Meet Gertie

 As I write, Herbie is getting a thorough internal inspection.  Behind the stove, inside the wardrobe, on the shelves and in the cupboards; it all seems very detailed, especially for a fourteen week old inspector!  Yes it's Gertie, the new ship's cat enjoying her first taste of life aboard.  Here she is in more familiar surroundings at home.

And like all cats she is ever curious.

She seems to have no complaints so far about boat life I'm happy to report, although she didn't especially enjoy the car journey here.  In preparation, Kath had already got Gertie used to wearing a harness, so she could sit on the back seat of the car, rather than in her cat carrier so she didn't complain too much.

We're not going anywhere in the boat this time, this is just a familiarisation visit to settle Gertie in new surroundings, although we may just do a circuit of the marina pool and put Herbie into her new berth twenty yards from where we are currently.

There's more exciting news, well exciting for me anyway.  I've booked myself onto a traditional signwriting course in October.  It's with renowned fairground artist Joby Carter of the famous but now sadly defunct Carter's Steam Fair.  Joby has been running these 5 day courses for some years, but this is the last one at his current location only twenty minutes drive from our house so I grabbed a place while I could..  What I've seen of his work is incredibly good, and he's real old school - no computer graphics, no masking tape, real freehand brushwork.  The videos advertising his course are very encouraging and I just know I'm going to love it.  Maybe, just maybe, I'll have a go at repainting Herbie's name panel after doing the course.  It's not going to turn me into a Phil Speight or a Dave Moore of course, but I reckon I might have a go at painting the name without a mile of masking tape next time.  Here's what it was like then 

Even then it turned out sort of reasonably, if somewhat, um, sterile. I never liked the way I did the E's

and if you could see it close up, the paint wasn't thinned enough and was pretty lumpy.  I'm hoping some hands on tuition from Joby will help me with all that.  And if I chicken out and don't repaint the name, I'll still enjoy the course and maybe knock up some other decorative bits somewhere.

For info in case anyone is interested, here's a link to his course details

https://jobycarter.com/courses/five-day-intensive-signwriting-course

Lastly an update report on our Brompton folding bikes.  When I bought our two (one at a time second hand on Facebook Market Place) I didn't realise that were so many subtle variations.  Now I see that one of the bikes is lower geared than the other due to the size of the chain wheel. I think the lower geared might be the best for us as it makes it easier to get up hills.  They do each have 6 gears anyway, but everything is a notch lower on the one bike.  I can replace the chainwheel on the other for £35 so I might do that. There are a number of other small differences that I won't bore you with here.  Suffice it to say that it's well worth looking at a few Brompton Youtubes before choosing one.  The other thing to say is that buying second hand can save you a ton of money as long as you are careful.  The second one I bought is pristine, practically like new and a little over half the price of a new one.  The other is a bit older but still very good.  These bikes are top quality and built to last a long time.  Nothing folds smaller, or more easily.  I think though that if you wanted to ride a lot on rough bumpy towpaths, they are not the best solution. They are a lot better on smooth surfaces. Despite buying them to use from the boat, I suspect they'll get a lot of use when we visit our Peter in Cambridge.  We can get the two in our car boot with room for luggage as well.