The Great Wallpaper Removal Begins

I knew from the moment we viewed our house online that the wallpaper would not be staying. We put it off as a winter project, seeing as there were so many outdoor/gardening projects that had to be tackled while the weather was warm enough.

This week, the stripping began in earnest - how pleasing! It's peeling off in big strips with very little effort, which is great.

Behind the plasticky/vinyl paper is a gluey brown paper that comes off very easily with a wet sponge, so not a lot of scraping is needed at all.

All 3 stages can be seen along this wall.

And yes, that awful carpet will have to go as well. This is the first of 7 rooms needing to be stripped.

Lonely Phone Booth

We passed this phone booth in the dark on a country road, looking picturesque enough to necessitate a stop. It looked so incongruous, out in the middle of nowhere.

Work Party

Dale and I helped out at our town's wetlands restoration effort over the weekend. The wetland was maintained and serviced by people doing community service in lieu of a prison sentence in the past, but new Health & Safety regulations terminated that involvement (working near water ... !) almost 2 years ago.

The reeds and invasive bulrushes have grown up and smothered/covered everything over so that islands within the network were no longer separate or visible. We managed to get 14 volunteers for a period of 3 hours to try and get it back to its original, intended state.

These two hardworking guys cleared and re-dug a drainage ditch bringing water down from the tarred car park. 

People brought strimmers (weed whackers), hedge cutters, loppers, wheelbarrows, rakes, scythes and pitchforks to carry out the work. The few people with waders did the deeper water tasks.

Our town mayor came and joined the work crew

Though we weren't able to finish clearing the entire area, we cleared about 75% of the problem spots. It was a good day for working outside (NO RAIN), and we were rewarded with donuts and drinks. It was a great connecting (and aerobic) activity.

The Welshabet

Whilst visiting the Pontcysyllte aqueduct last week, I saw a sign for Wrecsam/Wrexham, which got me thinking, 'does Welsh use an X?'

I then fell down the another rabbit hole (no surprise), discovering that Welsh has 29 letters in its alphabet, and that doesn't include K, Q, V, X, Z. Instead, it uses ll, dd, ff and so on, as additional, separate letters (digraphs, the combination of which alters the sound). For example, 'ff' makes the sound of an f while f on its own makes the same sound as a v. How exciting, and extraordinary! It starts to make some kind of sense after a while!

So, here is what I call the Welshabet, without the j which has been more recently approved as an addition (1987).

Welsh alphabet

To complicate matters a little, the location of some letters in a word changes how that letter is said - English speakers shouldn't complain! The word for hospital (ysbyty) contains all 3 different ways y is pronounced, all in one word. (Remember y is a useful vowel)

To say hospital, ysbyty, try this: usbuhttee