Thankfully the snow which fell and settled on Sunday night, although still present on the grass, melted away from the roads, allowing me to ride the bike to the south gate to take the bus for my evening rendezvous.
Accordingly, in mid afternoon I showered. When I finished I stood for a minute or so under the warm water with my eyes closed and was given such a fright I feared I might have a heart attack. There was a loud bang as the electric water heater blew up a yard from my head. The breaker had cut out twice in mid-shower last week but it was a simple matter then of simply resetting it. This time it blew the electrics for the entire flat so I had to go outside in the cold in my bathrobe to reset the main breaker.
Whatever happened to the heater is terminal as it will not work at all now. Cinny is coming to campus this afternoon and will hopefully get an electrician (or school bodger) to come and look at it. Meanwhile I can’t shower - in summer I might just consider taking a cold one but with temperatures now below freezing, no way Jose.
So that was bad thing number one.
I duly caught the bus and walked to the Japanese restaurant to await the arrival of Avril. There were no customers but I thought possibly it was because it was early (only 1800) but it was conveyed to me that the large hob was broken. Great - part of the experience is watching the fat chap cook in front of you and I like surprising my guests with the banana and fire ice cream thing, that was now off the menu. They showed me the things they could do in the back kitchen and in fairness had I been alone it would have been fine but not what I had planned for Avril. I said no I would come back another day when the hob was fixed and asked for a beer whilst I waited for my companion to arrive and also to think where else we could go which was on the house. Bad thing number two.
Avril turned up and found out the hob wasn’t broken at all (the thought did cross my mind to ask them if I could have a crack at cooking!) but the fat lad was on holiday. He will return today or tomorrow so I said we will come back on Wednesday. In the end we went to the barbecue restaurant I ate in last week. A waitress I had noticed on a previous occasion had kept looking and smiling at me did so again this time. I have now given her the English name of Melinda and have her phone number. Unfortunately she works every night until nine o’clock so if I take her out it will need to be for lunch. She does have a lovely smile though.
Avril accompanied me to wait at the bus stop and yet again there was an interminable wait in the deep freezer. It ended with her hailing a cab - and prepaying the driver - to take me to school despite my protests. Actually I’m glad she did for I would have waited until this morning because on the return journey I never saw one bus, neither were there any waiting outside the school. Yet they never post temporary altered timetables at the stops so even the Chinese get caught out at spring festival. Crazy. Bad thing number three.
So I am currently waiting for Cinny to contact me although much longer and I will go shopping regardless. I have swept the flat (it needs to be done daily really as the wood floor shows every speck of dust) in preparation but, lazy swine that I am, I still haven’t scrubbed it. Instead I have forewarned Lucy she will be doing it when she returns. Just the sweeping gets my back aching so bending down with a brush would probably kill me. I WILL get a long handled scrubber at some point.
Anyway, here are three photos, one I forgot about of Amy’s extended family in Tongling and two of the puppies I have been trying to keep united with mum. Apologies for the poor quality but it was pitch dark under the stairwell so all I could do was point and hope.
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