Happy Birthday Old Man

 Rocky, our first Berner, has now made the right old age (for a Berner) of 11! This obviously could not go unmarked, no big party like last year, but a small gathering of the clan in the living room and a cake.

 With a nice sponge made with dog meat and a pate "icing" the clan were spoiled with their favourites on top, jaffa cakes and oaties.

 Thankfully given their size the clan waited patiently for their slice

and the Rock Star had a special bone from the butchers. Rocky has fathered some 54 pups, goodness knows how many grandchildren he's got, lets hope his longevity genes have been passed on.

Treasure hunt

 Ignoring the fact that Will.I.Am was determined to create new jobs, yours truly decided to get on with the task in hand which was to empty the annex (newly roofed) of all the clutter and find treasure as there was bound to be loads.

 First I had to evict a very naughty pony.

 Once inside I had to content with Rug Rat Mk2 inspecting every item for play potential.

 I did find some good things

 and some amazing things to a nerd.

 Once the job was done, the room that had previously been absolutely  full to capacity was now empty save for  the essentials at the back.

 It was quite cathartic sorting out all the clutter and the new space can now be filled with stuff that currently litters the workshop. I'm pretty sure there will be more need for bonfires shortly.

As we have no TV, once the boys retired up the wooden hill I concentrated on Russian Horse Artillery.

Goodbye old friend

 This is where Gerry has lain for the last 12 months. When Stan arrived Gerry got the hump and refused to start so hes been left to think about things. Lacking the mechanical know-how and beer vouchers to get him back into shape I finally decided he should go

 to some dedicated Land Rover enthusiasts who will love him and give him a new lease of life as an off roader.

They were very happy, me, I was sad to see him go but it was for the best. Bye Gerry.

Job done

 Finally the roof is complete and this side of the cottage is water proof for the first time in 10 years (Sorry Stable Sprite but the roof you fitted never stopped the water dripping into the utility room) and all is well with the world. All I need to do now is get up onto the main roof and fix that one in several places.

But for now I concentrate on my inner nerd by painting these Russian Napoleonic soldiers, they are 15mm high.

Naughty boy

 The morning patrol

 was its usual fine self

 nothing unusual

 save for finding this miscreant the wrong side of the border. Will.I.Am had made a break for England.

Along with his accomplice Snoops.

Moon walk

 A full moon was setting on the morning patrol

 hanging around as the sun rose.

 The clan led by The Rockmeister

 on top of the Bonsai Mountain

 ready for sun worship. Here is Sven,

 WooZah,

 Mrs Bear and

our very old boy, Rocky enjoying the autumn sun rays.

We need a bigger sofa

Something must be done

 The annex roof has all but collapsed causing untold damage to the precious things stored within.

 Not wanting to have all the things I should have already thrown away have to be disposed of because of water damage yours truly risked life and limb to climb up, remove the 497 nails holding the cardboard colander together and carefully slide the old panels off.

 Naturally it being a job at Rock HQ it was under the close scrutiny of critters, the Berners being locked indoors once Ripley knocked the ladder down for a second time.

 This is the new roof before its final adjustments with a massive hammer, metal, with an anti slip paint and anti condensation coating, much better and much less likely to let water and yours truly through.

 Breakfast was al fresco out of army ration packs, the boys joined me for this feast.

Here they are contemplating the merits of army vegetarian sausages.

8 Peaks Challenge

 This is a model village at the end of the ridge

 where we started our hike, actually the pub was shut so we abandoned plans to start here and drove to the other end to get a sandwich

 completely forgetting that by doing so we put 5 miles on the walk and so

 as we went round setting up the challenge, meeting the subsequent winner en route getting some sneaky practice in

 we found the whole thing

 very tiring

 great fun

 but most of all

 time consuming and finished very late. But the course is now set!

Get ready

 I have finally decided my next challenge, then added an interim one on account it seemed a good idea at the time.

 So, for 2019 I'm going to walk across England following the Wainwright route, 198 miles and 8681 metres of climbing and to make it interesting I'm going to do it in 4 days.

 Then because I have not ridden my bike much of late I entered a 300km road race for June next year.

 So today I ticked off another 150 metres of climbing for my Climb Everest anywhere challenge, making it 6800 metres done since 1 June and only 2000 to go.

 Naturally

Berners lead the way.