Just before leaving for our recent trip, the oven decided not to work. The minimum call out repair charge wasn’t much less than a new oven, so, on our return, I was all set to invest in a replacement. I checked the website of the fairly nearby shop that had received several recommendations and ascertained how much they were charging for what I wanted. I was passing the even more local Bideford Appliance Store, so called in there first, quite prepared to buy a whole new oven, if they could offer me a better price. It turned out that they could but ten out of ten for Bideford Appliance Store, they talked themselves out of an oven sale by suggesting that I may just need new knobs and that turned out to be the case, a considerable saving. Not many stores would have done that. Now we don’t have to live on a diet of things that can be cooked on a hob, in a microwave or slow cooker. We do have use of an air fryer but it has to be used in the conservatory as it sets the smoke alarm into aggressive mode that no amount of tea towel flapping or open front door wafting will pacify.
That brings me on to the conservatory. Arriving home from a fortnight away, we have just over two weeks before 150 people descend for a residential conference and I am heading up the organising team. I am well aware of this as I have what my granddaughter calls the ‘posh end’ of the garage crammed full of conference stuff. I have two lots of visitors to my tiny home in the interim. What dear readers, possessed me to think that now was a good time to decorate the conservatory? Having ordered flooring and what is know as a ‘banquette’ with delivery dates, there was no turning back. Stage one, two people in their eighth decade, both with minor health issues, decide to dump a six foot long bed settee. Never fear we have a trailer in which to take this to the recycling centre aka the tip. Said trailer is errrr six foot long. First of all, why am I always going backwards when carrying things? We did manage to unscrew the metal bed part of the settee from the rest which made life easier and heaved it into the trailer. Heaving it out was slightly harder and tip staff are not allowed to help until you have items out of your vehicle/trailer but mission accomplished.
Decorating day was two days ago. First to empty two large pieces of furniture so that they could be moved away from the walls to paint behind. Given the volumes of conference stuff there was absolutely nowhere sensible to put the contents, so I then had a living room that you could barely walk across. General mank that was lurking behind the pieces of moved furniture removed, I then started painting. Let’s just say it was slightly harder work than anticipated considering that the room is mostly glass not wall. Hindsight, always a wonderful thing, says that I should probably have taken the shelves off the wall and not tried to paint round six brackets and I probably needed a paint pad that was younger than fifty years old. And no I shouldn’t have left painting under the radiator (which involved lying on the floor) until last. To add insult to injury, mid paint my fitness watch (sadly the wearing of which does not make me fitter) claimed I’d been sitting still for an hour! Painting finished, I hadn’t looked at the time on said fitness watch but estimated it must be about 3.30pm – I was surprised to see it was only 12.30 – it just felt like I’d been painting for five hours not two. All that paint pad swirling and you’d think that my arms might ache but they aren’t too bad. I know I don’t have stairs anymore to practice going up and down but really there was very little getting up and down steps involved however inexplicably, my legs have ceased to work. Yesterday I had to go up and down flights of stairs when out and down was next to impossible.
Next step, we have to empty the furniture a second time and find room for not just the contents but the furniture itself in order for the new floor to be fitted, fortunately the conference and its associated stuff, which includes over 450 give away books, will be no more. As for the legs, I need to get them back in some semblance of working order ready for my dawn walk in aid of the Samaritans. Dawn is no problem – walk needs some work at the moment. Common sense says I should do this on Monday 12th October not Friday 9th (which is day one of the conference) but it will be that weekend. Many thanks to those who have very generously sponsored me. If anyone else can spare something for this good cause the link is https://dawnwalk.samaritans.org/fundraising/janets-dawn-walk
Now I am off to collect yet more conference stuff, oh and still more stuff is being delivered today – will my teeny tiny house for one ever reemerge?
