Collapse of (stout) party

We've had another soggy day today after a very cold night. In fact it was so cold that the smoke alarm started whingeing at five in the morning. Not a full alarm, just an occasional chirp. It's a comparatively new alarm, one of those with a lithium battery you can't replace but which is supposed to be good for ten years, so I didn't suspect that.

In the night, I just took it down off the ceiling of the study bedroom and buried it under a pile of cushions, having first checked that it was a false alarm, of course, and that the Squirrel was burning very low.

The usual other cause of that sort of chirp is a spider in the works, so this morning I gave it a blast with the compressed air duster and then vacuumed it. No sign of spiders or dirt; I suspect that it was the battery, especially as it had stopped when it warmed up.

If it does it again, I'm going to replace it with the older kind with a battery you have to change from time to time, but at least you can take it out in the middle of the night. The current one is the second replacement for the one we were given free by the nice man from the Wilts and Berks Fire and Rescue Service when we were on the K&A. Fire Angel have replaced it twice for just this sort of problem; I reckon that it's not up to coping with the humidity of boating life.

I was already a bit shaken by an event in the evening. Sitting happily in my Florence Recliner, glass of wine to hand, reading a book on the iPad, there came a cracking crunching noise and the whole chair capsized slightly sideways.

It didn't actually dump me on the floor; the bentwood piece that is the principal structural member on the side started to delaminate at the point of maximum curve so that the outer plies sheared across with a great cracking sound. Here's a couple of photos of the stricken chair:







Oh well, you pay for what you get, I guess. If others have these chairs, my apologies for recommending them! They are probably ok for leisure boating but not continuous liveaboard use.

We're going to manage with folding chairs until the new furniture place opens here at Mercia, when we'll make a choice between the usual suppliers i.e. Wilsons and Elite, the Mercia one (Zing) and Nu-trend in Stapleford, Nottingham who made the three piece suite for our lodge.