Tuesday

Good evening peeps,

The cat has just found the chicken I put out for her :)

Well what a day. I got on with some work while I waited for my hair appointment, and got a perfect score on a transcription project, I like the company, they pay automatically without you having to put in for a payout. I haven't finished the article I was doing, the company it is for are grungy, I don't like them or their articles, but on a brighter note I got 100% on the book review that I did. So that was work today.

I went and had my hair done. Welsh ladies usually have beautiful hair, and the Salon I went to were very Welsh, they even forgot I have an fairly English accent and they spoke to me in Welsh, which was fine.
 Eisteddwch yma os gwelwch yn dda

But they did the haircut that my hair has been missing since my hairdresser vanished a year ago. I am well impressed with my new Welsh hair, I look like a Welsh lady now :) and it was affordable. And I didn't have to worry about parking.
 It won't last, my hair is completely feral, like a drunk hedgehog, it does it's own thing, I was thinking about getting straighteners, but they cost a lot.

After the haircut I checked the cat and then went for a longer adventure than planned.

I took my friend's car, as arranged, the car is the heavy Passat that they said I could have if Max broke down or failed the MOT too badly. The Passat is running well and also passed it's MOT like Max did, but it is a heavy diesel.

I have been having breathing problems, presumably due to allergens and the stress of change of location and lifestyle, but during that first 10 minutes, driving the Passat across town, it felt like my lungs were going to pop out.

I had my satnav with me, as it is better to use my own that I am used to with my work, so I followed the satnav and was very careful with an unfamiliar car and unfamiliar roads. Ha, I had the funniest experience though.

My friend had said the car had loads of diesel, and I had taken her word for it and not even looked at the gauge, although I had sat and familiarized myself with the controls before I sat off, I think the engine was off at the time, and then I was so focused on trying to control the car and drive unfamiliar routes. So when the fuel warning light came on, I was a bit worried, Welsh roads are endless and fuel can get scarce.

I was in luck as there was a small fuel station, however, I didn't know which side of the Passat the fuel cap was! I went for one side and it was the other, and because the Passat is huge compared to Max, the fuel line wasn't going to stretch, but worse, I didn't know how to undo the fuel cap! My friends had been meaning to get my driving the Passat while they were here but they had got in such a last minute panic for going away that it got forgotten, along with various things, but I am independent, so I didn't think it mattered.

Anyway, so scrambling vainly with the fuel cap, parked the wrong side, I pulled my phone out and texted my friend, and then spotted the fuel button in the car, undid the cap, couldn't get the fuel line to stretch, and awkwardly scrambled the big car round to the other side of the pumps, and fueled up. The attendants in the teeny petrol station were nearly dead from laughter by now. And I sniggered too, and lumbered the Passat off to continue the journey after paying and explaining it was my first time driving the car.

On I went, and there was the junction where I could either go to the coal museum, which I really want to, or to Abergavenny, and I decided I couldn't wait to see Abergavenny again, so I headed that way.

The familiar sight above Abergavenny, and this is the Passat, see what I mean about her being a heavy machine compared to our Max?

I really enjoyed the drive down from Abergavenny to Brecon, and at Brecon I remembered the way.

Out onto that fast road that I used to drive along with Daffyd/David Williams when I was learning to drive, when I was a spotty teenager, and it is still an amazing drive. And before long, there is that turning, and the Griffin, still the revolting colour that it has always been.

'Verr-an-Vach! HAHA! And guess what, Martine, I never took your advice on men, and I am glad I didn't! I wish the English would invent their version of the unpronouncable in English sound that the Welsh and Hebrews have always had. FelinFatch means Water Mill, although if you look Water Mill up in a Welsh dictionary, you will get a different word altogether. I don't know where the mill is, but there is a river down there that I used to wade in with the retired collie.

 Griffin. 

So, here is the farm I worked on.
Unfortunately I was not able to get you the views that I used to see every day, partly because there was a haze over both the Brecon Beacons and the Black Mountains, and so the pictures really didn't show them, and because I didn't go right up to the farmhouse and the back fields where the views were so good. But every day, even though I was unhappy, I thought the mountains were beautiful, and I preferred the Black Mountains, their shape is more angular, more sharp, than the Beacons.

I did go up that endless track, and stopped some distance to the farmhouse, if the farmer is still there after all these years, and he might be if you look at the crop and sheep management, he will still be a bully and a psychopath, so I had no wish to see him apart from to tell him what I thought of him and to tell him that after all these years and with a broken back, I am a skilled landbased worker. He wouldn't recognize me, I was elective mute and my background and autism hadn't been diagnosed, I was an easy target for him.

Anyway, on to more cheerful things, I didn't nick the combine and drive it through his haystack, I just continued my journey.

See what I mean about the haze on the Black Mountains? You can't see the view I used to see.

Anyway, on I went. I survived it, peeps, I survived it.

That's what I mean about the black mountains being angular compared to the beacons, I wish I could get a really good picture, but I can't. But don't worry, I have better pictures of the Beacons.

 I had a long drive home, I was driving well with the Passat, used to it now, and overtaking the slower vehicles on the dual carriageway.

I got home and fed the cat and got supper. Went over to the shop. Did the bins when I got back, and have been idly watching the usual loops on television. I have taken to working in the kitchen as I sat here to wait for the courier who takes my friend's work and it is a habit, the TV down here is freeview, while the upstairs TVs are sky, the one in the lounge has gone faulty, and I don't watch TV at bed time, so I am missing out having to change hundreds of channels for something to watch when I don't even want to watch TV.