Tag Archives: wardrobe

Wednesday 25th March 2015 – I DID WELL …

… to light a little fire up here last night. I awoke to a relatively balmy 16.2°C and yet outside we had 5cms of snow. So much for Spring, hey?

And I’d been on my travels during the night too. I had aroused the antipathy of the factory bully who ended up chasing me around the factory brandishing an enormous club. He was intercepted by a few of his colleagues who persuaded him to use a slightly smaller club. But it all ended happily ever after as I ended up walking across the park towards some buildings in the distance, hand in hand (and later, arm round the waist) of a girl who, over the past two or three weeks, has appeared out of nowhere to accompany me on several of my nocturnal adventures. I’ve absolutely no idea at all what has prompted the strange inclusion of this unexpected companion, no matter how sweet many of the people in the park described the pair of us last night.

After breakfast I used up the rest of the cheap varnish on the window and the shelves in the wardrobe, and then I varnished the floor with the first coat. After that, I went off to Montlucon as I predicted.

First stop was Pionsat to sort out the boulangère. Sophie, the regular Friday livreuse, is off sick and so they’ve been taking on anyone that they can get. That explains all of the confusion about the delivery of Friday’s bread, and I hope that we’ve managed to sort it out.

At the LIDL I witnessed a very disagreeable incident of a young guy verbally abusing the young female cashier over the price of an article (but he cleared off before I could have a word in his shell-like) and then at the Auchan I stocked up with the next month’s major supply of food.

At Brico-Depot I managed to forget the floor-join and the brush for the bedroom door but I managed to fix myself up with some tackle to make a couple of Heath-Robinson hanging rails for the wardrobe, as well as a couple more 4-watt LED light bulbs. I also bumped into Pete Marsh and his friend, who were stocking up on supplies for their next contract.

I was disappointed though – the cheap but good varnish is no longer carried. It seems that the supplier has closed down. So to be on the safe side, I bought another large tin of the expensive stuff just in case. If I don’t use it, it’ll come in handy for the ground floor.

Problem solved though over the road at mr Bricolage. They had big tins of cheap clear varnish on offer so I bought one,as well as the glass that I need to do the window over the door. I’ve managed to bring that home in one piece – it’ll be interesting to see if I can manage to get it into the doorframe without dropping it.

NOZ came up with nothing so I came home, crashed out for an hour and then made myself a Heath-Robinson meal of a handful of pasta, sone peas, carrots and green beans, and some olive oil and mustard sauce. Cooked on the oven because I’ve had the fire on again tonight. The left-over wood from last night-s fire and a floorboard offcut and that was sufficient. It’s amazing what you can do with a good fire.

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Tuesday 24th March 2015 – SO WHAT …

… have I done today then?

First thing was to trim off a corner of the door that is catching on the floor. And having done that, it was then catching somewhere else. It seems that I have a warped floorboard and that is what is causing the door to catch.

The solution was therefore obvious – out came the big new belt sander and that soon dealt with that issue. There was a lot of vacuuming to do with the new vacuum cleaner, but that’s impressive too. There is however a design fault – a 90° bend in the pipe inside the machine that leads into the dust bag. That could easily be eliminated and so it should be, because it blocks up quite easily.

Next job was to fit the beading around the window and the framework for the sheet of glass that will be fitted above the door.

I had to sort out the issue of the flooring in the far corner. The walls are of course nothing like straight and there’s a gap that varies from about 15mm to 3mm. I tried to carve a piece to fit but gave up after half an hour. Instead I went into the barn and found a 4.5m length of 20mm x100mm left over from when we did the barn roof. I trimmed that down to 70mm using the desktop saw, and that will do to pad out the skirting board so that the gap is covered.

I then spent the rest of the morning vacuuming and cleaning up.

After lunch I masked off by the window and then started to varnish. I’ve done the window sill and insets and also the interior of the wardrobe and that took until all of 19:00. And I’ve had a bit of a shock in that I’m not going to have anything like enough varnish to do it all. A trip to Montlucon is therefore on the cards, well before my planned trip on Saturday.

I had a fire in here tonight. It wasn’t that it was that cold, but it was cold enough and it meant that I could cook my meal in comfort. It was left-over hot-pot from Sunday night – Liz gave me a doggy-bag. Not enough for a meal but with a handful or two of pasta thrown in, it made a lovely meal.

And now I’m off to bed – a nice early night.

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Monday 9th March 2015 – I’VE FINISHED …

finished wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome france… the wardrobe.

Well, I haven’t actually. It still needs varnishing, the hardware finishing off and a couple of the doors sanding down so that they can close properly. However, all of the woodwork is finished at long last.

The upper fascia panel isn’t particularly pretty, but with all irregular heights and having to carve around the ceiling beams, I’m not sure how else I could have done it. I suppose that I could have fitted a false ceiling as I’m planning to do with the ground floor, but I hadn’t thought of that when I started on the bedroom.

This has now taken me on to cleaning up and tidying ready to start the wallpapering. And I hate tidying up as you all kno. I can’t remember which Harry Potter film it was where Dumbledore had the magic wand that cleaned up that house where the timid teacher was living, but I would give all that I own and more to to have one of those.

But as I expected anyway, there isn’t enough room on the ground floor to put everything that I’ll be taking downstairs. This is going to become quite complicated before I go much further.

I was late starting because, as you know, I had to go with Terry to the quarry to fetch some sand. It was a nice morning out anyway because the sun was shining. However it clouded over in the afternoon and I think that the summer might have gone.

And for tea? Cooking in the verandah again I made one of my huge aubergine and kidney bean whatsist – enough to keep me going for four days. The next three days, I can warm up the food in here.

And tomorrow? I’ll be finishing off the tidying up and then hopefully starting on the wallpapering.

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Friday 6th March 2015 – I DIDN’T GET …

… as much done today as I was hoping for – but then again, isn’t this the story of this blasted wardrobe?

Mind you, I have an excuse for at least part of it. Round about 14:30 I noticed that the temperature in the verandah was 26°C. Not only that, the water in the home-made 12-volt immersion heater that I use as a dump load for the excess solar energy had gone up to more than 70°C but there was no room in the tank to put some cold water to cool it down, so I needed to take some out.

This can only mean one thing. And yes, the shower that I had was gorgeous.

Standing in the verandah pouring water all over me out of a jug might not seem like very much to you, but it’s the first shower of the year here so it’s significant in that respect and, of course, it’s all my own work.

And it’s the earliest shower of the year since I’ve been here (that was 2007 when I came to live here) and it’s a sure sign that the warm weather is here. In the height of summer I can have showers every day, and how I look forward to that.

In fact, today we had 207 amp-hours of surplus solar energy. That gives you some idea of how good the weather has been. What I’ve done therefore is to plug the fridge into the permanent circuit so that it runs through the night. Normally the fridge runs on the overcharge circuit so that it only runs when the batteries are fully charged (except in summer when I run it 24 hours per day) but I need to put a little bit of strain on the batteries. This is the earliest that I’ve had the fridge going through the night.

wardrobe door bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceReturning to our moutons, first job in the bedroom this morning was to trim off all of the doors on the upper row. I’d marked them off yesterday so it didn’t take all that long, but I ended up doing the bottom of one of the doors as well because the rest of it ended up looking so good.

I’ve started on the upper fascia panel too – making it out of the cut-off ends of floorboards mounted vertically, so I had to go a-scavenging around the bedroom for the offcuts. The chop saw is excellent though for the cutting.

However, here’s a design fault or two with the machine. A built-in measure would help enormously, as well as an end-stop which you can set in order to cut constanr lengths. I had to invent something for this.

I’m not very happy with this though. Each piece has to be shaped individually once it’s been cut, and some of these shapes around the exposed beams are quite complicated. For one section, I had to cut three different pieces before I was satisfied.

But that’s half-done now and it might take another half-day to finish. And I’ll be glad when it’s done too. I can then crack on with the rest of the bedroom

I finished off tonight by going down to Pionsat and the Intermarche for the shopping. THis means that I have Saturday free. And I’m pleased that I don’t have to go to Montlucon tomorrow for bits and pieces.

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Thursday 5th March 2015 – I DIDN’T QUITE MANAGE …

… to complete as much as I intended to do on the wardrobe today. I had the usual issues of working hard but making not much progress.

It took all morning to hang the two doors that I had made yesterday. Mind you, I spent some of the time having a good search around looking to see if I had any hinges lying around anywhere. I eventually found three in the barn. I must have bought those for some long-forgotten project, but they weren’t much good as they were left-hand hinges and too big in any case.

However I did find half a hinge in the house and this made a pair (or at least it will do when I find the other half) with a hinge that I had already, so I could at least do that. It also means that I don’t have to go on a shopping expedition to Montlucon on Saturday.

final door for wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceAfter lunch, I made the final door and for a change, I had a play with the cheap chop-saw that I bought agesa couple of years ago in the sales at Cheze in St Eloy-les-Mines. This did an excellent job, although it needs two cuts to cut the width of a floorboard (which is annoying) but never mind. I’ll be doing the floorboards with this.

While I was on my travels around, I tried to see if I could find the Ryobi portable router that I bought in the USA in 2012 but I’ve no idea where that might be. Not a trace.

The final door needed trimming down but once I’d done that it was quite a good fit and it’s all come out quite well.

all of the doors need trimming off of course, so I measured everything up ready to cut them down tomorrow. That ook me nicely up to 18:30 when I called it a day

During the night I was on my travels again, back in Crewe. We were living back in Davenport Avenue and there was quite a crowd of us there. We all had cars and the place was totally cluttered up with vehicles. Anyway, I went on the bus up Gresty Road and South Street and the bus turned right into Nantwich Road, towards the station. I realised that I should have alighted at the corner so I urgently rang the bell. The driver went to stop but of course there’s nowhere along there to stop (the bus was clearly driving on the right-hand side of the road) so the driver said that he would swing round into Pedley Street and come back round into Nantwich Road to drop me off. I told him not to bother as I was going to Pedley Street anyway, so I alighted then and there and went to a house where I cooked my pizza and chips. I somehow managed to burn my chips although my pizza wasn’t anything like nearly cooked. So I abandoned my tea that and went outside where I bumped into my friend Mandy, and we had quite a chat about the good old days.

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Wednesday 4th March 2015 – I WAS ON MY TRAVELS …

… during the night. At the wheel of a holiday coach going somewhere with a load of passengers. And to my surprise, there was a family (mum, dad and girl) from around here on board coming with me. Small world, isn’t it? I wonder why they were there.

And when I woke up it was dark. Not that it was early, but it was snowing like crazy. And throughout the day we had a mixture of sunlight followed by heavy snow flurries and back to sunshine again. And this was how it kept up. The temperature plummeted too and by teatime we were at freezing point. So much for the beautiful Spring weather of yesterday.

wardrobe doors bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceI spent most of the working day in the bedroom, as you might expect. And by the time lunchtime came round, I’d done the bracing for the two doors that I had cut yesterday, cut the lets in the doors and the framework for the hinges, hung the doors, fitted the handles and then the magnetic catches.

That took me nicely up to lunchtime so I cleared off for my buttied and coffee, and some more work on the website

Back at work this afternoon, I cut town the rest of the planking that I had made yesterday so that I had a strip for the doors on the other side of the wardrobe. I cut the two doors out of that and then cut them to size, and then cut the lets in the framework for hinges for the the right-hand door.

Thats as far as I reached today, as this was about 18:40 when I reached this point so I called it a day.

Up here, the temperature had fallen to 14.8°C – not all that cold but I may as well light a fire to cook my tea rather than use the gas.

So tomorrow, I’ll be hanging the two doors that I have cut and then cutting the final door. If I can do that, then I can apply the first coat of varnish on the inside before I knock off. THat will mean that it will dry through the night and won’t pick up any dust.

And won’t that be progress?

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Tuesday 3rd March 2015 – I HAD A GOOD DAY …

… at work today, for a change. Although, as usual, you wouldn’t really notice.

I was up early enough and after breakfast had a good crack on at the laptop. As well as the Radio Anglais programmes, I’ve restarted work on my website again. I’ve done almost nothing on it during the winter but now Spring is here and it’s time to come out of hibernation and get a wiggle on

upper doors fitted wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceIn the bedroom I spent some of the morning finishing off the second door on the upper part of the wardrobe, cutting out the lets for the hinges and fitting them, and then fitting the door handle and the magnetic catch. Once I’d done all of that, I could hang the door.

And then take the door off, file down part of the edges so that it would fit better and then rehang it.

Off to Caliburn next, to fetch another pack of floorboarding and bring that upstairs. Then I could make up a board out of seven planks, ready to cut down to make doors 3,4,5 and 6.

After lunch, I cut two strips 770mm wide out of the board that I had made. 770mm is the height of the upper doors (give or take a millimetre or two) and these two strips will form the four doors that I mentioned just now.

One of the strips I cut down to make two doors of exactly the right width for doors 3 and 4, and then fitted the reinforcing battens. I had to cut down some wood for the battens, and the table saw that I bought in Commentry a couple of months ago did the job expertly. In fact, I was running the electricity and power tools today (the circular saw, the belt sander and the table saw) until 18:40 today without significantly draining the batteries and I’m well pleased with that.

So now the two doors are ready to be hung tomorrow morning, and then I can crack on with cutting down doors 5 and 6. When they are done, there will be just door 7 to fit, and then the upper fascia panels and then I can varnish the wardrobe.

Tonight, I didn’t light a fire. 17.8°C in the attic it was, which was impressive for this time of year. I cooked tea on the single burner camping stove that I use for making coffee and as well as working perfectly (a good plan making these huge curries and packing them into individual portions – they don’t take much heating) it warmed up the place by 1°C.

On the subject of electricity, I noticed that at one stage we were having 42 amp-hours of surplus electricity. It didn’t last long but it pumped uop the heat in the home-made 12-volt immersion heater that I use as a dump load.

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Monday 2nd March 2015 – I DIDN’T GET …

… as much done as I wanted to today – but then I had quite an interruption round about lunchtime.

I struggled to get out of bed this morning, but nevertheless I cracked on with my stuff about Algeria and managed to finish that, at least, even though I was late going down to work.

I managed to fit all of the framework for the upper doors, although one piece had to be recut after it split while I was malleting it into position. All of that took much longer than I anticipated, due mainly to my having to cut a couple more fascia pieces as the ones that I had set aside were not strong enough.

Once that had been done, I went out to fetch a pile of floorboards from Caliburn and then made the first of the upper doors.

But this was when I noticed the smell of burning.

We had a brief patch of sun today and I ended up with 45 amp-hours of power going down the cables to the home-made 12-volt immersion heater. It seems that the connector on the positive cable wasn’t up to that and the connection was arcing out. I ended up having to cut it off, fit a new connector, cut off the insulation and then solder it using the new gas soldering gun that Terry bought me for Christmas.

My soldering is total rubbish as you know, but it has to be better than my crimping, so it seems. and it was then that I noticed that the thread appears to be stripped in the heater element. I had to remove the screw and do my best with a nut and bolt, but that’s not looking so good and I’m going to have to deal with this.

All in all, I ended up having lunch at about 16:30.

Back at work I carried on until 19:00. All of the hinges are in place but the door needs trimming down. That’s not the kind of thing that you can do when you are tired and so I’ll be dealing with that first thing tomorrow.

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Friday 27th February 2015 – IT WASN’T QUITE …

… such a late start this morning, although I did finish mixing the live concert for the rock show that i’ll be broadcasting in a few weeks time. I just need to do the text for the rock programmes (which I’ll do tomorrow morning) and that will be the rock shows done for the month of April.

shelves wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceBack in the bedroom, I started to fit the shelving in the wardrobe.

First job was to cut down the shelving strip. It comes in 2-metre lengths and so seeing as how I had four of them, I could each one in half to give me 8 lengths of I metre, and then measured up so that they could be screwed correctly into the back and front walls of the wardrobe so that the shelves will be level.

I ran through the offcuts of pine boarding that I had lying around, and there was enough to make 6 shelves, with some judicious cutting. Not enough, so I had to cut up a pine board in order to make two more.

shelves wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceWhat astonished me was that I went outside to find the clips that support the shelves and I was able to put my hand on them straight away. It’s not every day that this kind of thing happens, especially around here is it?

But anyway, now I have all of the shelving fitted and doesn’t it look nice?

I wasn’t so lucky with looking for the clothes rail. I know that I have two oval ones that I salvaged from a previous project, but I’ve absolutely no idea where they might be found. They will have to wait for another time.

I’ve also started fitting the framework for the upper row of doors, and it seems that I have miscounted and don’t have enough hinges, magnetic catches or door handles. Well, that’s just typical isn’t it?

And I’ve also managed to screw a screw into my thumb while I was at it.

Later on, after knocking off, I went to Pionsat and the Intermarche to do the shopping. And ended up having a lengthy chat about the virtues of Canadian maple syrup with a fellow-shopper.

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Thursday 26th February 2015 – I WAS UP …

… early this morning. However this was not due to any urgent desire to get to work. I knew that I shouldn’t have finished off that bottle of pop before I went to bed.

That gave me an hour or so before starting work and so I made a start on the next month’s issue of radio programmes. I might as well put this time to good use. I made quite a bit of progress too but like anything else, there’s never enough time to do anything.

I had a good day at work today. First job was to take that sheet of floorboarding that I had made up yesterday and cut off one of the doors for the wardrobe.

Once that had been done, it needed the diagonal bracing and the door handle fitting, and then I had to organise the hinges on the door and on the frame. With that done, I could hang the door. And while it needs a little sanding where it’s tight on the frame , it’s quite a good fit.

Next task was to cut down the remaider of the sheet of floorboarding to make the second door. And then to repeat all of the above procedure as on the first door and hang that.

That was a good fit too except once more, a little tight on the frame (but sanding will take care of that of course).

However, the width was about 2mm out but I was able to deal with that by undoing the bracing, using a large sash clamp to pull the floor boards closer together and then te-attaching the bracing. That way, I recovered the 2mm that I needed and the widths are perfect, which is certainly impressing me.

two pairs of doors on wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceOnce the bolt had been fitted on one of the door and the lock and magnetic catch fitted to the second door, then we now have two pairs of doors on the wardrobe and this is starting to look serious.

Knocking off for lunch 15 minutes late and knocking off for the evening 45 minutes late – you can see just how much time and effort that I’m putting into this bedroom. I don’t understand why it’s not progressing much quicker than it is. That’s something of a complete mystery to me.

Tomorrow, I’ll be fitting the shelving brackets and then cutting the shelves to fit. That is, provided that we have some sun. Today, we were bathed in a hanging cloud all day, solar energy was nominal and the batteries didn’t half creak when I was running the circular saw. We need a good day pretty soon.

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Wednesday 25th February 2015 – BACK TO WORK TODAY

And I didn’t feel much like it either. A late night last night and the battery going flat in the mobile phone that I use as an alarm clock meant that I wasn’t awake as early as I would have liked, and I crashed out for half an hour at lunchtime too.

Once I actually started work (about 20 minutes late) I cracked on – or so it seemed – but despite working consciensciously throughout the day, I haven’t made all that much progress and I don’t know why.

The story of my life just recently, I’m afraid.

door hanging wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceI cut the second door of the wardrobe down to size (and much to my surprise, the width is millimetre-perfect), sanded off the edges with the new belt sander, did the lets in the door and the frame for the hinges and fastened them, and then hung the door.

Once it was in place, I fitted the handle, fitted the door lock and drilled out the hole for the key, and fitted the magnetic catch.

That took me nicely up to something of a late lunch and I went off upstairs for a little doze

After lunch, I rooted out another couple of packets of floorboarding (and also found the strips for the shelving supports for the inside of the wardrobe – I knew that I had them somewhere) and then made the sheet of planks from which I’ll be cutting out the doors for the other half of the wardrobe.

I also made the framework for the doors and that took me to 18:30, so having more-than-recovered the time lost due to my late start, I called it a day.

For tea, I cooked a mega-pepper-and-lentil curry that’s now divided up for another three meals, and now I’m off to bed.

I’ll be carrying on with my doors tomorrow – I wonder how far I will get.

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Friday 20th February 2015 – AHHH WELL!

Yes indeed!

door wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceYesterday I told you of everything that I needed to do on the wardrobe, and how I would be lucky to do half of it. In fact I’ve managed to make the framework for one pair of doors, assemble a pair of doors and hang one of them.

And that’s it.

And I’m not sure why either. It’s not as if I’ve been slacking or been distracted, or spent hours looking for stuff either. I’ve put in a good shift and made good use of the circular saw and the new belt sander (with which I am very impressed – it does exactly what I wanted it to do) too, but for some reason I don’t think that I’ve advanced very much.

I’ll have to work much harder than this if I want to make progress because this isn’t very good at all. if I carry on like this I’m never going to accomplish anything. However, I’m not quite sure how I can work any faster. After all, as I have already said, it isn’t as if I’ve been slacking.

After knocking off, I went into Pionsat. Firstly, for a pile of shopping at the Intermarche of course, and secondly to put a load of washing into the washing machine there. As I have said before … "and you’ll say again" – ed … installing the little launderette at the Intermarche was the best thing that the owners of the supermarket ever did.

I had the clothes hanging outside in the wind, because we’ve been having a lovely windy day today, but when I was outside later doing the stats, it started to rain so I’ve stuck it all in the verandah.

Now I’m all set up for the weekend.

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Thursday 19th February 2015 – I’M ABSOLUTELY WHACKED …

… and I’ve no idea why either.

I was so tired last night that I was in bed and asleep by 22:20 and I’m not sure if that had ever happened before when I’ve not been ill. I slept right through until the alarm at 07:30 and I still managed to crash out at about 15:15 for a good 45 minutes after I had come back from Cécile’s. And I’d still go to bed right now given half a chance.

wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceYou may remember my target for today – to have the fixed shelving and the fixed fronts on the wardrobe by knocking-off time. Well, I managed to accomplish that and here you are, in all its glory.

It’s really quite funny but like most things around here, I ended up redesigning it, even when I was halfway through fixing it and it’s not quite thesame as it started out being. And I was almost held up by the lack of a 300mm plank for the intermediate shelf.

But not to worry – I remembered that I had two of them for my bookshelves up here in the attic and so I came up here and dismantled the bookshelves. Now I have books all over the place, but at least I have shelves in the wardrobe.

I’m well-pleased with this

What needs to be done next is for the moveable shelves to be fitted (if I can find the struts) and the doors to be made and hung. It’s quite a tall order to do that tomorrow – if i manage to do half of that I’ll consider myself lucky.

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Wednesday 18th February 2015 – IF YOU WERE TO LOOK …

… at the photo of today’s work, you would be forgiven for thinking that I don’t seem to have made much progress.

In actual fact, I reckon that today was the day when I accomplished the most work in the bedroom to date, in that all of the electricity in the dressing table area is now installed.

electricity fittings wardrobe bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceThere’s a pair of 12-volt sockets (you’ll notice that I use North American plugs and sockets for my 12-volt circuits as they take high-capacity cable), a 230-volt mains socket (I use British plugs and sockets here because the plugs are fused) and a light switch that powers one of these IKEA LED light strips.

All I need now is some extra-long screws to fasten the socket to the pattress, and also a mirror. But they will both come in the fullness of time.

I would have made much more progress too had I not fastened the connectors to the wire of the LED light strip before I’sd threaded it through the hole. I had to cut off the ends and pass the wires through, and then I couldn’t find any more connectors. I spent about half an hour looking too. In the end I had to invent something.

But you’ll notice the difference between today’s photo and yesterday’s. We have the mirror backing in position and also the other side wall of the dressing table area. We really are making progress.

Tomorrow I won’t accomplish too much because I have to go to Cécile’s to show someone round. But I’m hoping that I can fit the top of the wardrobe as well as the intermediate shelf. If I can do that, as well as to start to assemble the front walls, I shall be quite happy. But I have a feeling that I’m going to miss my target of the end of the month, and probably by a week or two as well, to finish the bedroom.

I had another helping of my vegan aubergine and kidney bean whatsit for tea, and I realised that I forgot to add the olives too. What a performance!

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Tuesday 17th February 2015 – I’VE BEEN ON MY TRAVELS …

… during the night and was having such an exciting time that I was determined to remember every second of it when I awoke.

Of course, you can guess what happened. I awoke and … paff … it was gone.

Ahhh well.

So this morning after something of a slow start (I’m not quite sure why I couldn’t summon up the enthusiasm) I cracked on. And much to my surprise, by the time that I had knocked off for lunch, I had really accomplished something.

home made chest of drawers bedroom les guis virlet puy de dome franceand here you are – my first ever home-made chest of drawers.

Don’t worry about the front panels by the way, they will be replaced eventually with pine planks when I have finished the wardrobe and know what offcuts that I might have left over. And they will pass in front of the wardrobe frame too, in order to hide the framework which isn’t quite straight.

Making the sides was exciting though. I had to make the first one and fit the runners in position by trial and error. And to my surprise, I only ended up 14mm out in height. And that was soon remedied with an offcut and from the outside, you would never notice.

The second side was of course so much easier, having already made the first and having taken copious notes.

The gap in between the two sides needed to be 549mm and to my total astonishment, having assembled the framework back in 2010 or 2011 or whenever, and doing it by guesswork, I had left a gap of 548mm. And what is 1mm betweem friends?

After lunch I fitted the top to the chest of drawers, fitted one of the sides of the wardrobe above the chest of drawers, and cut and shaped the piece for the back where the mirror will be. It’s all becoming quite exciting here as I progress.

But two things stick in my mind and one of them is annoying me intensely. I’ve designed the wardrobe so that the internal fitting is 500mm, meaning that I can use 500mm pine boards without having to cut them. However, the flaming, blasted, perishing 500mm pine boards are actually 505mm, meaning that I have to trim 5mm off each board.

This is a total shambles, I’ll tell you that. If there were anywhere else to go other than Brico Depot, I’d be there.

But the second thing that I have to say is based on the first thing, and this is definitely positive. That is that despite the hanging cloud that has covered us for all of the day, I’ve used the 650-watt circular saw intermittently today and you would never ever notice from the state of the batteries. Installing these new, big heavy-duty batteries back at the end of autumn was an excellent move. those old second-hand batteries would never have coped with this.

For tea tonight, I made an exciting vegan aubergine and kidney-bean whatsit. I’ve lost a load of supplies, including the macedoine vegetables and the kidney beans. I’ve no idea where these might have gone but its bewildering. I’ve had to use subsititutes and it doesn’t taste the same.

But where have these supplies gone to then? This is bizarre.

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