Safety Second

I slept like the proverbial log last night, waking at about 6am when a woodpecker kicked off at high volume in amongst the tea trees. I needed a wee so got up and didn't take my camera with me then went back for it so I could try and take a video and, typically, just as I approached for a second time, I heard it fly off and didn't get any video at all. What a shame.

Rambo at his waiting station

I went back to sleep, heard it again about 6.30 but didn't shift and then blinked and it was 7.30; so much for me getting up and ahead of the day. Oh well, I struggled out of bed and, as I had slept a bit longer, I think I was a little slower to get moving once I was finally up and out of bed. I put the kettle on, made a brew (there was enough water out of the tap upstairs to fill the kettle which was great as too much walking must be bad for you I reckon. While the kettle was boiling I popped out onto the balcony to snap a picture of the mist in the valley; I know this is a picture that has been taken many times now by me but I can't get over it and love to share it.

My morning was dominated by other people and first up it was Lubo. He arrived dead on time (as usual) and looking very breezy and summery in a colourful red check shirt. I had been round marking on the plans he left last week and today we spent twenty minutes or so confirming my measurements and discussing various things, mostly around the spiral staircase between the kitchen and living room. I was also able to explain the change around the guest suite which he really liked and he left smiling, having told me that the kmet had been seen going to town as he was on his way up.

That was a pain because I needed to catch him to fill out a form for my residency. I have decided to just crack on and not wait for him to come over to help me. As soon as Lubo left I jumped into Thomas and headed into town. I had a list of things to achieve and first was to put more credit on my Bulgarian mobile as I was out. I achieved this easily, the serving girls in the shop know me and one of them speaks a little bit of English, and then with this credit I rang and arranged to meet the Kmet. This was completed very quickly however I have since realised that he hasn't done everything I need so I will be going back down there tomorrow (or ringing him first thing in the morning) to find out what house number I actually am in the village.#

T, Thomas, and the work station

Anyway, after this I scooted over to the builders merchant and bought another six bags of cement which were loaded into the back of Thomas by a burly assistant and then I was up and home before time for my morning meeting. Excellent timing. When I got back first of all Rambo came and jogged really slowly in front of Thomas and round to the passenger side, causing me to have to emergency brake and this meant he was put in his enclosure in disgrace for a bit. Secondly T was on with moving a load of materiel up to his working site so I drove Thomas up with the cement bags in the back so he wouldn't have to hump them up there on his own. Here he is looking particularly dapper up the top of the land where he is making excellent progress.

That should be easy to shift....

While I was out I had realised that at some point a blister had developed on my big toe (the same one that was battered twice yesterday) and it was agony walking around so that put a stop to my plan of doing some scything today; I'm not going into that long grass bare foot as I expect to disturb a snake or two on the way. Because of this change of plan I finished my phone call, did some work and then, while I was waiting for an email reply, decided to go and have a look at the ceiling in the bedroom which needs the plaster pulling off it. I grabbed the ladder, the iron bar and the camera and climbed up to have a look.

... and it was - right onto my head

It looked pretty simple to do so I picked a bit that appeared loose but not too big and, having put the camera in a safe place and grabbed a plastic tray to hold over my head just in case, stuck the iron bar in and wiggled it. This was not the best idea I've ever had to be honest as a much bigger chunk than expected broke away and a portion of it plummeted straight through the tray and right onto my head with the thump. What an idiot. I knew I would need a hard hat for this and why I even thought it clever to disturb any of it without one I don't know. I went straight outside to the stand pipe and washed my head thoroughly, finding that there was blood, and then asked T to take a picture so I could see the damage.

Simple ice pack

It wasn't hurting that much but the lump was starting to develop so I went back upstairs and pulled out the bag of peas (I have no intention of eating these; they are in there for emergencies such as this) and sat for the next our or so with them balanced on my head, shifting them every now and then to achieve the best cold-to-injury ratio I could. It was a salutary lesson (and fortunately not a drastic one) in not being careful and making stupid decisions. Maybe some sense has been sunk into my thick skull.

Anyway I did a bit of paid work while balancing the peas and then it was lunch so a lovely set of cheese and nardenitsa butties with mayo was put together and taken outside onto the balcony, with my book, and I spent the next hour reading, sipping my carroti juice (I am now completely out of this, so this must be sourced again) and soaking up the sun. When I went back inside after this I felt so much better for it.

Hard headed man

The rest of the afternoon was spent on paid work and I got quite into it, with a new task finally being assigned, before I suddenly noticed it was raining and legged it downstairs to help T bring the cement in. This done I tasked him with popping down to the shop and buying some safety equipment for both of us, including a hard hat, some safety glasses and some masks. He did this quickly and returned with a bright yellow hard hat for each of us. If only I had waited I wouldn't have a lump on my head right now.

Stunning cloud formations

The rain had passed while T was out so he took Thomas back up the bank and cracked on with the wall. I popped outside onto the balcony at one point as I had caught a glimpse of the sky from the side window of Room 13 and was just amazed at the formations of the clouds that formed the rear edge of the storm. For a fair while after this the rumbles and burbles of the storm could be heard and I had a message from S and S suggesting that they had caught far more of this one than we did.

Rambo cooling off

Also while I was up on the balcony Rambo came to say hello, bringing his kong with him obviously, and then went round to his pool next to where the trailer is now parked for a quick cool off. I have been wanting a picture of him in there for a while but never had my camera so finally here it is.

A spider down his hole

Finally it was time for T to head off and I was going downstairs anyway to grab a picture of this little beasty. This morning, when I woke up, I saw something just by the step skitter off into the undergrowth and a little investigation revealed that there was a hole spider (they aren't called this but this is what I call them) living just there. I will probably stake his hole out and try and get a better photograph than this but this was the best I could get, with T holding his phone light up to try and illuminate down the hole. Spooky looking fella isn't he.

T had caught another funny video of Rambo and sent it to me. Apparently there was an injured butterfly, which had probably been attacked by a bird, and it was fluttering around near the ground. Rambo was not sure at all what to make of it and kept starting away when it moved, and then batting at it. He is a funny dog sometimes.

Sunset two ways

So I headed inside, put the chicken thighs I had been defrosting over today in the oven and started this blog. It has been slow to write this evening as I have been distracting myself a lot with various other things however I'm now drawing to the end. I did my normal leg it out to get some shots of the sunset however this time I went to the balcony as well and took a picture looking both ways; with the sun on the hills and its last rays through the trees. What a sight. I can't wait for my bedroom to be done so that will be my view every day.

Sassy back out of hiding

Sassy has not been well for a couple of days and she still isn't right. I wish I knew what was wrong with her but she isn't eating her food and spent the previous two days hiding under her lent over windows. Today she has emerged and I saw her nibbling on some straw which is an improvement. I really hope she is just having a bit of an upset and will recover; I'd be so sad if she was really ill and didn't make it. I don't think the vets here are really set up to cater for rabbits though. She is better than she was, for sure. I'm keeping a close eye on her.

And so the blog is over and tomorrow I will don my hard hat and pull that ceiling down. I may even have some visitors to spice the day up. We shall see. One thing to add for my memory banks is that today I have killed three mosquitoes in here, and heard a fourth. The wind has been low the last couple of days though so that might be a factor. Also, some really awesome decisions were made today which will become apparent over the next few weeks. Watch this space... very exciting times.

Two Days of Hard Work

I am just back from the studio after having had a fantastically productive couple of days sorting things out in the storage unit. It has really come into his own and proven what a sensible idea it was to take it on as the weather has broken (as you will all know) however I have been inside, sheltered warm and dry and with the shutter down and the arc lights on I have been able to just keep going through all the dramatic wind and rain.

Anyway, that is getting ahead of myself.

I have been trying to do overtime for work this holiday and it has been going a bit badly; first of all I left my hard drive at the studio when I was there at the weekend which meant I struggled to get the code to a place where I could access it on my laptop. Then, when I came to start the work I realised that I hadn't got all the resources I needed. For this reason I went past the office yesterday on my way over to the studio and got the resources which I needed.

Dehumidifier in Julian

Upon arriving at the studio my first task was to pull the power over to the unit and set the dehumidifier running. My plan was to leave this running continually throughout both days to get as much of the moisture out of the ceiling as I possibly could.

Yep, cutting wood here

With this done I got to work measuring the plywood boards for lining the bottom of the trailer. It turned out that I had bought exactly the correct amount of wood; I was able to cut one of the boards in two and make use of both halves to complete the tessellation.

The boards, laid out to prove it

With the boards cut to shape I started the task of painting them with PVA to seal and waterproof them. This took bloody AGES but I just got myself into a routine and cracked on with it and after a couple of hours it was all done.

PVA, plastic tray and brush with wood

I pulled some of the plastic trays out of the plastic wrapped stack and laid each board on them, thus keeping the glue covered wood off the floor. Once I had done all of one side, and the edges, I went back to the beginning and, turning them over, sealed the other side.

All the boards completed and drying

This task completed I left them overnight to dry.

At this point I almost stopped and vegetated however I snapped myself out of the lethargy of post-food and decided to have a go at applying the sealant to at least part of Julian's roof, even if just to see how easily it went on and whether my plan would work.

Ready to work on the roof

I set the arc lights pointing upwards and pulled the ladder round the side and the illumination was absolutely perfect to work on the roof. This alone is great to know however I did far more than just check how well I could see up there.

When I bought the sealant I also bought an applicator gun so I unpacked all my kit, including camera, and went up the ladder. After much effort squeezing the handle of the applicator I got the silicon to very near the end of the nozzle and then "crack" the handle bent in half!

The metal bent when I squeezed

Whoops.

Fortunately I knew that we had another of these in the studio so I dashed over, grabbed that, and it was of much more sturdy construction and pretty quickly I was applying and spreading the silicon along the edge of the roof where the gap was obvious. The following pictures illustrate the technique which I had worked out before I even started. First of all I put a thick trail of the silicon along the target area, large blobs of it. Next I took the scraper and smoothed along the line, making the join continuous and filling in any holes and gaps which, if left, would make the whole exercise pointless.

Blobby squirt of silicon

Smoothing with the scraper 

The smoothed silicon

Once I got started I just didn't stop and I went right the way round the whole edge of the roof, squirting and spreading and squirting and spreading until I had sealed everything. What a great success, I really thought I wouldn't achieve this much in one afternoon.

The drips still in the cabin

I decided not to sleep in Julian as I left the dehumidifier running through the night however the gales woke me in the night and about 4am I went downstairs and saw that the fuse had tripped out on the extension cable taking power to the other unit. I unplugged it, reset the fuse, and headed back to bed.

In the morning I was pleased that I was able to reconnect the power and it did not trip out again; the dehumidifier was on the job once again.

I bought all the fixings

I went to B and Q and bought them out (literally) of the straight joint strips, and a load of bolts with nuts, with which to affix the boards onto the trailer.

Measuring and Drilling the holes

I laid the first board top left of the trailer and for the first of many times headed under the trailer on my back and marked up where I wanted the bolt holes to be drilled. I then pulled the board onto the saw horses and drilled the first four holes. Next I took one of the plates and one bolt and worked out where the other hole needed to go, per fixing.

Measuring out the other hole

The board, fully drilled, went back into it's place on the trailer bed and I set about fixing it. This was accomplished by first of all putting one of the flat joint strips on the top of the board and then pushing the bolts through so the protruded through underneath the trailer. Next I went back underneath the trailer and used another flat joint strip and the nuts and tightened them up as much as I could finger tight.

The top strip in place 

And the bottom strip attached

It felt like I was crawling around on the floor under that trailer for hours (maybe because I was) but eventually I completed the task and all the boards were fixed into place.

The finished base on the trailer

I had made a mistake on the last board, however, as you always do as you come towards the end of a task it's important to keep focused. Because the bottom left board is rotated compared to all the other ones (as you can see from the picture above) I drilled the secondary holes in the wrong place; vertically above rather than horizontally across.

Filled the hole with silicon

After a little thinking I realised that I had that silicon gunk which I could use to fill these holes and so, as I was packing down ready to head off, I grab the gun and this worked really well. As I was driving home I realised I should have carried on and used the silicon to fill the gaps between the boards; I will have to do this first thing when I get back to the unit as I had hoped to start the process of packing the trailer up next time.

The water I collected

The last thing I did before leaving was unplug everything and check the state of the dehumidifier. I was still seeing some moisture in the gap in the ceiling but much less than earlier and you can see from the picture just how much had been drawn out of the vehicle. I will be plugging this back in and running it as much as I possibly can whenever I am over there, to keep this process going.

So there you have it, I got loads done. I have another list for the next time I get over there though. I bought some multi-purpose waterproofing paint which I am going to apply across the whole of the roof and as mentioned earlier I also want to pack the trailer.

It is really becoming very real now and my fears are starting to build; have I got enough money (probably not) will I cope with the isolation (I think so) is this really a good idea (yes I think so) and all these thoughts are spinning round in my head. I think it'll only get worse up until that moment when I drive away from the studio for the last time.

Post purchase, the next steps

Myself and my friends on Islay

When I got back to England, and while I spent the best the most amazing week on Islay meeting whisky nuts and getting a sun tan (who'd have thunk it on Islay!) I was aware that there was still a chance that I would not own the School.

Every sale made by the Obshtina has to be ratified by the head Kmet (mayor) who can decide that he/she doesn't actually want to sell that particular property to you. While they would have to give a pretty compelling reason to pull out at this late stage, it was still a possibility.

Georgi had in the meantime sent me the details for my own bank account into which I would pay the balance, once the ratification had occurred. It was supposed to only take a week for this to come through but, once again, they went on holiday and so it was a little longer than expected until the good news came through.

After an even more irritating episode with Santander where they refused to do the transfer over the telephone (despite having done so only a few weeks before) and then attempting to refuse to do so in the branch (I admit to getting my "you are not going to say no to me" voice out at the clerk and he wilted before it) I managed to get the balance winging its way to Bulgaria.

More flying money

Upon receipt of this Georgi paid the balance to the Obshtina, paid the sales taxes and got all the relevant stamps and then finally sent me the documents. Final proof, if it was needed, that I was the proud owner of the school.

Now what.

Another view of the school

I am now going to rewind slightly as I did skim over a few things to focus on the specifics of buying the property.

One of the actions I took whilst going through the process with Georgi was to double check all his advice by asking as many people as possible and trying to learn as much as I could from an independent source. A resource which I found particularly good (though it is slowly becoming less popular as more and more people move away from Bulgaria) is MyBulgaria.info and it was on here where I posted questions. I put a question on there about the different location, to which I received multiple replies, and I also asked if anyone had experience of buying a school from a council.

This is how I met Chaz, a very useful contact who was just coming to the end of the renovation of his own school. He was able to tell me the process he had been through and, at every stage, his advice agreed with what Georgi was telling me.

The planning process in Bulgaria is quite simple. If you are not extending and are building on existing footings you don't have to do anything however, as I had bought a building zoned as an educational facility I needed to go through a Change of Use to be allowed to make any changes to the building. For this to happen an architect needs to be engaged who will put together a Project. This Project includes plans for the building, electrical and plumbers plans and agreements from the water and electricity companies regarding supply. There are also hoops to jump through regarding insulation and fire safety, though these are less onerous as I am not trying to build a business, but purely a private dwelling.

Chaz was happy to help and recommended that I meet up with the architect who had managed his project. This made a lot of sense to me as personal recommendation is most often best. Over the course of a few emails I made an arrangement to meet her and booked some flights; I planned to spend the first day tidying and clearing the upstairs, and the second meeting her, then going round the utility companies to make arrangements for water and electricity suppler.

And the next blog will be about that trip.

My favourite seat on the plane