Tag Archives: moving house

Thursday 4th February 2010 – We had a really good go at Terry’s kitchen floor today.

After we emptied the kitchen we set out to do the tiling. We had something of a production line going, with Terry measuring, me cutting and shaping and then him laying. As well as that, I was mixing and carrying.

And it’s amazing but once you get into a rhythm it’s amazing just how much you can do and we would have had it finished if the light and the weather had held up.

Of course there were lentilburgers involved in this, and also vegan chocolate cake so I am well-satisfied with today.

After tea we sat and synchronised our diaries. The lengths that we are having to go to now that things seem to be moving around here. I don’t know where I’m going to find the time to fit it all in.

But one job we can delete from the list for the moment is Claude’s removal. They switched on the water and the gas this afternoon in his new apartment and the boiler exploded. So “don’t call us – we’ll call you”.

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Monday 1st February 2010 – You might be excused for thinking …

… that Sunday’s lowest temperature – minus 8.2 degrees – was blasted cold. But that wasn’t a patch on last night’s minus 9.8. It was the coldest night of the winter so far and almost reaching the depths of minus 10.4 – the figure recorded in January last year which was the lowest that I have ever seen.

Even more impressive was the figure recorded in the verandah which was minus 8 degrees. And that is definitely the lowest figure that has happened in there. In fact it was still so cold this morning that the water in my glass froze while I was cleaning my teeth.

It was also bright and clear with a beautiful sunshine – so much so in fact that everything was fully charged by 11:00. That prompted me to run the heater again in the attic but this time the weather was ready for me and it immediately clouded over and started to snow. Serves me right. But at least it warmed up. Mind you it felt warmer in the bright sunshine at minus 5 than it did in the damp and cloudy plus 1.

Round at Claude’s, he’s definitely out of it. So he made enquiries about the cost of hiring a van for 5 days and he’s going to engage Terry and his van for equal terms. Terry and I will move Claude and Francoise – I reckon we can do it in less time than they will.

This idea I had about hotwiring this wattmeter into my system – I’ve abandoned that. Taking the thing apart revealed just how badly it was assembled inside and at the first sign of any serious manipulation (“personipulation please” – ed) the solder for one of the wires on the PCB broke and the wire fell off. I reckon that if I’m going to go down this hardwiring route I’m going to need something much more solid than anything made in China and sold by LIDL.

This afternoon I started to put the insulation down the walls of the cupboard that is the gap behind the stairs. I want to get that finished pretty quickly so I can put some shelves in it.

At the Conversation Group tonight Liz and I spent most of the time chatting about this radio programme we’ll be doing and also about these CREFAD courses such as we went to on Friday evening. There’s one or two that interest us and they are presented simultaneously at Pontaumur and St Gervais.
“Which one are we going to?” asked Liz
“Whichever one Katrine is taking“
“Ohhh yes?” exclaimed Liz. “Chasing after her, are you?“
“Indeed I am” I replied. “And I’m just hoping that I can remember what to do when I catch her“.

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Saturday 30th January 2010 – I found today quite moving….

…in more than one sense of the word.

I woke up this morning and the first thing that needed to be done was to shovel snow. The blizzard that was down the south side of the Font Nanaud last night had made it over the crest of the range and had deposited three inches of snow chez nous.

And once I had cleared the snow away from off the solar panels and off Caliburn I went round to Claude’s. And this is where the moving came in. Dunno if you remember a few weeks back when I told you that someone had had some good news and I couldn’t say any more at the time but now I can and it’s that Claude has sold his house and he’s moving. His house is bigger than mine with a nicer plot of land and with a small extra house as well and he’s been slowly renovating it whenever funds have allowed. But last summer he had to have open-heart surgery and that has put paid to his plans for good. So he put his house up for sale and he sold it – and for the asking price too with no reduction. The only downside of that is that the purchasers wanted occupation as quickly as possible and so he hasn’t had time to find anywhere permanent. He’s come across an old empty apartment on top of an industrial premises in St Eloy and that’s where we’ve started to move him into.

Much as I’m pleased for his good fortune in selling his house at top price, I shall nevertheless miss him. He’s been a very good friend and neighbour and he’s helped me out loads of times, especially when I was taken ill down here in October 2003. That’s something I shan’t quickly forget.

We should have been footying tonight – the second half of the season getting under way after the winter break – but there was no chance of that. At about 16:00 it started to snow heavily again and we’ve had about 4 or 5 inches so far. It’s going to be more like ice hockey down the road in Pionsat if anyone bothered to turn up. But you can’t do anything in this weather except stay in. I’m supposed to be moving more stuff for Claude tomorrow but the weather is going to have a big say in the likelihood of that.

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