Only twenty-four more Stair Walks…
Well, here it is, late again *sigh* all because I was fiddling around with this new header (and new template… so what else is new, hmmm?) I’m not sure if I like it or not… so at the moment, you can expect it to change without notice! 😉 This morning we went over to Stillwater to wait for Clarke – I turned on the heating, and I timed it… it took fifteen minutes for the kitchen-dining-family area to start warming up, and twenty minutes for it to be nice and warmly comfortable! It was already nice and warm in the other rooms, but the kitchen-dining-family area is completely tiled, and quite enormous, and has a long, folding glass door facing onto the entertainment deck and back yard (as you can see from the photographs on the “As Seen On…” page!) Clarke arrived at about twenty past twelve, and after a bit of chit-chat we presented him with our list. The bath in my bathroom will be “capped” for the moment – that is, the faucet standing proud from the bath will be removed, as will the tap and flange from the wall, and a thin sheet of caesarstone or veneered wood will be dropped over the whole lot, giving me a very big bench on which to put things. Early in the new year the bath and its surrounds will be fully removed, and the bathroom will be re-modeled, with a vanity unit along one wall, and somewhere I can sit to do my hair and put on my makeup. I don’t think that they make a vanity unit in the shape that I want, with a diagonal corner section where I can sit as at a desk, with my legs tucked under the bench – I’ll probably have to design it and have it built, unless Clarke can come up with a better suggestion. At the moment the plan is that Clarke is going to make me a Cedar shower stool – it only has to last until the bathroom is re-modeled early next year, anyway. On Tuesday we have to go to either Reece’s or some other Bathroom place to get a new shower hose-head (? is that what they’re called?) because I don’t like the one that’s there, two new swivelly taps for my bathroom, and a new kitchen tap for the kitchen sink. So that took care of my bathroom (and the kitchen tap!) Next we went on to the en-suite. It, too, will be re-modeled early next year – and at the moment, all it needs is a door! Clarke did a lot of measuring, and I never realised that putting in a wall cavity sliding door was so complicated! The plaster has to come completely off the walls on both sides of the wall before the door can be installed – I suppose it makes sense – you really don’t know what might have been stuffed in the wall behind the plaster, do you? I mean you might electrocute yourself if it was live wires or something! Anyway, that’s being done. There’s room in the Walk In Wardrobe to put a standard door – there is a light switch on the wall where the door would open, but that’s going to be turned into a pressure switch so that every time you open the door, the Walk In Wardrobe light will automagically turn on. Next. Julian wanted a small hot water service installed in one of the island bench cupboards, like we have here, to facilitate the arrival of nice hot water faster than the pipes would normally carry it *rolls eyes* Julian thought it was terribly slow, but I pointed out to him that (a) it’s a lot closer to the hot water service than the Doncaster kitchen is, and (b) my Doncaster bathroom is only half the distance from the hot water service than the kitchen, and I have to wait twice as long as the Stillwater kitchen does for hot water to start coming out of the tap! The Stillwater kitchen hot water is not slow at all, it’s just that he’s spoilt here in Doncaster with the extra hot water service in the kitchen – because it is needed here! So we’ve decided to see how we go without the extra hot water service in the kitchen, and without an insinkerator for a “trial period” – if he feels he can’t live without one or both items, they can be installed any time! The kitchen does need a new kitchen tap though – the one that’s there is wobbly and wonky – so we’ll get that along with the things for my bathroom on Tuesday… Clarke is full of ideas though – the room designated “Library” really isn’t very big. It could work, if we quite literally lined the four walls with bookcases – even all around the windows, leaving the windows “framed” with bookcases (it could actually look very attractive! (that was one of my suggestions…)) I also suggested that we turn that small room into the third bedroom, and knock the wall down between the first two bedrooms, and turn that new large room into the Library. That could work, too… Clarke’s suggestion was to knock down the wall between the Den (which is gi-normous, anyway!) and the Library, turn the major part of the Den into the Library, with two recliners and a table, and move the Den/Computer area into the second, smaller part of the room (smaller, not in actual size, but because it’s a bit of a funny shape) that way we’d have a very comfortable and pleasant sitting and reading area, extending into an attractive computer area overlooking the entertainment deck and the back garden! That would work even better! And that was just off the top of his head, on the spur of the moment! I can just about guarantee that he’ll have even more and betterer ideas when he comes back next Wednesday! There are a few “odd jobs” for him to do outside, but that’s why we have to go and get the taps on Tuesday, because he’s starting on Wednesday! 🙂
And that was the Clarke visit!
Weigh-in this morning. Still no sign of the dreaded Bounce Back! Hopefully it’s been side-tracked by something else… *sigh* but no doubt it’ll catch up with me sooner or later – it always does! But today, I went down another two points, from 78.7kg to 78.5kg – and of course, this is where I really start to slow down… or stay the same… or go up… depending on my body’s whim (not my whim, you understand, it’s my body’s whim that does these terrible things to me!) We’ll see what tomorrow brings… but… “Please, father Christmas, if you love me at all… bring me a couple more points off first – I have got a pocket-knife, that almost cuts!” (as paraphrased by me from A.A. Milne’s “King John’s Christmas“) 😉
It looks as though I’m going to have to cancel my hairdresser’s appointment on Thursday 😦 Too much is happening. I have my Warfarin blood test – which only takes as long as it takes to wind a tourniquet around my arm and bung a needle into my vein – however the mirror will probably be arriving (ooo-er! The mirror people who were going to “install” (read: “hang”) it when they delivered it won’t be able to, because Clarke will be ripping the plaster off the wall it was going to hang on!) Clarke will be there doing “stuff”, and there’ll probably be other deliveries, like the clothes dryer, and the dishwasher… In fact, my suggestion is for Julian to take me over really early for my blood test, drop me back across the road, and then head off for Stillwater, leaving me here in Doncaster. I’d only be in the way over there, I’d have nothing comfortable to sit on, and I’d probably be bored silly (and besides, I don’t like Moccona coffee! It has an after-taste of, and smells like Marmite!) And that’s about all from me again for tonight! I’ll keep you all posted as to what’s happening, and when – as usual, subject to change without much notice – so do check back again tomorrow night to find out all the latest news at Chez Nous – or maybe Casa Nostra 🙂 Until then, however, please endeavour to bee good, remember that discipline is the bridge between goals and accomplishment, and don’t forget to drive carefully, to look after yourselves, and to keep warm – but most importantly, don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂
My Word! 