How egg-citing!

Evening once again and once again this is typed while my middle finger is wrapped up in a huge bandage containing a tomato. It does seem to help somewhat and I have no alternative as I don't believe that Iodine stuff helped at all. Anyway, onwards.

Not the best moon pic ever, but it isn't bad

Last night I was just about to head to bed when A shouted down that the moon was epic so off I trotted with the zoom and I snapped a raft of pictures of which only one came out even well enough to adjust the contrast on; the exposure time was way too long for me to hold completely steady for. It was so bright that when we went to bed it was nearly possible to read. I was reading with the paperwhite anyway but eventually felt tired so dropped off to sleep after a while. I think I slept OK but I could not get up at all so I was still in bed when A got back with the men; a proper lay in.

Look at all that not-free water!

When I did finally get out of my pit one of the first things I did was to go down and check the water; I turned the tap and wouldn't you know there was high pressure water from ViK. This probably means we should go and pay whatever money we owe as we haven't paid anything since it was installed, what with having no bills yet. How exciting though; as soon as that is reconnected to the house we will have reliable hot water in Room 13, be able to put the boiler in there back on its timer, be able to do our washing up and wash our clothes whenever we want. Ahh the freedom.

Final bits before the wood is fitted

Bekir was taking the wood rafts from around the staircase and then doing the last little bits, like soaking the concrete with water to stop it cracking. He had asked first thing for work to do as the wood isn't here for the steps yet so I pointed to the ceiling fan for the bedroom which he said he would get to in the afternoon. He had also said he wanted to go to town to get pipes for the trench however this ended up never happening today.

Sally starts chipping away at the paint

Sally was also needing work so I waved my hands around the living and said "everything" so in his usual way he got straight on and started chipping the old paint off the walls and he made so much better progress than either me or A managed. He had finished this completely by just after lunch time. They work so hard!

Here comes the sand and cement

My finger was still not better this morning so I decided that it would have to be a visit to the clinic. We also packed up my ex-friend's petchka, and grabbed all the stuff to take to the carpenter to get the quote. We went past her house first which was relatively painful, though incredibly so driving away considering what has been lost there. The carpenter was shut again so I took the phone number off the door but then forgot to ring it during the day. Finally it was in to the main town where we went to the clinic but were told they wouldn't see us. I am pretty sure she said I need a referral so that's that. We went home feeling a little deflated but at least we had tried. When we got home we had some lunch and then went to bed and slept for ages. We must have been more tired than we realised. When we woke up I went to see what was happening and found that a delivery truck had arrived with loads of sand and cement; this must have been why Bekir was keen to get the pipes in and close the trench as they had had to put a ramp of stones back in so the truck could reverse to its dumping location.

LOOK AT OUR FIRST EGGS!

After this I went in to the chicken run to talk about where we wanted the pipes to go and what we would be doing with them and Bekir commented that he thought the chickens would be laying soon so I went to the nesting box and wouldn't you know there were THREE EGGS THERE!! How excited was I! Almost as excited as A when I called her down and got her to have a look. We picked them up, they are small but feel very solid, and have brought them in and dated them. I can't wait to eat them. Well done KitKat.

Keep rolling that tar

The other men were late turning up today, not arriving until after A was back with our men, and I did think they may not come at all however far from that happening they have slaved away and stayed very late. One of them was carrying on the asphalting of the roof, doing the dog leg back along the back of the building, while the other men worked to plan out the wall and the amount of drop there would be for drainage. They are making excellent progress the only question is when will we see the tiles so we can know if we like them or not.

Precariously balanced on his ladder

Meanwhile Bekir had figured out the ceiling fan, put together the parts that he could while on the ground, and was up the ladder (precariously as usual) to measure so he knew where the holes should go.  From this point on he worked away, getting the scaffold into the bedroom eventually which made me calmer as he could easily have fallen from that ladder, and then drilling down and through.

Thelma with her hand grenade

Louise looking expectant

We were chilling on the sofa on the landing, then spending time looking at the living room to work out where we want lights and how we'll probably arrange it, and this pretty much took up the remainder of the afternoon. It actually proved quite difficult to imagine how things will be but I think we've come up with a relatively good solution. We were also playing with the girls which was just great fun; Thelma in particular loves to have her toys thrown and swung and she will chase and kill what you throw.

The extent of the trench

It has been a really hot day today, it was still 33 degrees when I took the men home, and Gyuner has been outside all day extending the trench. He managed to reach the fence and get a fair way across the inside towards the building today so tomorrow he may reach it. I need to decide if we are going to take the pipe inside and split it there, or whether we should continue the pipe for the pond in a trench along the front. We also need to urgently design the pond. I'm tempted to just have a tap to refill the pond, and worry about more complex solutions another time.

New window ledges to be fitted

Sally completed the stripping of the walls then went on to removing the excess expanding foam around the windows. With everything within reach done of this task he asked if I wanted new windowsills which I answered "yes" so he started doing the preparation for that. This involves knocking down the old brick sill outside and then chipping away the bricks from underneath each window. Tomorrow he will probably get to building the rafts and putting the metal in them. Such exciting progress today!

Laying forms for the concrete

As mentioned earlier the other workmen have been preparing themselves for starting to lay the concrete tomorrow. as we need to make sure there is a good slope for water to run off and through the drainage holes they will leave in the parapet they have build little forms which they will use to keep the slope regular and accurate. I am quite excited about the progress I will see tomorrow.

Super excited to have the fan up

We were sat still discussing the living room (A has drawn a plan out which really helped) Bekir came to find us as he had finished fitting the fan. We went in and played with the settings and first impressions are really good; it gets pretty fast at its top setting, but moves plenty of air on the low settings and at no point did it seem to make any noise at all. Now we just hvae to get moved back in to that room to check it out. Of course by the time we are (after the living room is done) it'll not be hot any more. Oh well.

Superb dinner

And so the end of the day came without the ViK being connected as Bekir needs to get some more plumbing bits so I took them home with no excitement at all and when I got back I settled into typing this up. Our dinner this evening was bacon, cabbage and mash and when it was ready we took it onto the roof and it was absolutely lovely. I even had a beer with it, for the first time for a while.

Glorious is the only word I can apply to this

And it disappears again

It was another glorious evening with a beautiful sunset which started happening as we sat down and finished not long after we stopped eating. The sun is setting very much noticeably earlier than it was but that is meaning that the roof terrace is no longer way too hot to use so we have been able to get back up here, having lost our balcony for the time being. It was so quiet this evening, only the dogs next door barking but very irregularly, disturbed the peace.

So tomorrow I may well end up having to go and register at a doctor somewhere, make an appointment or maybe even see one. I've removed the tomato on my finger for now but may strap another on there before I go to bed. Time to go and shut the chickens away (I helped with the watering round this evening which was nice but no sign of Harvey).