Food prices in Bellingham MA USA

Portsmouth New Hampshire

Gus and Karen with the USS Albacore the first submarine designed to travel underwater continuously  was a test ship with no weapons designed to test different propulsion, propeller and sail configurations 1953-1963

Coffee break in Portsmouth

Gus first visit to USA gun store in Portsmouh. As well as rifles many revolvers and automatic hand guns were available for "hunters". This was a huge store possibly a Hottie Heaven here on earth(in the USA) where everyone (including lunatics) has the right to "bear arrns"!!???

An after dinner moment in Portsmouth

At "Olive Garden" the best value restaurant chain for $25 one gets dinner for two-  2 entrees , 2 main courses and one dessert to share, excellent food. I had two bowls(no limit on # of refills of soup) of Zuppa soup and pasta with Italian sausage. K had Minestrone soup followed by eggplant Parmigian. We took the chocolate cake desert  home to eat later'

The best value of all in New Hampshire where there is no sales tax and liquor costs less than at the duty free shops at the border 1.75 litres of brandy for $18 Amanda should see the wine and champagne prices.

Christmas 2012 in MA

Sunday 23 Dec we visited Guy, Karen's brother Guy and wife Gail seen in their drawing room in Chatham on  Cape Cod

Christmas Eve Karen with her son  Jeff who has now formed his own band FM Crush  by working with Artistic Management  Group in Andover  MA. This company was founded by Andrew Lawson who  was the founding member of B-Factor, a very successful music group based in Europe from 1999-2003

Gus and Karen  opening stocking gifts

Renovations 2012 outside Conclusion status

This status update shows the progress after 12 weeks of outside work. during this time the basic design and floor layout for the inside work in the basement was also completed. This involved taking down some walls, starting to saw through the concrete floor for the new waste pipes required for the new basement bathroom, installing a new electric water heater and starting to understand? the antique wiring system in the old basement- more details will be shown in a blog next year at the start of the full time inside work.

Kitchen door looking towards upper deck, note concrete pad for deck steps and rose garden in foreground which will be moved down beside the lower deck in the Spring
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Kitchen door  looking towards new shed (where wading pool used to be) and where the new shade patio will be placed in the Spring. The shade patio will have flagstone with shrubs in gaps.

Mud room and basement doors open on to concrete slabs which change into a flagstone way to the lower deck.

Where the lower deck will be placed in the Spring with the rose garden in the sunny sheltered spot to the right

Front door from garage with new single level interlock laid and two new concrete pads one between the steps and garage and the other at the side of the frontdoor steps. These pads provide  a firm control for the interlock.

New interlock looking straight on to the side of the house. 

Interlock bricks on skids sorted to put in a path beside the garage in the Spring

Catan Games night late finish Fri/Sat Nov 23/24

Tom, Chris, Doug, Sue and George the gang

Gus and Tom

Catan near the end o the game

and finally showdown not the time!!

The Chief Mechanical Engineer

Has a chemistry background but great talent in mechanical devices particularly small motors. Without Dave's help so much equipment would not be working.

Keeping the lawn tractor going

and cutting the grass

helping out in the crunch washing the bricks

with so little time left B4 the ground freezes for the winter