Rusty Hamster Cage Anyone ?

30 November 1999

What a weekend! I can't remember such hot weather during May for years. Not since the days of my childhood, when, lets face it, every day seemed hot and endless. It was good to have very little to worry about workwise and to just get on with getting sunburnt and pretending to potter about in the garden. We even got the barby out, blackened some sausages and drank too much beer. Perfect!

There is nothing like sitting in the sun watching the kids playing nicely together and realising that all your hard work has got us to this point. Its not perfect, but it is better than what some people have to endure and we ought to be thankful for what we have.

However, just as the warm weather has now disappeared, my easy week has taken a bit of a turn too. Monday morning I get a call from Chris. His ex-tenants (the ones who left the house in a shocking state and have been living elsewhere for the last month) rang him to ask why all their stuff had been chucked away....

I could hardly believe my ears. They had been round to the house over the weekend and were going to pick up some of the stuff they left. They couldn't understand why they couldn't gain access (the locks have been changed) and why it was clear that the house was empty of all their crap. They even accused him of stealing it to sell for profit. Rusty hamster cage anyone?

Chris was pretty blunt with them. 1: they couldn't just go back and let themselves into a house for which they have not paid rent for the last month and for which he now has a repossession order. 2: they have no right to keep a key to the house; 3: their contract specifically states they should leave the house as they found it, ie: free from rubbish, furniture etc and 4: they could wave goodbye to their deposit because the amount of work to be done was going to cost a fortune.

Chris knows he is legally in the right and I am guessing this is where the story will end. But I am still mystified as to why they wanted any of that stuff we threw away. God help their new landlord.

Katy and I had a bit of a laugh over that one. But we are still a little concerned they might just show up while we are there. It is obvious they are either crazy or just plain stupid and I don't like dealing with either one of those.

Katy and I have been working on the bathroom this week. After we fitted the bathroom suite I decided to see what her tiling skills were like. We went through how to measure and set out tiles so they are evenly spaced and how to cut them to the right size. The first one she laid fell off and she looked really embarrassed. So I had to admit that the first tiles I laid all fell off within a week and that she was lucky to have someone to learn from. I did it through trial and error (lots of error!). So she got there in the end and I was actually pretty proud of her by the end of the day.

So I suppose that in all it has been a good week. Can't complain about the weather, but if it gets much hotter than I am sure I can squeeze out a few sentences on how much I hate that!