Home Wasn't Built in a Day!

Wednesday, 27 February 2013

Empty Glasses and Overflowing Cups

Half Full or Half Empty?

So, is your glass half full or half empty? I can usually identify the half fulls and half empties in life. The LGB is most definitely in possession of a half full glass (it’s usually half full of red wine), I on the other hand teeter-totter between the two. The last couple of weeks however, my glass has neither been half empty nor half full – it has been positively drained, vide!

We returned home a week past Friday, fresh baguette tucked under my arm and homemade soup ready to be reheated. I don’t like to say I told you so but I told you so, at least I told me so. The buggers had cut off the electricity! The Voisines said a man appeared a few minutes after our departure (he was probably hiding behind a log pile or a dung heap just waiting for us to leave). So much for keeping everything crossed I just ended up getting my knickers in a twist.

Starving and seething we hot footed it into Angouleme to EDF. We asked if their man could just pop back to the site and flick the switch back on, but it wasn’t to be. To cut a long story short, ERDF would not give us another ‘prolongation’ of our temporary supply of electricity, instead we had to reapply all over again. This meant completing forms and supplying a copy of the ‘plan de situation’ and a copy of the ‘cadastre’ (a map showing the plot number and a plan of the house on the plot). I pointed out that they already had a dossier with all this information, could they not refer to this? It fell on deaf ears and I suppose it provides jobs for the boys. To be fair the assistant at EDF, on seeing my quivering bottom lip and the LGBs twitchy right thumb already going into spasm with the onset of cold turkey at the thought of being deprived of teletext (did I mention his obsession with all things sporty from football scores to tiddly-wink championships) did pen a covering letter to ERDF explaining that we were living on site and could they please get the electricity back on quickly. On day twelve we were plugged back into the national grid.

My Cup Runneth Over

What on earth did you do for twelve days with no electricity I hear you ask? A little legal squatting, taking up those offers that were nonchalantly proffered over one too many glasses of wine on a summer evening or the LGB being a cheeky bugger and inviting himself to stay!

There was a cold snap about the time of the cut-off and we got offers of accommodation from friends who didn’t even know we were without electricity. The LGB was building a garden wall for a couple and they generously offered their home to us whilst they were away and for us to stay on when they returned. This kind offer came from a couple we had only met twice. Are they mad offering us their home when they hardly know us? I think those who do know us and still let us stay are probably madder! We stayed with The Old Bones on Bikes. When I managed to prise the television remote controls from the grasp of the LGBs grubby little mitts we moved on to two nights at Deidre and Conor’s whilst they were away, and a few nights with Jane and David on their fermette

Jane's lemon drizzle cakes

We enjoyed lavish lunches and delicious dinners and great company. I have to say those twelve days would have been very different without our hosts. Thank you, thank you, thank you to those of you we descended upon and those of you who made offers, your generosity is heart-warming and truly greatly appreciated.

St Valentine’s Day

I imagine by now reading this post you will have gathered not a lot of building work has gone on whilst we have been sans electricity. Did you have a good one? Did you celebrate at all? Did you even know it was Valentine’s Day and did you even care? Some friends stayed at this gorgeous chambre d'hôte for a couple of nights. I know another couple who give each other (and expect) ridiculously extravagant presents and spend the rest of the year arguing and on the brink of divorce.

Couleurs du Temps

I usually make a handmade card for the LGB, but my craft bits are all packed away and besides all the envelopes have stuck closed from being stored in the garage. Me? I got a text and a yellow rose. Aaaah, how lovely! Yes, the text was from my lovely Dad and the yellow rose was from the (female) cashier in the builder’s yard! Bitter? Me? Who’s the patron saint of battered builders these days? The LGB doesn't hold with the commercial nonsense of St Val's Day, he can express his love any day he wants (so he says) and I have to say I do agree but the old romantic in me would quite like a little recognition of the day.

courtesy of www.boston.com

So you can see, in the one hand I have been holding an empty glass but in the other hand my cup hath runneth over with the kindness and munificence of friends. And remember, whether your glass is half empty or half full there is always room for more wine! Mine’s a sparkly. Cheers!

Picture courtesy of Hollybank Trust. Quality of life......for life.

Monday, 11 February 2013

Speed Dating and Les Odeurs

These days seem so much calmer than those frenetic days last summer mixing concrete and lugging tiles and blocks around. The LGB has been plumbing and I have been cutting and putting up plaster boards. I enjoy plaster boarding; it gives the feeling that things are really taking shape.

Back bedroom

Front bedroom

Bathroom

Landing

We've finished upstairs, just the returns around the windows to do. So that’s it, we have four fully formed bedrooms, an en suite shower room and a bathroom. If the LGB would only get the walls plastered I could sand and treat the floors and then ………………… dun, dun, dun, dun (drum-roll of excitement and anticipation!) I can decorate!!!! What colour though? Let’s not even go there. No actually, let's go there.

These are the colours I have opted for for the kitchen units (this week!). The dark one on the right and the middle one - I think! The darker one actually looks closer to black in real life. What do you think?

The colour on the right is the latest choice for the shutters and windows???? Yes or no?

Having decided where the bath and sanitary ware would go in the bathroom we (the Royal we) had a complete about turn at the eleventh hour. The LGB has now put the water pipes in so there is no way back. That is probably a good thing really. Perhaps he ought to get to the point of no return with everything then I would have no agonising choices to make.

Let There Be Lights

I bought a light and ordered three more lights for the kitchen from Bentalls department store when we were in the UK, but I've changed my mind! I was granted a day off this week and mooched around the sales in Angouleme and…….. bought some different lights! (It’s the LGB’s fault; he shouldn't let me out alone). I haven’t shown them to him yet (or even told him in fact) so if I change my mind I’ll just bury them in the garage among the rest of our ~~rubbish~~ worldly goods.

A day out wouldn't be complete without a visit to Emmaus and my favourite depot vente. Naturally I didn't come away empty handed. I just managed to squeeze two occasional tables into the car. I am not sure where they are going yet, but I couldn't leave them there! I think the LGB wishes I had.

They came as a pair!

Smelly Problems

We have to fit a system into the loft that extracts the humid air from the bathroom and kitchen and basically belches it out the roof. It is apparently ‘obligitoire’ in new builds. Just another expense I say. The garb said it was suitable for 2 bathrooms and a kitchen (activated when it detects humidity) and a WC (activated by detecting a presence in the loo. Not actually the presence of a pooh down the loo, but a person in the room). First dilemma - they only supplied the outlets for one bathroom. Second dilemma - we have a WC in both bathrooms so do we need the automatic WC extractor and the humidity extractor in each bathroom? I was dispatched to Leroy Merlin to pose the question.

Arrive. Search for an assistant. Try to explain the problem. Go outside to get a phone signal to tell the LGB that we can use the humidity detector in one bathroom and the WC outlet in the other bathroom, just cover the thing that detects a presence in the room. More questions from the LGB. Back in. Smile at security officer with my finest I’m not a tea-leaf (thief) smile. Find assistant. Yes, the WC extractor will detect humidity (because it is terribly clever and knows hot air from a fart). Back out to phone LGB, funny look from security officer. Will the humidity extractor extract toilet smells? Thanks Bren! Wander back inside. Avoid eye contact with security officer whilst trying to recall the word for smell or fart, but can only think of ‘vent’ which is wind in the meteorological sense. Find the assistant I have been talking to but he’s with a colleague and I just can’t face trying to ask two of them about toilet smells (bad enough in English) so become intensely interested in heating valves and radiators until they have finished their tête à tête. Will the extractor detect ……… (hold my nose and wrinkle it)? Yes, it will detect les odeurs. Yes, yes, yes (a Harry Met Sally orgasmic moment)! That’s the word, odeurs/odours, no wonder I couldn't remember it!! Mission accomplished.

I partook in a kind of speed dating night last week. It was an Anglo-French affair. I wasn't actually out to find a new mate or romance though. The English all sat one side of the table and the French sat opposite us. The French were prepped with a list of questions to ask us in English and thankfully we replied in English. After five minutes the French moved around to the next person. I answered questions from about three hundred French people (well it felt like three hundred). I repeated to each one; I live on a building site and go to bed up a ladder; I’ve lived here years but still can’t speak the language; I don’t have a swimming pool but we grow potatoes. I refrained from telling them I pee in a bucket at night! There is such a thing as too much information, says she writing it in her blog! It was great fun and I met lots of lovely people.

We have a number of family members on our ‘payroll’ – son, daughter, nephews and a niece. One of the above asked if they could have their birthday money early (nine months early) to pay for a holiday deposit. A couple of days later we received a text to ask if the money had been ‘transfused’!! Perhaps they have heard that getting money out of the LGB is like getting blood out of a stone!

Thursday, 31 January 2013

We Shall Not Be Moved!

In response to your messages I would like to clarify that we aren’t selling the house. Well not anytime soon anyway. It was on my bucket list of the things I want to do before I die and I don’t intend to kick the bucket just yet, although there are no guarantees in this life. We will certainly be here for a while yet, at least to finish the job and as we all know a builder never finishes his own house.

Snowed In and Snowed Under

Got snowed in chez Old Bones on Bikes

Most days on site are good days but I had a day last week when I felt overwhelmed by the whole thing. Waking with a migraine was a bad start to the day. The LGB didn’t help when he popped in to say he had found a breakage amongst the paraphernalia stored in the garage; my lovely Tiffany lampshade. (I’m still convinced the LGB was cack-handed when he was getting the box down.) The postmistress left a notice that a registered letter was awaiting collection at the post office. Registered letters never bring good news and this one was from ERDF to say they are cutting off our temporary electricity supply on January 31. We have started to move some of our worldly goods from the garage to the house to avoid another winter in storage. Our bedsit and kitchen, which were as neat as our circumstances would allow are now a jumble of boxes and black bags. We rounded off the evening with a delightful couple of hours in a freezing launderette and to top it all off there’s a moose loose aboot this hoose! For my French friends, we have a mouse in the house. Tomorrow is another day.

Ring, ring, ring, ring.

‘Hello.’ says I.

‘Hi, how are you?’ says my little friend.

‘Fine, but cold.’ says I.

‘Ooohh, I haven’t been out yet’ says she.

‘Nor have I.’ says I ‘It’s only three degrees in the house!’

Three Degrees is a good name for a Motown singing troupe but not a good temperature for a house. Mind you it was an improvement on the night before when I was in the shower and the LGB called out that it was one and a half degrees in the kitchen! The shower is in the kitchen! Brass monkeys!

After terrific wind that took some ridge tiles off the roof, rain, sleet and snow, Monday brought us a lovely sunny day. It was actually warmer outside than inside and I even basked for a while in the sunshine cleaning an electricity box! Simple pleasures.

Hopefully we have sorted the electricity supply but only time will tell. I never quite trust anything we do/sort/arrange here until it comes to fruition. I am not blaming anyone but things get lost in translation. The lady at the electricity company said they are sending out a technician and I am not too sure why. She mentioned ‘coupe’ which is cut, so you will understand my trepidation. As she had been shouting at the couple ahead of us I didn’t want the same treatment because I may have just crumbled into a blubbering heap beneath her desk, so rather than ask again for clarification I just smiled and said ‘merci’. Quite what I was thanking her for I don’t know, for not bawling at me perhaps.

Meanwhile work continues with wires looping hither and thither, conduit being pulled through holes and plugs and switches being fixed onto walls.

The upstairs rooms are taking shape with all four bedrooms and the bathrooms having been plaster boarded on one side of the metal partitions. The bath has been positioned in every conceivable place in the main bathroom, bar the ceiling, to determine the best place for it. As usual there has been a complete turnabout in where the shower, toilet, basin and bath will go.

If I pass you in the street and I am walking funny and looking a bit boss eyed it is because I have everything crossed in the hope that I haven’t got my wires crossed and the electric supply will stay connected.

Sunday, 20 January 2013

Bucket Lists and Resolutions

“Will you come out for a cookie?”

says the LGB and it's not even light outside yet. It’s time to crawl out from under the duvet. The Christmas break is over and we have to get into work mode again. Here we are back on site. I always worry a little whenever we are away from the sites. There were no nasties awaiting us. The LGB had even left the keys to the transit van in the door of the van, but nobody took advantage! Other than that all was well.

New Year's Eve came and went. I left the LGB and Dad celebrating in the village pub. They indulged with full gusto, returned to eat a meal and promptly retired to bed. I spent the evening in the company of Jules Holland and Hootenanny and celebrated the New Year to the sounds of fire-works, Auld Lang Syne and two squiffy men snoring down the corridor.

No, no, no, don’t feel sorry for me, well maybe a little. Actually, I really didn’t mind. I am not one for New Year’s celebrations. They are often a big anticlimax and Jules Holland doesn’t make a grab and smack a sloppy kiss on my mush at the stroke of midnight. Why do total strangers do that? Thankfully I usually manage to turn my head quickly enough for them to leave their spittle dripping from my earlobe like a shiny drop earring. Yuk!

Bucket Lists

Have you made any New Year’s Resolutions? I don’t make any, well none that I say out loud. I kind of whisper a few to myself. Never give anyone any ammunition to throw back at a later date. Mine are usually; lose weight, get fit, do the ironing as soon as it comes off the line. Unsurprisingly I’m still a chubber and still get out of breath as I push the ironing into the cupboard as it strains against the door to escape.

A ‘Bucket List’ seems to be the in thing at the moment. It’s a wish list of the things you would like to do before you kick the bucket. For my French friends to ‘kick the bucket’ means to ‘pop your clogs’ or ‘pushing up the daisies’, does that help? Perhaps not, it means to die.

What would be on your Bucket List? Mine would read;

Lose weight.

Get fit.

Do the ironing as soon as it comes off the line.

Finish building the house. (Actually, I’ll put that on the LGB’s Bucket List instead.) Blimey, I hope he doesn’t kick the bucket before he finishes. He wouldn’t be so selfish would he?

Sell the house.

Build a house. (Are you totally barking?) A much smaller house, much, much smaller, ……… tiny, minuscule in fact. A bolt hole for when we are not travelling in our camper van.

Buy a camper van.

Make a rag rug.

Learn how to use this laptop and my camera.

This is not a binding contract! I may do all, some or none of these things.

Ranting in the Mother Tongue

The main purpose of our trip back to the UK (besides Christmas with the family) was to collect the remainder of the system for the heating system. An email to Ice Energy before leaving France received a reply that all was well. A confirmation phone call the day before collection brought the bad news that the equipment wasn’t there. The LGB was not pleased. However, he did say it was satisfying to be able to shout at someone in English! Every cloud has a silver lining!

Our First Visitor

We didn’t get straight back to work as the LGB’s daughter, Lily came to stay. I think she was suitably impressed with the progress we had made, but not too impressed with having to sleep on the floor in our ‘bedsit’ and even less impressed with the en suite bucket. Strangely, nobody needed the loo during the night! Meanwhile the family Lily was holidaying with spent a night in The Lavender House in Montemboeuf, a tasteful and very reasonably priced local Chambre d’Hote.

The second night they spent at my favourite local Chambre d’Hote, the beautiful Chateau du Mesnieux, my dream house.

This bench is for sale.
Circa 1900
300€
Call the Chateau for details

Back to Building Business

We’ve laid the chestnut flooring in the last bedroom and have put up all the partitions for the bedrooms and bathrooms ready for plaster boarding and first fix electrics.

I forgot to take a photo of the finished floor before covering it!

The camera battery was flat so I have no photos of the partitions :( I will put them on the next blog post (add to bucket list).

Thursday, 3 January 2013

Busy Lollygagging

Lollygaggers And Scallywags

After the season’s festivities and two days at the sales we are now doing a spot of lollygagging. What a great word! It’s up there with scallywag, golly and gosh (which I actually do use when I don’t have my labourer’s hat on – then I can usually be heard effing and blinding) and if the PC brigade will allow me to say it, golliwog is also there with those lovely 'olly ally illy' words. It conjures up childhood memories of jam butties, collecting badges and soft toys. My Dad still has his childhood golliwog and a younger companion beside his bed. When my niece was about seven Brendan called her a ‘scallywag’, she gasped and her jaw dropped. “You’re not allowed to call me that! You can’t use that word!” It took some time and much laughter to realise she had got her words muddled up. How sad that the PC brigade make us feel uncomfortable calling Dad’s Golly by his full name.

The old gent on the right is over three score and ten now and the years have taken their toll

The handsome young whipper-snapper is about ten years old

Golly I've side-tracked again, way off track! Back to our lollygagging. When we are working hard I long for the time when we can have a rest and spend time aimlessly, idling at leisure. However, now that we do have time on our hands we are restless and are wondering what we can do to while away the hours. It has been too wet to clean the moss from the roof. I have asked Dad if he would like me to paint a room. No thanks love. The front door? No. What about some furniture Dad? No! Well, can I paint the cat then?

So, we shall have to hope for some better weather and don our walking shoes and wait for Ice Energy to reopen so that we can collect the rest of the geothermal heating system.

We have ordered a bath (not too taxing) and today we bought the top for the island in the kitchen. I suppose I could scour the land for paint for the windows. That would kill some time.

BBC Repeats

As there has been nothing to report on the building front I thought I would post a few pictures of the build from the start. If the BBC can get away with ruddy repeats I surely can, and I don’t even charge a licence fee. Now there’s an idea! So here are my BBC (building blog cop-out) repeats.