Tag Archives: builders

It Started So Well

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For some reason I woke up feeling quite bright and cheerful this morning. I think it was probably the unexpected good night’s sleep that did the trick. I still woke twice in he night, but after each time I fell back into deep slumber and woke refreshed.

Gregg’s Vegan Sausage Roll

Lots of stuff has happened since my last post, but although I made mental notes, I seem to have forgotten most of it and can’t think of anything to say. Not only that, but the days has slid through my fingers like a Vaselined viper and I have, as yet, nothing to show for my continuing existence.

The rotary dryer in the back garden has now completely ceased to function. It’s about a year old and should have had years of useful life. Despite Julia’s undoubted talent at wrecking anything that moves I think we can put this down to the first builder we used, the one I tend to think of as The Expensive Mistake. He was supposed to source us a good quality dryer and install it. Normally, as I recall, you cement a socket into the ground. This one, which I assume is poor quality from the way it has broken, was set directly into a block of cement.

I don’t have an itemised bill, but I do remember from a rough calculation I made at the time, that i would have been cheaper to hire a lawyer to do the work. A lawyer would probably have made a better job too, as much of the work has already needed redoing. It isn’t worth the hassle of trying to get him to do the work properly, or get a refund, which is what cowboy builders rely on.

I am conflicted because I don’t like being ripped off and like to stand up for myself, but I just don’t need the aggravation.

We have had five tradesmen since we moved in. There was The Expensive Mistake and then the  Rip-Off Gardener. I asked Julia not to take him on, but she went ahead and it did not turn out well.

Fortunately we have then had the fencing man, the handyman and the conservatory roofers. The first two were very good and were reasonably priced. The third was very good but I was left with a feeling that I was funding a lavish lifestyle.

I’s hard finding trustworthy tradesmen when you are new to an area. It wasn’t easy finding them in Nottingham, though they tended to be cheaper than they are in Peterborough.

The photos are from March 2019 and they are pictures of things I am no longer able to eat under my new dietary regime.

 

 

 

 

Is Writing a Pleasure or is it Publication?

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We woke this morning after hearing moderately heavy rain overnight. The general aspect of the morning was wet, rather than snowy, icy or frosty.  Looking at the choice of words there, I realise that the story of the Innuit and all their words for snow might not be as outlandish as we think. We seem to have a good selection of words for it and some years we don’t get any. This year, I think, we may have a snowy winter. That will be good as it will see a lot of rats and disease off. On the other hand, the birds will need plenty of food.

For the first time in 12 months the rain did not make it inside, the builders having done their job well. I can’t help thinking it may have been more cost effective just to retile he roof with banknotes but hopefully the pain will subside.

The worst bit of the builders being here, apart from having to get up at a time dictated by someone else, is that we had the dining table in the living space and the conservatory contents in the dining area. Two days of living with clutter brought back a lot of old memories and was not pleasant. This morning, as 7pm dawned, I pulled the flannelette duvet cover up to my chin, arranged the coverlet to block any gaps and luxuriated in the warmth. It was good.

I suppose I ought to have used this as the beginning of the last post, but that one seemed to take on a life of its own. I also note that I seem to be a day behind again. This, I think, is mainly due to my lack of routine. The days bleed into one, particularly if I sleep in front of TV and restart late at night. I must get to grips with this for several reasons – health, vitality, writing quality and consistency are ones I can think of immediately.

During the day I exchanged emails with someone who told me I shouldn’t be stressing over the amount I wrote as it should be a relaxation now I was retired. Writing, he said, should be a pleasure. I have never found it to be a pleasure. For me, the pleasure comes from finishing and from publication. The writing is a real grind.

How about you? And, as an extra question,  would you carry on writing if you had nobody to read it?

Five Days!

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Julia with Peter Rabbit. She likes Christmas. I endure it. You can probably tell that from the header picture.

It’s five days since I last posted. That’s a long time between posts, but it’s cold, I’m busy and, as of two days ago, I am sneezing on a regular basis, wheezing, and feeling sorry for myself.

It happens at this time of the year.

We are about to make a decision on a new internet provider – once we get connected it may be easier to keep in touch. I say “may” because nothing is certain the the world of house moves. It’s a little like trying to read Alice in Wonderland using the reflection from a fairground mirror.

The builder has arrived. He fixed a number of things, including the porch roof. He said it wasn’t a leak, just an overflowing gutter. So he cleared the gutter. Next night it rained and the roof leaked. I’m no engineer, but even if the gutter is overflowing, there has to be a hole before the roof leaks. He’s going to find and fix the leak now.

Compared to the list of faults with our house, there isn’t much wrong with the new one, though it does seem like it when you start making lists and asking how much it will cost.

You can tell I’m poorly because the effort of writing two hundred words has made me feel exhausted. Considering that I spent the morning in bed and the afternoon sitting under a blanket drinking cold cures and complaining about daytime TV, it’s not like I’ve used a lot of energy today.

Only six words until my self-inflicted target of 250 words minimum.

Good night.

Photos are from past Decembers.

 

Another Senior Moment/Forgotten Title

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Julia, South Pier, Lowestoft, Suffolk

The day started with porridge, fruit and toast. I’m really trying to give toast up on weekdays but Julia keeps making it. Eventually, I suppose, I will have to start refusing it, but I like toast and I don’t like to waste food. I could, I suppose, just scrape off the marmalade but without marmalade there is little point in toast so I may as well just give it up. Really it’s just a delivery system to facilitate the eating of melted bitter, cheese or marmalade. Nobody I know would want a piece of dry toast, though if any of you, I’d be happy to know.

It continued with a trip to the dentist to drop Julia off, followed by a twenty minute interlude writing notes in the car park at the surgery before it was time for my blood test. This went well – two attempts on one arm with no success, but the first attempt on the second arm struck blood and we soon had three full tubes. It was a big day today, I had a special envelope from my last trip to Rheumatology and that needed two tubes. It had red writing on it, so it must be important. I got weighed while I was there. I’ve lost 8 lbs in the last eight weeks. Not spectacular, but a useful loss. No stupid diet, just ate a little less. I make no grandiose claims, and may yet disappoint myself, but at this point I am happy with this loss.

Julia on the patio

I’m writing this to the accompaniment of whistling, clattering scaffolding and the low annoyance of a radio. Yes, it’s building season again. The young couple next door are having something done, though I don’t know what. They are always having something done. The people diagonally across the road are having a loft extension. I sometimes wonder why people buy houses in this street if they need so much changing.

Julia just rang. She just bought an advance ticket for her Canada trip. Nottingham to Norwich and then on to London is just £28. Yes, £28. She was amazed. The man in the ticket office was so surprised he double checked it. It seems that there’s an offer on. At least part of the Canada trip is going to be cheap. She’s on her way home from town now. I am going to do the washing up. Then I expect we will sit in the front room, watch TV and (in my case) nap. There are worse ways to spend my time.

Love Locks at Bakewell

 

 

Sciatica, Sensitivity and Strange Collapses

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I have just spent the last few weeks shaking off sciatica. I have been lucky as it was only really bad for a few of days and I was able to work out the likely cause and a possible solution. So far, the solution (padding on my typing chairs) seems to be working. I’m also walking round instead of sitting all the time and limiting my typing time in the evening. It’s not 100% gone but it’s gone for 95% of the time and the severity is much reduced.

As that declined, I found myself becoming more agitated about Roald Dahl and the Sensitivity Readers. The more I read about it, the more I realise it’s about money and pushing an agenda rather than real sensitivity, and when I see that Matilda’s favourite authors have been changed from Conrad, Hemingway and Kipling to Austen, Hemingway and Steinbeck I find myself completely lost.

I don’t understand why Hemingway is seen as more sensitive than Conrad and Kipling. And I don’t understand why Austen and Steinbeck are considered adequate substitutes. Dahl presumably wanted to portray Matilda as a girl who enjoyed reading the sea stories of Conrad, a Polish emigre who had been persecuted by Russian invaders and taught himself to write classic works in English. The revision sees he as a girl who enjoys reading the mannered stories of jane Austen –  undoubtedly a writer of great stature, but not at all the same. As for Steinbeck, I don’t know what to say. It just seems a random selection, probably from an American reader, as he doesn’t feature heavily in UK reading lists.

And then we have the drive . . .

Our drive adjoins the drive of the people next door. The previous people damaged the edge of ours when they had their new one laid and the present people tend to catch ours as they swing into theirs. It’s one of those things that is no big deal, but just a minor irritant of suburban living.

Yesterday morning we stepped out to go to work and found that the cast iron drain cover in the drive has collapsed. It’s been cracked for years, but I never drive over it, so I’ve never done anything about it.  I think that the neighbours have driven over it as they swung in and it has collapsed. However, it may have simply collapsed under it’s own weight, or the footsteps of a passing fox may have been the last straw. We will never know. All I do know is that they rushed past us last night without stopping as they took the dog for a walk, which is suspicious behaviour. . .

I’m currently waiting for quotes, which are, no doubt, going to look more like ransom demands than the bill for a simple repair job.

Not My Greatest Day

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The week got off to a bad start when I turned up and found that the roadworks outside the shop, far from being “finished in a week” were looking worse than ever and the signs diverted the public through our car park. No point quibbling, builders just do what they want.

Then, looking for something where it should be, rather than where it had been randomly stashed by one of my colleagues, I fumbled the whole lot and dumped a box of coin sets on the floor, breaking several cases and letting a number of coins run free. twenty seconds later I had one of those premonitions and turned to find a couple of nuns looking at me as if they’d never heard a man swear before.

Though the meek many inherit the earth, the visitors they encourage tend to pass off a lot of foreign coins in the collection boxes, which they bring to us after it has built up enough.

As if this wasn’t bad enough my lunchtime sandwich disintegrated and spread a film of Marie Rose sauce (or Thousand Islands Dressing if you are American) and wholemeal bread crumbs over my keyboard. Then I produced a listing for Swiss coin sets that looked like it had been typed by a man with broken fingers. Some fo this was my ineptitude

I’m currently sitting at home typing and wondering why I bothered getting out of bed this morning. Very little has gone right and  have left my camera at work again, even though I wanted to use it for something tonight.

Warning – I am experimenting with being an unreliable narrator, as we writers say. Which of the above facts do you think is a lie?