Cheer of the Day!

[a twig]

Ha, it’s a good line but I genuinely wish it had all been down to me, would have been a lot less stressful. It was much more fun (and a lot cheaper) renovating our entire previous property on my own than having to pay trades to do a sub par job on delivering this small one story extension.

2 and a half years wasted arguing with planning, then delays in the build due to an architect who didn’t believe in actually detailing drawings, and then “know it all” builders who lost interest once the building was water tight and they had to actually deliver the spec of interior and second fix which they assured me they were capable of during tender.

Since I finally managed to get rid of them, it’s been much better, I can deliver things to the standard my OCD demands, it’s gone faster because things aren’t having to be done 3 times and it doesn’t cost me an body part every 30 days!

 

[Lacan07]

In my ongoing 3 year kitchen extension saga the end is finally coming into sight. Lots of wins to cheer about this week.

Kitchen units were finally delivered this week - win 1 - so have been busy fitting them.

Turned out the builders had installed the window 70mm to the left of where it should have been but managed to swap a couple of units round to still make it work (in fact the layout now works better) and the 2 wall units that no longer had a home fitted perfectly in my utility and hide the hideous CU and switch panel - win number 2.

Got all the wall units hung this afternoon and managed to only drop one on my head so that’s win 3.

Managed to punch the tap hole into the Belfast sink without destroying it (the most terrifying 45 minutes of my life) - win 4.

And finally - win number 5 - got the sink plumbed first time with no leaks!

So just need to install the range cooker, finish off the island, install about a hundred handles, and do last bits of decorating over the weekend.

Wife has chosen pretentious non-DIYable worktops so fitters coming to template on Monday and in theory fit them by end of next week.

Then we will finally have a kitchen for the first time since May 1st and I can put the despised air fryer back in the cupboard where it belongs and get back to proper cooking!

Amen to that! And I know what you mean about those air fryers, yet another over-hyped fad designed to sell stuff to people they don't need.

 

[Cubist]

Amen to that! And I know what you mean about those air fryers, yet another over-hyped fad designed to sell stuff to people they don't need.

I believe theres some kind of correlation between the amount of space we have and how much we then buy/use to fill it? I think theres also another associated with this concerning the amount of storage space we then fill with junk..... and despite what some may say that's got nothing to do with any of my sheds!

 

[fernicarry]

And finally - win number 5

If I ever had that many wins in a row I'd definitely be watching my back for karma catching up...

But, well done, long may it continue.

 

[a twig]

Amen to that! And I know what you mean about those air fryers, yet another over-hyped fad designed to sell stuff to people they don't need.

They do a job, for a quick midweek “argh we have no food in for my daughter’s dinner, grab something beige out the freezer and cook it in 10 minutes” it’s perfect.

But having only an air fryer and a microwave as your cooking options for an entire family for 5 months is not fun…

 

[a twig]

If I ever had that many wins in a row I'd definitely be watching my back for karma catching up...

But, well done, long may it continue.

I’m viewing this as an overdue positive re-adjustment after a particularly long bad run

 

[Lacan07]

They do a job, for a quick midweek “argh we have no food in for my daughter’s dinner, grab something beige out the freezer and cook it in 10 minutes” it’s perfect.

But having only an air fryer and a microwave as your cooking options for an entire family for 5 months is not fun…

I've had that set up for a year and half...and counting, but no little ones to cook for. Microwaves are genuinely useful though.

 

[lizziecupcakes]

So, I've noticed that as Grump of the Day has had a resurgence in popularity, so there have been more people posting about how their projects are getting them down, might sell up and move etc. It may well be a coincidence but I thought I would propose an injection of positivity to the forum to help keep everyone cheerful!

So rather than posting a grump, post something positive that turned out well, restored your faith in humanity or just plain made you smile.

To kick things off then:


Today a brief burst of sunshine this morning allowed me to get outside and strip some more paint and dress back some more ashlar blockwork. I decided to stop for lunch, and just as I put all the tools undercover, the heavens opened, which has saved me the dirty job of hosing down all the stone dust!

To cap it all off, by the time I had finished my lunch, the sun was out again so I could carry on.

Lovely @a twig !! I’m glad that went well.

I can share a positive: I found a damp patch on my upstairs chimney breast that appeared after heavy rain. Looking closer at the estate agebt photos on rightmove, it eas kind of there but super faint outline. I’m a bit annoyed the surveyor missed it. We missed it too I guess - it never was apparent with light rain. Anyway, that chimney breast has awful wood chip super thick paper over it, i stripped it back in that damp area hoping to dry it out. It looks like the original lime plaster and i’m also using our dehumidifier. What worried me was what looks like mould. On closee inspection, it looks like some dry, sooty black studf that smudges - I don’t know it’s mould or not. Anyways, i scrapped or off. Also got our roofer to check the area and he couldn’t see anything obvious but thinks during heavy rain the water might be pooling and riding abovd the lead flashing line and the felt beneath isn’t quite up against the chimney stack. Anyways, he made some small fixes there. To the good news: during the last heavy rain (last week) the damp patch didn’t get worse! Hooray. The dehumidifier has always shown the room to be normal humidity, never high, and that’s still the case. Hopefully it’ll all just dry out It may be salts in the chimney breast drawing in moisture too, but I’ll tacky that hypothesis if it’s not improving

 

[a twig]

Have been putting off an annoying fix a toilet job for weeks - water constantly trickling down into the pan, until it gets low enough to trigger the float valve and re-fill. It’s a close coupled cistern which I hate dealing with so had been hoping it would fix itself…

Anyway it has been getting worse and today that was happening every 40 minutes so finally snapped and decided to deal with it - expecting it to be a rip out and replace the internals job which would involve dealing with lots of very rusty screws and bolts.

Lo and behold, the siphon mechanism had been designed in such a way that it could be separated and opened up for servicing without having to remove it (and thus the cistern can stay in place)!

Took all of a minute to twist the top half off, take a look and see that the issue was massive limescale buildup on the rubber seal, which was stopping it from fully closing off.

Quick clean up under a hot tap, re-fit and all is working correctly again. Never in my life did I think I would be so grateful to a toilet flush designer

 

[Cubist]

Have been putting off an annoying fix a toilet job for weeks - water constantly trickling down into the pan, until it gets low enough to trigger the float valve and re-fill. It’s a close coupled cistern which I hate dealing with so had been hoping it would fix itself…

For years we... I was about say 'were' when the truth is 'we still are'... plagued by this same problem. In our case, perhaps a trifle more annoyingly, the toilet cistern in question is fed from the storage tanks in the loft which are in turn filled from the borehole supply. As a consequence the 'trickle' from the toilet cistern can, after repeatedly triggering the refill of itself, can then trigger a refill of the main storage tanks in the loft. Over time we have become rather blasé about the gentle 'thump' of the water hammer induced by the borehole pump when it kicks in and are usually quite deaf to such occurrences.... until we, at some unconscious level, realise it is happening far too often.

Like A Twig perhaps the investigation would be deferred as all cursory examinations revealed nothing of note and the problem would sometimes seem to sort itself out without my ever finding the root cause.

Quick clean up under a hot tap, re-fit and all is working correctly again. Never in my life did I think I would be so grateful to a toilet flush designer

Eventually though, and after having had the loft storage tanks seemingly re-filling multiple times in the space of a couple of hours, I resolved to fix the problem once and for all. After removing the porcelain lid I happened to gently nudge the lever only to see some kind of black material escape from the side of the siphon at its foot.... whereupon the trickle into the bowl stopped. Loud clang as 'Penny Drops' - grains of sand dredged up by the borehole pump finding their way through the plumbing to come to rest directly under the Flap Valve in the toilet siphon! There being no easy and permanent fix for this I settled on a few quick pumps of the toilet lever to 'flush' out any offending lumps of sand from beneath the flap valve.... when I/we notice the 'trickle'.

This tale should perhaps belong in the Grumps thread but A Twigs contribution above triggered my personal Flap Valve.

 

[Janela]

A plug socket on the refectory table that serves as my kitchen island/work surface. Hooray.

It wasn't a lot to ask but I have been asking for several years............and balancing bowls on the edge of the cooker to reach a plug socket to use any kitchen power tools!

Yes I could have done it myself but that's not the point, he's the electrician for the house, would I expect him to pick up trowel and hawk and start plastering,? NO. (nobody touches my plastering tools and lives)

 

[Flyfisher]

You do all the plastering? Bravo!! If you lived here I'd be fitting sockets all over the place for you

 

[Cubist]

And I second Flyfishers sentiment and pitch my bid into the ring .. anyone that keeps me away from the 'splat in the eye' tools is more than welcome here.

Cor... nearly broke my neck checking to see if the First Lady was about.

 

[Janela]

I used to do a lot of wedding cakes and when we moved here and couldn't find anyone prepared to even give us a quote for plastering husband said "well isn't it just like royal icing a cake". and so the whole house is now covered in royal icing!

 

[paulc]

Just wait until you try your hand at Venetian Plastering. It is just like buttering toast. Slap it on, scrape it off. Wait a few minutes, and give it a quick polish.