Further to yesterday’s water men making big holes in the little street at the back of my house, the work started promptly at 9 am again today with a bit of banging and the smell of cigarettes. I peeked out of the window and saw two men, struggling, determinedly with an orange pipe. It certainly looked like a good fit!

At least they haven’t made any more holes nearer to my precious garden and I’m keeping my fingers tightly crossed.

They stopped for lunch around midday and came back to deal with the second hole later on.

The rest of the day was fairly quiet. I had to do some weeding in front of my house in the cobbles. I need to fix them up as part of my renovation and if the weather holds, and I manage to buy the ready mix mortar I will scrape out the soil and debris and replace the mortar. It should look rather smart. This is a job for the near future as this week has already filled up as has a good part of next week.

I can’t keep up with it. It’s Tuesday and already it feels like Friday there is so much more to do this week then my quiet, mundane dream of a week. Tomorrow I am being measured up for new windows in the old part of my house. I’m also taking delivery of some insulating panels which sadly will cover my terracotta ceiling and my small beams. The big ones will still be visible though. I say sadly because I love my tiled ceiling. I wanted to insulate my loft / attic space but there is no access from my house. If there was, the height is fairly low so it would be a very tricky job to get it down. The solution was thick polystyrene panels and plasterboard which would create an insulated ceiling. This will hopefully stop the freezing winter temperatures and the boiling summer ones in this part of my house. I am afraid that I’ve had to trade prettyness for practicality and warmth.

No regrets though and it will lighten the room up somewhat. I am doing the same to my son’s room which should make a huge difference as it has a hardwood, dark ceiling and lots of draughts.

A lovely surprise this evening, my son treated us to a cake from the local bakery and bar. Well, the one in the nearest town! A mixture of meringue, sponge, cream, chocolate and fruit. The cake had everything! We devoured it on our laps not even wanting the refinement of sitting at the table. It was absolutely divine and light…. and there’s still a bit left for tomorrow!