In the olden days, he would have been called by the name which everyone knows; you know, the bloke whose lunch is taken by all the Townies who visit country pubs and tea-shops around lunch-time? That's right, Dear Reader, the 'Ploughman', he must be awfully hungry by now!
In these more enlightened days, of course, he (or possibly she) would have to be referred to as a 'plougher'. Which brings me to the nub of this posting; Freda wouldn't let me buy one in Egypt, as they were about 150le and she could never imagine getting 150le's worth of use out of it! However, I saw something on 'Freecycle' which I thought that I could modify and convert to make into my very own, ultra-powerful, BLOWER! (Pronounced as in 'Plougher' and not as in 'slower'.) The bloke I got it off, funnily enough, was the Superintendent Minister of the North Tyne Methodist Church Circuit! Small world, eh?
Do you know of Freecycle? It's a website where people give things away when they no longer have a use for them. I suppose that it's popularity increased in direct proportion to the local Councils charging more and more (on top of the normal rates/council tax or whatever that we all have to pay, regardless) for taking unwanted stuff away and disposing of it. They've got some cheek, those Blighters! I still cannot understand why I used to pay business rates for my rented (from the Council) yard and garage yet they also expected me to pay their Legal Department's exorbitant charges every time the tenancy was renewed over the last 40 odd years. After all; I was already paying their blinking overly generous wages!!!!! I suppose that's typical of Mr Bliar's pseudo-socialism for you, the constant re-distribution of wealth from those who work to those who prefer to shirk!
Never mind that now, I've got my blood pressure to think of, thank you very much. Anyway, now that I have this blower, I can blow (remember the pronunciation now, as in plough) to my heart's content. With a saw, a bit of ingenuity and with very little pecuniary outlay, I managed to convert something like this:
Into this:
It's a Beast! Of course, as you might expect, it wasn't all that straightforward, as I wanted to tame it and make it 'user-friendly'. i.e. It needed to have a flexible pipe to direct the 'blow' where I wanted it to go without humping the actual blower into awkward positions; like blowing the dust out of the outside A/C units.
I had to reduce the outlet size and shape from an oblong(ish) 3 inch circumference to a round vacuum cleaner flexy-pipe size. This entailed begging the red concertina hose from a coach operator friend (I think it's an old turbo-charger hose from a 300hp Cummins engine) and marrying that up to half an 'Oasis' drinks bottle, which nicely brought the size down to fit the second-hand vacuum cleaner hose (which I managed to find in the electrical repair shop just down the street here in Luxor, for the princely sum of 25le).
It's great! Now I can blast dust (or indeed, anything I fancy!) everywhere I go. I'm seriously wondering about getting a generator; so that I can hire out the whole kit and caboodle to one of the felucca men on the Nile, for use when the wind drops. He wouldn't have to hire a tugboat to tow him along. Imagine; he could just point the blower into the sail and Hey Presto, away he goes!!!!
What do you think, Dear Reader?
In these more enlightened days, of course, he (or possibly she) would have to be referred to as a 'plougher'. Which brings me to the nub of this posting; Freda wouldn't let me buy one in Egypt, as they were about 150le and she could never imagine getting 150le's worth of use out of it! However, I saw something on 'Freecycle' which I thought that I could modify and convert to make into my very own, ultra-powerful, BLOWER! (Pronounced as in 'Plougher' and not as in 'slower'.) The bloke I got it off, funnily enough, was the Superintendent Minister of the North Tyne Methodist Church Circuit! Small world, eh?
Do you know of Freecycle? It's a website where people give things away when they no longer have a use for them. I suppose that it's popularity increased in direct proportion to the local Councils charging more and more (on top of the normal rates/council tax or whatever that we all have to pay, regardless) for taking unwanted stuff away and disposing of it. They've got some cheek, those Blighters! I still cannot understand why I used to pay business rates for my rented (from the Council) yard and garage yet they also expected me to pay their Legal Department's exorbitant charges every time the tenancy was renewed over the last 40 odd years. After all; I was already paying their blinking overly generous wages!!!!! I suppose that's typical of Mr Bliar's pseudo-socialism for you, the constant re-distribution of wealth from those who work to those who prefer to shirk!
Never mind that now, I've got my blood pressure to think of, thank you very much. Anyway, now that I have this blower, I can blow (remember the pronunciation now, as in plough) to my heart's content. With a saw, a bit of ingenuity and with very little pecuniary outlay, I managed to convert something like this:
Into this:
I had to reduce the outlet size and shape from an oblong(ish) 3 inch circumference to a round vacuum cleaner flexy-pipe size. This entailed begging the red concertina hose from a coach operator friend (I think it's an old turbo-charger hose from a 300hp Cummins engine) and marrying that up to half an 'Oasis' drinks bottle, which nicely brought the size down to fit the second-hand vacuum cleaner hose (which I managed to find in the electrical repair shop just down the street here in Luxor, for the princely sum of 25le).
It's great! Now I can blast dust (or indeed, anything I fancy!) everywhere I go. I'm seriously wondering about getting a generator; so that I can hire out the whole kit and caboodle to one of the felucca men on the Nile, for use when the wind drops. He wouldn't have to hire a tugboat to tow him along. Imagine; he could just point the blower into the sail and Hey Presto, away he goes!!!!
What do you think, Dear Reader?
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