Tag Archives: bathroom

Saturday 5th February 2011 – This gale is still howling away

It’s been going almost non-stop for over 48 hours and shows little sign of abating.And here we are trying to cut tiles and paint window frames and we’ve ended up with dust and paint everywhere.

Mind you, I have the making of a magnificent bathroom thanks to Liz’s artistic eyes and Terry’s workmanship. It’s certainly something. It might even be finished by Monday night and that will be real progress.

In the bedroom all of the woodwork is painted, we have wallpapered and there’s a couple of coats of paint on the ceiling, although there will be others as the ceiling is quite thirsty.

This afternoon I took Liz and Terry to the battlefield at Waterloo but there was far too much wind to make it possible to climb to the top of the Butte du Lion. And at the huge Carrefour at Mont-St Jean we did a week’s worth of shopping and spent a fortune. But it was worth is for I even found a supply of vegan cheese. And that doesn’t happen every day.

Then off to the big Brico where we spent another small fortune, but now we have all the wallpaper and paint that we need for here. I needed an operation for the removal of my wallet, and was given oxygen afterwards.

A major disappointment was that Chi-Chi’s, the really good Tex-Mex restaurant in Overijse, had closed down. Terry suggested a pizza, Liz fancied a fritkot, but once I had Tex-Mex on my mind that was that and we fought our way into Brussels city centre for the other Chi-Chi’s. Terry was suitably impressed with the roads in the city, of course. He reckons that they wouldn’t be out of place in Ougadougou or Dar-es-Salaam.

And what a good night it was in Chi-Chi’s – excellent service (none of the staff is Belgian), really good food, and a couple of South Americans entertaining the diners. It’s been a long time since I had such an enjoyable evening. Liz enjoyed her Mexican coffee and Terry loved his deep-fried ice-cream.

And so that was our day. And a good day it was too, with a good time being had by all. Tomorrow is a day of rest of course, and then back to the grindstone on Monday.

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Friday 4th February 2011 – We are making some good progress right now

Terry has spent all day tiling in the bathroom and he’s making some splendid progress. It’s looking a world different that it did this time last week and I’m really impressed.

Liz and I spent all day in the third bedroom. We started off by putting the second coat of paint on the woodwork, and then carried on with the wallpapering. Liz kept on encouraging me when I was starting to flag, and we managed in the end to do all of it, even the fiddly bits that take all the time. It’s much better when you have someone to help to motivate you.

So not much to write about, but a great deal of work done. We are all thoroughly exhausted and I’m off to bed in a minute. But I don’t imagine I’ll get much sleep. There’s been a howling gale blowing here all day and some of the gusts are shaking the windows, making quite a noise. It’s been ages since I’ve seen a wind quite like this.

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Tuesday 1st February 2011 – The one big advantage …

 of having a hand-picked team is that it’s amazing just how quickly you can progress.

Terry has finished all of the grouting in the kitchen now and has done the wiring in the third bedroom and made good around the sockets. And when that was complete Liz washed down the ceiling and the walls while I sanded down all of the woodwork and patched some of the plastering that needed doing.

Meantime, back in the bathroom Terry has taken the radiator and the sink off the wall, removed the rest of the tiles that I couldn’t reach, and plastered the walls where the tiles used to be. And that bit wasn’t easy either. Whoever did the tiling in here when the place was new didn’t make it easy for anyone to follow.

But after all of that no wonder we are all exhausted. It’s flaming hard work all of this.

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Monday 31st January 2011 – For some unknown reason …

… that I haven’t quite worked out, I’m totally whacked this evening. And after our day of rest too. Mind you, day of rest, when we went off on a route march all across the parks of Jette (and there are a fair few of those) in a temperature of about minus 5 or something.

Today was better, a mere minus 2, and I had the morning off to go and be rude to an insurance company here in Brussels who are trying to charge me 3 months insurance for failing to renew Caliburn’s 2009 insurance. And a profitable morning it was as I managed to overturn a €390 or something demand into a mere €72.06.

While I was away Terry grouted the kitchen wall tiles (and what a good job he made of that – I have a beautiful kitchen here now) and Liz put the first coat of paint on the bathroom ceiling. This afternoon Terry and I disconnected the water (and that was an exciting project) so that Terry could finish off the de-tiling in the bathroom, and Liz and I worked in the third bedroom – me sanding down the window frame and the door and Liz trying her best to wash the ceiling and walls (and understanding now why I put polystyrene tiles on the ceiling and fibreglass wallpaper on the walls).

If Terry can finish the electrics in the third bedroom Liz and I can make a good start in there tomorrow. There’s a lot of work to be done in there.

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Saturday 29th January 2011 – We went to the seaside this afternoon

I say this afternoon, because this morning we were busy. Terry finished off the electricity in the bathroom and fitted the tiles in the kitchen (the grouting needs to be done), Liz painted the ceiling in the toilet and rubbed down the one in the bathroom, and I emptied more junk out of the third bedroom and plastered the wall behind where the radiator will be.

But you can’t make a DiY-type noise in these apartment blocks after 14:00 on a Saturday, it was a gorgeous (but freezing cold) day, and I had promised that I would take Liz to the seaside some time while we were here, and so this afternoon was a good bet.

And it was freezing too and there was a bitterly cold wind blowing, but we still had a walk along the prom and round the harbour at Oostende, as well as coffee and waffles in a cafe. And as pure luck would have it, as I was trying to show Liz and Terry around the huge church there (but there was Confession going on there so we couldn’t go round) we noticed a huge old-clothes repository. And so back to Caliburn and we deposited the sacks of no-longer-needed clothing there, and that was that.

grote markt grand place brugge bruges belgiumOf course you can’t be in that neck of the woods without going to see Brugge and so we went for a wander around in the evening. Places always look so much better at night, all lit up, and Brugge is no exception. We wandered around the main square there and soaked up all the atmosphere, went for a meal and I bought a restaurant. At least, I imagine that that was the significance of the amount on the bill, unless I was paying for everyone else in the restaurant.

So scintillating is my company that Liz and Terry fell asleep on the way home, and we finally arived back here at 23:00. Not bad at all for just an afternoon out at the coast, was it?

Tomorrow is a day of rest and if Esi remembers to contact me, we will also be eating out tomorrow.

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Wednesday 26th January 2011 – So what did we do today then?

Another not-so-early morning and breakfast, and then Terry did some plastering underneath the kitchen window where the old tiles had been. I had to go to the bank and so I took Liz and showed her where the shops are. We also met one of my neighbours and her daughter and stopped for a good chat. She is thinking about having some tiling done sometime soon and so she’ll be coming round to weigh up Terry’s attributes.

Liz has carried on with painting the WC and I’ve been tidying up the 3rd bedroom, emptying the cupboard under the stairs and taking the tiles off the wall in the bathroom. I’ve been able to take of quite a few in one piece and these I will be using in the Auvergne in what will be my washroom. Waste not, want not.

We hit a little snag though. In the kitchen some of the wiring to the bathroom needs to be buried underneath the tiling and it’s not connected up. And furthermore, it’s not so easy to see how it should be connected up. So that used up a few hours of work, trying to sort that lot out.

Tomorrow it’s shopping again. We need to find some tiles for the bathroom and for the balcony, and I have a couple more bills to pay.

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Tuesday 25th January 2011 – We’re cracking on in this apartment.

After a leisurely start Terry and I went down to the garage and brought up the kitchen tiles. And then Terry set off and tiled one of the walls in the kitchen. Just like that! There’s another few places on the other walls to tile, and then it will all need to be grouted, but it was impressive all  the same.

Liz bravely attacked the big bedroom and gave it a thorough cleaning and polishing. I can’t believe how dirty that had become and how much dust there was since I relaid the floor back in 2001.

Me, I emptied the 3rd bedroom of all of the rubbish so that there’s now room to move about in there. That needs some polyfilla in the walls and then a thorough clean before Liz and I can start to decorate it. I’ve also been dismantling the furniture in the hall and I made a start on the cupboard under the stairs.

Another huge pile of rubbish found its way into the skips today. I can’t believe how much stuff has accumulated here since I moved in, in May 2000. I do recall that I moved here with a half-empty Luton Transit. I reckon I’ve thrown that much out in the last couple of days and there is still more to go. But I’m impressed with all of the work so far.

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Thursday 19th August 2010 – There’s no photo this evening, people.

The truth is that I was rather carried away with things and ran out of time.

It was 19:42 in fact when I knocked off. And that was after an early start too. Terry rang me as usual only today it was to St Gervais d’Auvergne to meet up, and then off to Blot l’Eglise to rescue the scaffolding. And was it heck dismantled – the people who had hired it were still using it. So we turfed them off, dismantled it and then loaded up the vans. Back to Terry’s to unload and then it was lunchtime already. But at least moving the scaffolding in two vans was a workable option after all of the excitement with the trailers we have been using.

This afternoon I was labouring for Terry who was on the roof and for Simon who was building framework and fitting plasterboards in the bathroom. It’s a good job that I suffer from schizophrenia so that both of me can manage with tasks like this.

And we didn’t finish there until 17:30 either, and with a full bucket-load of mortar I set off to attack my wall. It took ages of course, much of which time was spent hunting suitable rocks, but half of that wall has now been built up to the level of the chevrons, which is exciting news. A nice bucket of sloppy liquid gravelly concrete went on there a treat. For that half of the wall it’s now mostly a case of infilling with whatever rocks I can find and then concreting them into position.

And that took me until 19:42, as I said. And when I’ve been working like that I don’t feel like much else. But tomorrow is another day – in fact, it’s POETS day.

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Wednesday 18th August 2010 – First pic today …

roofing tiles stone cladding wall lieneke les guis virlet puy de dome france… features the roof of the lean-to. Terry went and fetched some more tiles this morning and while he was away Simon and I finished up building one of the side walls.

You’ve seen the breeze-block version of this photo a couple of days ago – that’s what it looks like inside. What we have done since then is to clad the wall with stones.

It looks quite impressive and from a distance you would never ever guess that it isn’t a real, traditional stone wall. Mind you, the pointing might give the game away. I bet that you have never seen pointing this good on a traditional stone wall.

So now that all of the tiles are on, what’s needed is to put the flashing at the top against the wall and then to do the edging tiles.

stripping plasterboard bathroom lieneke les guis virlet puy de dome franceAnd we would have finished that today too except that this afternoon we had an almost-continual downpour. But now that we are authorised to do some work inside the house we cracked on with that instead.

What we did was to rip off all of the old plasterboard off the wall of the bathroom. Now that we have effectively redesigned the bathroom we need to rearrange the plasterboard in there and the easiest was yo do that is to start with virgin walls.

But it was cold, wet and miserable today. I was hard-pressed to point my walls with the leavings in the mixer, but it was a shame to leave it so I wasn’t going to let it all go to waste.

And tomorrow morning I have to go round to near Menat and rescue the scaffolding. The hire period is now up and there’s a customer waiting.

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Sunday 28th February 2010 – Phew!

I didn’t wake up until past 11:00 this morning But that’s no surprise as I didn’t get to sleep until God knows what time. What kept me awake for most of the night was the hurricane we had. It started to blow round about 19:30 but by the time 01:00 came round it was howling away like a good’un. The crescendo was at probably 04:00 when there was everything howling around. You could hear the wood that I had neatly stacked up come crashing down and it was round about this time that the bathroom window was blown in.

What was surprising though was how warm it was. it was 12 degrees outside during all of this – a good 10 degrees warmer than usual. In fact when I woke up it was almost 14 degrees in here and it rose steadily during the day.

hurricane blows slates off barn roof les guis virlet puy de dome franceSo first job after breakfast was to fix everything. But in reality there wasn’t all that much. The barn has lost a pile of slates but it will be going to lose all of them in early course – the same with the bathroom window which is going to be replaced. So the permanent damage is about nil. Mind you it wasn’t half impressive.

And most of today has been spent cleaning and tidying. It’s about time I did something like this. Nietzsche said something like “out of chaos comes order” but he clearly hasn’t ever been around anywhere that I have been.

I’ve had no heating today either – the first day of the year. And it’s still 13.4 degrees. Sumer is definitely acumen in. Lude sing cucu, what?

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