Tag Archives: ceiling

Chilly wind blowing round Mr Bunn

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Dot at sunny Southwold

The weather has turned to autumn, with a chilly wind blowing around Mr Bunn, who has been on the roof for the last couple of days, repairing our valley and replacing some tiles. He should finish later today, as should Tim the decorator (no, not me: this one’s from Yarmouth and knows what he’s doing). Both very pleasant and helpful guys. Tim woke me at 8am yesterday, but today I was ready for him, despite having a lousy night for some reason. Dot is out at Acle school, but I’m expecting her back soon.

So the living room should be completed and dry by tomorrow. Unfortunately we can’t get the furniture back till Monday, but that’s a minor thing really.

On Saturday, when it was still relatively warm, we had our hair cut and then went to Southwold to celebrate the Robinsons’ ruby wedding. We arrived a couple of hours early and after driving round by the harbour (spoiled visually by a lot of construction work going on) we parked on the seafront and walked down to the pier, where we had a cup of tea in a cafe out of the wind. Then we drove up to the Swan and negotiated its parking challenge (the most contorted parking area I’ve ever come across) before Dot went into the loo and changed into her dinner party clothes. The Robinson family duly arrived – children earlier than parents, who brought Francine with them. Eleven of us in all, and a very nice meal.

I was preaching at church on Sunday and completed my preparation less than an hour before the service started. Still, it went OK, and afterwards I sat in the church for an hour waiting to see if anyone wanted to look round – it was Heritage Day. One woman did, the sparse attendance possibly down to a mistake in the Heritage booklet, which had us open only on the Saturday. When Claire arrived to take over, Dot and I made for North Walsham via Morrisons (I was almost out of petrol) and took in the cemetery before visiting Jessie and supplementing our lunchtime sandwiches with a piece of cake. The cemetery was at its best – really warm in the afternoon sun.

Last night I replayed my knockout chess game against Greg, which was again an up-and-down affair. I emerged eventually with a clear advantage, but in time trouble couldn’t be sure of the winning line. I messed it up, but he obliged by taking so long over his calculations that he lost on time. So I am through to the next round.

Echoing to the sound of footsteps

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Roger, Barbara and Dot at Blakeney

We now have an empty living room that echoes to the sound of footsteps. But the ceiling is up and skimmed, complete with coving and substantially more insulation than we had originally. Now I just have to persuade Mr Bunn the Builder to come and repair the roof. The felt is definitely in need of replacement where the leak was, and in a couple of other places too. I’ve taken pictures. Redecoration should take place early next week after the ceiling is completely dry.

This week has as a result been rather odd. I’ve spent quite a lot of time trying to write a sermon and become involved in other computerish things – most excitingly the resurrection of my website, that David has done a brilliant job with. I really like the look of it and have posted something new to celebrate.

Today, in very warm weather, Dot and I played pitch and putt on Mousehold, which would have been a lot more fun if (a) I hadn’t played so badly and (b) I hadn’t been worrying about finding details of our travel insurance for our Treyn holiday. The policy was online but it proved very difficult to find because the directions to it were out of date. I think it’s all sorted now. I suspect (a) and (b) may have been related, but of course I could just be losing whatever touch I had.

Magical spot discovered by accident

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Oliver on the beach at Woolacombe

As soon as the Murrays returned to Canada, the weather improved. Yesterday could almost be described as hot, especially if you had been walking into the city, paying in some church cheques and then, out of the blue, buying a guitar for Oliver’s birthday. Last Friday, by contrast, was not hot, but we did manage to get out into the garden for a quick drink before retreating inside for a meal with Roger, Barbara, Anne and Philip. Excellent meal by Dot – citrus salmon – despite her not feeling great, but I was so tired that I actually went to sleep toward the end of the evening. I don’t suppose anyone noticed.

On Saturday it was quite pleasant, and we went to Holt, where Dot and Barbara shopped while Roger and I went our separate ways. I accidentally found this beautiful area called Spout Hills and walked through it and on along a path into a hilly field. Quite magical in places. Started writing a poem. Also bought a new book by Alan Garner called Boneland, which is supposed to be a sequel to the Brisingamen trilogy. Went on to Blakeney and had afternoon tea in the Blakeney Hotel’s upstairs lounge, then walked a little, but the wind was quite chilly by then. Drove home via Salthouse (brief walk on the shingle), then West Runton and by country lanes to Aylsham.

In the evening we had a really nice meal at Loch Fyne. Our waiter, Pedro, was brilliant, and I entered into the spirit of things by having the seasonal fish, which was turbot – and very good too with samphire and chips. This was a sort of celebration of the Murrays’ 45th wedding anniversary, which was actually on the Sunday, when they were flying home – which meant that Barbara would be practically unconscious for most of the time. Afterwards, there was the packing, while Dot and I watched Match of the Day.

They left early on Sunday, in case of hold-ups on the road, but actually made it to Heathrow in record time and rang us to tell us so: unfortunately the phone rang in the middle of one of our quiet periods in church, and Dot had to rush out with her bag, because the phone was somewhere in there… We spent the rest of the day (with breaks) clearing the living room of all we could in preparation for the work that is now going on. Trickiest bit was keeping the curtains neat and depositing them on the table tennis table, but it was followed closely by shifting the hi-fi and the television, plus DVD-player, Humax and Apple TV – then reconnecting all the wires. Everything worked except the television, because the aerial wasn’t receiving a signal. We could still use Apple TV and watch recorded programmes, but not live TV. I Have called in our expert aerial man Ryan, and he will be arriving later today.

Yesterday the furniture men arrived promptly at 9am, and all seemed to be well until they found they couldn’t safely dismantle the bookcase because the top bit was nailed on. So they shifted it off the wall and made it movable so that it could be worked round. Everything else (bar the piano) was removed, either by us or by them. The house is now a mite cluttered. Today we have the asbestos men, who arrived at about 9.45am and are almost finished. They had to drive here from Lincoln, which seems a bit excessive.

To round off yesterday we had a DCC meeting, during which I presented the financial report. Happily there were no questions I couldn’t answer. Today Dot is doing Philosophy at Kersey in Suffolk, which I happened to stumble on during an earlier inspection trip and which is a lovely little village with a ford in the middle of it and a steep hill up to the church. Nothing to do with Philosophy, but a nice setting for it.

Tea at Mannington Hall

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Amy enjoying the sea at Mundesley last week

Have managed to reach Friday in a rather stressful week. The roof has been fixed temporarily, and the ceiling has a tasteful white sheet covering the holes and the damp section. It stayed up at the second attempt. The second surveyor (for the builders) said the asbestos positive meant the whole ceiling would have to be removed and reinstated, which would involve moving all the furniture out and making good afterwards. Haven’t heard the insurance company’s reaction to this, but it leaves us still in limbo, which I hate. I am not good at waiting.

Meanwhile Dot has finished the wall-painting, and I have painted the trapdoor to the loft, because I am taller. Well, to be more accurate, I have painted it once, and I am about to paint it again. Dot is now immersed in improving the look of the garden, and keeps arriving home with a car full of plants. Keep catching bits  of the Olympics, but not always the right bits. Happily the BBC website is quite good on videos of bits you miss. I am as pro-Team GB as anyone, but I did rather enjoy those South African rowers who came from miles back to snatch the gold.

Two further sources of stress: intermittent Broadband connection at the beginning of the week for no apparent reason; and the unexpected difficulty of finding transport for church members without cars who want to go on a boat trip to St Benet’s Abbey on Sunday for the afternoon service. This would have been difficult enough anyway, but Dot and I are taking Phil and going on to Lowestoft afterwards for our third Seagull gig, so couldn’t take anyone. One of our members with a car didn’t know if she was going until Thursday, another (understandably) didn’t want to come into the city to collect people, and the two people at St Luke’s who might have helped were unreachable by phone or email. Howard could borrow a people carrier but couldn’t drive it because he had no insurance. Aargh! In the end I gatecrashed the Vicarage and spoke to Heather, with the result that Nicholas is going to drive the people carrier.

Our church is full of people who can’t drive or don’t have a car, or both. On Thursday Ian asked me to pick him up from the City College midway through the evening, which I did, of course.

Tuesday was kind of a highlight, because I had tea with Lord and Lady Walpole at Mannington Hall. Also present were Lucy, Jo and John, and we were discussing the Paston event at the Hall in October (weekend of 27–28). As Chronicle, the four of us – Caroline, Rob, Kay and I – are going to do two half-hour slots, but we will have to rework The Heroine of Hungate to introduce a Mannington connection. This is not quite as obscure as I thought it was (there is a 15th century marriage), but it will take a bit of working out. Afterwards Jo and John paid for lunch for Lucy and myself (and them) at the Saracen’s Head. Very impressive spot for lunch. Excellent food. Probably the fist gooseberry compote with mackerel I have ever had.

In the evening Tuesday Group was at the Archers, and another excellent repast – this time sausages and mashed potatoes – was followed by a very tasty video by Rob Bell. This was almost matched culturally on Thursday by a second attempt at a poetry group at the Narthex at St John’s Roman Catholic Cathedral, led by Hilary Mellon. Ten of us present, and it worked much better than the one on Betjeman. We looked closely at three of six Larkin poems that he had read out electronically and without hiccoughs at the start. Found myself liking his work a lot, though not his rather dour philosophy.

Have just made a list of areas for which I am responsible, in an attempt to work out why I never have time to do anything. I am up to 24 at the moment.

About as perfect as it gets

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Dave and Anandi Brennan

At last summer has arrived, and we are bathed in warm sunshine. Yesterday Adrian and Clarissa arrived in their Potter Heigham boat, Gliding Light, and moored at the bottom of the road. We joined them for a drink in the Compleat Angler (bottom deck), and later they  came up to ours for a kind of high tea in the garden – sitting outside till about 10pm! They had their friends Brian and Celia with them, and we had a good evening. The weather is set to continue as we pick up Oliver and Amy later today.

An eventful few days, it must be said, starting last Thursday with a haircut and visit to a poetry session on John Betjeman in the Narthex at St John’s RC Cathedral. Still cool and wet then, and the session was not brilliant. The members of the group were less than inspiring, and leader Hilary M was not at her best, feeling the effects of blood sugar loss and having problems with the equipment.

Friday was brilliant, however. The surveyor eventually turned up and didn’t inspire an awful lot of confidence. We decided to let the insurers supply a builder for the ceiling repairs (skimming, replacing some plasterboard, and making the ceiling good), but the roof is not covered (if you see what I mean). So I have contacted Mr Bunn the Builder – well, he’s a roofer, actually. He came this morning and did inspire confidence. He’s going to make the roof watertight in the next couple of days and do a complete job on the “valley” and tiles a couple of weeks later. Needless to say the roof featured things he had never seen before.

But that’s not why Friday was brilliant. That was down to Anandi’s wedding at the Cathedral, which was a one-off. Not that it was perfect: the sermon was too long, we couldn’t see clearly, and we had difficulty hearing the speeches at the reception because Blackfriars Hall has lousy acoustics. But it was a fine day and it all had a lovely naturalness and simplicity – for instance, the bride and groom walked from the cathedral to Blackfriars. After the service we had champagne and nibbles in the cloisters for quite a long time: lots of people from St Augustine’s were there, but only Dot and I (plus the vicar and his wife) were invited to the reception. In the cloisters we had music from an a cappella group which had appeared on TV but which was composed mainly of friends of the groom – who sang a little bit as a tribute to his wife! Both Anandi and her new husband Dave are so likeable it’s frightening.

Debbie and Neil with (the Rev) Heather Cracknell, who took the service

On Saturday another “wedding”: this time a renewal of vows after 25 years by Debbie and Neil, two friends from St Luke’s. By now the weather was stunning, and the setting – Ranworth Church on the Broads – was equally gorgeous. Debbie went the whole hog with a white dress, bridesmaids and all the trimmings – we think because their actual wedding had been a registry office affair and very low-key. Cake and tea afterwards in the church grounds (it has a church hall cafe) completed the picture, together with a trip up the church tower, with its spectacular views.

Earlier in the day Colin came round and cut the hedge, and I went to the launch of Joe’s book, Journeying with Abraham, at St Andrew’s Church, Eaton. Couple of dozen people there, which was encouraging for him, and I had a chat with both him and Birgit. Then at the end of a very packed day, Dot and I went round to the Higbees for a meal, which was very relaxing. As a result of that, Alan H came round yesterday to put right a problem with the lighting in the loft that he had installed.

Bright day on Sunday: after a nice service at church, with Geoff debuting as preacher, we relaxed. Dot spent a lot of time gardening, and I watched quite a bit of the Open and saw the end of the Tour de France, with Wiggins in yellow, Froome second and Cavendish winning the final sprint. Which is about as perfect as it gets in the world of cycling.

There’s a hole in my ceiling…

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Dot and Julia, shopping in hand, approach a cafe in Villers

I think we can say it hasn’t worked – in spades. But at least it’s stopped raining for the moment. That means there’s no water entering the roof space and finding its way down into the living room, via the piece of insulation that soaks it up and redistributes it through one of the two large holes in the ceiling, created when I placed my hand on it (very gently) from above.

I was trying to identify the source of the dampness and perhaps move some stuff to prevent it getting worse, but the smallest pressure on the ceiling was enough to thwart that plan. Now we are awaiting a phone call from the insurer’s surveyor to make an appointment to come and look at the damage. This is likely to involve some quite drastic work in the living room, and a bit on the roof too. I suspect that water had been getting inside and being soaked up for some time. The surveyor seems reluctant to ring: I reported it all 24 hours ago. But at least the water has stopped dripping through, and the room is usable.

The chaos is exacerbated by the fact that Dot is in the midst of redecoration in preparation for new curtains. She has nearly finished our bedroom (a new pole was fitted yesterday), and once that is done she will probably have to abandon painting the living room until we find out what needs to be done, and when. We managed to have our usual Tuesday Group meal and meeting last night, but Dot and I were totally shattered at the end of it. This morning she is visiting a school, but she should be back soon.