Anticipating considerable expense on our electrical adventures, we were hit by a further large prospective bill when the plumber came on Wednesday to fix what we thought was a small leak in the shower room. Turns out that the whole room may be affected, and it will cost an estimated £2500 to put right. This will start on September 9 and see us exiled to the guest bedroom for a week.
It’s an ill wind, because the lockdown has meant that we have had to forgo our usual holidays, and we therefore have enough in our account to cover all this comfortably. The electrician has almost finished (I think), and has installed wall lights in the lounge, lights on the wall behind our bed, a new hob on the cooker, two lights in the garage and various other smaller things. He also completely restructured the main fuse box, and rewired the lights in the loft, which he considered dangerous. I did have my suspicions and am relieved that he’s done that. Well, all of it, actually.
We are now waiting for our lounge ceiling lights to arrive at John Lewis, not to mention the dishwasher from Hughes. We also have to go and look at some tiles for the shower room, as well as some better flooring. It’s all go.
It’s been quite a busy week – for Dot, anyway. On Monday she drove Anna to Bernard Seaman’s funeral at Hingham (he is Phyllis Seaman’s brother, but she couldn’t go because she’s in a care home, with restricted movement). Dot saw Sylvia Ford, David’s former head teacher at Alpington, who is Bernard and Phyllis’s niece.
The next day we (or mainly Dot) sorted out the garage, and she took two sackfuls of stuff to Age UK. She also bought a clock and a duvet from Sainsbury’s. I trimmed back the ivy a bit, but still feel tired after doing small amounts of physical exercise.
On Wednesday Gary did a great deal of the electrical work, and the plumber (Robin) came at 5.30 to give us the bad news – or some of it: the full import of what needed to be done was delivered by phone later. I got back to work on some of the Paston letters.
Next day it was sunny enough (off and on) for Dot to do some of her art retreat work in the garden, while Gary continued his electrical marathon indoors. We watched a fair amount of television, including Octopussy (James Bond) and the final episodes of Counterpart, which had been lent to us by Paul (on DVD). This is a very clever concept involving duplicates of a city and the people in them – Berlin, actually – both existing at the same time. Sounds a bit corny, but works very well, though you have to concentrate. In the evening we rang David, who had been quiet for a while. He seems OK.
Earlier, as Gary was leaving, my cousin Ann rang from Liverpool, wanting to know when Kathleen had died. I looked it up and told her (2011). She also had Bev, her niece – so my cousin once removed – with her; and I had a chat with her too. She is about to leave for Belfast to stay with her daughter Palmira.
Yesterday Anne and Dot did the Shardlake (Kett’s Rebellion) walk that I did some months ago. It was very windy day, though quite warm, and it was hard for the leader – Paul Dickson, who I know pretty well – to make himself heard. They both enjoyed it, though, ending with coffee in the courtyard at the Maids Head.
In the afternoon Paul brought Holly round for quite a long chat, and at 6pm we had the usual wine in the road session. We forgot initially, and I was a bit reluctant, but it turned out to be very enjoyable, in spite of the wind. Mark and Ciara joined Des, Chris and ourselves. Our new lights in the bedroom are working very well, which may be one reason why we were late getting to sleep.