MORE PETTY WITTERINGS.

Not normally too self-indulgent (I hope), you are going to have to excuse me being so today, but after the week I've had and unable to participate in any retail therapy, I feel the need to witter.

First things first. Many thanks for all the messages of concern and support that you have sent to myself and Husband dearest. Home from hospital, he has quite a lot of medication to take and is on a strict no-fibre diet but still, at least, he's home.

And so we go to the on-going saga of The boiler (sound atmospheric music, you know the kind I mean.)

You remember the last time I left you with a constant, but not too alarming, drip, drip, drip. Well!!!!! That drip, drip, drip became more of a .......? Tidal wave is too strong a word - more of a, (shall we say?) waterfall.

Yes, the boiler had burst completely leaving me with water pouring through the ceiling and unable to turn off the water supply. Typical, unable to contact Hd and with all of our neighbours at work, the emergency plumbers advice? Can't you stop someone in the street and get them to turn your water off? Can you believe it? Good advice? - invite any old stranger into your home and hope for the best. I don't think so.

Anyway, aid eventually sought, the water supply is turned off and we await the arrival of a plumber. So far, so good, except, a few hours after he has gone I notice we have heating but no hot water. Great, another visit from a plumber - at this rate we'll be on their Christmas card list.

Plumber number 4 been and gone. Words fail me - it turns out we have had no hot water for the best part of a week and all because plumber number 2 forgot to turn a tap which allowed the water to heat and plumber number 3 didn't spot this. As I say, words fail.

You know they say these things come in threes - the boiler (1), Husband dearest (2), the front door lock? (3). (Please let there be no number 4.)

Yes it 'never rains but it pours'* (in the case of the boiler, literally) - on top of everything else the lock on the front door decides it doesn't want me getting in. Cue, our good friend Jimmy who, as a master carpenter and fantastic joiner, fits me a new lock making the joke that Hd is only out of the house five minutes and I'm already changing the locks. Just as well I still maintain a sense of humour.

Minor catastrophes looked at, what of my other news?

Wishing to see how much self control I had with regard to the buying of books and given the small mountain that is my to be read pile, I decided I wouldn't buy any more books until Christmas.

Ok so it didn't last too long but at only 10p for a hard-back book that had hardly been read who could blame me for buying one (alright then, four)? Then there was the £5 voucher I got for recommending mam to the BOOK PEOPLE. Yes I know the voucher was for £5 and I spent over £20 but the books I ordered were very good value. Then there was the book I won over at SATISFACTION FOR INSATIABLE READERS (thanks GMR) but that really doesn't count as I didn't actually buy that.

Yippee, I won a book thanks to the Blogomania event I was telling you about - and not just any book but one of my choosing. So, having seen this on GMR's blog a few weeks ago and having added it to my wish list, I opted for HECK: WHERE THE BAD KIDS GO by Dale E. Basye. Heck being the story of:-

"WHEN MILTON AND Marlo Fauster die in a marshmallow bear explosion, they get sent straight to Heck, an otherworldly reform school. Milton can understand why his kleptomaniac sister is here, but Milton is - or was - a model citizen. Has a mistake been made? Not according to Bea 'Elsa' Bubb, the Principal of Darkness. She doesn't make mistakes. She personally sees to it that Heck - whether it be home-ec class with Lizzie Borden, ethics with Richard Nixon, or gym with Blackbeard the Pirate - is especially, well, heckish for the Fausters. Will Milton and Marlo find a way to escape? Or are they stuck here for all eternity, or until they turn 18, whichever comes first?" - FANTASTIC FICTION.

* You guessed another of my nana's sayings - A proverbial phrase. The origin is unknown but the phrase itself was known by the early 18th century. For example, this item from a work by John Arbuthnot, 1726: "It cannot rain but it pours; or London strow'd with rarities." according to THE PHRASE FINDER.