(no subject)

Yesterday we had the accounts up to 31st. October from our dual-fuel gas and leccy suppliers, showing that they have about £650 of my money sitting in their account. even after this most up to date bill.  That's almost two and a half times our excessive monthly direct debit.  I am not pleased. John will be phoning them tomorrow to blister their ears.

I always knew that the amounts were too high, but John had several arguments with them and they said that this was what they anticipated we would use. So that's sheer guesswork then, but they don't take any responsibility to check after a while to see if they've made a mistake and they don't supply bills for the customer to check how accurate it is.

hooloovoo_42  suggested that we switch suppliers and keep the estimated amounts in an online deposit account in future rather than pay by direct debit.  I think that's a good idea if it doesn't work out that any interest we earn is taken by extra charges for not paying by Direct Debit..  We have to get it sorted out first, though, cos there's no way I'm leaving that money in their pockets earning them interest and keeping me poor.

John and I went to the Riverside Park again yesterday afternoon and I managed to walk even further than last time which quite pleased me, although I found it harder work than usual to return to the car.  It was another lovely afternoon and the place was deserted except for a few Old Codgers like us taking their dogs for walks and so forth.  Everyone is soo friendly when they meet you out wombling along the bank.

I took a lot more photos too.  Here are a couple.  The colour is a bit washed out because of the camera setting I had it on with the zoom at maximum

( pictures here )

I wish it wouldn't get so dark so early.  Even when it's been a lovely day as it has today again, it gets a bit miserable around dusk.

I slept very badly again last night.  Apart from cats on the bed, I was just unable to sleep despite being very tired.  My eyes were too tired to read or use the PC, so I just had to lie awake listening to the radio.  Since a lot of the stuff was repeats, I got very bored.  Then I was woken at 8.00 am by Bramble and Morgan demanding attention.  Today I've taken both Prozac at once in the morning in the hope that that may help. Charles seems to think it may.  I have to say, I feel extremely calm.  Perhaps I should have started taking the extra one sooner.

It's time to go down and take the dough out of the bread machine to make into burger buns for our home made burgers which are resting in the fridge.  That'll mean Charles' home-made chips again!  Delicious!

Bad cat, Bramble!

This evening, while Charles and I were cooking the dinner, Bramble came in through the cat-flap bearing a tiny burden.  We couldn't think what it was, in fact, I thought it was an old teabag he'd found somewhere, but it turned out to be a tiny bat!!

We chased him all over the house and eventually Charles cornered him and took it from him.  It was bleeding slightly, but it was still moving.  We had no idea what to do, so in the end I took it out and put it on the roof of the shed.  It was sooo tiny!

We locked the cat-flap so Bramble couldn't get after it again, and later, when I checked the shed roof, it was gone.

Charles is worried in case we might get into trouble for disturbing a bat, but I explained that so far courts had declined to make cat-owners responsible for their cats' actions.

How on earth Bramble managed to catch it, I can't conceive.  I didn't even know there were bats in the vicinity.  Charles was very upset, because he could hear the high-pitched squeaks the poor thing was making but my ears are no longer that good, so at least I was spared that.

Bramble was very indignant and sulked for, oooo, 10 minutes until he was fed.

This is another good reason for not letting the cats out at night.  Usually Charles has them locked in from dusk onwards, but he must have forgotten today.  Later on Phoebe got upset by fireworks going off outside.

Phoebe just catches mice, which we're rather glad of, but so far, apart from a selection of moths, flies and butterflies, Bramble has killed a blue-tit and caught this bat.  What next, I wonder!

I'm worried about the bat now.  I do hope it's all right and hasn't just crawled away to die.