Grrr, Ugh, Unf, Boredom, Yay, OUCH
Yesterday started well enough with a leisurely early start at Jo's place, out the door a few minutes after my planned time of 10:30. Thus I headed to Hammersmith tube and then down the Picadilly line to Hatton Cross to pick up my Hire Van.
Then I took the easy route (after initially going the wrong way, why do I always think Heathrow is just outside the M25 rather than just inside as it actually is?) of M4, M25, M3 etc to Fleet to do the 'check in' and get my keys.
After that I set off for Southend, zipping around the M25 in a clockwise direction to avoid the toll at Dartford. Little did I know just how good an idea that was at the time. So, arrived at Southend, sat down to eat an apple and finish a drink, then took the bagful of my stuff plus my sleeping bag and headed off to Woolwich...
... and ran into a huge problem. Earlier in the day there'd been some 'spill' in the Blackwall Tunnel, which is more towards central London, but still one of THE major routes to get north/south across the Thames. Thus the effect of this knocked on to both the Woolwich Ferry and the Dartford Tunnel/Bridge. I did get across the Bridge ok, but quickly hit huge traffic problems ALL the way to the storage place near Woolwich Dockyard. A journey that is doable in a little under 2 hours took over 4 hours!
So I arrived at the storage place rather grumpy, but proceeded to load all my stuff up (took 5 or 6 trips by myself) and make sure it was all fairly well packed for the minimum of rattles or sliding around.
Luckily by this time the traffic problems had calmed down, although I did avoid the major roads, taking a 'shortcut' back to Shooters Hill Road (A207) to start the trek back to the M25 to zip around the southern half of it clockwise to Fleet. Once on the M25 I realised I was starving so stopped at some services for a yummy pizza, fries and drink, picked up an extra bottled drink and got on my way again.
I finally arrived back at the flat around 10:30 at night and straight away started unloading stuff. Ugh, my back HATED me for that. I took small breaks, but mostly it was nonstop, finishing sometime after midnight.
So, got the flat straightish, but pretty much nothing unpacked yet, then setup the bed and went to bed (after first seeing if I could get online using dialup from Linux, which I couldn't, something about Zen's dialup setup doesn't like pppd).
Today I got up around 9, showered, then took the van back. After that I was pondering half a day in London to shop for trainers and relax, but decided I'd best crack on with unpacking, food shopping etc, so went straight to Waterloo to catch a train back.
Once in Fleet I did attempt to shop for a new pair of trainers... with no success. Out of 4 or 5 shops only one had something like I wanted, but didn't have it in my size, so I'll have to go to London sometime soon anyway (well, maybe just Farnborough). I then found some nice new underwear, a drying rack (there's a washing machine in the flat, but no dryer) and did some basic food shopping.
Of course I did forget some things, so once I'd done a load of laundry and was pondering washing dishes I realised I had no washing up liquid so popped out to the 10 mins walk either way Tesco Express to get that, and a few other things.
Once I got back I managed to get the place more or less straight, still things in 3 boxes and some obstruction in the storage room/corridor to the bathroom, but it'll do for today.
My back is killing me, all this set off the problem I have around the bottom tip of my right shoulder blade, my neck and shoulders in general are screaming at me, and I'm exhausted. So, now I've confirmed dialup is working on Windows it's time to do some net.catchup.
Then I took the easy route (after initially going the wrong way, why do I always think Heathrow is just outside the M25 rather than just inside as it actually is?) of M4, M25, M3 etc to Fleet to do the 'check in' and get my keys.
After that I set off for Southend, zipping around the M25 in a clockwise direction to avoid the toll at Dartford. Little did I know just how good an idea that was at the time. So, arrived at Southend, sat down to eat an apple and finish a drink, then took the bagful of my stuff plus my sleeping bag and headed off to Woolwich...
... and ran into a huge problem. Earlier in the day there'd been some 'spill' in the Blackwall Tunnel, which is more towards central London, but still one of THE major routes to get north/south across the Thames. Thus the effect of this knocked on to both the Woolwich Ferry and the Dartford Tunnel/Bridge. I did get across the Bridge ok, but quickly hit huge traffic problems ALL the way to the storage place near Woolwich Dockyard. A journey that is doable in a little under 2 hours took over 4 hours!
So I arrived at the storage place rather grumpy, but proceeded to load all my stuff up (took 5 or 6 trips by myself) and make sure it was all fairly well packed for the minimum of rattles or sliding around.
Luckily by this time the traffic problems had calmed down, although I did avoid the major roads, taking a 'shortcut' back to Shooters Hill Road (A207) to start the trek back to the M25 to zip around the southern half of it clockwise to Fleet. Once on the M25 I realised I was starving so stopped at some services for a yummy pizza, fries and drink, picked up an extra bottled drink and got on my way again.
I finally arrived back at the flat around 10:30 at night and straight away started unloading stuff. Ugh, my back HATED me for that. I took small breaks, but mostly it was nonstop, finishing sometime after midnight.
So, got the flat straightish, but pretty much nothing unpacked yet, then setup the bed and went to bed (after first seeing if I could get online using dialup from Linux, which I couldn't, something about Zen's dialup setup doesn't like pppd).
Today I got up around 9, showered, then took the van back. After that I was pondering half a day in London to shop for trainers and relax, but decided I'd best crack on with unpacking, food shopping etc, so went straight to Waterloo to catch a train back.
Once in Fleet I did attempt to shop for a new pair of trainers... with no success. Out of 4 or 5 shops only one had something like I wanted, but didn't have it in my size, so I'll have to go to London sometime soon anyway (well, maybe just Farnborough). I then found some nice new underwear, a drying rack (there's a washing machine in the flat, but no dryer) and did some basic food shopping.
Of course I did forget some things, so once I'd done a load of laundry and was pondering washing dishes I realised I had no washing up liquid so popped out to the 10 mins walk either way Tesco Express to get that, and a few other things.
Once I got back I managed to get the place more or less straight, still things in 3 boxes and some obstruction in the storage room/corridor to the bathroom, but it'll do for today.
My back is killing me, all this set off the problem I have around the bottom tip of my right shoulder blade, my neck and shoulders in general are screaming at me, and I'm exhausted. So, now I've confirmed dialup is working on Windows it's time to do some net.catchup.