a blow torch it was soon in a usuable condition.
The next bargains were a couple of compression testers,one in a box with all the adaptors and the other looking little used £3.50p bought the two. A vacuum gauge was 50p and a huge engine starter and charger was another £10.
The starter/charger needed some soldering but seems to work fine.
I didn't sell much but with my purchases considered the day was a good one.

Is that really the time?

I can't believe it,times gone so fast.
We are now doing a few car boots,we normally go to Julies car boot at Burgh Castle,only down the road from us now we've moved.
We started taking a load of second hand bits and pieces but are now taking some tools.We managed to get hold of a few in a cheaper range that the whitworth and AF tools stuff that we sell on the net.These are mainly metric.
We've also bought a load of hardware for the house,DIY etc .Time will tell if this is a seller or
 not.
Meanwhile I've done little real work on my P5b Rover. I repaired a water leak on the back screen and had a breakdown on the way to a car show.

I've spent a long while welding rust holes in the transit and taxi.

Patti free to run about

Patti,an Italian mastiff was taken as a puppy to a rescue centre.
After eighteen months of being kept on a lead or in a kennel she finally gets to run free for the first time.
Here is a you tube video of her enjoying her freedom..
Pattis first free run

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The rescue centre Patti came from has lots of other dogs all needing a home.
Have a look at the dogs here.

Settling in.

Patti continues to amuse and baffle us both at the same time.
She's suddenly decided squirrel chasing might be fun,she barks and strains to get up a tree everytime she sees one.
She demolished part of the fence the other day chasing a cat (I notice more birds are coming to the table outside the window they probably thing with Patti chasing the cats away they're safe,trouble is Patti will probably chase them if she gets bored).
Some turd left some broken glass on Gorleston beach the other day and Patti got a bad cut on her front pad from it.It didn't bleed much and we've kept it clean,it has healed well and she shows no sign of being in any discomfort.

There are lots of dogs at Meadow Green a rescue centre near us.All of them deserve to have a better Christmas in a family home.I always want to take them all home with me when I go there,some have been very badly treated in the past. I doubt Patti would tolerate another dog in the house. Shame really.

How much is that doggy in the window?

Patty is settling in and wearing us both out in the process.She is very headstrong (apparently a Cane Corso) characteristic,incredibly strong and boisterous.
This is her sitting in the shop window as we clear out all the stock as the place is now up for sale. We've shifted a lot of stuff at the car boot and on ebay but there is still a hell of a lot to move.
I still miss old George,the tree planted over him is doing well and it somehow provides a link to him or rather his memory,if Patty becomes half the dog he was she'll be doing well.
In lots of ways I prefer the company of dogs to humans.In all the years I had George and his mate Jack they never lied to me or cheated,they didn't want money or ask for anything other than a place to live and food.In return I got a couple of super companions and true friends.
Some people could learn a lot from them (but they wont).

Patty

Georges passing left a big hole and I doubt any dog could fill it.
However a dog called Patty is having a ruddy good try of establishing a place for herself.
A rescue dog who had been in kennels for a long time she arrived a week ago to a chorus of never again from the wife and me..
She's been helping rearrange the house by removing things she finds and leaving them strewn about the place and pulls like a train on a lead.She is the most affectionate dog I've ever known and is full of mischief and investigates everything and anything she sees.George was one of the randiest dogs I've had and he'd have been in his element with her even though she's been spayed.She wont replace him and in her own way she's not trying to,I think we are going to get along fine.

My mate George is with us no more

My best mate George had to go to the vets for the last time.His legs started giving way and he was getting more pain.His life quality was poor.
I took him to be put down and the poor old boy suffered badly,it wasn't the quiet death he deserved.
I'll really miss my best mate,I do hope he's somehow reunited with his mate Jack,George seemed to lose a lot of his previous vitality after Jack died in his sleep.I managed to take George for one last swim and he was able to have all sorts of treats in his past few days.I buried him in the garden under a tree with a fancy name and blue flowers that I bought at a garden centre.
Rest in peace George you really were one in a million.

George and the car boots.

Ive been busy organising the move and some of the stuff I no longer need has been taken to the car boot (Julies at Burgh Castle) to sell.As usual my old mate George has come along for the ride but now its possible he's been to his last one.
George has suddenly developed a really bad limp and is hardly using one leg at all.The vet has agreed that at his advanced age (he's nearly fifteen) the only real hope is that strong pain killers might give nature a chance to heal what ever is wrong with hi,it seems risky to knock him out for x rays etc and at that age the chances of surgery of any kind performing a miracle seem limited.
With the tablets he is wobbling about reasonably well and doesn't seem in distress or pain.
We'll have to see,here he is in happier times.

Rusty doors

Looks to me like there's the odd spot of rust in this door bottom off the transit.

Typically the rust you can see on this Mk1 transit door is just the tip of an iceberg,the hole will get much bigger with a bit of prodding and poking.The vehicle spent the past few years parked up on Lowestofts dockside where it was wetted by sea spray every time the wind blew.

Time flies when you're having fun

Has it really been this long? I'm sure there are builders who've built houses in less time than I've taken so far to sort this one out.

I've now had the doors stripped and am making a stair rail after managing to fall down the stairs.

The floor boards are all back down after sorting out the plumbing and wiring and the fireplace that had been covered with tiles (badly) has been opened up.

The taxi and the P5b got through the MOTs just the motorhome and newest Rover to do.

I fitted some wing mirrors on the P5b so I could reverse it easier,a very stiff neck (getting old) was making it harder to judge and I dont really want to wuipe the door handles off on a wall.

I picked up a load of new oil filler caps for the older BMC vehicles at a car boot,I'll try them on Ebay and see how they go.

Still working on the house

I really need Melinda Messenger and that little bald geezer or one of those other DIY rescue shows.The guy who used to own my place must have done the vast majority of his DIY when under the influence of something ,I've seen some pretty rubbish stuff over the years but not for instance tiling over four layers of wall paper or concreting over stopcocks.
We live and learn.

Car boots and rusty pillars

Tried another car boot today at burgh castle.To be honest it was pretty much a waste of time,people just walking round but not spending much at all.With people saying that the closest one at kessingland wildlife park charging 50p just to look round I thought it might have been busier.I did get rid or a few bulky items but didn't take a lot of money.
I thought when I got home I'd have a poke at a rust hole in the taxi that had been annoying me,the hole soon grew.

Taxi hole at base of windscreen pillar.

I cut a patch out of some scrap galvanised sheet and welded it in,it should last a few years at any rate.

A couple of plates curved to shape and mig welded in.

Car booty in a taxi.

I took a load of stuff to the local car boot,Julies Car boot at Burgh Castle.There didn't seem much to take at first so I just loaded it in the taxi but ended up pretty much filling the old girl.When it's all laid out it looks pretty nigh impossible to get it all back in it.

I didn't do too bad getting rid of some gear that there wouldn't really have been a place for at the new home.I don't like the Kessingland car boot,although its closer they tend to squeeze you up together and have all sorts of sily rules about where you can go and what times you're allowed to go on,I can do without a load of petty aggro first thing on a sunday morning.

Still waiting to move

I'm still awaiting the exchange of contracts to move house.Lots of work to do in the new place and years of accumulated junk and clutter to sort out.Then its time to think about MOTs on the cars and transit and sorting out somewhere to move the business to.
can't wait.

Must be summer,the heaters working.

I haven't had much time to do any work on the Rover P5b for a while.One thing I did do was have another go at getting the heater to work.I'd already taken off the heater pipes and flushed it through and set the levers as per the manual.Someone suggsted the internal flaps might be seized so I had another go at taking off all the levers and cables,freed off the spindles and reconneted everything,it seems to be working although I've yet to take it for a long run,too busy at the moment getting ready to move.
Filling the radiator on these cars has to be done in a certain way,topping up with the engine hot and ticking over otherwise they have air locks in the cooling system that cause all sorts of problems.

Moving

I've just agreed to buy a new place.Loads of stuff to sort out,stuff to move and all the aggro of changing adress but I'm really pleased to be moving out of the town.
Lowestoft has been my home and work place for over twelve years but the past few years with the councils attitude to small business have been a nightmare.
Jack,my best mate died the other day.He was getting on in years and had been losing weight but his death came as a horrible shock.He died in his bed,outside the beadroom with his mate George just a few feet away.
I buried him in a garden,rest in peace big fella.

Lowestot and the conservation area.

Waveney Road in Lowestoft is suppose to be one of its so called conservation areas.I wonder what on earth they are supposed to be trying to conserve and why.

For me, running a shop,Waveney District Council seem only too keen to put obstacles in the way in terms of placing adverts,satellite dishes,parking and loading bays and all the rest,yet turn a blind eye to breaches of the same stupid rules all up and down the road and bend over backwards to provide other businesses with their own loading or parking bays.
I keep wondering what I've done wrong.Is it because I criticise this bunch of stuffed shirts or is it that my criticism seems to ask why some people ar exempt from the rules that I'm forced to abide by?.
Is it that I'm supposed to tug my forelock or join some sort of club and get special treatment.
Wasn't it Groucho Marx who said "I wouldn't join any club that would have me as a member?" I think he was talking about WDC and Lowestoft

Moving stock

I've been wanting to run down the tool business for some time and devote time to other projects. I have literally tons of whitworth,BSF,BA and AF tools to clear out and have been working out the best ways to do so.Ebids auction site is really a waste of time and Ebay is not the force it was,I suppose I could try the 'normal' auction route but without lots of advertising the audience will probably not have the faintest idea of what they're looking at and the prices the tools will fetch wont be much higher than scrap value.To buy some of the really big spanners now would cost a fortune but the demand simply isn't there and people are far more inclined to buy cheap chinese and indian tools than stuff made to a standard and not to a price.
Decisions,decisions.

Lowestofts Rubbish

The council must have been well over a hundred times to the alley close to me to collect bags of household rubbish left there by the occupier of one of the tatty flats on the corner. They know who dumps it,who the landlord is yet chose to do absolutley nothing about it.
I bet if I threw my rubbish out on the street they'd be down on me like a ton of bricks.
They can fart about fining people for putting the bins out a day early yet ignore some tosser littering the place on a daily basis
Why?.
No wonder Lowestoft is such a filthy place.

Trying to save a bit of Lowestofts heritage.

There is a large ex department store known as "The old Tuttles building" in lowestoft that has survived fires,two world wars and lead thieves on the roof.Its owners seem determined to let it fall into a derelict state.
A petition has been launched to stop this building which is of historic importance being allowed to simply fall down through neglect.
The petition is here.Save the Tuttles bulding.