Another Week Older and Deeper in Debt

I will start off by apologising once again to my loyal readership – (you have to believe that someone out there occasionally finds your messages washed up on the shore along with the other thousand million bottles.)

Excuses for not posting? To be honest I just haven’t made the time. Life has done its usual routine of creeping up quietly and then hitting me on the back of the head.
We were hoping to go away for the latter part of last week, a little city break. Barcelona maybe. Then everything started to slide.

First our washing machine broke down. A minor problem, but annoying for my wife and I and absolutely devastating for my mother-in-law. She lives with us, but really she Lives To Launder. She will seek out stuff to wash. She is an addict. We actually let the washing machine detergent run out every so often just to see her twitch when the withdrawal symptoms start. We ordered a new machine as the other one had been run into the ground. That was going to take a week to arrive.

Then Transco stepped onto the scene, in the form of a gas engineer sent to replace our venerable gas meter. Friday afternoon he turns up, changes the meter, tests it, and condemns our entire gas installation as Immediately Dangerous. Switches the gas off at the meter and runs for his van before we get a chance to say “Wha…?”

So we now have no washing machine, no hot water, no central heating, and only an electric oven and a microwave to cook on. And the weather was unseasonably cold.

Then over the weekend my Mother (over eighty, like my mother-in-law) announces that her only companion, her dog, is on its last legs. Cue instant guilt feelings from her only borne child.

By last Monday it became obvious that Barcelona was going to have to wait.

The majority of last week was spent tidying up and sorting things in the attic ready for the gas fitters to come in. This is a process akin to playing Tetris, the game where you have to move small blocks so that you can make room to put others in their place. The local charity shops received an unexpected windfall, and I suspect the Bin Men will be muttering about us for weeks to come.

This afternoon the fitter finished. All we need do now is put back everything that we moved out of his way. We’ll have a heck of a job with the widescreen T.V.

Oh, that reminds me. The Video broke down last week too…..