Fooling Around in the Dark!!

Thursday 27th September, 2012 still at Aldermaston.
Yesterday's rain cleared to give a fine bright day. R, taking advantage of M's absence, took himself off to the nearby K&A Trust Tea Shop for a "Full English" breakfast. Very filling! Back at home  in Reigate, M dutifully had porridge (Grrr!).
Today the trains ran like clockwork (ie: for once the spring didn't break and they ran on time). A fifty minute wait at Reading was just enough time for M to buy a "few bits" at the small M&S on the station concourse. As a result, it was a good thing that R was waiting at Aldermaston station to help her carry all the bags back to MM! In fact, it was all so heavy that we decided to stop off at the K&A Trust Tea Shop on the way for some lunch to give us the strength to continue...
It seems the current leaseholders have been given notice by the K&A Trust, so sadly, the future of the tea room is uncertain.

Later, in the early evening, we were sitting listening to J.K Rowling being interviewed on Radio 4 about her new book which was released today.  By then, darkness had fallen and to our consternation, strange noises were heard outside and then the sound of a narrowboat's engine at full throttle. This worried us, as it is rare for narrowboats to travel after dark.
R went out to investigate and found that the narrowboat that had been moored in front of us was jammed broadside across the canal with its engine running flat out in reverse. Its bow rope had broken and the stern mooring pin had pulled out, so the boat had drifted off. The owner, who was somewhat under the "affluence of incohol", had been trying to manoeuver in the dark without much success. R asked him to stop the engine and was then able to push the stern away from the bank. It should then have been easy to drive the boat gently back into its mooring, but when asked to put the boat into reverse, the owner opened the throttle wide - and drove the boat straight back into the bank! On the third or fourth attempt, he finally grasped the need to go back very slowly - and was soon back on his mooring. It was then just a case of retrieving the mooring pin that was dangling from the bow and waiting while he tried to find a replacement rope for the stern. The owner was very grateful if not entirely coherent!
Back on board, we watched some episodes of Shaun the Sheep - from the ridiculous to the sublime?
Today: Charging the batteries 2.9 hours.