Face masks and stove sagas

Weather to paint (or not) An autumn cruise

Face masks and stove sagas

Once again, I've postponed writing my blog for no other reason than being busy with life. I don't know why I'm finding it hard to do my post a week as I always used to do, but other things really are getting in the way. There's also the fact I'm busy writing another book, which is consuming much of my writing time, but I've never had trouble doing the two simultaneously before. I shall have to blame the Current Situation, which deserves the capital letters because of the impact it's having on our lives.

Like most of Europe, we are experiencing a resurgence of the virus here in the Netherlands and I believe we have the dubious honour of having the highest infection rate per capita of any country on this continent. What's worse is that Rotterdam is the hardest hit city in the region right now. As a result, we are back into partial lockdown with the main feature being that we are obliged to wear face masks almost everywhere indoors (except at home), and that even means for teaching. I gave my first face masked class last Wednesday, which was interesting to say the least. I don't think I'd appreciated before how much we use facial expressions to convey and receive meaning. I'll now have to develop a whole new technique to improve my non verbal communication and practise eye reading as well!

The essential stove

The other story that's occupied my time is the saga of my stove, which was actually quite amusing. Normally, I travel to Rotterdam alone because I'm teaching. Koos has enough to do on the Hennie Ha without schlepping all the way there and back with me and prefers to stay in the south. But I'm glad he was with me this time when my oil stove, the light of my onboard winter life and that which warms my being (along with my hot water bottle and woolly slippers), refused to work. In the process of fixing it, we started big and ended up tiny, with a needle in fact.

Convinced that the fuel pipe from the tank was blocked and that diesel bug had developed in the system over the summer, we first emptied and washed out the fuel tank (the big job). We then disconnected all the fuel lines and put the compressor to work (also a big job).

However, all the fun started when I happened to be standing at the end of the copper pipe indoors when Koos applied the pressure outside. I was shocked to find myself in the path of a huge glob of mucky diesel as it shot out of the pipe. Luckily, most of it flew over my shoulder and splattered on the wall the other side; it just missed heading out through the window.

Effective? Well, yes, you could say that. We both shudder to think what might have happened if I'd been standing just a little to the side, the consequences of which don't bear thinking of too much. I’m also relieved the window wasn’t open. I’d have had some explaining to do to the river police about the strange oil slick around my barge. The consequences of that don’t bear thinking of either. Anyway, the pipe was thereafter judged to be clean even if the language I uttered wasn't. But it still didn't solve the problem.

We'd already cleaned out the carburettor, which admittedly had a lot of sludge in it, but that still didn't effect a cure. In the end, we, or rather Koos, found that there is a tiny part inside the carburettor's regulator which had a clogged-up slit in it. My eyesight is so iffy I couldn't even see it. Since I had my cataract ops ten years ago now, I haven’t been able to see anything close up or too far away, so focusing is a bit like zooming in and out until I get to the right distance.

But I digress. Koos could see the tiny slit and this, it seems, is the outlet through which the diesel seeps into the stove and enables me to light it. Because it's so thread thin, it took my finest needle to free it of the dirt, which almost had to be done with a magnifying glass. But then hey presto! All of a sudden everything came right and warmth was restored.

After all that work, we could have solved it without risking environmental disaster from diesel spillages on deck and globular projectiles from inside, but who knew? I just hope it behaves itself when I return next Tuesday. Watch this space!

Altogether, though it was an interesting exercise and since I have quite a fascination for mechanical things, I actually enjoyed the process taking everything apart with Koos. And of course now I know how it works, I could possibly dismantle the carburettor myself, which feels like a lesson well learned, albeit with fairly limited applications in this electronic age.