Day 84

No actual building today, though the assistant chippie did come round about 2 to ferret in our woodpile for something that belonged elsewhere...

The main thing is the water supply stopcocks. When we had the pipe-cut on the 1st, it turned out that the one in our driveway was broken, and the one in the street too. Some I phoned up to schedule a fix. A few days ago I phoned up to see what had happened, and they thought it was fixed on the 14th! But, it didn't look too fixed, and they thought that it *ought* to look fixed.

Today, 2 chaps turned up (while I was at work: M was in though). They thought it was fixed! They sort-of offered to dig up our drive and make absolutely sure, but settled for turning it on and off again and said, Yup, its fixed. So... there we are I suppose.

Also... a letter from the council (which turned out to be only a cc to us, mostly to Ian) about the tree roots. I turns out that they don't really want a covenant, just a letter to cover their backsides. So thats OK then!

Day 80-83

Rolling a few days into one: not a lot went on this week but I forgot to record it as it happened.

The digger and Harry returned and dug out under where the kitchen floor will be, to allow the air to freely circulate and the rats to live. Err... the photo shows the digger sitting in the hole it has dug, confirming that our kitchen will be about the size of a small digger! The white band diagonally bottom right is the concrete foundations; under the diggers scoop is the old brick sewage inspection pit, which is bridged by a new concrete beam for the foundations. Beyond that is the hole dug down for the new pit.

Meanwhile... inside the wetroom, progress on getting the toilet etc finished, though things rather overlap between different trades. And the door promised today is not yet here. Notice that we now have a flush-button, though as yet there is too much junk on the loo to use it.

Ian came round today to chat... partly to explain why things weren't happening (the floor beams are awaited; etc). Next tuesdays meeting with The Neighbours is still on, it seems, and Ian seems biarrely hopeful that this will sort all out.

Not-quite-related to the building, we discover that the kitchen stopcock is dripping, and we have been doing the equivalent of pouring three bowls of water behind the unit every day for... some time. Which accounts for the wet patch on hte floor. This prompts me to phone (Weds) the water company to check on the repairs to the drive stopcock they were supposed to be doing. They assure me that they have been done. Hmmm... This morning, get harry the builder to look, and he is doubtful. Phone again... end up with a real water person on a mobile who says no it hasn't, and sorry, and they will do it asap. Maybe even tomorrow...

Day 78,79: The room is ours!

Nothing on thursday that I could see. We did however scan in the kitchen plans and send them of to Mfd/J (well actually to J but Mfd turned out to be interested too! Good) for their comments and ideas. But Ian came round and he decided that he could get BtB to finish it off by the end of the week, to my surprise.

Friday: well, I come home and Paul is just finishing off the tidying up and sweeping up. The room is bare, though it turns out that the wetroom is full of stuff. Then BtB comes round and we talk (a lot, on his part...). So, the room is now ours: its not finished, but we can use it, and from now on when they have to do work they work around us rather than vice versa. Excellent. The photo shows it after I hoovered up and put down a rug, and it will never look as clean and empty again I predict... and indeed, that very night the children decide to sleep in it.

Day 77. Odd bit of MDF; Kitchen; and Party Wall stuff

Apart from the odd-job guy turning up with a big bit of MDF whose purpose neither Ian nor I can work out, no building type stuff.

Ian agrees that the back room is "nearly there" as it has been for quite a while and agrees to expedite Smiley on actually handing it over to us. There is a chip on the tile near the shower point that needs fixing; one light doesn't work; Karl needs to get back to us on a light for the shower room; the radiator; Tim needs to finish the cabinet; etc. But its nearly there...

On Phase 3, some progress, and possibly a chink in B's obstinate refusal to cooperate... or maybe not. Anyway, the machinery grinds forward there, with a meeting set up next week.

Kitchen: agree with Ian a layout (though we've mailed the plan to J for comment) that replaces the W window with 2 narrow ones on either side of the cooker hob. Etc.

Day 76. Toilet and Shower and Pipes!

Pete the plumber comes in (fortunately M is at home) and so we end up with a connected toilet and a working shower (though its not a good idea to use it as there is no door yet, which is bad for modesty and also would let the water out...

Also the toilet is apparently functional but the flush is rather hard to operate as it doesn't have a proper handle. It hasn't been "christened" yet.

The pipes for all this run up through the spare bedroom and the loft; this is OK as they are temporary.

Day 74-75. Footings

AFAIK nothing on friday. Monday, Pete and Paul turn up to do the "footings", ie put a nice level surface of concrete beams and bricks on top of the concrete ready to build up the walls a bit later.

Day 72-73. Cabinet.

Nothing on wednesday; today Tim does some more work on the toilet/cabinet surrounds. One thing that I had been worrying about (the location of the hose-tap that we can use for the garden, and the builders for external water) is going to get moved from R to L, so that fact that its currently boxed in doesn't matter.

Also, we have large numbers (about 400) of concrete blocks in the driveway (so its stronger than it looks) which augurs well for starting work on the kitchen walls soon.

Day 71. Toilet.

While the foundations are curing, Tim the carpenter turns up to work on the cabinet bit in the wetroom that hold the toilet, cistern and washbasin.

You'll notice that we have a Smiley toilet. I always say that they are the best sort :-).

This room has been a bit neglected recently... they've been "about to finish it off" for a while. Fortunately we're not in a hurry. The room itself is clean and dry inside: Miranda uses it to arrange her dolls in.

Day 70. Concrete.

Yes, the digging was indeed done, and today (while I wandered in London) the foundation-pouring went on. I presume it will need to set for a day or two.

There is a cryptic message etched into a bit not on this photo: the words "love u pete" have been written by unknown hands...

If you're perceptive, you'll notice that the drain inspection pit is in the way of the walls. This is going to get moved at some point, I understand.

Day 69: Digging Done?

We thought we were going to get concrete today. I'm not sure why not. It rained a bit more. There was some stuff digging out around our existing inspection pit near the front door. Anyway, when we get back the digger is gone so presumably they are finished digging.

I've just uploaded a photo via the new "blogger images" stuff, which seems to work. Unlike wiki is doesn't offer auto-thumbnailing, though.

Day 68: Digging

Light early rain slows Harry down (he sits quietly in his car smoking...) but when I get back he and Les (Les is a sort of general help-man; he drives around delivering stuff, and does (I think) some less skilled digging under Harry's supervision. Only H gets to drive the digger) have back-filled the existing stuff to 1m depth and pretty nearly finished the rest. The (lead) pipe for out water supply (and Dots) is being carefully dug around.

Also... a nice touch, Harry has managed to rip the two remaining Leylandii out for me: a few seconds pull for the digger saves me a lot of muscle power.

Day 67: Gawn Assoc

Not much visible action, but while we're out the Gawn Associates (structural engineers) man comes and verifies the obvious: that a 1m deep foundation is fine, providing the trees don't grow too big. Mr Council chappie has apparently decided (after Ian leant on him) that this is OK, provided the Gawn chap OKs it *and* we sign a covenant on the house preventing the trees growing over 8m. Since they are really a hedge not trees this is a bit OTT. Especially as the house proves to be sitting on 9" (yes " not ') foundations.

In a bit of free time I cut off the highest tree, and cut down one Leylandii: what an effort, I should have killed them 10 years ago when we moved in and they were but saplings. Take my advice folks: don't plant Leylandii, and if you've got any, kill them while they're young.

Day 66: Lights!

Harry comes for the digger, and we get to watch it waddling slowly up the road. So... no digging today. talk with Ian re alternative building inspectors; he assures me that he can snatch back the paperwork (and though I am dubious, this turns out to be true). He hopes to be digging again tomorrow.

Karl the electrician is on site most of the day, and has the sockets in and connected, and the lights working, by the end of it. Hurrah, one more functional thing. Discuss what the cat-5 cable is to have on it... ethernet of course, though this surprises him. He has now removed the temporary electricals rigged up before.

Day 65: Council building inspectors are stupid

When I come back, the trench in our garden is down to something like 1.8m. And the man from the council wants it down to 2.4m! Thats taller than the kitchen is going to be. Its gross, its gratuitous, its a waste of cement and its a waste of CO2 emissions. And all because he is worried that our hedge outfront might grow taller than 8m. Bozo! All the more bozo because its perfectly clear that the current depth is deep below the topsoil on a clear solid clay layer. Hmm, well, we shall see.

Meanwhile, some more tiles have turned up in the back, but not yet on the walls.

The (newly uploaded) image shows the full glory of 1.8m deep foundations (happily, later backfilled down to a more sensible 1m). As you can see its down the the Galt Clay which is deep and thick and even. Quite why *anyone* would want to go a further 0.6m down into this I don't know. Its not easy to see the depth from this photo... the object, foreshortened, in the hole is a long spade. The pipe is about 1m down: its a rainwater drain, we think.

Day 64: the kitchen begins! Burst pipes!

In the back, the painting continues. The painter says the tiler has run out of tiles, which is why he has stopped.

In the front, they begin digging the foundations. When I get back at 2 I have missed some excitement: a pipe, that runs close to the front wall of our house (and lead!) that they didn't expect and shouldn't have been there, got dug through. So there was water everywhere, and Dots water cut off, and our driveway stopcock didn't work, and nor did the pavement one, so they had the water board out to cut off the mains, briefly. And I missed it all. Later the plumber shows up to fix the join properly, and there are about 5 builders with their heads in the hole. Also they do a temp kludge to fix the downpipe that now ends nowhere.

But anyway, all this is someone elses problem (err, until they ask for more money for fixing it...). Later, Harry (Mr Digger Man is really Harry) finds *another* pipe running through the front garden... why is it there? Where does it come from? We don't know. But the foundations can just go over it.