The lateral thinker in the family?

G came up with the ultimate lateral solution to the stove pipe problem! She didn't know it when she suggested it but there we are - you don't have to know it's lateral to come up with it. And the answer? A longer ladder or, more precisely, a longer set of ladders. Easy when you think about it and spot on. The issue was always about being able to put the cap back on the bottom of the stove pipe once the flue had been swept. Extending the pipe down looked to be the way to go but after yesterdays abortive attempts to do just that it was back to the drawing board.

G's motivation was how dangerous it looked with one of the FarmTwins up the previous ladder twiddling with six inch stainless steel pipes and juggling a mallet and, as she pointed, out a longer ladder would make getting to the join point much safer and easier but of course if it make the access that easy and safe then why bother extending the pipe at all? Answer; you don't.

A beneficial side effect of this master stroke is that we will, in future, as of today, have access to the top of the flue and the bottom of the flue simultaneously while undertaking maintenance and sweeping! Genius. I only wish that we had thought of it sooner! Job jobbed.

We got the ladders today (6 metres at full stretch, aluminium, a tad over 3 metres collapsed), they wobble a bit (I think professionals would call it bounce but it feels like wobble to us amateurs) but do the job admirably. We are now set for winter stove madness - all we need is a delivery of logs. G even sweet talked the miserable guy who owns our local DIY store into delivering them - and he smiled while he did it! Bramah.

Not content with her sterling performances on the ladder front G even got the new rambling rose planted today. It right up by the front wall between the tall nasturtiums and the prickly pear and a main shoot goes in each direction. I suspect that it's going to look pretty special once it gets into its stride.

Mathes and Georgetown this morning: water and post respectively. The post contained two more online purchases: a Belkin surge protection device (ethernet, power supplies, phone, and ADSL) and a book that Lindz alerted us to; 600 Greek verbs fully conjugated in all their tenses. The book will provide hours of winter pleasure and will definitely improve G's Greek. Whether it improves mine depends on whether or not I put in the effort. It is good at last to be proof against power surges and lightning strikes especially as we seem to be in the midst of thunderstorm season right now.

Betty is playing up again but tomorrow is another day.

Oh yes, thought I'd mention that Spymac seem incapable of lifting my ban despite me having served my sentence. So: banned without explanation of what I said; ban not lifted on time; no feedback on when the unbanning might happen. Kafka could have written this script. The exercise of power without accountability is an awesome thing to see.