We currently can't move for builders as they try apparently in vein to catch up some time on the internals. We currently have 3 half bathrooms and no kitchen, well that last bit is a porky as we do have a kitchen of sorts,
Hiding behind a tarpaulin are four wall cupboards fastened together and stood on the floor the sink is on trestles and the work top is a piece of ply on yes, a, tressel
The lovely wife is being a great sport constantly fighting the urge to book a flight and head north to Yorkshire till spring, but the daily pleasure gained by bossing the builders about and seeing the plan unravel , or is that evolve ? Not sure . Keeps her off the flight planner.
We've settled in to a daily routine now, up at 6:30 the guys arrive before 8:00 we then we get showered in dust and serenaded to the tune of the Sds max chisel or some other weapon of destruction. The day ending sat out side with the lovely wife watching them down the drive at 4:30, sitting to watch the sun set and enjoy the silence.
As they say "out of the ashes " or the dust , the first bath room is now complete, well almost as there is the slight issue of no hot water to the whole bathroom due to the fact that we're having a gas heater in the carport but it will be a couple of months probably before there's a car port. So for now it's cold n cold running water but it looks great and the loos fine.
The second bathroom complete with hot water is on course for handover on Christmas Eve, there's a few minor issues , such as the hot n cold reversed on the sink , grit in the tap on the sink and bidet and the vanity unit not being fastened to the wall but all will be right with two days left as I write.
The 3rd bathroom was our own project, as such has been on hold for the last couple of weeks as its off the kitchen and as such has been chaos central. So in the interest of expedience we kept well out of it, that will now need to change.
The really big job of removing the wall in the kitchen is also now finished, it has made for a huge space that we can now start to fill with our kitchen and dinning table. The plasterer, Don had made a tidy job all round , dumbing down his obvious talents to match his new work in with our battle scared original walls .
If you remember my last joyful visit to ikea in Murcia , I vowed not to go again. The desperate need for a kitchen and 15% off blended with the wishes of the lovely wife saw us set off once more, only to replicate the same driving nightmare. One can only ponder the substances that the traffic management team were on when they designed the roads around the store, it must be similar to the stuff that the other road users were on around me, some had had that much that they needed to call their dealers to arrange more whilst racing around the islands in the outside lane like a demented sheep dog keeping the herd together.
Once in the car park the lovely wife went in armed with a list of items and placed the order, I put the seat back and listened to some calming music to prepare myself for the short trip to the Kentucky, 5 mins on foot but a seemingly impossible drive.
After two attempts we settled for being just across the road from it and went across for some much deserved crispy chicken, except our request for a bucket came back as a bag of spicy wings with fries, I gave up and headed back to the autovia and home, I really will never go again to ikea.
As you know we have waited and waited for our licences and received them five weeks ago . To our surprise we received a recoded letter from the town hall last week requesting to see our occupancy certificate ? The same occupancy cert issued by the same town hall ?
A trip to the town hall resulted in an appointment with the town planner again, the letter requested that we attend within ten days , however the planner was away and we had to call back. On our return we showed him the first occupancy cert issued by his town hall twenty years ago and he said " it's good " your licence will arrive in two weeks then you can start work, thank you that will be great ! Left n right hand ? How can they request every detail of your life only to not know what to do with it when they have it. The Stasi at least filed it away to use against you !
As the season of good will commences the lovely wife has had to compromise on Christmas trees this year, the big family tree is staying in the box and has been replaced by a 45cm fibre optic battery job with multi flash functions. It's quality really struck me when she demonstrated it I was so blown over I accidentally used the box to start the log burner so unfortunately it will be a one year booking for this flashy imposter, but it was up on the 12 night so tradition was preserved and little time was wasted as it only took 30 seconds to erect and dress.
So wishing you all well at this odd time of year,
Feliz Navidad