Maybe it’s time to do an update after the January post…
- Quickly came to the conclusion that it’s not feasible to replace the fence panel myself – the bloody thing’s far too heavy to lift high! Plus, the adjacent panel has a strip that comes off in a strong easterly wind. So, last week, I arranged for a fencer from Crigglestone (near Wakefield) to come up and have a look at replacing both panels. Unfortunately, he never turned up, and I heard nothing more from him. This sort of behaviour really pisses me off.
Rather than go through another painful search for a local fencer, I had a backup strategy. Jenna next door had a fence post seriously pushed to a perilous angle by the same storm, so I thought I could just wait for her to get someone to sort that, and then ask him to do our panels. And that’s what happened (unusual for a plan of mine to work!). Going to cost £150 to replace both panels, but, at least, it’s done, and I can start to think about the next stage of sorting out the back garden. - The damp patch was sorted by Dave from Peter Cox in 3 days. Not without some minor problems along the way, of course. After stripping away the old plaster and render, it revealed that the mains cable into the wall socket had a live wire that had become exposed and badly patched up by someone years ago – not a good idea to have an exposed live wire when wet render and plaster are going to be applied on top of it! So, that involved finding an out-of-hours electrician to deal with it quickly, and that was another £150… Otherwise, just a minor snag when bricking up the outside passive vent: Dave couldn’t get a brick to match in size or wall colour, but he got round that by taking 2 bricks from the garden wall and replacing them with his not-quite-matching ones.
- SKY: problem still remains but I can’t yet bring myself to having to deal with SKY and all their bullshit. I really must do it, though. Becky and Andy have managed to ditch all SKY TV products with not too much pain.
- No more viruses, but seem to be entering the allergy season… Mild so far – and hope it stays that way! Kitchen tap dripping is only a minor and infrequent hassle. Lost a second filling and still waiting it out – next appointment is May, not April as I’d thought… And I replaced the silicone watchstrap with a nylon one and that’s done the trick.
- No joy with the “discretionary commission” thing for the car – Toyota are saying we suffered 0% commision, so that’s disappointing!