Monday 31 January 2011

THE DAY THE WALLS CAME TUMBLING DOWN

221,  Yep, that's the magic number. 221 nails had been hammered into the walls of the house which I have to say is all the more remarkable if you realise that most of those walls are filled with flint stones. I have had to try to put some screws into these walls and have hit a few of the flints with my drill. The poor drill bit ended up in an unholy twisted contorted Helta Skelter as it came up against this unforgiving rock. I assume that is why the last owner used nails, although today I had to put 4 nails in what I thought was wood only to find it was actually wall and flint at that. I bent 6 nails before I found somewhere that I could nail into so goodness only knows how many attempts were made to get 221 nails in!                       
    Anyway, were you close?   Did you nail it?


Today I made use of Stephen's youth and height as we have branches from a Wisteria spreading across the main house roof and sneaking under tiles and the solar panel which if left unchecked would cause damage to each respectively. This task involved a little 'daring' as it involved climbing out of a first floor window on to a flat roof then up onto a fairly steep roof of old terracotta curved tiles. It was an amber on the danger list so I chose first born to do the task (after all I still had a 'spare' 2nd born if it all went tits up...  or down if you see what I mean). In all honesty I am pretty peeved that I can't climb up there myself, oh I did the ungainly clamber out of the window on to the flat roof but I really wanted to be able to get onto the exciting bit. Sadly my knee joint prevents me doing this sort of stuff and it really frustrates me, so I just had to be there to catch him if he slid off (just kidding Mum!).
   Anyway, putting all thoughts of the Archers out of our heads Stephen proceeded to the roof and he did a great job on the Wisteria  pruning and removing the worst of the branches. Whilst I was up there I thought I would check the Annex roof, which is also off this flat roof. The house is old and the Survey did suggest that the Annex roof was showing signs of spreading and there had previously been a small leak or two inside. So I poked my head down the valley between the two roofs that make up the annex and was horrified to see a portion of it had simply fallen down into the gutter.




Now as it happens I had to go and see my neighbours, that live in my garden wall, as one of their roof tiles had come down and I thought they should know.  What do you mean what do I mean by live in my garden wall? Well it's simple, I have a back garden that is totally enclosed by a (surprise, surprise) flint wall and these neighbours live in a house which part of their house wall is also my back garden wall ergo my neighbours live in my garden wall. When I first met one of them I greeted her with, "Oh you're the people that live in my garden wall then". There was a bemused look on her face and an awkward silence, then as what I meant dawned on her I think she took it as a bit of an insult and the conversation was a little 'cold'. Anyhow I have made contact since and I even gave her a broken tile from her roof as a peace offering so I feel sure I have made good now with the elves that live in my garden wall. So as a result of all of this I gave her permission to let a roof tiler into my back garden so he could get on with fixing the hole where the rain gets in and stops my mind from wandering....., where it will go, where it will go...

Where was I?  Oh yer, So I discovered this collapsed wall just an hour before he was due and so when he got here I managed to bend his ear, well not literally 'cause that would hurt and anyway he was far bigger than me, so I actually didn't bend his ear but spoke into it in a clear and professional way, well obviously I didn't speak into his ear directly, like close up and everything that would seem odd, I mean I had a word about my wall collapsing. Well not really 'a' word as that wouldn't have got me very far would it, no I had a few words but by that don't read in to it as if we had 'a few words' like we had an argument because that is not what I meant at all. Oh dear, I think I should start again. I told him what was wrong, he looked at the said wall, we agreed a price, he is to arrange a date soon. There that was better wasn't it?

Alison is on holiday this week and so she is helping me to get on top of things and has been organising lots of meetings and preparing for our meeting with the accountant tomorrow when I shall try to look my best-ist and try to behave like a grown-up for a few minutes.   Here's hoping I can pull it off!





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