predencia

I woke up this morning and for a few delicious moments lay in bed relishing the thought that there would be no workmen today. I didn’t have to set the alarm, didn’t have to rush out of bed half asleep to open the door, didn’t have to put on a bright perky face when all I wanted to do was go back to bed. I lay there in the dim light and smiled, stretched out like a starfish and savoured the feel of the sheet against my skin. It was 10 a.m. before I got up – oh what a long time since I could endulge myself like this.

We spent the day writing a snags list with no enthusiasm to attend to anything on it. I made some feeble attempt to dismantle the stereo (yes stereo its over 30 years old) then gave up and phoned a friend. Yes I reminded myself, it’s possible to have a social conversation in the day.

Andrew made an attempt to fit heaters in the utilities room as the forcast is for -8 degrees tonight, and I made an attempt to sweep another layer of dirt off the kitchen floor. Tomorrow we’ll make a more concerted effort to start on the snags list – today was just deliciously quiet and peaceful.

The decorator finished today. HURRAY! The electrician finished all the work inside HURRAY – all that’s left is to fit the metres to the washing machine and tumble dryers out in the utilities room. He seemed stunned (as he walked through the house with his list) that everything was ticked off. I gave both the decorator and the electrician a hug as they left. They’ve been here so long they felt like family. Tomorrow we begin the final push – me and Andrew – working through our own snags list. It feels like giving birth – this is the final week and the anticipation is huge, we know what kind of baby it will be, we love it but will others? We think so. The boys came for one last meal here last Sunday and my brother and his family today. They all like the changes. With all the talk of integrated smoke detection systems, emergency lighting and fire doors they were expecting the house to look more industrial. They were pleasantly surprised. Andrew and I are really looking forward to a break soon. Looked at an all inclusive to Gran Canaria but it could be anywhere that offers sun, sea, sand and the opportunity to sleep.

Yesterday was a blur. Woke up at 11.30, made it to the settee to watch Christmas TV and to the kitchen at 2 pm to prepare a turkey and put it in the oven. It, along with the rest of the meal, was ready by 6.30 and although there were only 2 of us I made an effort to dress for dinner. After exchange of presents, a large meal and virtually a bottle of champagne on my own I returned to the settee. Pretty much it for Christmas day. Not sure how much of my late getting up today was due to sheer fatigue and how much to the champagne but I didn’t make it out of bed till 1.30 pm today. Managed a walk in the Liecestershire countryside in the bright but cold sunshine, then back to the settee. Managed a visit to Andrew’s parents this evening for a couple of hours then, you guessed it – back to the settee. I can’t remember the last time I watched so much TV but I’ve tried to rest my mind from project management during my waking hours these two days because during my sleeping hours I’m back there – all night long it feels like. I’ve given Andrew a holiday as a present to be taken when the house is complete. We’ll both need it.

And what of the house? Well it’s not complete. We have one more bedroom to paint and lot more painting in the hallways. On the plus side we’ve now got all the furniture for all the rooms – beds arrived on Christmas eve. As they are all flat packed we’ll spend tomorrow putting them together. We should have at least one room complete tomorrow – hopefully in time for when my son arrives.

History seem to be repeating itself in the yard. The new people have proved not much better than the old ones – needed pushing to complete the work in their stated time, rushed it, very poor finish, and a demand for their money. I’ve refused until we are satisfied – he became abusive, called me difficult and hung up in the middle of our discussion when it became clear I would not pay him any money until we were absolutely satisfied with the work. But for two days I’ve been able to leave it all behind. Tomorrow will be time enough to pick it up again.

I went to see my coach last week and he suggested that I could aim for the end of December as a new deadline. He is also my acupuncturist and when I asked why he’d put needles in my ears (normally I only have needles in my hands and feet for balance) he said it was for calming me down. Wasn’t aware it was that obvious.

So where are we with the house with 3 more working days before Christmas? By Monday 4 of the bedrooms will be habitable. Going shopping tomorrow for furniture. Curtains have been dry cleaned and rehung, carpets are down – got a good deal from Abdullah and Son in Sparkbrook. Kitchen is nearly there – just need a few holes filling in and a bit more paint, a few pictures on the walls and a few old cupboards removing. I love the new cooker and the matching black fridge and freezer went in today. I cooked for the first time in ages yesterday. We’ve still to find a home for the huge microwave to make way for a dinky new one.

The painter is working his way through the house. He’d got a plan worked out yesterday for moving systematically through the hallway into the lounge – but like everything else that had to be shelved. I bought the carpet for the lounge yesterday, they could fit tomorrow or after Christmas. Guess what – the painter changed his plan so the room could be ready for the carpet tomorrow. He’s a great guy but I can’t help but think that he could probably work a little quicker (and with less paint dripping everywhere) if he wasn’t always drunk. He’s 65 and when he’s not working here he’s down the pub. One morning he rang at 10.30 to apologise for not gettin here at 8.30 – he’d just got home from the night before and was grabbing himself some breakfast. He offered to do a couple of hours for free to get the upstairs ready for the carpets but I told him to come in for half day and I’d pay him. He’s been reading me some of his poetry. He writes in the pub, instant stuff about what’s going on at the time, and performs them there and then. With the round of parties at the moment I don’t think we are likely to see him sober this side of the year; and by his account he’s pretty much out of it in January as his birthday is new year’s eve. Still, even allowing for cleaning up after him it’s still quicker than trying to do it ourselves.

The bathroom is functional, as is the toilet – doors went back on today. Still some touching up to be done in the bathroom but once Andrew fits the shower head we are in business. Chippy was in creating more dust but should be finished tomorrow. Please dear God let it be the end for him.

The only big jobs left are the tank to be fitted in the loft and the outside. They’ve made good progress out there but didn’t turn up today – the day they’d promised it would be finished by. When I rang to enquire why – they said it had been raining very hard and they can’t work in the rain – they must have been in another part of the country to me because I only say drizzle today. Anyway they phoned later to say they’d come tomorrow (even though they don’t work on Sundays) Jesus preserve us from British workmen. It isn’t as if they are cheap either – I can understand it with Brian but these guys are being paid £2,200 for a week’s work. And they had the nerve to critisize others who didn’t dieliver on time. We only took them on because a) they were recommended and b) they promised they would not let us down.

This whole process has had an interesting effect on our relationship (mine and Andrew’s) It’s the first time we’ve spent such a concentrated amount of time together. Most of the time it’s been much better than we were expecting but as we’ve beome more tired we’re becoming a bit frayed at the edges. What it has shown us though is that we are pretty solid – and I’m glad we’re doing this now and not next July.

Alas there’s been no time to focus on Christmas – next year should be better.

Eleven days to Christmas. It looks like 3 rooms will be completed and possibly the kitchen. With a real push (we’ve got a decorator in all week but he’s not speedy gonzales) we may get the lounge painted. Guys coming to start the paving and patio tomorrow – promised to be finished before Christmas.

Then the blow – my boys are not coming for Christmas. Will the first one without them. We are both very zombified.

Well, it’s the 12 December and not a single room is complete. We really are going about this arse about face. The decorators have moved in but the electrician is still taking up floorboards to put in first fix cabling. The tilers have gone to another job and send me texts almost daily to say they are coming next day and then another one on the day to say they are coming the next day, and to think we got them in to speed up the job. The problem builder has now done his bit and gone. He wanted paying for the remaining fire doors which were £900 and to leave the small tasks (worth £10) to finish off ‘as and when’. I had to use the broken record technique ‘I’ll pay you when all the jobs are done’ to get him to come in and finish off all the little jobs – one of which turned out not to be so little after all – he just lead us to believe it was. He surprised us by not wanting payment for a day spent making and fitting 2 shower bases – not for labour or materials – just goes to show you can never completely know someone.

On the other hand the drainage guy, having threatened me has now sent me a bill for £5,777.00 what he claims is the full amount for the work carried out. I have already paid him what I calculated the work to be worth (£1,480.00) and wait to see what he will do now as I don’t intend to pay anymore.

So what progress have we made? The kitchen is tantalisingly close to being finished – just a cupboard to be fitted and a few cables boxed in and I can start moving in the furniture. We had black brickwork tiles and they look surperb. I spent 3 days covering up the yellow walls and green woodwork with magnolia and white – now the kitchen looks twice the size it did – it’s going to be lovely. The front bedroom is now almost there, just waiting for the dado rails to be fitted in the ensuite and the carpet and we are done in there. I don’t want to be overly optimistic but may also have the other two bedrooms on that floor done by Sunday. There is still, however, a mammoth painting job to be done on the lounge which hasn’t been touched yet (more yellow and green) Not to mention the garden.

Been getting quotes from the yellohw pages. Very interesting will write about that next time.

My intention was to write a blog everyday to chart the progress of the HMO development. Alas some days I haven’t even been able to switch on my computer I’ve been so busy/tired. This week (or at least the last 9 days have been crazy.

I did the performance at the Town Hall with Ita. It was fantastic to be performing on such a big stage to such a huge audience. The event was promoted on the local TV station, radio, on the B’ham website and in the press. This coupled with the large cast of performance brought an audience of about 400. We were on in the second half and I was a) disappointed that my microphone kept falling off which detracted somewhat from the preformance and b) that the music and the action were perfectly synchronized, (A first for any performance with Ita) Andrew helped me to put the music together and the sound engineer (Tim I believe his name is) on the night was superb. We had some good feedback on the night – the audience laughed in all the expected places and we got good applause – but then so did everyone. There were some superb acts my favourites being Barbara Nice – the compare, the group of children dancing in white and the cast of RENT. I must go and see them at the Hippodrome in the new year.

I’ll stay with performances for the time being as they have been the most rewarding things this week. On Saturday I did my co hosting of the Amnesty/WWB event. It was fabulous – not just because Ita and I were great MCs on the night but because the performers were so spot on. The musicians included Steve Yimga, an amazing djembe player, Joe Beale from the Joe Beale Blues Band, Silk Road, Matthew Tuite, Rockstone from Roakstone and ghe Y2K band, and the headline artiste – Ben Akofor who came all the way from Malvern. I was impressed when he said he was thinking what songs to sing at this event while he was in Palestine a couple of weeks ago. They were all superb. And the WWB performers really stepped it up a gear. I felt proud to be a part of the group.

As well as doing the MC ing we also did our poetry. Mine was ‘The Guide’ a poem about domestic violence. Almost immediately after I’d finished a gentleman came to ask me where he could buy the poem – sadly at this stage I don’t have my poems available for sale. A bizarre thing happened. At the interval a woman took my hand – I thought to shake it – but no – she kissed my hand, looked into my eyes and repeated thank you a number of times. Apparently I was telling her story in the poem. A couple of people who work with women who have experienced domestic violence wanted to know if I would do something with their clients. A DJ from Newstyle Radio wanted me to come on to his show and many of the audience sought me out to tell me how much moved they were by the poem. What I find interesting is that while I was focused on the comparing part of the evening I was not overly concerned about performing the poem, and while I enjoyed the performace I really loved MCing. Much more so than I thought I would. Feed back has been really positive.

All this has been a welcome disraction from the house which is still inching its way forward. Too tired now to say much more but main builder completed all his work today. He’s been paid and its good that all the fire doors are now in place (getting arm exercise opening them) Too tired to go on.

I should feel very depressed because the deadline for completing the conversion is today and the elves didn’t come out and complete the work. Instead the electrician worked all weekend, the kitchen fitter put in a marathon spell, the door fitter put in a stint on Saturday and got all but one of the fire doors fitted, Andrew worked like a trojan with the electrician but it was not enough. I think we will be lucky to have it done by next week so I’m setting a new date of December 12. Apparently running over on your first project is not unusual – and is actually expected. It doesn’t help either that we are now in dispute with the drainage company for not being able to deliver to our agreed date but worse of all for trying to rip us off on the quote. Not fitting equipment and trying to charge us for it. Will be interesting to see if the director turns up tomorrow to get his money as he threatened.

I’m not depressed because I’ve been too busy preparing for the World’s Aid day performance at the Town Hall tomorrow. Amazing how long it takes to put together a ten minute skit. I’m doing it with Ita – one of the Mahagony Tree. Also today I was asked if I would be master of ceremony for the Amnesty/Writers Without Borders event on December 6th. My gut reaction was ‘I’m not ready for this’ but if someone considers that I am then I must be – so I said yes. I’ll have to feel the fear and do it anyway.

I discovered something today – some builders don’t want you around when they are working – especially if you know what they should be doing and more to the point – how they should be doing it. No scope for scams, for charging you for materials they didn’t use, for doing things shoddily and charging you top whack for the privilege. We are two our builders worst nightmare (or at least Andrew is) because he scrutinses their work and insists on getting it to his standards (which even I think are a bit excating at times) but as these guys don’t come cheap they shouldn’t expect to deliver a shoddy service. Yes- you’ve guessed it – the main builder and the drainage boss man.

I had to ring them today as I’ve had no word from either of them in a week. The fire doors are still not on and the drains which should have taken one week now looks like taking five and a half – and still with the unresolved issue of the paved patio. We should be getting a drawing of his proposal to incorporate decking into the design tomorrow. Though somehow I’m not holding my breath. And I’ve now been told that the new doors will be arriving tomorrow afternoon and the ‘chippy’ will be out to fit them on Saturday. Fortunately at this stage they are not holding up progress in the rest of the house so it will be no great disaster if he doesn’t arrive.

What is holding up progress though is the tilers not being able to complete the bathroom this week. Not now till early next week. I can’t really get mad at them because they had other stuff booked in and it’s partly our fault that they couldn’t get access to the bathroom when they were free. What is also holding up progress is that we still hven’t got all the electrics in place – not even (or especially the first fix). Work is going on as I write (10.30 at night) but that’s part of the problem. The ‘sparky’ can only come sometimes after work which apart from slowing the process makes for very long days for us. We have to be up to let in the workmen that arrive at 8.30 a.m. and be here for the ones that finish at 11.00 p.m. and frankly at this point I’m am fed up; tired of the long days, of the constant dust; of what appears to be so little progress or at least the sporadic nature of the progress. My dreams of having this all finished by the end of the month has not quite turned into a nightmare but it is certainly an uncomfortable place to be.

I am trying hard to maintain my belief that thing happen when they are meant to and that everyday I learn a new lesson but right now I just feel like I want a day off school. It was great to have the kitchen guy start yesterday. Please dear God let him be consistent

I’m still trying to get my head round what happened yesterday. Here’s the situation. In September we were recommeded a drainage company and was initially impressed by the speed of thier response to our enquiries and the delivery of thier quote, and we were able to negotiate what we considered to be a good price. It was all in wiriting. Later we negotiated some further work to the garden, putting in steps, laying slabs etc. This was agreed at an additional price (not written) and there in lay the issue. Through a series of delays on thier part the work did not begin till 8th November with the promise of ‘throwing 4 men at it and it will be over in a week’. On the 8th one man turned up – and he is still here and at the rate he is going (he’s quick but still one man doing the work of four) he will be here for at least another 2 weeks.

Yesterday the guy we had done the deal with came and swore blind he had not quoted to carry out the work on the garden area – only to lay the slabs. I was gobsmacked but was incerdibly grateful for my previous experence of working with delinquent liars and managing difficult staff. I asked why his staff had started the work if it was never intended – he said Andrew had instructed him. There then followed a verbal tennis match about who said what, what was understood and more to the point what was misunderstood. He asked questions like ‘Surely you could not have thought that all this work could have come so cheaply’ to which I replied ‘I am not in drainage or in groundswork I have no idea what the work is supposed to cost – that is your area of expertise’. He suggested the work we were asking for would cost another £1,500 . I suggested that his staff put back everything he had spent the last 3 days digging out exactly as he found it, every rock, every pebble, every shrub, every bulb. It was time for hin to look gobsmacked.

I then acknowledge that there had indeed been some major misunderstanding – I totally refrained from pointing out that he had underquoted for a piece of work and was now trying to wriggle out of it – and asked him to think of a solution that would leave the space maintenance free (which is what we wanted). I was not overly impressed with his idea of decking and shrubs.

No coincedence methinks that this issue has come come quickly on the back of a dispute with the main builder about the what was quoted for – he tried to wriggle out of paying for plaster work which was included in the price of a partition wall. The upside to this is that we’ve found another plasterer not connected to these guys in any way – just as good at one third of the price.