Who's Going To Make The Tea Now Then

06 January 2011

Back to normality – well near enough. Little Chloe is back at school, Ethan is back at nursery, Claire is back to normal after all the running around and I am back to work. Brilliant.

Well actually it hasn't been brilliant at all. I am now working on my own and it really isn't fun at all. I have only done a few days and already I am wondering who is going to hold my screwdriver and make the tea. I find myself wanting to explain everything I am doing to someone. I am so used to Katy's incessant questions about everything that I can't work in total silence any more. Thank goodness for the radio!

So it has been just a little bit depressing and I am not coping well. The job I am working on right now is going to be long and hard and someone to help me out would have been good. I am doing a makeover of three flats in one building. Chris owns the whole building which is quite a modern block, but the build quality is just a little bit shoddy.

There is one flat on each level and as each is completed, Chris wants to get tenants in. So I am starting on the top level and working my way down. So, you guessed it, I have to walk all of my materials and equipment up six lots of stairs. I am up and down to the van ten or twenty times a day and it is playing havoc with my legs and back. I think I am pretty fit, but this is murder!

To make matters worse I had a delivery yesterday of the kitchen units and guess what? They won't take them up the stairs... they cited some sort of health and safety regulation and refused to bring them any further than the downstairs lobby. I couldn't believe it. I had a right barney with the driver and told him that he wasn't doing his job properly and asked would he do this if I was an elderly person. He suggested I get a mate to help me and I said “well, can't you be a mate and give me a hand?” He said it was more than his job's worth and walked off.

Two things have come from this little issue: Number one I will never order a kitchen from these people again even if they have the sale of the century. Number two I have the worst back pain I have ever experienced. Hot water bottles and ibuprofen are working wonders, but I am still fuming!

So this week I have stripped out the bathroom and kitchen, pulled all of the old flooring and filled all of the holes in the walls. I have never seen a property so full of holes. It is like Swiss cheese. Admittedly the plasterboard is the dirt cheap kind which is too thin, but even so, the former tenants must have had a penchant for punching things. At least it wasn't each other, I hope.

Here's to things being a little better next week. I can't cure my loneliness though...