Today started far too early, with a meeting with initial builder and his sparky at 8am. We re-iterated what we were looking for, and then off they toddled, whilst Matt headed to work. I stripped another ceiling of polystyrene tiles, and then filled up our wheelie bin with the results. We are currently having to pay council tax for two houses (because the council won’t let us claim an empty house - we’re not knocking walls down, and that is what would be needed) - so I am filling up two rubbish bins for removal each week. We will eventually need to get a skip, but this will do for now. We received exciting post - a New Home present from a friend of a Screwfix voucher - Laura definitely has the measure of the project :)

At 12:30pm we had another builder arrive - along with a sock… Builder turned up first, and I did the usual of showing him all that we wanted done. This time, we were told 10-12 weeks of work, which again was a bit of a surprise, but more reasonable than yesterday’s 3-4 weeks.
When I was letting him out, I discovered that someone had left a sock in the porch. A single, black, sports sock. I was quite glad that the builder was there to be honest, because he confirmed that it hadn’t been there when he arrived. It suggests that I am not going completely bonkers (although you never know really!!). The porch did not have a key to the lock, so anyone could have dropped it there - but why??

Would anyone like to claim this sock?!

After that, it was time to head home and have a nap - see I said I was trying to be good….

For those of you wondering, by the way, this is my mode of transport across to the house - I seem to repeatedly be taking loads to and fro in it - it’s not the most stable of bike trailers, but is okay for the short journeys I am making at the moment, and saving my arms hugely My beast of burden

After nap, headed back again, fixed loft ladder (it’s a little rickety, but will do the job for now), stripped the attic ceiling of tiles and waited for another builder. 5pm Third builder of the day: I must be getting old when the builders are looking too young!! He reckons he could start in 3 weeks, and that the job would take 5-8 weeks. It’s fascinating how different people look at a job.