The Robbing Butcher - Bemused by the Patio at FrogMhor Cottage

[TheMustressMhor]

What next for the Robbing Butcher?

Will he wander past Mhor Cottage several times a day so that he can keep an eye on the progress of the patio?

Will Mr. Mhor's measurements turn out to be wrong? And will Mustress Mhor and her DH have too many SLABS as a result?

If they do, what will they do with them?

Will the eggs be dippy tomorrow?

Sign up below if you are interested in the answers to these pivotal questions.

catherine is it Anne Weir who wrote/is writing a book on each wife of HVIII? They are excellent I think. Cath of Aragon was immensely brave, and Katherine Parr wily and incredibly lucky. Poor little Jane Grey.

I am still trying to pluck up the courage to read Wolf Hall (and the rest) but I have mum's hardback copy and it just seems such a weighty tome... I fell in love with historical fiction when I read Jean Plaidy (something about Fotheringay?) when I was 10 - which was of course a vv long time ago, hence affect of gravity on said body.

LaMa talking about user names, is yours because of Die Rosenkavalier?

Oh, and I have a sliding scale of charges for any of you who wish me to pass into the hallowed portals of the Robbing Butcher's shop on your behalf.

Enquiries on a postcard.

Well mustress what kind of bribery are we talking here?

DH is making me prawn spaghetti tonight. It might sound weird, but it will be delicious because whatever he cooks always is. Thriving.

Sunday will be surviving because PIL and one of their friends coming to lunch, which means I will have to tidy up. OTH, friend is very lovely indeed and will lighten the convo.

AND he finished chemo today!! yay! Now we just wait for next round of scans, tests etc but fingers xd.

Yolo, face or figure , am definitely making a go of face these days!

Cheese sandwiches are not good for weight loss for me. In fact, they are prime suspects in my weight gain, I love cheese sandwiches!! Maybe I am doing it wrong.

Happy to report that we survived the night, all little hippos slept well in their layers. Mr Hippo is home and claims the boiler is safe. His main contribution was to remove the “danger do NOT use” sticker .

Am planning to turn the thing off tonight again I think! It is not leaking though, not sure was the Robbing Plumber was on about. It was leaking (but also raining) and he did lots of stuff before it stopped leaking - but it was still unsafe for some reason. And he wanted to change it .

for finishing chemo!!!

boilers are bastards hippo. They connive to make things go wrong, I well remember the 4 weeks the winter before last with no central heating and then no hot water - not helped by the fact that Mr yolo pressed wrong button and switched off hot water. Oh how we laughed! (not)

thank you for party emojis re end of chemo, much appreciated.

hope baby 7 has stopped being an arse, and the Robbing Butcher will be open in the morning for mustress delectation.

Per requirements I shall send you requests for Robbing Butcher Mustress I'm excited at thought of getting to use a pretty stamp! Erm.....do you accept postal orders as payment??

Yes Starkey is controversial. That must be why he's not on TV much anymore. Mouth runs away with him. Love his books and series though!

Yes Yolo, Alison Weir has a book on Henry's six wives. It's good, but Starkeys is the best there is imo. You should definately read Wolf Hall or better still listen to it on Audible if you don't want to wade through the massive tome. Bring up the Bodies is fantastic on Audible. The narrator Simon Vance is excellent I really loved it and apart from that never used Audible for anything else.

The BBC series of WH was excellent although I felt missed some good bits from the books. I've watched it 3 times! I never fancied Mark Rylance at all before but he became quite appealing playing Thomas Moore and Damian Lewis was the best Henry 8th I've seen.

Prawn Spaggetti sounds lovely. I ate a block of cheese on crackers and more left overs. I'm well boring.

Feel your pain about having to tidy up for guests though. Here's an anticipatory halo

And massive massive congrats on finishing Chemo!!!

CatherineofAragon I accept all forms of legal tender and look forward to receiving your order.

Hippo
His main contribution was to remove the “danger do NOT use” sticker

Oh yes? Mr. Hippo knows what he's doing, then?

I would have treated him to a Very Hard Stare and a or two, for good measure.

yolo you and yours deserve a good deal of and a as well.

Three hearty cheers!

That's lovely news, yolo. Do have some and also

I was going to add one of the crowned emojis but I see they have disappeared. Off to Canada maybe.

Night night all 💤

THE MUSTRESS MHOR MAKES A FAUX PAS

I was in the pharmacy this morning and as they are right next door to the RB's shop (and also because his opening hours are incomprehensible) I asked the assistant (and this is word-for-word) "Do you know if the Robbing Butcher is going to be open today?"

Oops.

I am so used to calling him the "Robbing Butcher" that I temporarily forgot that it is only on this thread that he is generally described as such.

The assistant gave me a strange look but the pharmacist burst out laughing.

I gathered up my purchases (paracetamol and lipstick) and left hurriedly.

Oh, and in case anyone is interested, our pharmacy has plenty of paracetamol and ibuprofen in stock. I gather from reading the coronavirus threads that this is not the case in most areas.

It is one of the advantages of living in a remote Scottish village. Our transport links to everywhere are so poor that I am absolutely convinced that we will not get CV here.

Just hoping that Hippo gives us an update this morning.

I am hoping anxiously that her house has not exploded overnight due to Mr. Hippo's intransigence.

I'm very impressed that your purchases were paracetamol and lipstick, Mustress. Are you planning a wild night out, or in?

In Waitrose yesterday the paracetamol shelves were bare, as were those for toilet rolls, anti bac cleaners and liquid soap. What are people doing with them? More to the point, how did they manage before?

Morning all! Mustress, that is so funny. If the pharmacist was laughing he must be known for his prices!

Happy to report that the whole Hippo family survived the night! I am beyond confused about the boiler.

These are the facts:

a) It has in the past been leaking from behind the boiler when it rains. This has taken the form of a drip, frequent, persistent, but still just a drip.

b) A few months ago, a tiny part of the boiler broke and a VERY insistent drip started from a new place. This part was replaced and things went back to normal.

c) On Thursday, a small stream started pouring from the boiler, after a minute changing to a very insistent drip started from the same place as in b. At the time, it was raining massively.

d) the Robbing Plumber came, had a look, spent a lot of time on the phone to his colleagues and declared major work / new boiler needed (about £2,500!!!!).

e) It is not leaking at the moment and it is not raining.

So:

1. was the Robbing Plumber incompetent and it was the same fault as in b (spent a lot of time on the phone, might not be that sure of what he was doing)?

2. was the Robbing Plumber trying it on to make even more money on top of his extortionate fee?

3. or do we have some issue where rain water leaked (safely) to a new place?

I am so confused. If it was 1), it must have been fixed by him as it now is not leaking (and he is truly a crook). If it is 3, can water safely leak through a boiler ?

Was the Robbing Plumber incompetent

Probably.

Was the Robbing Plumber trying it on to make even more money on top of his extortionate fee

Oh yes.

Glad to hear Hippohouse is still in one piece! It there any possibility it is an outside leak and nothing to do with the boiler? Odd that it happens only when it rains.

We had a similar issue, a drip, drip, drip from behind the boiler. Turned out to be nothing more than condensation when the weather was particularly cold. I had the boiler covered under British Gas Homecare but it cost me my £60 excess to find this out.

check the roof hippo?

We have spent the morning adding more weatherproofing to chicken palace only to find we are several sheets short (several sheets to the wind?). Very annoying. Am currently loading car with all the packaging from the shutters for kitchen and our bedroom. They came from China so I am teasing DH by coughing at him dramatically. I am soooo funny.

Our own Robbing Plumber, when we had one, used to bore us into a coma with the details of what was wrong with our previous boiler. I'm surprised yours had managed to resist sharing his expertise.

If you start a thread PigletJohn will be along to help, it might be less terrifying than you think.

coughing at him dramatically. I am soooo funny

Baby is ill with high temp. No one is thriving at our house.

oh 7 poor baby, and poor you all

Poor baby, and poor you 7.

However they are resilient little beasts, babies, they never cease to amaze with their powers of recuperation.

yeah but fleas they put you through the mill while they are ill!

how old is baby7?

our shutter/blind thingys are up in the kitchen. I hate them - I knew I would. I can see the practicality at night, and screening the sunlight which is blinding in our south facing kitchen, but I would just rather look through the windows and draw curtains. I wanted them to open so far they would fold flat against the wall - one side is ok, the other side sticks out so is annoying.

however, they were DH heart's desire so I gave in. they will be going in our bedroom too, where they will be perfectly fine.

humph. I expect I'll get used to them.

Baby7 is 9 months old; out of hours GP prescribed antibiotics for red tonsils. We are about to go to bed, hope there will be sleep 🤞🏼
yolo did you buy cute baby stuff?