Today I went to Brownhills on the A5 east of Cannock and got two hours of film, freezing temperatures, the wind got up a bit and increased the chill factor. My new coat keeps my body warm and I can now manage the video with gloves on. My feet were the weak point stood on frozen grass. Handy place to park, suit early in day in summer or spring by lunch time the suin has swung around too far. See what you think of the stills in tonights slideshow. I finished off the last few minutes back in Cannock as I was getting too cold in the end at Brownhills. When I got back we had hassle with BT open reach, their call centre in India had leaked our details and inundated with spam calls from India. We now have a password when BT have to give if they phone us and we have a facility to block these numbers but mostly they say unknown as international. Then the electric went off.

On the plus side Mandy has got everything back in order on the lounge. Tomorrow I need to touch up the balustrades on the hall and stairs and part of the mantle piece in the lounge, just a bit of gloss white to do.We are probably going out for our erstwhile Thursday drink at the Golden Pheasant, haven't been in for weeks now.  I've sorted out the recent DVD stock to put in the van ready for Boyle St Xmas Cracker in Manchester, we are setting up tomorrow evening, we were going to do it Saturday morning but Mandy wanted to minimise the effort at the weekend. Anyway here are some shots from the A5 Brownhills this morning.

It all changes by the hour but then with British weather it's hardly surprising. I took a punt on Keighly as it isn't too far and going up the M6 and across to Burnley isn't anything like as traumatic as the rush hour on the M62 to Yorkshire. There were still plenty of school buses around first thing but the traffic in the town was awful. The sky was much clearer than anticipated but as luck would have it it got cloudier as the morning went on which allowed some very reasonable shots and if Youtube doesn't delete them all they will be loaded this evening. They even deleted advertising on one of the Cheltenham films, what did Cheltenham ever do to upset Google! It didn't take that long to get back home, noted truck options on the roads to Skipton/Keighly/Bradford, not overwhelming but some interesting hauliers.

Then at home I phoned the computer chap re no sound, as it was him who fitted the gadget to get sorted he thinks he knows where to look, when I unplugged it seems it reverted to the default settings. The email was playing up but seems to have got sorted. I got all the DVD orders which came in up to this afternoon away in the post, well actually Mandy posted them, one parcel sent 48 hour guaranteed delivery took 6 days to arrive. Photos from Keighley this morning.

A long days work but now all the paint work is finished and furniture restored to it's correct placed and with pictures hung it just awaits the freshly cleaned curtains to be hung tomorrow perhaps. There is a lot of china to be cleaned and returned to display cabinets but at least we have room to move around again. The weather was dry and bright, I'll see if I can find a reliable weather source and see which days I can take a stab at trucks with at the new locations I've located. I've been busy loading various archive films on our Youtube channel but the Google 'crawler' eliminates anything which mentions Turkey ( 1998 visit) or Kosova ( 2010) visit. Thus I've had to put things like 2008 holiday, 2010 vacation at least it stays up with revenue stream linked, there is little point in having them listed and not gaining funds from it which are sorely needed to keep the PMP Archive growing.

With all this busyness it's been hard keeping reports going on other activities, we had a Blackcap on the bird feeder on Sunday, a rare warbler visitor but we have a couple of sightings over the years. A bit of a bully to other small birds. Coming back from my course in Chester on Monday nights I saw on consecutive weeks a barn owl and hare both near home and rare sightings of note.We've made progress on both Mandy's and my own family trees with direct ancestors now mid 17thC for Mandy via her natural father and myself mid 16thC via my mother's side in Norfolk.

Frustrating times with Co-op re meter readings, sent a chap to read them but normally send on the net, then they ask for the net reading, why send a chap round, answers obviously beyond their tiny brains. Amazon, well what do you expect, migration seems to be the big issue and no its not Geese, its postage, don't ask me I just use it, phoned India I suppose left it with them, came the old soldier routine. BT scraping the barrel now, the internet connection keeps vanishing and poor speeds, said they found a fault and it would be fixed by end of the day, I wonder. Photos from Cheltenham yesterday

A five am start this morning, a clear run down but weather not as forecast( yet again) the BBC are rubbish with their forecasts I must make a determined effort to avoid their efforts and get a more realistic synopsis of the conditions. It was far too bright despite the promise of heavy cloud melting to light cloud but I still managed to get reasonable shots at an interesting time in Gloucester where work has started on the new shop and bus station complex while the old one is still being used. The morning rush hour was very chaotic and makes for quite entertaining viewing.

After covering Gloucester we made our way to Cheltenham, we used to enjoy the cafe there with giant eclairs, a lifetime away now, it's Costa or Starbucks and even these are bottom of their range, no nice cakes anywhere, very poor expected better of Cheltenham. Bus content about usual, lingered around to get some variety at the bus station, it clouded over a bit so got some decent shots in the town. Tomorrow we continue decorating the lounge , on the home straight.

It will probably be trucks the rest of the week when I get time as it's going to be sunny, I spotted another truck filming location so I can try that sometimes, I've a couple of new ones in mind. Photos at Gloucester this morning. It's my course at Chester tonight. Looking at a Cuba trip in February next year, heat and old lorries are a good combination but really need a self drive which we didn't get last time.

After seeing a car visiting a neighbour yesterday morning covered in snow it wasn't too surprising when it heaved down with sleet yesterday afternoon and evening. Today it's been fairly raw although just above freezing. The weather is ok for bus filming in parts just tomorrow so we shall put the last phase of decorating on hold a day and are intending to head to Gloucester and Cheltenham early on and then get back to get the DVD orders in the post before it closes. Not so many orders today but it's still going to take me a while to get them sorted. A busy day with an 8am service at St Oswalds, I got most of the things set up for the main 11am service and hurried back for breakfast then back again at 10am. We had to go back again in the afternoon as there was a practice run for the confirmation service next Sunday evening with Bishop Libby.

I managed to get a lot more decorating done and that included the radiator and now I'm working my round the skirting boards and making more parts ok  for replacing furniture, all the paintings arte now rehung. I'm still having problems with adverts and listings on Youtube, I had to delete most of the instantly popular Kosovo shots from 2010 as their 'crawler' immediately latched on the word Kosovo then why doesn't it pick on other copuntries which have had large conflicts by rights everything including the UK, USA, France, Japan,Germany and so on should be banned, instead the sick remarks and abuse get through although we seldom get any now at PMP just the Spam messages.I think google/Youtube need to get their act together but at the PMP Archive we are happy with the increase in hits and revenue which enables us to keep reaching into 'new' bits of the world of transport. As we are heading S West tomorrow lets go there for tonights slideshow.

It was an early start again as I wanted to get all last nights DVD orders ready, there was quite a pile but they all went off this morning. We already have another batch piling up but no post until Monday so will hold them until Sunday evening as we are far too tired to start anything else. It was day 4 of decorating the lounge, today we really broke the back of the job and have all the ceilings and walls finished. The only bit left is the radiator and then the wood work but this doesn't need the whole room in covers and we've moved our coffee table back so we don't have to put our drinks on the floor, after all this work our backs aren't up to the stretching! Obviously we've had no time for anything else but at least we are having a proper dinner tonight. The tv played up, it's this BT gismo that goes wrong quite often, the picture just froze, turning on and off did nothing but ended up resetting the BT box and its ok for now, frustrating but easier to look for solutions o the net than ask BT anything, worst service in the world BT. I'll try and get some fresh clips on Youtube channel tonight, I couldn't do it yesterday but did get all the recent DVDs finished, covers made and listed on our shop here are the covers for the recent releases.

Around 100 DVDs a day flying out with Santa at present thus little time left as we are also in the middle of decorating our lounge, day three of that and hopefully the end is in sight. I've actually received an order which includes the Cambridge bus visit but isn't in our shop yet so despite being on my knees I'll try and get the cover done this evening. Day 2 of weekly fasting moved from Tues Wed to Thurs Fri due to afternoon cream tea Wednesday. I had my weekly course meeting with vicar Jane this afternoon, a couple of hours respite from the paint. Thankfully I've not that much course work to do as my essay went in early and we start a new unit next Monday which fits well with this busy period. The most DVDs to one person so far is 42 in one shipment. Somebody is going to be delighted and goggle eyed over Christmas.

I managed to get some Albanian truck clips on Youtube last night, hoping to get some on the same trip in Kosovo uploaded this evening. I've an archive lorry DVD in the making which should be ready before Christmas but no promises. Other things still in the piperline include new releases in the Bus Spot series which will see some of the early issues updated and in widescreen and images enhanced, I've also been putting some interesting city centre shots to one side which have plenty of bus content from the old days. I know you are going short of shots this week so lets see if I can find anything from that 2010 Balkans trip, must be ready for a re-run soon.o I couldn't see them so here are some lorries in Ireland in 2008. Lots of new truck locations being examined for 2018.

It's like Santas grotto with all the masses of DVDs flying out for Christmas plus the white undercoat paint in the lounge. Really busy as you can imagine I'll try and post something tomorrow but been on the go since 8.30 and it's 9.30 pm just about to sit down!

A decorating day, started quite early with everything covered up although it took a while as there was another bunch of DVD orders on the net overnight but today it's been quiet on that front. We started the decorating filling in various cracks with polyfilla and then started with the undercoat of matt white which is covering the present blue and yellow paint. I also did half the ceiling by roller, this worked better at getting the coverage on the walls so will finish off tomorrow also using the roller although it does generate a bit of mess so essential everything remains covered throughout the process.

We had to pack in mid afternoon as we had a concert at Clonter Opera, a really pleasant afternoon of John Locke inspired songs with Robin Humphreys at the piano. It was really lovely to be transported back over the years to the 30-50's and a change from opera to the popular songs of a bygone era many get so few outings these times. Anyway when we got back a big clean up so we can sit in the lounge and watch tv tonight. We resume painting tomorrow morning. It's been windy and wet here today, little better tomorrow so not a problem doing the decorating. Photos this evening from Cambridge and Huntingdon  yesterday. Just paused for a bacon buttie, too much cream tea for anything more! Just burning the Cambridge DVD, it looks really good.

A much requested and thoroughly enjoyable trip to Cambridgeshire today and a stop off at Huntingdon. It was an early start for the second day in a row and we'll be thankful for a lay in bed tomorrow morning. We had a quick trip down as far as the A14 then had an hour creeping towards Cambridge thus missing any extra rush hour delights but as it was already gone 9am we had a brew in M&S before I got cracking. Lots of great video and hundreds of super stills in this mainly double decker stronghold and just the lack of much independent presence albeit Whippets in green bus way livery but made up for that on the way back for the multi coloured fleet of theirs at Huntingdon although not as busy as it once was

. Tomorrow morning will be taken up with decorating the lounge, no great rush and hopefully after we get furniture moved and covered I'll get the ceiling and walls done with white which will act as an undercoat on the walls to ensure the blue top coat looks the same throughout. Tomorrow afternoon we have a concert at Clonter Opera. I think the weather goes downhill towards the end of the week so perhaps more decorating although I have many bus and truck venues to be completed before the year is out as per our news page. A bit random as to order, it depends a lot on the weather, Peterborough, Gloucestershire, Keighley are all high on my bus list. Trucks I'm thinking of the bottom end of the A500 for a change and the much changed Runcorn Expressway M56 roundabout. I eyed up a couple of places on the A14 for spring before the new road is opened but I guess I've still got plenty of time but it will be something of a one off. Our first Christmas card arrived today, we have the PMP cards ready to be written up. Photos from Nuneaton yesterday.