Kitchen drain blocked

 After 15 years the 10cm pipe from the kitchen sink wasn't draining quickly. Even the dishwasher was filling the sink. Too little washing by hand to push the grease through?

A drain snake cleared the block at what felt like a T with the utility.

Garage floor

It's been coming for a while. I built the new garage in 2021 and put on a coat of floor paint. I'd bought enough for 2 coats, plus a third (?) on the main garage floor. It's the amount of stuff to move that's put me off.

Yep, that's 2 trailers, 2 generators, homebrew boiler, firewood and a chipper. 1 trailer stayed in place!

Not too much outside for 2 days. It was economy paint from Leroy Merlin. It dried in 3 hours, but 48 hours are recommended before traffic. Even 2 months on, paint is peeling off where tyres are left standing.

Shameful packaging - or is it just me

 iLast care hyaluronic moisturising cream. 30mL

I use a tiny amount of this stuff, despite it's eye-watering price, it works for me. About 25€.

After 18 months it ran out. Well I thought it had. I took it apart and found a disgusting waste of plastic and packaging. A lovely design, but for fuck's sake, I need a finger to apply this stuff, so just put it in a pot and let me dab some on my finger. I cut open the 'empty' pot and carried on using it for 4 weeks. There are various type of plastic, O-rings, pistons. These parts will have taken precision moulding, so more expense and energy, in the manufacturing plant, design office, prototyping and consumer trials to name just a few.

Note it's stated open time is 6 months. Why? It has this totally over-engineered dispensing system that keeps it sealed. Well, it must keep it sealed as there is nothing to remove to start using it. It made it from the factory, with a use by date of a year or so, but once I press the dispense button, it magically has to be used in 6 months? Not a chance I'll buy this every 6 months. In fact, I'll now look for another brand in a little-heard-of thing called a pot.

Seized strimmer

Think twice if you're offered a (small) engine that has seized because it's been run on straight petrol. The petrol readily evaporates leaving gum everywhere, and you know how carburetors love goo.

So factor in a lot of cleaning of the crank etc, plus potentially a new carb. An ultrasonic bath might do it.

I got away without a bath, but it took 2 thorough cleans, and obviously I needed a rebuild kit.

Allow ~8 hours (strip + rebuild) for a strimmer.

The Deck (again)

Previous renovation

The deck went in around October 2011.

Quite a few beams to replace this time, plus all the uprights. The uprights have rotted off above ground. All the wood set in concrete is as-new. There is a rose and honeysuckle which have done a good job of pushing the pergola north

Of the 6 posts, 2 can't be removed due to the rose and the honeysuckle. The southern 2 (3) are both at 500mm deep and in with speed beton. The RH one thursday 22nd, the LH one saturday 24rd August. Of the northern 2 (3) the LH one has a decent socket 25cm deep and is anchored onto a large rock. The RH one was dug fresh (easier) and is 600 from grass, which is 100mm higher than the original.

The intention is :- southern end, link the 2 good posts with a chevron and attach the horizontal part as-is. No point trying to force the rose around; northern end, make Y pieces between the post and rail.

The concrete sets hard quickly, but like any concrete is at design strength in 28 days. After 7 days is nearly 2/3 full strength

Sept 2025. Finally replaced the flower pots with corten steel and trimmed roots etc. The weather was too poor to replace all the beams which had been bought about 2 years earlier...busy couple of years.

15/6/26 Removed the deck tiles from the side entrance to the sink. Replaced 2 beams from the Douglas 'stock' and levelled the deck. 7 tiles had fallen apart and were glued back together.

Need to swap a number from the sink to the south face as they are really starting to show their age (15 years old)

Ryanair error message 'an error has occurred, please try later'

 A reminder to myself. This is the second time it's happened.

The problem. You want to add your passport details, but you have to add your name. However, when trying to add your own name to your account you get the message 'an error has occurred, please try later'

The first time this happened I spent ages on chat with Ryanair as they didn't know why. Finally someone worked it out. However, the utterly moronic fucking witless twats didn't update their website. This was years ago.

The solution? Go to the section marked travelling companions and delete your own name.

Now, the question to ask is why Ryanair thought that you would want to add your own name to your own account as a companion. The next question is why the dick that sets up the error messages did not put up something meaningful.

Router UPS

We have a SFR/RED router and ONT. It takes up to 20 mins to connect after the shortest of brown-outs. It needs a UPS and I sort of have one. It's a house battery - see my posts on Victron. However, that won't keep stuff going during a firmware update, or if someone restarts the dbus....

Enter a UPS. The router has a 2A 12V psu. The ONT has a 12V 1A psu. Combined operating current is 1.3A max (15.6W) A Y-lead means you can delete the smaller PSU. That will save a watt or 2 vs 2 mains bricks. Turning off the wifi will save another ~4W (see later post on Asus router as why this matters)

A quick and dirty router consists of a 3S li-on battery scabbed from a very old Dell laptop. Added a 3S protection board and put it in parallel. The battery will have about 80% capacity at 12V. The discharge curve is pretty flat, and I only need protection for maybe 30s if I change supplies over.

The protection board will cut out a 8.1V and it will prevent excessive charge.  I'll need to test this otherwise there is a risk the battery will collapse the 12V supply.