Friday, April 28, 2006

Kitchen Builders

Supposed to be getting a tiler in today, to do the back of the worktop and the floor. But nobody came. The electrician came yesterday. I thought now that's finished we could get the tiling done. It's been a fortnight now. That's how long it was supposed to take to finish it but it isn't all finished yet.

Yesterday

The university open day my son went to was a bit of a waste of time. Nothing to do with the course he was on. It was really just a buffet.

Bins

Wheelie bins are so much better than the dustbins we have. You're supposed to put everying in bags in you bin but the binmen won't fetch your bin. You have to take the bags out yourself and put them on the road. A lot of people don't tie them up so things fall out, animals can get in and spread rubbish.

Not a day off

I was supposed to take a day off yesterday but I forgot. I had booked the day off! My son was going to Birmingham Uni and we were going to be having people round. The electrician was coming to replace a perfectly good cooker power socket.

Thursday, April 27, 2006

Phones

I tried to transfer a phone call to someone else in work but I got the wrong number and the person on the next desk got it. It was a good thing because the person I should have transferred to, her phone wasn't working. I tried to phone her just now but it wasn't working.

Greasy Biro

I hate it when biros get greased up and won't write. My fault for eating crisps.

Car Stereos

My son had a new stereo put in his car. It originally only had a radio cassette, it's now got a cd
player and mp3. He said it was better than the one in my car, I've only got cassette. I don't think
he has used the mp3. He only makes 15 minute journeys. He got it from work, there were 2 left in
stock and he had one and the manager had the other. £200-odd stereos for about half that.

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

My Computer

I'm going to have to restart my computer. I've sent several emails but they are stuck in my outbox. I turned it off and on again yesterday and it started working.
Phoned technical support and it turned out to be the card reader. I don't need it any more, it's for an old camera. It changes the 'H' drive. Outlook works locally but won't send. It worked ok when the computer was first brought up here and I plugged it. It must be using a different port or something. Why 'H' drive would incapacitate email I don't know. No, wait, that was something to do with memory. Too much memory or something.

Monday, April 24, 2006

Bus Baby

That's the trouble with bus travel. You often get a crying baby on the seat next to you.

Kitchen

We are still living with a collapsible table in the dining room. We're waiting for the plumber to finish off in the kitchen.

Phone Call

We had a phone call last night. It was my daughter asking my how many times Nigel Mansell won the British Grand Prix. Not the overall championship. Just the British race. Silverstone, or Goodwood or wherever because they used to alternate. Back in the 70's. No, it wouldn't have been Goodwood. She was in a pub quiz. Unfortunately we didn't have the computer switched on so I couldn't check. I think she thought it was the kind of thing I would know off the top of my head.

Free worktop

Got a free worktop once. We were having some work done and the workmen had this in their van from another job. It was too wide to go in the garage. We wanted it over the freezer. It's a good quality piece with a surface on it. If you catch it with a knife it won't scratch.

Friday, April 21, 2006

Sudoku

The sudoku puzzle in The Sun newspaper is different to the one on their website.

Water Pressure

I don't know how the canteen manages, here on the top floor, with no water pressure. You turn on the taps in the toilet and hardly any water comes out. When a canteen runs on water.

Fridge

Thats one thing we definately had to move to the dining room - the refrigerator. I suppose when people get new stuff with a kitchen they keep the old one going while they transfer everything over.

Kitchen Again

When I got home the plasterer had plastered all walls. The double socket had been put in. The p lasterer had to wait for electrician. There was no extra cost because they were sub contracted from builders and we'd agreed a set price for the whole job.
We have now got 4 double sockets in the kitchen instead of the 3 we used to have.
The room looks better without hatch. We now have plain wall with damp square of plaster. The doorway has proper metal edge strips and everything.

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Creme Eggs

Creme eggs used to be massive when i was a kid. You couldn't get one in your pocket. Now you can fit about 4 in.

Our electrician used to work for cadburys on the production line. He wouldn't tell us how the eggs were made, it was a company secret.

The electrician came today

Where we've had the door knocked through there used to be a socket, a double power point. We expected him to move it further along the wall. Instead he put junction box and a wire down to the power point for the cooker to light the gas hob. He left us a power point but no lead.

The plasterer is coming today. Thankfully he had seen note I left where the double point should be with an arrow pointing to wall. He left a hole for for the electrician to put the double socket in. If he'd plastered wouldn't have been able to find the wire! That's the trouble with me not being there.The only double socket we'd have had would be the other side of the gas hob. I don't want to have a trailing extension cable going across a gas hob.

Not Wednesday

I thought i'd missed a day, thought it was wednesday. I hadn't put in the mileage for wednesday! I should throw away some of these loose pieces of paper where I've written down the mileage from our drivers.

No Cooker

It takes a bit of getting used to eating out of the dining room plugging everything into a lead. The builders hadn't done much. The electrician had been though.

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Egg on Toast

Probably having egg on toast tonight or something from the chippy. We have some microwave chips from Tesco but I'm not sure whether I want to try them. I think my son will.

My Kitchen

The plasterer is coming today to fill the hole in the wall. There is wooden frame where the hatch was, where the walkway through from the kitchen to the dining room is.

Raining

Back from lunch. It was raining, just spotting. Not enough to need my hat even though I took it with me. I didn't need to take it out of my bag.

Chinese Restaurant

There's a place we travel through, stockwell green, with a chinese restaurant but the sign simply says "chinese restaurant". These places usually have a chinese name. You'd have thought if they were paying to get a proper sign made they'd have got a proper name.

Rain

This morning I got caught in rain but only when I got to town. It was very light. I think it was more in the night/early mornning when it was pouring down.

Tyres

I had to replace a perfectly good tyre because a screw or nail got into it. The tread was fine. I have to replace my front tyres more often because you can't rotate tyres any more because the spare is nearly always a space saver so if I did rotate I could only rotate the four.

I normally get my tyres from from the Costco Tyre Centre but they didn't stock them My car needs bigger tyres then normal with it being the c-max version. I bought goodyear. They are a recognised make, not dirt cheap but reasonable. The other tyres were £20 more. The one's I bought have more parallel grooves which are good in the rain.

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

My Weekend

The supermarkets closed on sunday. That doesn't happen very often. The only days seem to be easter day and Christmas. I took my daughter back to university to get some work done. Term doesn't start yet but I took her back. I drove.
We've got workmen coming to do the kitchen. We're living off what we can plug into the dining room. We can't use the stove because that's in the kitchen. We will have problem when they knock through to the dining room to connect the two because we won't be able to use that room while they are doing that. I had to clear all the units and cupboards and take everything out of the kitchen. The kitchen has a little alcove with door. A pantry. I'm replacing doors and putting shelves in. It looks like it hasn't been painted since the house was built. It's magnolia but dusty. I am putting in half glazed doors. The pantry door will be bi-fold but I can't get the right size. I will have to cut the door down to make it narrow enough but need to line the middle of the door with the rest of the room and the main kitchen door. The top of the pantry door is 1 centimeter lower than the other door but I cannot see any reason for it. It is below where the stairs are but there is still 15 centimeters above the door. The door alarms will need rewiring. The control box for the alarms is in the pantry. When we moved in there was a control box with a button to press to deactivate the alarm. You would have to come in through the front door and walk throught the house to get to the kitchen. We now have a keypad to turn off the alarm.

Sending Machine Code

We were emailed an assessment form to fill in. It came in an email. I had to click on the link and the word document loaded. I filled in the form and then on the menu in the window tried to send it but the window didn't have my document, only machine code so I couldn't send it.

Pond Water

Over the weekend I looked at my pond and noticed that the water level was low. We have a fountain in it and I thought a pipe may have sprung a leak. I was worried because we have fish in there as well. I had been very windy so I think the water must have blown away.