Out with a flash

Day spent again trying to clear up just some of the chaos from this year, moving farm trailers hither and thither loaded with timber left over from the re-roofing and making some space in the stables for the coming winter. I doubt we managed more than 0.5% of what still needs to be done!

The garden is yet another "building site" that hasn't had any time spent on it at all with just Angie managing to do the minimum required to keep the grass under control. We no longer have any flower or shrub beds, just man high weeds with the odd flower trying to make an appearance. Greenhouse wasn't used at all this year and the vegetable plot was never touched. I hope things change next year.

At least it stayed dry was sunny and warm for almost the entire day. Late afternoon a shower or two with wonderful rainbows but not enough to get me inside.

Angie had taken the dogs for a morning walk near Ottobeuren before she did the food shop. Flash went down a bank of the river for a drink at a place he had never used. He lost his footing and suddenly was under water and although he resurfaced he was in the current and with his extremely weak muscles was struggling. Angie quickly ditched jacket and shoes and went in after him. Luckily the river isn't deep with lots of bends and gravel banks and she could get him back out. She said he gave the impression he rather enjoyed the swim, I suspect the first one he has had in several years. Controlled swimming would actually be very good for his muscles. Given our swimming pool won't be used any more this year we could try it out but for the fact that there is only a ladder to get in and out and he's far too heavy to lift.

Also today the end of the PV Month. The exceptionally bad weather at the beginning of September has hit our "expected/calculated" yield. Still produced more electricity than we used, we were 87% (August 97%) self sufficient and used 67% (August 57%) of the electricity generated ourselves and apparently we saved 524kg of CO². For the first time since the system went live in June, we had to use the wood pellet boiler to generate warm water but only on one day, so that is another money and CO² saving.

Have to say we are very happy with the system and getting quite used to the voluntary changes it makes in one's lifestyle as one tries to balance energy consumption with generation. The longer nights does now mean the battery can't get us through the night as we still tend to do some cooking and at least this month have probably had hot water bottles every night! I think we have also had the wood sitting room fire on every night in September - that must be a record.

In the late evening I took the dogs for another walk near Ottobeuren but we avoided the river! Luna didn't want to get out of the car, normally a sign of thunderstorms but I hadn't seen or heard anything. Very poor quality photo is from the mobile phone looking south towards Ottobeuren. A few minutes in to the walk, saw the lightning flashes in the very far northern distance and shortly after we got home the rain came.

Hoping for a golden October.