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Hi, Rusty!
Oh dear! So the awarding of the World Championships to Eugene is now under criminal investigation?
However have I managed to miss all this scandal?
I must have been going around with my eyes and ears closed! (can you have your ears 'closed'?)
I dimly recall the awarding of the World Championships to Japan without any bidding? but was there any aftermath to that decision?
I cannot remember?
What does Seb Coe have to say about all this? Is he admitting to there being any corruption?
I'm feeling somewhat sickened by all this........
I wonder what will happen next ?
I've just looked up "tommy rot" in Brewers - all it says is "utter nonsense, rubbish; tomfool behaviour".
And for "tommy" , it gives "sometimes has a somewhat contemptuous implication".

Maybe time to have dinner and put the World's problems to one side......

Hello, Elle!
I agree.
We shall put the Worlds problems to the side.
Can't have you getting fraught!
I had Irish stew for my tea from a tin, and it was not the most delicious meal I have had all week.
Our rain is back.
I am back reading the "Airman and the Carpenter" and although it was written many years ago, I find it excellent.
The subtitle gives you a clue to what the author thinks.
"The Lindbergh Case and the Framing of Richard Hauptmann."
It is from Lancashire Library, Burnley.
Be one of my penny ones from Amazon.
David Walliams said the audition of BGT in Birmingham was great. It is the last one and the show returns to TV in April.
I always thought it was summer it was on?

Hi, Rusty!
I have just been having my weekly hour-long chat with my cousin.
All is well up there in Blackburn.
I have heard of "The Airman and the Carpenter"! By Ludovic Kennedy, isn't it?
I remember him from way back as a newsreader, among other things.
How strange that the book should come from Burnley Library, though - only 30 miles from Bolton, where I was brought up, and only about 12 miles from my cousin in Blackburn.
I am still reading my Kathy Reichs book, although I have only a few chapters to go now. You would not like it, but I enjoy the detection, and the scientific aspects, of the book.
Irish stew from a tin does not sound up to your usual culinary standards?..... I thought you were a great believer in using your slow cooker?
We had meat pie, jacket potatoes, and red cabbage. It was good!
Raining here, too - and the wind is getting up again........
A quieter week coming up, I think....
How about you? Anything planned ?

Good afternoon, Elle!
Fine day here.
Nice blue sky and no wind!
How are you for weather?
Hearing some crews have been taken off the oil rigs in the North Sea due to high winds.
I love the slow cooker!
Now, red cabbage?
I have not came across that before. Is it naturally red, or are you at the capers?
I was looking at iPads earlier in a shop. I think I preferred the Samsung models.
Did not purchase anything.
I had already ordered a bedroom wardrobe this morning, so thought I had better calm down!
Went to bakery though and stocked up with apple squares!

Morning Rusty !

Not a fine day here - gale force wind, even here in the centre of the country, and 'flying' showers. Orange alert on all coastal areas with winds up to 120km/hour and dangerously high waves.

Elle is not having you on with red cabbage - it is a type of cabbage that is naturally red (though it might be a hybrid) and it has a taste of its own, rather nice I think.

What style is the wardrobe ?

Good afternoon, Rusty!
It's very wet, very cold, and exceedingly windy here !
I believe we are on a Yellow alert - yesterday we were threatened with an Amber, so have got off relatively lightly so far.
You must have heard of red cabbage? I think you are having me on (again)?
It is a cabbage of reddish purple colour - delicious cooked with sliced onions , cooking apples and sultanas.
Experiment? if you really have not tried this before?
You have had a busy morning - buying a wardrobe ( this decorating lark is going to your head!) and "nearly" purchasing an ipad, too!
Is the new wardrobe for your own bedroom - or for one of the ones going to be decorated soon?
I don't think I am venturing out again this afternoon if the wind doesn't calm down.......I'd be blown off my feet!

Hello, Pigale!
Nice to hear from you!
Poor you, with the weather.
It is like summer here.
A beautiful day and no breeze.
Yes, I have looked up red cabbage. It is new to me.
I thought Elle was being mischievous!
Wardrobes are tricky, Pigale! Huge choice!
The one I ordered is quite plain. Looks like oak.
It is one of those you put together yourself, like a jigsaw.
All I need is a screwdriver, apparently, and endless patience, which will be in short supply!
Won't be here until the 20th.
Be careful if venturing out in the weather, Pigale!

What ho, Elle!
Do you know this?
Red cabbage is not something which has crossed my path.
Remember, I just found out what Kiwi fruits were, last year.
I know onions and apples though.
The "wardrobe" is for me.
I am dumping the old "marital" one.
Too vast for me.
Soon, I am phoning "a man and a van" and we will take stuff to the dump.
It is a daunting prospect being confronted by dozens of tablets in Curry's. My heart was in my boots!
I shall take a young one next time. They are far more up on these things than me!
Yes, be careful out in the weather.
Pigale has it too.
Seems to have missed us Northerners out!

Rusty, better not do what my Husband used to do: whenever we ordered something in kit form, he would throw himself into building it on his own without looking at the instructions - though successful sometimes, he often had to undo everything and start all over again having read the instructions - and in any case there was always a screw or a bolt left unused!

Hello, Pigale!
I have put similar things together before.
And I have two sons who are tradesmen and well used to screwdrivers and Allen keys, so should be OK!
I would have preferred a prebuilt one, but there are not nearly so many, and most were taller than I wanted.
So, I went down the do-it-yourself road.
Hopefully it will be straightforward!