Heating Up!

     First dip in the pool today as I was hot and sweaty when I got home from tennis. I wasn't able to swim as I had to keep my hand suspended out of the water but did get fully immersed. I held on to the ladder and floated a bit while paddling my legs. So refreshing!

  Tennis was fine and I played for nearly an hour and a half with only a little discomfort and no blisters. I taped up a couple of fingers and wore my golf glove and that made a huge difference! I will try for two hours on Thursday - of course we have lots of breaks so it's not a constant two hours.

   We are set for some lovely weather this week, sunny, mid 20's and not much humidity. I just wish the whole summer could be like this! My tomato plants are coming on great guns and there are lots of flowers on them. The raspberries also have flowers. I will need to pick some more rhubarb very soon.

I don't know if you can see this but a duck landed in the pool the other day.

I have six tomato plants this year.

Raspberries

Kale. Last year I couldn't find any but this year I shopped early. It's ready to start picking.

Rhubarb I have two healthy plants and one that doesn't produce much.

   

Another Headache

 The company that maintains my heating and cooling system is pretty reliable and I have coverage for what I thought were all eventualities. However, this week I have come to doubt how well covered I really am.

    Last Fall my furnace wouldn't start up when the weather turned cooler so I had a visit from a technician who diagnosed the problem and replaced the thermostat lickity split. All was well until early last week. We had a couple of hot days and I optimistically turned on the A/C - nothing!

   A techie duly arrived a day or two later and spent a good hour trying to diagnose this new problem. It turned out the guy who installed the thermostat last year had only hooked up the heating. No, he couldn't fix it as there was no wire to connect to the A/C. despite it working perfectly before the thermostat was replaced. I would need an electrician to run a new wire between the thermostat and the cooling unit. 

   This is where the problem arises. The electrician is an independent contractor and requires payment from the customer. No way was I going to pay for a problem caused by a faulty repair job so I declined to have him visit. So now we are at an impass. The techie jerry rigged it so I have A/C using the wire from the furnace so I am OK for the time being but this is not over. Unbelievable! It is beginning to sound like the problem I had with my stove - a series of frustrating phone calls with very little achieved. Stay tuned for the next episode!

Trip To Stratford (cont'd.)

    I haven't cured the Blogger problem but seem to have figured out a way to circumvent it, so here goes:

   I managed to locate the missing photos and will try to post a video of a number from the show. It was highly spectacular, so full of energy with a very talented cast. If you haven't seen "Chicago" and enjoy the music of that era (the 20's, I think) it's worth a look.

The Bard is everywhere including this life size statue in the gardens. He makes for a great photo op!

I don't often get dressed up but decided this special occasion called for something a bit fancier than my usual casual attire!

In the gift shop. I bought a couple of things for the grandkids. Oldest grandson is studying "Macbeth" in his English class.

Here's a video of the intro number in the show but with different performers but you will get the idea of the energy and musicality of the performance I saw.

To Be Continued

 Problems continue - I have to create a new post before I can reply to comments left on the previous one or comment on anyone else's. However, I'm sure eventually it will right itself (ever the optimist!)

   Yesterday's Trip: This is the most exciting thing that has happened to me in two years so please forgive me if I go a bit overboard with the photos etc.

    The theatre is a gorgeous venue surrounded by beautiful grounds and we had time to stroll around before the show. You can see the big red bus we travelled in, in one of the photos. A very unconventional stage and we were just 6 rows from the front so it felt very "up close and personal". 

    Just a few kilometres outside of Stratford is the small village of Shakespeare where we stopped on the way home to buy an assortment of pies. The servers were Mennonite girls and I am sure they were delighted to see us descend on the store in droves! 

    Traffic in both directions was pretty horrendous so it made for a long, tiring day. I left the house at 7:40 a.m. for the pickup and arrived back home at 8:15 p.m.

   I see I have missed a couple of photos so will post them tomorrow.