2010 — 25 June: Friday

I've been out in the garden with the shears (having put the secateurs somewhere logical, no doubt, that currently escapes me) making sure the back doorstep brambles are no more, and trimming back the vine, particularly any that was going to get near the new boiler's new flue.

It's sunny out there at 08:12 but, if the plumber departs as promised after the coving repair and a spot of paintwork round the boiler, I shall finally be able to make a real start on the mammoth tidy-up. Cue, no doubt, for some action required on my part up in the Midlands unless Murphy is asleep on the job.

I see IBM lawyers aren't getting a summer break. (Source.) I see IBM lawyers still aren't getting a summer break. (Source.)

Not yet checked to see if any of these chaps are back...

Hotting up

The central heating system is being fired up as part of the series of final checks and commissioning. It makes a warm house hotter, of course, but has to be done. It's 10:06 and all's looking good so far. [Pause] Buddha be praised, I've just (12:55) got back from picking up my spare set of house keys from Brian the plumber. The system is up, fully operational, and the house merely needs a spot or two of paint, carpet, vinyl flooring, the new gas cooker, and 178 cartons of books to be re-imported and all will be (almost) exactly as it was before :-)

Shouldn't take more than a year or so. But first, lunch! The salad is on the kitchen windowsill to give its ice coat a sporting chance of disappearing.

And a glimpse of the new kit:

New kit

Technically, it seems the gubbins on the right softens the wet stuff before passing it along to the gubbins on the left for heating and circulating. Simple, huh? And, for the first time in nearly 30 years, I can run hot water without central heating. (Doesn't sound like much, but the system installed here by the original builders was primitive, badly-engineered, and seemingly designed to fail. We even found joints that had barely been soldered, as well as the unlovely airtrap without an air vent in sight. Shoddy 1980 work by a builder heading directly for bankruptcy.)

Having just scrabbled together...

... the necessary pennies1 to pay the plumber, Mr Postie has now dropped off the details of the amount still to pay for part one of the vinyl and carpet fitting (namely, bathroom, hall, landing, stairs, and the new "library", plus the kitchen). Mr Never Knowingly Undersold has yet to send in his partnership card bill for the new cooker (but at least I get some "points" for buying it with their own account card). I'm unaware of any further major calls on my widower's mite, and I look forward to ever-smaller gas bills. Given that much of my gas was being used to heat limescale, and much of my electricity to push thick black treacle through tiny apertures in the old pipework, it will be interesting to see the effect of a modern, efficient, system.

It's 16:48, it's warm, and having replenished the stores cupboard ahead of Peter's visit I whizzed out to get my Nationwide savings account book updated. It confirms that the interest I'm getting now is a quarter of what it paid two years ago. But salting a little away every month and basically forgetting about it works quite well. Interestingly, I noticed my model of water softener on display in the window of a local DIY shop for twice what I paid for it. Aren't local corner shops a wonderful British institution?

I can tell it's summer: my favourite "artworks" software has just been upgraded. I get a decent upgrade price so I've downloaded it and (finally) ordered a manual, too. It started life as "Artworks" on the Acorn RISC OS platform, and has now metamorphosed into Photo and Graphic Designer 6. What's in a name?

A call from niece #1 to tell me that 75% of them are "in town" and they're plotting a visit to the Midlands to see their grandmother. Good luck with that, say I. Should be interesting. Meanwhile, having made a start on "Sense and Sensibility" last night, I'm now reminding myself of the 1995 Ang Lee film version for which Emma Thompson got her screenwriting Oscar.

And...

... so to bed. It's 23:19 and I'm zonked.

  

Footnote

1  Not including the 30-year-old "one new penny" coin revealed when the old cooker left the building.