Its a beautiful spring day on the Thames the water is flowing gently and the sun is out, its that great time of year when all the river birds are building riverside accommodation (if they can get past the human clutter) and are getting it on.
In about six- nine weeks we will be feeding, watching and rescuing tiny chicks before they head down the weir. for now in this moment the day is just perfect.
I am spending no time at all thinking of the messy garden, the dirty windows the jet wash the boat needs or the essay i will soon be overdue with if i don't get my finger out.
Oh, and I've just discovered twitter, what about that for a total distracter.


Boat catch up
Desmond and Marge need jetwashing before plants start growing on them
the laser dingy is now here, there by saving money and duty time.
Laser 2 is still up for sale, no bites bizare
Ally is still working on the river with the nieghbour
the rescue boat is still at the fixers
Bluey the canoe has a black nose from tree dropings or filthy river, unsure.

Cats
Bonnie need glasses and hearing aid as well as dentures 20 yrs old
BJ all good
Leo beat up a nieghbours cat as it tried to get on the boat.
Nutty is OD ing on dental biscuits

A Mil for the Mooring

This was written by our mad mate Duncan the jobbing actor guy, a little bit of poetic licence but he's basically captured the basics, thanks Dunc.....

Mil for the Mooring

My name is Dan and this is Mogs

We live among the ducks and frogs

We need a mil for our Mooring

So cough up now and don't be boring

Or we'll send gangsters to make a fuss

And you'll be sorry You messed with us.

Ok, he needs to stick to his day job.

Our other not so fantastic idea was to have many summer parties on the island and charge for the tickets, but then we get into licencing and such and we would need to hold at least 8 parties with the nieghbours approval so all less realistic, still if you should fall over anyone itching to chuck away say 150,000 just chuck is our way and you'll benefit from us being real nice to you for the rest of your life............... (a girl can dream you know) but seriously any money raising ideas greatfully recieved.

Just a wee catch up on Island life

Tough times, but the suns out, the website is being revamped, and work is not exactly pouring in, but nor has it stopped. We had a few cat traumas post snow, seems Leo our young accident prone boy tried to use his back brakes and managed to tear all his claw's off leading to very bloody painful toes. Apparently this kind of injury is common for car crash victims, which as we live on a car free island is quite clever of him.
Made a valient effort to sink a very small boat the other day, a talent i don't have but with help from the passing islanders, we eventully managed it.
Dan had his 50th recently, this consisted of 3 big pressies from me and a small office party with a big banner hung outside which he managed to miss the banner, obviously it's very humugous size meant a great deal in making it invisible.
So what next, Theatre tonight, the fantastic MAmamia, i hope its as good as Joseph, managed to miss Defending the cave man the other day, but did sell on the tickets so all good.


Boats
Laser (yacht on coast) now up for sale
Marge all good but need a cover for loo vent
Desmond full of garden junk
Edna don't know

Cats

Leo butter paws for now
Bonnie fragile
BJ balemic as ever
Nutty starves himself for biscuit treats

So sent a few emails noticed the rest of the south was at home and spent the morning refining our artistic talents I'll let you be the judge, and yes its unlikly we will be looking for a career change.

meet Dennis (eyebrows) and midge

Fantastic SNOW rare down here, great to play, have fun , see the bright side.

So the question is do we go into work ? or sit on the sofa and work from home........ no contest.

State of the river Slow and flat

State of boats

Desmond covered in snow but happy for the his sleeping bag

Marge the barge Snow not melting which means the insulation is working.

Today was a lazy day, you know, one of those days when you’re at work but not very work orientated, when it’s fun to have a chat or several, I probably spent more time talking about good books and bad english lit lessons at school than doing any real work.
Not good I know but I had a tough day yesterday so I took the opportunity to ease back, this concluded in a fantastic exchange of good books to read so I’m back to the Kite runner.
I also learned today that 7000 jobs were created yes created by Subway that means that yesterday about 3 x as many jobs were created than lost, How big was that news, it certainly didn’t get to the radio 4 headlines this morning.

State of River still, fast and very cold
Desmond (dory which we use to get to land) broke down today had to beg a lift off a good mate.
Little Edna (3-4person narrow boat 20ft) engine good, heating still not working Engineer may come out on Monday, don’t hold your breath.
Marge (the boat we live on) Probably working but river running too fast so don't know
Laser (neglected tatty yacht on the coast) just cost a fortune to fix and keep on mooring got to sail her this year. Still haven’t rung the man very embarrassed.
Shea Khan (2 man laser) Bloke is terrified of sailing this so we will try and sell it, no luck yet, which is odd she’s a great boat in good shape, but we are not good at getting rid of boats.
Laser dingy (1 man laser) still ok at sailing club unsailed in 08
Allie (old boat for crossing river) on neighbours land
Bluey the canoe damp but good not used recently
Canadian canoe needs some wood work a spring job.

Cats all happy had left over sausages tonight
Bonnie Girl, 20 year old nagging old hag brings out the worst in us but we love her sort of.
Beaches Girl,17 year old silver torte the queen who has us under her paw
Nutty Boy 3 yr old, insane half Burmese, quite loopy bit of rat catcher
Leo or Mr Ardo sane half Burmese brother of nutty built like a rockwieller very controlled.

So today I think I joined either the sad group or the new front, I joined twitter not because I spend hours on the computer but as the one good news stories from admittedly a bad event that happened last week came from a twitterer first then I want to be in the loop.

I’m just a little tired of good news channels searching out the negatives not that the news isn’t bad but surly that’s in our face the real work should be to find the news that isn’t bloody obvious like Banks have tonnes of liquidity its confidence they are lacking so let’s stop trying to bleed the comparative good guys like Barclays and HSBC. Or dwell on the bad guys until we all stop listening MOVE ON. is there any more on that pilot and his cool crew? Which companies did well today, can we have an in-depth look at them. Rant over.....

State of the River Real fast
State of boat boats

• Little Edna (3-4person narrow boat 20ft) engine good heating still not working went out on her this last weekend with mates.
• Desmond (dory which we use to get to land) Working sounding good
• Marge (the boat we live on) Probably working but river running too fast so don't know
• Laser (neglected tatty yacht on the coast) just cost £2000 to fix and keep on mooring got to sail her this year.
• Shia Khan (2 man laser) Bloke is terrified of sailing this so we will try and sell it, no luck yet, which is odd shes a great boat in good shape, but we are not good at getting rid of boats.
• laser dingy (1 man laser) still ok at sailing club unsailed in 08
• Allie (old boat for crossing river) on nieghbours land
• Bluey the canoe damp but good not used recently
• canadian canoe needs some wood work a spring job.

Cats

• Bonnie 20 year old nagging old hag brings out the worst in us but we love her sort of
• Beaches 17 year old silver torte the queen who has us under her paw
• Nutty 3 yr old, insane half burmese, quite loopy bit of rat catcher
• Leo or Mr Ardo sane half burmese brother of nutty built like a rockwiller very controlled.