Happy Birthday to...

That Norman bloke, who's a whole 43 years old (that's 376538 hours or so) today.

The newest addition to the Dolan clan, who's approximately 1.5 hours old as I type this.

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 5:01:27 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

WHAT A DAY

And it's nothing to do with sitting out in the sun!

So, today, will probably turn out to be one of the hottest days ever in the UK, yes? It could become a day people talk about in years to come...."what did you do on the hottest day ever?"

Well, I did this...

I spent some of the morning wiring some of the new studio up. Good so far. Until it got a bit warm in there (with it becoming the Hottest Day Ever(TM) and all) so about 1pm had some lunch (it gets more interesting than this, honest).

2pm watching a bit of TV. Bang. All the electriticy goes off. Odd, I thought. Checked with some others in my building, they're all working OK although the fire alarm has gone off (most do when the power is cut). Hmmm. I take a little stroll in the sunshine along the street to see if I can see any other buildings with the lights out. All seems OK everywhere else, though I do notice the fire alarm is also going off in an office block about 50 yards down. Not just me then...

Get back to flat, call Electricity company, tell them the problem. They find it strange that just a few of the flats here have gone out, and not all of them. I agree. This doesn't solve much. So they say they'll be sending some men round. Lucky me. Or Lucky men, perhaps.

10 minutes later. All hell breaks loose. 4 fire engines arrive.

Then a couple more.

It's looking like the fire alarm in the office building is not just a power-out alarm the way mine is. Oh indeed it is not. The place is most definitely no-doubt-about-it on fire now.

Still no electricity for me - it's about 3pm now. Lots of policemen arrive. They tape off the whole area. They tell me off for watching the goings on from my balcony. I kind of ignore them on this issue, if the place is gonna explode I'll be able to move a foot indoors and shut the door, I suggest.

The fire men though don't really seem to be doing that much, I mean I know nothing about fire-fighting so I'm guessing they were getting a feel for what was happening and drafting a plan of attack, or something. Then again, when it suddenly turned from a few little columns of grey smoke to proper red flames they seemed to get all inspired. Lots of running about and shouting. And they finally turned the water on, which seemed like a good idea to me.

Half an hour of this passes. I've got no electricity on the Hottest Day Of The Year. Which means no fan to keep me cool. "Well", you say,"go outside then!". Nope, can't do that, firstly because I'm waiting for the Electric Men (they fix the electric, they're not made of the stuff) to come and fix my flat (or the supply to it more correctly). And I also fear if I leave I might not be allowed back in, the Police are now getting all jumpy about people being in the area and are not letting anyone back in if they leave.

Then, just to make things just a little bit more uncomfortable, the wind direction changes, the building flares up again, and we're told (shouted at) to close all our windows like NOW.

OK, let's recap: Hottest Day Ever. Indoors. No fan to keep me cool, cos of no electricity. Have to keep all windows very shut cos of rolling black thick smoke coming down the street towards me. Can't escape because I have to be here to wait for Men. Very low on battery on my mobile, and of course can't charge it, so can't make many calls or anything. This is not how I wanted to spend today.

About 6pm the Electric Men arrived, they found about 4 faults (some in my building, some across the road where a cable had been damaged by fire/water/whatever) and got me going again. Hurrah. And the fire seems to be dampened down OK, although they're still pouring water over it at 10pm.

Oh, haha, as I was typing this (the first draft of it anyway) the power went again, about 1030pm or so. And then it's just started pissing with rain as well. Really hard.

When do the plague of locusts arrive?

Phew, what a day!



Posted By Simon Thornton @ 11:02:43 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []