To Do and Have Done

Probably Madonna di Campiglio, January 2018

I am a very task-driven operator. My lists rule my life. Having said that, it would be a shame if I couldn't relax while there are still things on the list still To Be Done, and I am very mindful of the fact that there will always be things on the list still To Be Done and sometimes you have to let them wait a day or two while you have a rest.

I have obviously been crossing quite a few things off the lists recently, the most notable being the word 'kitchen'. The building inspector has signed off the project and I've received a 'Completion Certificate' which I have duly filed. He didn't ask any questions, had a quick look outside and inside and the whole thing took no more than five minutes. There are still issues with the utility room tap, access to the stopcock, and the telescopic rails for the oven, but I have arranged for Kitchen Ylf himself to visit and advise. Ulf has been very helpful with suggestions of why the tap may have a problem and how it might be resolved.

Tester pots for kitchen paint are waiting for me, and Ilf has given me a few ideas about where I could look for wall tiles. He's booked for decorating towards the end of February. Cleaning and putting things away continues, but I'm getting there. The garden is in a right state with building debris littering the lawn, but the weather is too horrible at the moment and I'm not going out there until it gets a bit warmer.

Away for a week skiing - blog post to follow...

Last snags

Carnivorous plants at the Krakow Botanical Garden, July 2016

Now that most of the LTRP (Kitchen Instalment) is done, I've returned to my previous dilatory habits, and the frequency of blog posts seems to have returned to previous levels. However, I was delighted to spend my first weekend in the new kitchen, although I'm still cleaning utensils and deciding where to put things. The new saucepans are wonderful, but the ovens are somewhat harder to operate than they should be.

It turns out that I keep a surprising amount of stuff in the kitchen, but I'm weeding out a few bits and pieces. One new project I'm thinking about is to sell stuff in the local car boot sale. One of my badminton-playing friends regularly attends a car boot to sell his plants, so I'll have a look when the 'season' starts in May.

Last Tuesday was fully booked with the boiler due for a service, building inspector coming for the final sign-off, laundry to do and hoping to go for a walk with a friend. The boiler man was first and he was a delight - very enthusiastic about my brand of boiler and showed me how to deal with error codes. Then he helped me move a sofa from the living room into the kitchen.

When the building inspector hadn't turned up by lunchtime I phoned the department, where an idiot of a man wasted quite a lot of time by looking up addresses that weren't mine but eventually said that there was no record of any scheduled visit. So I made another booking for next Tuesday, but by this time it was too late for a walk because of the requirement to do laundry when I took the opportunity of washing all the sofa covers too.

I got a call from the kitchen Ylfs to say that all the missing parts had arrived, and Team Ylf could either visit on Friday or not until February. So on Friday they made more dust and finished constructing cupboards and the sink in the utility room, plumbed in the washing machine and adjusted the plinth below the dishwasher so its door would open. They were unable to come up with an answer to the problem of the inaccessible stopcock.

After they went I celebrated with a load of laundry and a load of dishes, but discovered that the hot water pressure in the utility room is too low for the tap to work properly. I don't know if this is a problem with the tap itself, the installation or the plumbing behind it, so I have contacted all parties to ask them for their suggestions.

New year, old friends

Krakow Botanical Gardens, July 2016

Now that all the building work is finished with only a few things left on the snagging list for the kitchen people, there really isn't anything much to write. I sent a couple of messages to the kitchen company, but so far they haven't responded. I had a lovely ten days off work, but only three of them at home.

For Christmas I was in Nottingham with very old friends. We had nut roast for Christmas dinner and Boxing Day lunch was at the boating clubhouse by the side of the river. The sun was out, but it was jolly cold.

Between Christmas and New Year I did some more kitchen shopping - lampshades, bar stools, wine glasses - and went to Steve's funeral. It was worse in the anticipation than the reality, and a few light moments helped me to stay composed, especially when the organist and the congregation parted ways for a couple of verses of 'Abide With Me.'

I spent New Year in Cambridge with other old friends. This was a slightly longer trip with activities that included walks, pub lunches, evening dinners, games, shopping and even an interlude to play badminton. Lola II and Mr M were also present (except for the badminton and shopping day), and provided key elements of the games activity. We visited a bird reserve and saw migrating swans, we were prevented from reaching one of our pub choices because of extensive flooding, and I bought saucepans!

Both Lolas and Mr M catered for thirteen at the New Year's Eve dinner. There were supposed to be fifteen, I'd multiplied all the recipes up to sixteen and then two didn't come, and we had so much food that we didn't even serve two of the courses (salad and fruit). And I'd made a mistake with one recipe and doubled the amounts, which didn't help with the surplus food situation. It was most convenient having bought saucepans because we could use them to take away some of the leftovers, which we then had for lunch next day with mum and dad plus enough for my lunches for the rest of the week.

My last day of holiday was Tuesday, when I collected my new spectacles (they are so similar to the previous pair that nobody has noticed so far), and admitted defeat with the weight loss plan and bought new trousers from the charity shop. I treated myself to a trip to Ikea where I bought more useful kitchen stuff including bins for recycling that fit perfectly under the sink, which makes me very happy. I'm planning to restock the freezer with soup over the weekend, and I have a list of things to cook that use the new kitchen facilities - toasted cheese, jacket potato, poached egg - not complicated dishes, just things I've been missing.