Why didn't I think of this before. 

Here are the top 15 of my downloads from Morguefile.
I have had the screen capture device for years and use it frequently. Yet it had never previously entered my mind to be able to capture the multiple pictures as a whole on morguefile.com
I must be slowing up mentally to have taken so long to realise the chances. 

Speedy work

                                 From the Tuesday arrival of the future contents

In three days I was amazed.

My Kitchen is being transformed. FWJ Property Maintenance Services who work for Alliance Homes don't hang about.
This is the third day of work and it still requires tiles setting round the middle sections of the wall and the electric light and an extractor fan installing but it is like a palace to me. 
I shan't recognise myself when I can start using it on Friday afternoon.
Having thrown out my old Electric cooker I am now using microwave and Homegear Halogen 
cookers for half the electricity costs with a Vonshef addition for brewing my coffee. 
They took this in their stride with a little shelf half way down to give me sight control with my Vonshef griller and oven. 
My conversion of the broom closet stayed without problems also the shelf I fitted years back above the door to carry all my cook books.
3 star works? More like 10 star.

Hoorah

Well the work has started on my kitchen refurbishment. The old stuff was ripped out very fast and new electric points installed.

The wall in the left corner shows a lot of trouble from the water leak from the bathroom stop tap and pipe. Seems the water must have been leaking for quite some time. If it had gone the other way to where there was a bare wall in the bathroom, it would have shown up a lot earlier.
Had a visit from the bosses and they say it will be finished by mid-day Friday.
Seems very odd to me - when they re-did the electric points they had to rip out the old wall points and switches because it was all buried in the wall. What are they doing now with the re-wiring?
Burying it in the wall again from the conduits on down.

Had a go at converting some pix I took a few years back into simulated watercolours of Crab Apple Blossom. 

I like trying different methods to diffuse the effect of sharpness.

I find that Paint Shop Pro's Salt and Pepper filter works well. Requires a little shuffling back and forth though to get the degree required.

Image is first reduced in size, then P & S filter is applied.
I can't make up my mind which is the better of pix 1 and 3.
I'll maybe have another go at the originals.

I joined a Royalty Free site just over 10 years ago. www.morguefile.com It had been started by 2 brothers as a commemoration site for their parents who were teachers at a care school. People could use the pictures at no cost for anything bar stand alone use. In other words they could put them on a website, use them for a leaflet; make them into book covers; or simlar. What they could not do was to use them as photo prints, or as posters for sale.

It very rapidly took on as a first class site for folk who wanted to use pictures but could not afford to pay out sums of money for the use of them; Charities, Church publications, Book Covers for first time publishers etc. When I got my first digital camera I decided that as it was costing me nothing – bar electricity – to take pictures I would join them.

Now as my friends know I am an inveterate taker of Steam Train pictures; and until age made me give up Rugby Union action shots. Selections from all my pictures rapidly followed, as well as photos of my home town and the general area.
Last autumn I realised that my downloads were approaching 500,000 and had hoped to have reached the half million mark by Christmas. This didn’t happen but now I find I am only a couple of hundred downloads from reaching my target. I feel I must mention here that although it seems a fabulous number to me, to the leaders of the field on the website it is nothing. They count in the million plus mark.

                                             Here is the top choice 4,088 downloads

Second is this shot of a country lane that has been used many times as a "Can you copy/paint this into a picture?" 

3,243 downloads

Third is this shot very similar to the first one. 2,477 downloads

Fourth the little "Toadstool" house at Druid Stoke  1982 downloads

and fifth is the shot of a double header steam loco 1,961 downloads.

Altogether I have 14 pix that have reached the thousand and over downloads, with a few more approaching them. 

I post under the pseudonym jusben so if by any chance you are looking for pictures you can use dive in.
I checked Saturday morning and find I have reached my Half-million downloads and 55 more. 

At the moment my living room is piled up with the contents of my kitchen. “How did this happen?” You say to yourself.

Well I have been down on the list to get a re-furbished kitchen from my landlord. Around three weeks ago the crew turned up to take the measurements and etc. and printed out a very nice plan of what it would be like.

They told me I would get a letter fixing up a date for around three weeks time..

On Friday the 18^th I had an Email from the Alliance Housing assistance officer, she said she had heard from the kitchen people that Health and Safety (The appointed nose pokers of Official Circles) had said I must have a perfectly clear access through my hallway and to the kitchen. Therefore the work which they had scheduled to start Monday 22^nd Feb. could not take place.

Now I am almost overflowing with reference books and so have two small bookcases there. This was the first notification I had of all of this. What you might ask had happened to the letter telling me when they would start? It got lost in the files of Health and Safety presumably.

I immediately sent a reply to the Alliance officer saying it would be cleared and the kitchen emptied by Monday Morning.

Friday I spent clearing the two bookcases and stacking the contents on other shelves. 

Saturday and Sunday I succeeded in moving the kitchen contents to the living room.

Now my family is not content to be relatively long lived but we also have a streak of obstinacy in bred into us as well. I was buggered if I would ask for help.

I managed with the fridge and tumble drier but the little freezer had me beaten. I asked a neighbour to help me by lifting it onto the little platform it lived on.

All was ready.  Came 8.30 Monday morning no workforce appeared, I gave them until almost 9.30 and then rang Alliance. What was happening I queried.

The officer Emailed me back almost immediately, she had told the surveyor and he was getting in to contact with the workforce.

Later that morning there was a knock at my door two people had arrived a lady and a gent. She explained that they had had no confirmation from Alliance that the flat was ready to have the work done.

The gent looked at the emptied kitchen and I explained about the puckers etc on the wall caused by the leaking pipe that was concealed by the bath in the room abutting the kitchen. “That will be dealt with” he said. I then asked “When will the work commence?” 

I asked because having never being told by them previously by letter, Email or spoken word I was curious to know why I had not been told by them about the Health and Safety worries.  

“In around three weeks” was the reply.

So for three weeks and another one to get the job done I am landed with the situation.

Got stuck.

How awkward when things go wrong. I was rattling away this morning on a crossword when one of the words I was using just would not work out. It gave me no connection whatever to any word on one of the down spaces..

I had to completely change and opt for a different one. Having already chosen 4 words that incorporated letters in the forbidden one I had to refrain from using some options because they had an I or a U. as an ending to the word suggested. 

However all's well that ends well.

Managed at last and can now watch my saved tele programme from last night.

Made up for the delay - did one complete in a fraction over half an hour.