At the risk of tempting the universe/PTB to throw anything more at me, a brief summary of my weekend (with added background info that I bought my first house 2 months ago):
Saturday morning, arse o’clock: text from my mother saying she is sending my dad over and are there any jobs that need doing?
Yes, quite a few. Chief of which is I want to trace whatever fault means that half1 the spotlights in my kitchen aren’t working.2
Slightly later Saturday, more reasonable time: Dad arrives. Decides that since weather is nice, he's going to repair my back gate. Fair enough - it wasn't on my list, but it will mean I can actually open it whenever I need to rather than wrestling with it.
While helping him: Spot something that annoys me, and I have purchased the means to fix but not got around to actually doing it. The security light comes on no matter what time of day it is. It is currently broad daylight. Decide to amend this. Venture into basement, turn electricity off. Arm self with screwdrivers. Prepare to install switch rather than popping fuse out of wall all the time3.
Bit of swearing later: Fuse panel is off wall, but there is something going on outside. Venture out to find a guy out cold in the street running behind the terrace, with two teenage girls speaking to the 999 operator. As I kneel beside him to try and assess, he starts to come round - enough to say he doesn't want an ambulance. I try to get girls to not relay this to the operator, but they do and it's cancelled. He is CLEARLY still out of it. They hang up, go on their way, and he promptly passes out again.
Remind self of how to put someone into the recovery position. Lament that last time I did this it was a conscious, skinny PGCE student in her early twenties, and this is a grown-ass man who is not surreptitiously helping with the rolling over. I also can't get his hand under his head, so I hold his head up myself instead, while my dad finally decides I've been a while and rings 999 back4.
Takes them a while to get there. I think the call timer is over 20 mins. My back is in spasms, my left leg is going numb and pins & needles-y. The guy has vomited three times (thank fuck I rolled him). Paramedics manage to bring him round a bit - enough to get him to confess he's on methodone.
Ow, fucking ow: Have to go back to doing the electrical work, since the power is off and my dad now needs to charge the drill. Set about attaching the cables to the right bits. Discover that the cabling is too short to reach one of the terminals on the new switch. Fuck. Re-install fuse plate. Turn power back on. Thank whoever is listening that I don't seem to have screwed anything up.
Saturday, 2:45: Lunch. I have frozen bread, and a shit-load of eggs. Scrambled eggs on toast it is.
Maybe 3:15?: Dad sets about re-seating curtain pole in the spare room, with decent rawlplugs so that it will take the weight of the curtain my mum is making for it.
Not long later: That's done with minimal fuss5. Dad muses that could do with putting the rail back on the stairs6.
Couple of minutes later: Persuade him that could actually do with lifting the floor since I'd quite like to be able to see in the kitchen after nightfall, whereas the handrail is a minor inconvenience. We begin.
At this point, it is worth noting that I had tried this myself on Thursday evening only to discover the floor appears to be chipboard rather than floorboards. Also it is worth noting that the carpet was laid and then the skirting boards put down over it.
Half an hour later?: Free enough of the carpet to realise that the bed needs to be moved. And by moved, I mean effectively dismantled.
Another hour?: Bed semi-dismantled and on its side7, room totally rearranged. More skirting boards unscrewed, silicon sealant peeled from the walls, skirtings removed8, carpet screws removed, carpet rolled up as much as possible. We manage to prise one of the bits of chipboard up, only to realise that:
a) the original floorboards are still mostly there underneath (although mostly not under this particular bit), and
b) the majority of the fucking things have not only been screwed down over the floorboards, but also GLUED. I shit you not. Also that some of the boards extend underneath the plasterboard9 wall
We decide this is a bigger job than us and have to at least put the flooring back down and move things we had moved from there into my room back so I can at least get into bed. We decide not to do anything else as it will only need moving again.
Around 6pm: My poor dad heads home. I discover I have a stray text from my mum about half an hour earlier asking if he's still with me.
Not long later: Run bath. Pour self bowl of tesco's coco pops in lieu of meal I haven't got the spoons to cook.10
Ominous message from mother: She is coming over tomorrow to hang the curtain, and set the spare room right again.
Sunday, about 9am: Ow. Owowowowow. Break out the painkillers. Fuck. Browse AO3 for Rose/Ten fics since I have just binged their season and I have feels, okay?
11:30: Text from mother: she is heading over around 1: do I want anything picking up at the temperance bar since she is going?11
Around 12: Decide should get dressed. Painkillers doing their job. Get clean jeans since she is dragging me out for curtain hoops. I might not drive, but I at least know where I'm going.12
12:15: spot a big, ominous wet patch above my bedroom door that is just about to start dripping. FUCK!
Shove water cup under the impending drip, grab towel and slightly larger container, replace cup. Grab bigger container and head for loft access hatch.
Realise loft access is behind all this shit we moved around in the spare room yesterday. Double fuck. Set about moving it elsewhere so I can get in.
12:30:Ring Dad and ask if he can bring over his big set of stepladders as I suspect I probably could get myself into the attic space13, but would break my neck coming back down. Also I need a torch that is not my phone. He laments that Mum has taken the big car. I call her instead, get her to head home and stock up on essentials (ladders, torch, Dad). I decide to change into yesterday's scruffy jeans since this isn't likely to be a clean job.
About 1-1:15: They arrive, and my dad manoeuvres himself into the attic. This is impressive and just a lot of a dangerous move or two involved. It takes a second person (read: me), which means I have no chance of getting up there myself.
Issue is with the chimney stack and can't actually get a bucket under it. But by the light of my phone14 he can see multiple other issues. Although he does move a slate back into place so I can't see daylight between it and its next-door neighbour. Bless him.
2:15: decide to get some lunch and the curtain hoops. Head into town. Can't park15 Mum decides she isn't hungry, drops us at Costa (it's open, at least) and goes to get the hoops herself.
3-ish: Get back. Sort spare room so it is habitable. Because there is still a drip from my bedroom doorframe, so guess where I'm suddenly sleeping tonight. Hang curtain16.
4-ish: Decide to actually put the handrail back, so we can feel we've at least achieved something useful. This turns out to be a bigger job than anticipated because the fucking plaster keeps falling apart and the rawlplugs won't hold properly. And the ones that will, we don't have screws the right size for. I mean...
5:30-ish: Rail is up. They leave. I run bath as everything is ouch.
7-ish: Can no longer ignore fact that I can hear dripping in the bathroom. Get out while bath is still full to try and work out where the fuck it is coming from. Take side panel off bath17. Not obvious. The outlet pipe has drippy bits all along it. Can't get a container under it. Yay.
Shove microfibre cloth under just to try and contain dripping. Suspect the joint in the pipe where new plumbing has been connected to older is the issue, but seems to be from both bloody ends of the joint piece.
7:45-ish: Drain bath, turn shower on so can wash hair. Little later than anticipated - won't dry properly now18.
tl;dr: I hate my house and everything about it.
1. The half that are on the useful side of the kitchen. You know, where the sink and hob are. The ones that help me do things like cook and wash up after dark.
2. Spotlights embedded into ceilings are clearly one of Crowley's inventions.
3. I am not a qualified electrician, but I have studied electronics at school, been taught on the side by my engineer dad, and I know my limits. Do not do this yourself if you aren't absolutely sure of what you're looking at.
4. Can't do it myself as my battery is dead and, guess what - I've turned the electricity off so I can't charge it. And my landline is cordless, so that needs power too.
5. other than Dad not realising that my ceilings are a little lower than his and going 1 step too high on the ladder. Muppet.
6. I removed this about 2 days after I moved in because of the 4 brackets supposedly securing it to the wall, only 2 actually were. I was more liable to break my neck using it than not. It didn't take me long to realise that while removing it was a 1 woman job, putting it back required more hands. 4 more, as it transpires.
7. Dad manages to hit his head on one of the protruding legs of the bed. I swear...
8. Honestly. They were screwed to the wall and then silicon sealed along the top (and joining edges). The carpet was screwed to the floor under the boards.
9. Drywall, for anyone of an American disposition.
10. Ignore suspicious dripping sound. This turns out to be something of a mistake.
11. Fucking yes, I am almost out of all my cordials. Curse not living near it any more
12. Mostly. One-way systems are a touch tricky when you don't have to obey them. As are bus-only routes.
13. On later reflection, this is incredibly doubtful since I lack the upper body strength to haul myself several feet straight up.
14. Because they brought a curtain and cushions as well as the big stepladder, but not a torch.
15. Also not something I have to think about often.
16. Discover Mum and I have been talking cross-purposes as to which side of the window it is going on. Fortunately this is not a massive issue.
17. Inventory of the under-bath: 2 bags grout, 1 tub of paint, 1 jigsaw piece, 1 part of an old loo roll holder, about 50cm of 1cm diameter dowel, 1 electrical cable that is quite possibly live given that an attempt has been made to insulate it inside a plastic bag. What is not there is the wooden frame that should support the sides of the plastic bath.
18. There are many advantages to the care and maintenance of curly hair. Not being able to blow-dry it is NOT one of them. Not having to, otoh, is.
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Highlights of our new house
It's quiet at night except for the gentle rushing of the appropriately distant A40. This is a welcome change from the indecently ungentle yelling and horn honking of the A40 Roundabout from Hell and the Lansdown pub.
The sun rises over our bedroom window. We approve.
A whole new highly varied subset of spider species is available for gentle ejection through our front door and I don't even mind because WE HAVE A FRONT DOOR.
We have mastered the hot water system (key: the notice that says Nothing In This Room Should Be Switched Off really means it). The heating is still something of a mystery but we have a month or so to figure out what the manual isn't saying.
Suddenly we have the ability, nay the necessity, to Attach Things to Walls, both interior and exterior. This is approximately twice as terrifying as it is awesome. What even is a rawlplug? I don't know, but I'm determined to find out. After I have upgraded our buildings insurance to include Accidental Damage.
We have three bathrooms. THREE. What brave new world &c &c.
I have an entire garden full of Unidentified Growing Objects which probably need some form of nurturing, and no idea what any of them are except for what I'm pretty certain is a hazel sapling doing its best to look inconspicuous.
Alas, I have to find/build a massive wall-mounted spice rack because the kitchen has no room for our spices. Aye me, io moi moi, &c.
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