Thirty Eight
The beginning part of the week is weirdly filled with woodstain… shelves, floorboards for windowseat fronts, pew ends, window seat frames… To get the right amount of stain and varnish on things, I seem to be permanently staining something either before breakfast or after work. And my fingers end up a funny colour. On Monday I show three people in kagoules round Guy’s house and they irritate me. They ask millions of questions like when was it rewired and what are the floors made of and have the walls been replastered and was this once wallpapered. I begin to get facetious. ‘Is this wall hanging hiding damp?’ I lift it to show the perfectly blank wall and say ‘Nope’. ‘Is this fire ever used? It looks suspiciously new’. I fling open the doors, point inside and say ‘Ash’. Eventually they go. The youngest kagoule wearer phones the next day to say the house is ’15 miles too far east’. I refrain from pointing out ‘it’s in the same bloody place it was when you viewed it, love’.
On Friday I wake up unwell, get ready for work (as you do), drive to the office, my boss looks as me and says ‘yeugh, you look horrible, go home’, I’m feeling so unwell I’m not even offended, and I go back to bed. I sleep most of the day, wake up to see Guy and have my supper cooked for me, then go back to sleep again. As days go, it’s a bit of a write-off.
On Saturday we have viewings of Guy’s house booked for 11am and 1pm and Guy says he’s left the house tidy. I’m feeling better but a bit wiped out, so we get papers and go up there to wait. The first chap is just lovely – he’s driven 4 hours from Brighton after a friend saw the house in the paper and said it was what he wanted, and he’s super chatty… loves the house, thinks it’s perfect, takes photos and gets back in his car to drive the 4 hours back home. The second couple are not so much fun. They are, in a word, DULL. They stand in the middle of each room saying nothing. Nothing. Not ‘ooh, it’s nice’ or even ‘yuk I can’t stand it’. Just nothing. I give up, leaving poor Guy to try to jolly them along. Eventually (seems like they’re with us forever) they go. Hope they don’t come back. Then another lot come at 3, but they’re the complete opposite – superfast viewing, in and around in 20 minutes with a very bright kid (if you like that sort of thing) who tries to climb on the fake bed. I can see the horror in Guy’s face… luckily it doesn’t collapse. (The fake bed, not Guy’s face).
After all that non-shedding we’re in the mood for a bit of DIY, so we put in the frame for one of the window seats…
Add the front bits
And a seat with super cheap foam rubber and spare fabric..
Hey presto – one window seat!
Funny pictures – the walls are brown, not blue… Although the blue is nice. Maybe we should repaint?
On Sunday Guy’s mum Joy comes for lunch – I drive to Monmouth to pick her up, leaving Guy behind to get lunch ready. Damned Fine Plan. When we get back, my mum arrives to say hi, I go out to the shed to light the fire and then Guy comes in, all of a tizz. The first (chatty) viewer from yesterday has made an offer - £10k under the asking price. Close, but not close enough. We think about it, all have coffee sitting in the shed and then I phone him back to say ‘not close enough’. We leave it with him and start lunch… he phones again and agrees to come up to what we wanted. OHMIGOD! We’ve sold Guy’s house! On the market for precisely 9 days. CRIKEY! And he’s already sold, wants to move in at the end of April. OHMIGOD! That gives us about 7 weeks max to (a) finish the shed (b) clear Guy’s house (c) clear my house (d) do the renovations we wanted and (e) move Guy in. We celebrate with a bottle of wine (as you do) and then can’t think straight… OHMIGOD!
Guy drives Joy home (via his house to admire it in its clean and tidy state) and I take the cats and Blunkett for a walk in the woods. It’s a bit like ‘The Incredible Journey’ except that was two dogs and one cat and no humans. And probably one of the cats wasn’t muttering ‘does that bloody dog have to be here’ all the way. (BB). He loves her really…
Then we’re still twitchy, so we finish the other window seat… OHMIGOD!
Achieved: We have two window seats and we’ve sold Guy’s house. Aaaaarrrrggggghhhh!
Hours worked: More than we care to think about staining stuff, quite a few showing prospective buyers round Guy’s house, just a couple making window seats.
Purchases: Nope, can’t think of anything. A cheap week…
Sales: A HOUSE!
Wildlife update: The fox visited again this week – he is so beautiful. Izzy thought she would chase him, so she sat out on the patio whilst he was eating, wiggling her backside and looking ready to pounce. I don’t know why I was watching really… if she had pounced she might have come to a very sticky end.
Plan: Help! What to do first? Finish shed? Start on house? Both? Eek!!!
On Friday I wake up unwell, get ready for work (as you do), drive to the office, my boss looks as me and says ‘yeugh, you look horrible, go home’, I’m feeling so unwell I’m not even offended, and I go back to bed. I sleep most of the day, wake up to see Guy and have my supper cooked for me, then go back to sleep again. As days go, it’s a bit of a write-off.
On Saturday we have viewings of Guy’s house booked for 11am and 1pm and Guy says he’s left the house tidy. I’m feeling better but a bit wiped out, so we get papers and go up there to wait. The first chap is just lovely – he’s driven 4 hours from Brighton after a friend saw the house in the paper and said it was what he wanted, and he’s super chatty… loves the house, thinks it’s perfect, takes photos and gets back in his car to drive the 4 hours back home. The second couple are not so much fun. They are, in a word, DULL. They stand in the middle of each room saying nothing. Nothing. Not ‘ooh, it’s nice’ or even ‘yuk I can’t stand it’. Just nothing. I give up, leaving poor Guy to try to jolly them along. Eventually (seems like they’re with us forever) they go. Hope they don’t come back. Then another lot come at 3, but they’re the complete opposite – superfast viewing, in and around in 20 minutes with a very bright kid (if you like that sort of thing) who tries to climb on the fake bed. I can see the horror in Guy’s face… luckily it doesn’t collapse. (The fake bed, not Guy’s face).
After all that non-shedding we’re in the mood for a bit of DIY, so we put in the frame for one of the window seats…
Add the front bits
And a seat with super cheap foam rubber and spare fabric..
Hey presto – one window seat!
Funny pictures – the walls are brown, not blue… Although the blue is nice. Maybe we should repaint?
On Sunday Guy’s mum Joy comes for lunch – I drive to Monmouth to pick her up, leaving Guy behind to get lunch ready. Damned Fine Plan. When we get back, my mum arrives to say hi, I go out to the shed to light the fire and then Guy comes in, all of a tizz. The first (chatty) viewer from yesterday has made an offer - £10k under the asking price. Close, but not close enough. We think about it, all have coffee sitting in the shed and then I phone him back to say ‘not close enough’. We leave it with him and start lunch… he phones again and agrees to come up to what we wanted. OHMIGOD! We’ve sold Guy’s house! On the market for precisely 9 days. CRIKEY! And he’s already sold, wants to move in at the end of April. OHMIGOD! That gives us about 7 weeks max to (a) finish the shed (b) clear Guy’s house (c) clear my house (d) do the renovations we wanted and (e) move Guy in. We celebrate with a bottle of wine (as you do) and then can’t think straight… OHMIGOD!
Guy drives Joy home (via his house to admire it in its clean and tidy state) and I take the cats and Blunkett for a walk in the woods. It’s a bit like ‘The Incredible Journey’ except that was two dogs and one cat and no humans. And probably one of the cats wasn’t muttering ‘does that bloody dog have to be here’ all the way. (BB). He loves her really…
Then we’re still twitchy, so we finish the other window seat… OHMIGOD!
Achieved: We have two window seats and we’ve sold Guy’s house. Aaaaarrrrggggghhhh!
Hours worked: More than we care to think about staining stuff, quite a few showing prospective buyers round Guy’s house, just a couple making window seats.
Purchases: Nope, can’t think of anything. A cheap week…
Sales: A HOUSE!
Wildlife update: The fox visited again this week – he is so beautiful. Izzy thought she would chase him, so she sat out on the patio whilst he was eating, wiggling her backside and looking ready to pounce. I don’t know why I was watching really… if she had pounced she might have come to a very sticky end.
Plan: Help! What to do first? Finish shed? Start on house? Both? Eek!!!
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