Our two new Rescue Chooks

We’ve got two more chickens! They were rescued from the cold having escaped the lorry that took their colleagues to the slaughter house. Many didn’t make it, but these two did – found huddled close to the heating system of the battery barn.

They’re still nameless at the moment. The one on the left has a broken spur that we’re applying TCP to. The one on the right is, as you can see, “oven ready” – that’s to say, very few feathers. She’s rather cold so she’s currently acclimatising to the cold in a separate pen that’s in our lean-to.

No, no. No baby on the way. I’ve now been playing the violin for 9 months. I realised I haven’t done a violin video since way back in April, so I thought I better fix it. So here’s two Irish polkas: Dan Mack’s (also known as the Newmarket) and Tourniore Lasses.

The video was created from the first take of both guitar and violin parts; I guess if I’d done more takes I might have gotten them better – particularly the A-part of Tourniore Ladies!

Tourniore Lasses and Dan Mack's Polkas

I went to the optician on Wednesday (technically she’s an optometrist but you know what I mean). Had my eyes re-tested after the fiasco with the other opticians’ shop and the Glasses Direct order. Turns out my prescription is quite different to the one that the first opticians created, so that’s probably why I couldn’t see through the glasses that Glasses Direct sent me. I’m now down to around -6 in both eyes – that’s blind-as-a-bat to you.

I have considered having laser treatment, but the videos I saw online of the process actually put me off. The statistics seem to say that 95% of people are satisfied with their treatment. Maybe I’m a pessimist, but that means 5% are not satisfied. That sounds quite a lot when you consider how many laser treatments occur every day.

Anyway, £226 for new lenses in my current frames (how do they sleep at night?!) and I’ll keep considering the laser thing. My Mum goes in for cataract removal before Christmas. It’s a very similar operation, although her’s is now necessary, unlike mine. I’ll definitely wait to see how she goes, although she is having her operation done under a general anaesthetic. On the plus-side: I know what to get Mum for Christmas: A white stick.

Having visited the Centre for Alternative Technology on our holiday (more of that to come later) we bought a couple of attachments for our taps that are supposed to save water.

They work on the same idea that a shower uses less water than a bath. By forcing the water through small, spread-out holes, less water is used but appears to be just as useful.

We bought two attachments for taps that have no screw fitting. They are from TapMagic and have two flow rates. The low flow rate is just the shower, sprinkler-like water and, if you turn the tap on more, a centre stream of water is also provided.

Tap Magic

It was easy to fit it onto the taps. I quickly fitted it to the cold tap. Then I noticed the claim that it would save 70% of the water on a normal tap. Really? Could it be that much?

Here’s the science bit

I got a jug from the cupboard and with the help of Daisy, we timed 5 seconds and measured the throughput of water on the standard hot tap (on full pelt). It used about 900ml, which is just under 11 litres a minute. I then fitted the TapMagic and we re-did the test. With the TapMagic fitted (on full pelt) it used approximately 600ml, which is just over 7 litres a minute. That’s a saving of a third. Great!

However, we never use the taps on full pelt. As the TapMagic has a dual-flow mode, we measured how much water was used in low-flow mode. This is what you’d use to wash your hands or brush your teeth. In this mode it used about 250ml, which is onl 3 litres a minute. That nearly is a saving of 75% on the full-pelt original tap (perhaps an unfair comparison though).

900ml

600ml

250ml

Tap flow - before

Tap flow - After

At £5.50 each, they’re not all that cheap, but I guess that kind of money is easily made back over a short amount of time with those kind of savings. Unfortunately, they’re only available for round-holed taps, so our kitchen tap cannot be retrofitted, nor can the bath.