Tomorrow the plumber is due back to install our kitchen sink (after some 4 weeks without one) and so operation QUITS was kicked into action. QUITS? Quick, Units In, Toot Sweet. So Stephen and I started to build, move and place everything that we would need that is under the work top where the sink is to be place. As I have explained the kitchen is 7mtrs long and just 2mtrs wide so it can be classed as a Galley kitchen. We have completed the cupboards (B&Q's cheapest) on one side of the room, but the sink side was still naked with the exception of the ever so loyal Dishwasher which has stayed and kept me company through thick and thin. Ahhhh the times that we have shared together....
Anyhooooo, now I needed to put everything onto the sink side so that we could position the work surface so the plumber can do his thing on Wednesday. The work surface had not been delivered yet but was due during the day, so everything was a leap of faith (& trust) in B&Q's delivery system, which, as it turned out, went like clockwork and the 3.7metre slab was squeezed into my kitchen by two burly geezers.
The first item in order along this wall was the American style fridge / freezer. We have had this for several years and, as yet, had never actually managed to get it into a kitchen (too large) having only fitted it into a utility room in our old home and the garage in the rented property. So I played fridge surgeon, opening her up gutting the contents and then amputating its doors so we could attempt to squeeze it through the kitchen doors. It sat in the Garage and I had the foresight to buy a barrow which came in very handy here. A little like the PG monkeys, "to you son", to you dad", "left hand down, no, no, right hand down, that's it, carfuuuuullllllllllll, goooood, ok heave........ "Dad, do you know the fridge is on my foot?" "You hum it son and I'll play it". Bit by bit, door by door by cajolery, cunning and commitment we finally managed to get the fridge into the kitchen. The first of five items to be located there.
Next to the fridge is my dear friend the dishwasher which just required a slight re-positioning then Stephen built the first of the two kitchen units to go this side. It was a metre long unit into which the sink will be positioned and this was his first such build. Oh he had made other units, the odd book shelf, a bed or two but this was his first B&Q kitchen unit So like a wise old sage I sat back and let him get on with it! Well he'd only get cross if I interfered wouldn't he? I smiled to myself as each frustration with the ambiguities of the instruction led to a huffy exclamation and vindicated me when I made the same error or got frustrated at the same point when I made the units a few days before. It was not noble of me and I'm not proud and yes I actually did give a little direction here and there and occasionally I even assisted! Especially with the exploding drawers with which I did battle previously. When I took them on they definitely won the battles whilst I won the war...... eventually.
So Stephen successfully, and with little help from me, built the two kitchen units so the only other items to join this menagerie of kitchen creatures were the clothes washing machine and the Spin Dryer which I have decided to bring into the kitchen from the annex as we hope to convert the annex into a holiday let. Now everything in place and Alison returns from work just in time for the 'topping out' ceremony, which was great as it weighs a tonne!
With a final effort we lift the slab of work surface into position and at last, with a sense of achievement the whole room seemed to come together, it still needs a lot of tiling above the worktop and in the window sills but on the whole it looked right. This was the first time that I could genuinely use the expression that we had actually got 'Everything but the kitchen sink'!
I'm not posting any photos at this point, the next photo of the Kitchen will be when the job is completed, the BIG REVEAL, so keep checking us out.
Earlier in the day I had to pop out of the house. I did not want our cat to run out of the front door whilst I loaded my car with some bits, so I shut down the room where the front door leads to. This meant that she could not get in the room at all unless Stephen opens a door for her in my absence. About 15 minutes later I returned and parked my car nose towards the room and stopped the engine. As I looked up and at the big bay window I found myself doing a double take, for there in the window was a massive Bagpuss tabby cat sitting looking out at the world as if she had lived in the property all her life. Well I knew it was not ours, for ours is a look-a-like 'Felix cat' so in I rushed to find out why Stephen had kidnapped someone's puddy cat. When I opened the front door all the other entrances to the room where shut, I called Stephen who remonstrated that he knew nothing of said cat and that he had not left the sofa since I had been gone. Well knowing Stephens Modus operandi I could well believe that to have been the case, but that did not answer the question as to how this big cat got into our dinning room unannounced! AND this was a very, very big cat, at least twice the size of our cat, Stephen quite rightly described it to be as big as a 'Lion Cub'. She did not seem too distressed and so I deducted that she had not squeezed through the key hole nor under any of the doors. This did not get close to solving the magical manifestation of one of the biggest pussy cats I have ever come across. In total bewilderment I realised that she needed to be set free so I opened the back door and she slowly, drifted out into the garden where she spent the next 10 minutes wandering around snooping at all Scribble's (our cat) favourite haunts and taking a little time to mark her territory on one of them she shinned up our apple tree and roamed off like a vagabond in search of another adventure, bound to be another family's unexpected visitor......
You ought to know Mr. Mistoffelees! The Original Conjuring Cat-- (There can be no doubt about that).......
... His manner is vague and aloof, You would think there was nobody shyer-- But his voice has been heard on the roof When he was curled up by the fire. And he's sometimes been heard by the fire When he was about on the roof-- (At least we all heard that somebody purred) Which is incontestable proof Of his singular magical powers: And I have known the family to call Him in from the garden for hours, While he was asleep in the hall. And not long ago this phenomenal Cat Produced seven kittens right out of a hat! And we all said: OH! Well I never! Did you ever Know a Cat so clever As Magical Mr. Mistoffelees!
T.S. Eliot
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