Computer, Rosa, moving caches, apple juice, lunch guests and a full day of geocaching

With my knee ultrasound having been postponed by 3 weeks, we got on with other things to do in town. I have realised that the money in the bank was depleted very quickly, so I had to go and put some more in to cover the bills. Having done that I went and fetched my new computer which has been put together before we went to the harvest, but we had no time to fetch it then.

Busy

My desk minus computer

Prior to that we rearranged the top of the landing to have space for both of us having a desktop machine. I have taken Roy's space facing the front door and he moved to the back of the landing by the boxroom. Amazingly this provided so much space in the middle that the whole area started looking much bigger than before.

We also realised that this being a desktop computer, there are no speakers, camera, keyboard, mouse and network card with it. So we went out on Wednesday to get all these and managed to add about another £100 to the price. But, just before that, on Tuesday, I attended a private clinic for an abdominal ultrasound and I am glad to report that nothing too untoward was found. Apparently I do have a small cyst on my liver, but the doctor said that that is nothing to worry about.

At the Blood Bank

The next exciting event was my visit to the Blood Bank. I am too sickly and old to give blood any more, but my very very good friend Feri had offered that I could go with him when he next gives blood and then I can, as his companion, log the blood donor geocache, which is behind the front desk at the centre. This is what we did and I was really pleased that I could go. With my currently still dodgy knee, my caching activities have been severely curtailed, so any chance to get the odd point, is most welcome. I also had to go to the hairdresser this week, as my head started to resemble an untidy haystack.

Salmon on toast, radish, kohlrabi and Dreher Gold

And then we started putting together the new computer with its monitor, keyboard, mouse, WiFi stick and headphone, which was fine. I started using it and its speed was impressive. Just as I was enjoying myself by my lovely new table and shelf unit on the landing, the computer cut out, but came back of its own accord straight away. Not a good sign, I thought, but at least it corrected itself automatically, so all was well again.

Hot feta salad with champagne

However, after it had done it another three times I was getting a bit concerned. I rang Szabolcs, who built it and impressed on him the seriousness of the situation, so he came out the following day to fix it. As it happened, once he arrived, needless to say the computer would not oblige us with doing it again in front of him. So finally, he offered to take it back and run it as a long test to see if he can fathom what's going on. I accepted, so I immediately lost my brand new computer. Brrrr!!!

A glorious pink

Fortunately, we were planning to spend the next week in Bér, so we were not going to miss it, therefore I thought no more about it. This one day delay, caused us to arrive in Bér on Friday and our meeting with Rosa, whose yoga retreat apparently went extremely well. The people were very nice, they loved the Bunkhouse and Rosa herself was very pleased with everything.  She cleaned up after the group very well and all was safe.

One of my usual red beauties

The bombshell hit when suddenly she was on the verge of tears and admitted that her relationship with Barnabás is over. Apparently he is abusive, including physical abuse. He had beaten her up several times, accused her of infidelity and was very cold and distant for a good while now. I personally liked Barnabás, he was a good worker, polite and very friendly.  However, I know from previous experience that abuse is almost always totally hidden and outsiders very often have not an inkling that it is going on.

Roy's birthday present

We tried to cheer her up, she got quite a lot of it off her chest and eventually fortified by a gallon of must from Pityu in a container, she left reasonably settled. I was somewhat concerned how much was she up to driving, as coming over to us she drove straight into her own fence and damaged the corner light.  I have tried to ring her without success, it seems to go to voicemail all the time. I hope she is OK, I'll keep on trying, or perhaps send an SMS.

Apple juice production

On Friday the other notable event was Roy's 78th birthday. His main present was a press, primarily for grapes, but apples and other fruits as well. Ultimately, I think he wants to learn how to make cider, but in the meantime we restricted ourselves to making apple juice.  Considering that it was pressed from very sharp, sour and partly unripe apples, I was amazed to find that the juice was really sweet. We pressed about a litre and drank all of it very quickly.

Glass and a half of freshly pressed apple juice

The birthday meal was our favourite hot salad with brown fusilli, cocktail tomatoes, feta cheese, olive oil, freshly squeezed orange juice and fresh basil. This is a dish we will never tire of, it's that delicious. It was all washed down with lovely demisec Törley champagne which was also a surprise. I don't normally like Törley or anything other than dry, but this was refreshing and just as alcoholic as I like it.

Memorial board for a young biker who died at 20

We were staying put over the weekend and most of the following week, in order to rest my knee and catch up with things in Bér. However, totally unplanned things happened, which, for once, were very pleasant. First of all, as I can hardly go geocaching due to my dodgy knee, somebody brought a moving cache and hid it 5 minutes away from the house.  This has happened before (although not too often), but almost always at times when we were in town.

An old well that has been here for nearly 500 years

My other problem is that I don't normally pay too much attention to my telephone and it can beep away like mad and I don't have a look what the message or e-mail was about. Most of the time it is about moving caches, but I tend to miss them, even when they are close, as I don't look at the message early enough. This was on the cards again, but while talking to Mariann on the phone, discussing our planned geocaching trip on Tuesday next, she happened to mention that somebody placed that moving cache very close to us. I almost slammed the phone down in my hurry to get there before somebody else has snazzled it.

Beautiful reservoir, now a fishing lake

It was still there, even though they hid it it on the hillside where one of my own caches has disappeared three times. I was over the moon and was only sad about the couple that put it there, not calling for a coffee and a chat. So, when István called back, seeing that I rang him and he didn't hear it at the time, I told him off for not calling in person. So guess what he did on Sunday? Called back and told me that they are coming to see us and bringing another moving cache. I couldn't believe it, and they spent about an hour with us chatting and sipping coffee. Luki and BlackCat (their geocaching nicknames) are delightful people whose wedding I managed to miss while in France in the summer. As I clapped eyes on her I realised what was behind the rushed wedding. I think she is due in about 3 weeks, and I hope they have a lovely baby. As he was driving and so close to the birth  she no longer drinks alcohol, we gave them a litre and a half of the must to drink later at home.

A romantic, neglected lake

While fetching the second cache, I ran into our Dutch friends taking a walk and invited them to lunch on Monday. They were in the village during my holiday in France and Italy, so I haven't seen them for nearly six months. They accepted and Roy was also very pleased when I told them about it. As we overbought on the food front (as we usually do), that was also nice to make a big meal with a sweet course and entertain some lovely people.

Bull-lake, the most beautiful of the three

Nicely framed shot from the lake side

The weather has gone summery again, and while the nights are now longer and colder, during the day it is always beautifully warm. We laid the table in the pavilion and had a lovely meal, drinks and a long chat al fresco with some gorgeous pople we always hit it off with. The three of them had roast chicken and I had liver. We had quite a quantity of must and finished with apple crumble.

On Sunday there was yet another Grand Prix, the Russian one in Baku, which is not normally known for exciting racing, but this time it proved itself a fascinating effort, which ended up with Lewis having the luck for once, which is usually in short supply for him. The front row was Leclerc and Lewis, but Vettel managed to push Lewis down to third at the start and at one stage he was even fourth. However, there were a fair number safety car periods (both virtual and real) in the race as well as some clever tricks in stops and tyre choices. Lewis finally struggled back to second, when Vettel's engine gave up.  After that he stayed up front, even though young Leclerc was charging towards the end. A very good, exciting and enjoyable race, with the icing on the cake being Lewis's victory. May they all be like this!! Five more races are left, so the overall win is most certainly not in the bag yet.

My friend, Mariann is heading into the jungle

Other achievements on Monday include finding a blind repair map for Ros and Ian. I hope he does turn up next Monday, as promised. I also started writing my caching list for next week, when we will spend 5 days by the Balaton, enjoying the nice autumn colours and finding a few caches in the process.

Old tank stand on a disused military exercise area

And finally, the star event of the week is definitely my geocaching  trip with Mariann yesterday. This was also the first real test of my knee, as I drove all day and walked about 4km in total, with the hardest walk up a big hill at the very end. We didn't do all the caches planned, but that was fairly predictable, partly because of my knee, but also due to bad traffic in the afternoon, as well as some shitty caches which took a hell of a long time to (not) find. All in all that was a very enjoyable day, with good weather, some lovely lakes, views and the placing of the two moving caches from the weekend.

Old, disused geodesic tower

My knee is a bit sore, but I am moving quite well, so hopefully I shouldn't be too lame next week by the Balaton. I will probably only post after that trip, so a longish gap is likely to ensue.