Rather spoilt by a bad mood, a dodgy lens and a broken dishwasher.
Dishwasher first. It’s been playing up for a while, but we always managed to cajole it into getting its act together. Not so today. It refused to do anything but petulantly show its “Check Water” light. Even worse, there was a pool of water in the machine about100mm deep at its deepest. I baled out the water into a basin which Scamp emptied for me. Next I checked the impeller and it was turning freely. Put everything back together and tried again without any luck. Disconnected the water outlet to the main drain in the sink and it was clear. Even checked the water inlet filter and it too was a bid mucky, but nothing that would bring the machine to a grinding halt. After an hour and a half, I gave up and tightened everything back up and left it sitting where it had been with the light still glowing until I pulled the plug. We may need to call in a repair man to fix it, or bite the bullet and buy a new one.
The dodgy lens. Like the dishwasher, it’s been playing up for a month or so. It sometimes refuses to focus. I’ve tried cleaning the electronic contacts, but they were shiny clean to start with. I know it’s a ‘kit’ lens, the one you get with the camera, and it’s probably not the best quality, but up until now it’s focussed perfectly. According to some reports in the photography forums, the lens suffers from a dodgy focus motor. Not all of the lenses have the problem and if the focus motor does start to fail, it doesn’t fail all the time. I don’t think I can call in a lens repair man to fix it.
I don’t think the bad mood came from the dodgy lens or the broken dishwasher. I don’t know what brought it on. I went out this morning to get my hair cut (a number 3 all over) and when I came home, I brought a ‘black monkey’ home with me. I didn’t want to do anything and, like the dishwasher, I petulantly refused every offer of help. Eventually we decided to go to Chatelherault for a walk in the countryside. Even that didn’t help. However as well as the walk, we were also looking for a planter for a pot of miniature chrysanthemums Scamp had got last Thursday. We ended up with two pots, one for a Rudbeckia that I liked and one for an Astrantia that Scamp liked. That broke the spell and I think I might have passed the ‘black monkey’ on to someone else. I pity them, whoever and wherever they are.
PoD was a laser cut rusty steel silhouette of David Livingstone (of “Doctor Livingstone I presume” fame) that I took with the dodgy lens at Chatelherault.
Today Mairi Gillies went through her operation. She is being kept in overnight because her op was delayed and she didn’t come out of theatre until late in the day. Hope she doesn’t have too hard a time recovering.
Tomorrow, Scamp is out in the morning for her dentist’s checkup, and I’m going to put on a happy face!