Winter at last! in The View from the Terrace

I was beginning to think that winter had forgotten to call this year. I think the flowers thought so too, our daffodils are really tall and in bud, and the clematis is starting to bloom, while I still have one montbretia blooming since the autumn. Two days ago, however, it arrived. This morning I felt so cold when I woke that I had to put the heater and electric blanket on and then get back into bed to warm up.

We don’t have central heating. When we moved here 36 years ago lots of houses didn’t. Hubby was always going to put it in. We bought a big wood burner that heated the water and could provide central heating too and Hubby even collected radiators from various places but he never got further than drilling all of the holes in the walls. There is now a scheme to help people over 60 put in central heating, but our house is so full from Hubby’s hoarding that we would have to sort that out first.

We do still have a woodburner. Hubby put in a new one a few years back but it doesn’t provide hot water. The lady selling them told us that, if you have one that heats water and don’t use it for central heating too, the water can get too hot and cause the tank to explode. I have been wondering now if we were living with a ticking time bomb with the other one, but maybe they give out more heat nowadays.

Talking of ticking timebombs, when my son rewired last year he discovered that we had the wrong grade of wiring. We had that wiring put in when we moved here 36 years ago. Now we know why the electric used to cut out. It was OK for years but started cutting out about the time the children had their own TVs, computers and so on in their rooms and I got more electrical devices like a dishwasher and microwave. It overloaded the system. It’s fine now and I can put the dishwasher and washing machine on at the same time!

Even though it’s cold, it’s bright and sunny and I might try to tidy the garden a little.