This is what I was doing today.

I've painted the end wall of the lean-to that I've been rebuilding. And even looking carefully, you can't really see the join between the original rendering and the rendering that I did.

You can however see the original colour of the rendering if you look between the ground floor window and the 1st floor window - a horrible manky dirty grey paint. This cement-based paint that I've been using to paint the house - a pale yellow colour, makes it look so much nicer. And it will look nicer still when I do the second coat.

You'll notice the door of the lean-to. That was one that I made back in 2000 and as I was leaving, and not due back for 6 months, I painted it in used engine oil. It's the best treatment that you can ever do to wood and when I'm preparing wood to be buried in the ground, like fence posts and so on, I always soak the ends in used engine oil, even today.

This morning though I was as usual on the computer doing my web pages. And quite early too - I was awake long before the alarms went off. A couple of consecutive early nights are what I have to thank for that. But I had a weird dream again - I was a-wandering down West Street in Crewe and met up with an old schoolfriend, and we chatted for ages about one or two people we knew and the cars that they owned. We all - a large group of us in the end - ended up back at a hotel. Bizarre!

This evening, with the hotel in St Gervais closed for holidays, we went round to Clotilde's and spent a very pleasant evening there. Clotilde made loads of stuff to eat, which was really nice of her, and she gave me a doggy bag, the contents of which I have just this minute demolished.

It's nice to meet up with good friends and chat away for ages. I should do it more often.