Bummer!

Yesterday, we headed over to Bello, and picked up the security camera, on the way we saw that we were going to be out a long time, the flow of traffic on the autopista in the homebound direction, was static, which only meant one thing, a fatal accident!

From Bello it was back to Niquia to the Centro Comercial, to get some bits, and then to the Timber yard, which is on the homebound autopista! the traffic was back to the Timber yard, and apparently had been since 9am, it was then 11.30am, why the road hadn\’t been closed so people were not sat in the scorching sun, I have no idea.

We ordered all the timber I will need to build the new frame for the roof of the kiosko, timber here is relatively expensive, but you don\’t get cheap rubbish, it is nearly all hardwood, and treated against the weather, this has been my biggest bill for some time, and hopefully for some time to come, but it is not the end of the expense for the kiosko, as you will see in the future. The timber will be ready for collection on Tuesday, so we will have to try and get hold of Christian, the lad we use for transportation, I would go myself, but as much of it is 4m long, it wont fit in the trailer.

Just as we were leaving, and thinking that we would be stuck in the traffic, it began to flow, thank goodness for that. We moved on to Copacabana, for a Super Macedonia, we missed out the previous day, so had to make up for it!  Then it was back home.

We then received a phone call from Don Jorge in Bello, with a quote for some metalwork I need, both for the kiosko, and the balcony, unfortunately it appears, he has decided to go for Gringo prices, so we will have to look elswhere.

I was straight upstairs to connect my Security Camera, it says download software, plug in and it will be up and running…I should have known better, nothing is that easy for us, I played with it for hours, and investigated on the internet, it appears that the router may need to be configured. So I have sent an email to the seller, who has a support dept, that will configure the camera remotely for a fee! I think I will go that route, to avoid me throwing the camera out of the window.

We didn\’t get much sleep last night, there was a tropical storm, probably the worst since I moved to Colombia, the thunder and lightening was overhead for ages, the thunder just kept rolling, it couldn\’t get out of the valley, the walls of the house were vibrating, and the rain was sheeting down, I was worried that we would have leaks, especially as we were let down on the roof repairs, and we haven\’t found anyone else yet. I kept tossing and turning, eventually Marcela woke as a result, thinking I was ill, when I told her, she laughed, until I mentioned that the swimming pool cover may  pull away under the weight of the water, that did it…she was wide awake, and cussing me ha!ha!, so she started reading, eventually we both got back to sleep, but it was well past 3am when we did.

This morning, I decided that I would install the new house alarm siren, I gave it a trial run in the office, before drilling through the wall onto the balcony, yes, it will do the job, certainly everyone will hear it, whether anyone will do anything about it other than complain, is another matter. So I drilled and cabled, the siren is now fully functional, I just hope there are not too many false alarms, otherwise we will not be very popular. There have been a couple of false alarms with the workshop alarm, however I worked out what was the problem, the sensor is that good, it was picking up high sided vehicles passing on the road outside, also when we opened the main gate, it slid passed the window opening, and the sensor picked it up, I\’m not faulting it, I have put a piece of timber in the opening to stop this happening again, now I guess it will be spiders crawling across the sensor!

That done, I retired to my haven, in the workshop, I finished painting my acrow-props, that done, I wanted to make a sawhorse, I am always looking for places to rest my work, whilst sawing, painting etc. so I used reclaimed hardwood, and it is hardwood, I had to drill pilot holes for the nails! they were just bending, when I tried to hammer them home, as as result, I have a sawhorse, that is on the heavy side,  but because of the material used, it can be left outside, so no space taken up.

Whilst doing that, Marcela called me, she was upset, she had found a crack in the swimming pool, running from the surface to the floor, it has appeared in the last couple of days, but only goes up the side, at the moment we don\’t know if it is just a superficial crack, or if we are losing water, only time will tell, if it is a structural crack, then that is the end of the pool, we will break up the bottom, to allow future drainage, and fill it with rubble, and create another kiosko, then save up and use the current kiosko for a Jacuzzi /Spa, much like I had in Spain, much cheaper to run in the long term. I feel sorry for Marcela, because the pool has been her baby, we are also a bit undecided what to do, because we have made a down payment on balustrade to surround the pool, as a safety measure, it is due to be installed next week, I think we will have to go ahead, and if the worst happens, we will incorporate it into the new kiosko, it\’s a bit of a bummer all the same.

Whilst Marcela went upstairs for a pamper session, I put up some hooks for her to hang her hoses for the pool, tidied up around the pool, and also the workshop, and called it a day.

This evening, Marcela has phoned our Telephone service provider, regarding access to the router for configuration, it appears, they are not very keen to give out the access codes for their routers, but they have created an IP address specifically for the camera, so I will have to see what happens.