http://www.itv.com/BeonTV/LoveYourShed2/defau ... .html

...bad weather, BBQ, beers and some form of DIY, it's what us Brits do best, it's part of our Great British Institution. With BBQ ruled out, I was left with DIY. Having brought the flat packed shed for about a month now, the recent down pour meant it has spent most of it's time as target practice for birds to sh1t all over it, and I have to admit, they are pretty good at it. In between the dry spells, I have given the panels a couple licks of Ronseal's Eco-Friendly, odourless, water soluable "it does what it say's on the can" wood preservative for sheds to reduce the painting time later on once assembled. Seem like my days of Airfix logic has finally paid off. I have finally put the shed together with the help of my parents and Suzy after some local Chinese Dim Sum today. We started the project off with the obligatory pot beverage.

Dad acts as surveyor and chief QA

Mum is project manager and I am labour gimp on minimum wage

Rehearsing for my MTV shed cribs pose

A job well (almost) done.

The weather wasn't too bad today, so I got to paint the trim and tidy up the roof lining. Still needs more pinning.

Clearly this shed owns the other shed on the left.

Now where's the beer?

Thought I use this as evidence to just show you my "home office" for the "working from home" excuse. The Macbook Air is loaned from a friend, although I like to pretend it's mine, just like his guitar. Wonder if I get away with the M3? Hopefully with my min wage, he'll take some sympathy.

Such a wordsmith. There comes a time in every man's life where he will be faced with the dilemma and life changing experience of purchasing a shed. It's inevetible, I never thought the time would come for me since I am merely "26" years young and way to cool for that kind of behaviour, however, my "garden project" has been an ongoing and painful saga for the past nine years, and what better way to hide the mess by covering it up with a shed as big as my house, only stronger and more luxurious (Tools and plants not included). Having had this veto'd by the better halve at a wallet friendly £4000:

I settled fot this instead. Life's full of unhappy compromises.

Having recently spent a small sum (about £700) in the garden with less than adequate results, I have also had an expensive week with car maintenance. £748.14 (Service and MOT) + £490.71 (insurance) + £185 (DVLA) = £1423.85 + a thirsty car that requires a £55 refill every five days. Not too bad in the greater scheme of things I guess, and perhaps a price more digestible if I had a decent looking and performing motor, still I think I used to pay that for car insurance alone. The joys of motoring offset with the pain of escalating petrol prices and global warming. Isn't living in Britain great. Still, a price worth paying for the privelage we have here as opposed to the costs you would incur in either Hong Kong or Japan.

Yes, completely unimpressed and just shy of seven hundred and fifty notes to get it through MOT. It's probably more than what the car's worth, and you can probably build one for cheaper. Needless to say, it was expected, having neglected the car for three years and washing her just the once once. I like them dirty, the car too. Here's hoping to another three years of trouble free motoring. In fairness, it does have new shoes on the car, and I have something of a rubber fetish, as well as sheds.

well, it's that time of year again when the MOT is due and my wannabe Batmobile in on death row to the scrap heap. Just another blatant reminder of upcoming costs associated with it. I genuinely should stop buying these so called "grey" imports, in which the goverment have conspired to fleece the average punter from saving a bob or two, but then again, I needn't have to worry about passing MOT, since I don't ever recall a time where my car hasn't gone under the scrutiny of "it's gonna cost ya", be it from dealers, insurers, service and repairs, parts, import, tax, petrol and so on... anyway, judgement day tommorrow as it goes in for the full service which it rightly deserves, since it hasn't done so since I bought the car 3 years ago. Proving Japanese car manufacturer Toyota do seriously make robust cars, and proving my case further, in Japan, it's the local cabbies prefered mode of transport, and you can even be seen chaufeured around in an early 80s number. Having spent 3 hours this evening changing one brake bulb clearly highlights their durability and workmanship. Removing panel after panel, albeit plastic, then nut after nut, just to replace one bulb?! they don't just make it easy no more. To be fair though, I also change my JDM (Japanese Domestic Market) rear plate to a more conservative OEM (Original European Market) rear plate, thus giving maximum exposure to my poncy plate and clarity to traffic cameras so I can be fleeced further caught speeding. Fingers cross, and I promise to treat my car with more respect if it passes MOT, like buying her a brand new set of oversized spinning chrome alloys.

As most of you who know me, I rarely turn down any opportunity to go out and get myself bladered, however for the first time ever this weekend, I blew mates and family out in order to subject myself to an arduous task and physical pain of performing some do it yourself. This by no means was an easy decision, however, I have developed a strange fetish for sheds recently and I'm not too sure if this is the result of getting old and senial. Having yo yo'd my way to and from Homebase 3 times this weekend in my car (which is on it's last legs, however if it passes MOT this week, I will treat it with all the respect she truely deserves), I managed to buy a total of 36 paving slabs, 12 bags of sharp sand, 4 bags of mortar and 28 bricks. The result so far:

This is marking up only before prying off the 35 slabs of paving and laying on the mortar. As far as hated chores around the home, this has to be right up there next to ironing. I'm not particularly looking forward to the back pain which has already begun to work it's way to every muscle I didn't know I have. Yes, I have a really lame garden, but it was even worse before.Think I'm gonna have to pay some cowboy to put the shed together for me.

 

So I feel mildly ashamed being a webjam fan boy, and letting team "Greenwood" down into my belief of him and associates' company. In my feeble lame ass defense, I have genuinely been quite busy at work, amongst improving on my own personal website in recent times for greater exposure, thus including a new blog feature. Yes, it still looks just as good as it did last year, proving my point of a classic and timeless design, but there are also things happening in the background. So here's a shameless plug of the site itself. I promise to post something up soon.