12 February 2007

Story so far

I removed that other post/storm of fury at the poor plumber. I had a valid point, but publicly humiliating him didn't sit well with me after more than five minutes.

So its Monday morning.

Today we will host:

  • The electricians, come to finish carving track for new sockets into the kitchen walls.
  • The tiler, come to tile something. Could be kitchen or bathroom, but if its the kitchen he's going to be out of luck, today.
  • A plumber to mend the slow leak under the new sink that's been occupying my teatowels since early Saturday morning
  • A refrigerator engineer come to see my 4 month old larder fridge which has stopped working
  • A gas man, because one of the electricians is sure he can smell gas at the bottom of the meter cupboard
  • Delivery men from the local electrical goods shop, because we bought the new fridge from them so they have raided the MD's office and lent us her (much smaller) fridge for the weekend so we didnt lose the Sunday roast etc. Please God, they will be able to come and take it back, as its a lifesaver but slap bang in the middle of my tiny kitchen, blocking access to half the drawers and base units.

Update: Having consigned this post to the drafts whilst the electricians changed the fusebox, now I come back to complete it there are a few updates.
Specifically:
  1. Electricians: grand job. Back tomorrow to fit extractors int he kitchen and bathroom, then thats them all done.
  2. Tiler: a dissappointing no-show, so far.
  3. Plumber: came, saw (or rather failed to see) and left ne with instructions not to mop up but to let it leak and he would be back this afternoon. Obviously the inference was that I was making it all up just to cast aspersions on his workmanship, so as the tiny puddle was visible again five minutes after he left, I coralled the electricians as witnesses.
  4. The refrigerator engineer crept in when the front door was open, and got to the job without introducing himself or announcing his presence, so it was quite creepy to bump into him. It needs a new condenser, It can have it NEXT Monday. Right.
  5. Gas Man couldnt smell a thing and left, but not until he had volunteered to make sure the boiler would fire back up and cracked the housing in the process.
  6. Delivery men: GOD BLESS CLEARVIEW LTD! They say I can keep the spare fridge all week. Talk about service.
So, here we are, lunchtime on the first proper day fo the school half term and against all the odds the kids haven't killed each other yet, inspite of the house feeling very claustrophobic.

Gosh, we made it.

So far.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Dang woman, you've been busy! You're obviously on top of things & are CYA by having the electricians witness what the plumber didn't see.

Jennifer said...

"Larder fridge," what means? Over here we have fridges. Sometimes we have little half-pint mini fridges, but those are mostly for efficiency apartments and college dormitory rooms. Oprah has a Sub-Zero fridge, which is a gimongous fridge made of stainless steel with glass doors and looks like it belongs in an institutional cafeteria, but that's HER problem. My fridge is sub-par by current American standards, and when I'm forced to replace it, I will NOT spring for the snooty must-have stainless steel exterior, because who wants to wipe away all those fingerprints?!?!

Larder fridge -- does it have a freezer attached to it? I'm such a dolt.

Cheryl said...

Anything bigger than would fit under a kitchen counter. (Mini fridge, here, means something that would sit on the counter.)

Mine is as tall as my old fridge freezer but all fridge so definitely ostentatious for the UK although its no wider than any standard appliance. We don't do those walk in wardrobes with ice machines on the front, here - I don't think my whole kitchen is that big, in fact I am very annoyed because I've just lost 4" off the size of my kitchen sink - the new bowl is only 13" by 16". I can't scrub a baking tray any more - heck I can hardly wipe an 8" dinner plate without catching it on the taps.

(Excuse me I need to go write lots of books now or start a trading-up webpage, or both, because I think for the first time in my life I feel the furious need to own my own home. Any ideas?)

;-\

Ms Melancholy said...

You have reminded me just why am still living with a pretty vile kitchen, despite putting the money to one side 5 years ago for a refurb when we moved into this house. I just can't face the thought of all those tradespeople tramping through my house and causing me grief. And the kitchen still works. It is just vile, that's all. I can live with it.

fineartist said...

Oh crud, blogger ate my words.

Lemme see if I can remember what I wrote...

God bless you!

Hang in there honey bun, it will all be over soon, okay, as soon as they get around to doing what it is they do anyway.

When I moved out of the man's house and into the hippy house, Samps and I had to use one of those mini fridges that zilla's talking about, for six months, until I could scrape together 160 bucks to buy a big fridge. I had to shop every other night, because there was very little room in that thing.

And I can so relate to having a small kitchen. I have four cabinets in mine and my washer and dryer live in a closet in the kitchen, it's handy but man, sure takes up a lot of space.

Hang in there sweetie! xx