Hung and drawn

The Gorse Fox and Silver Vixen had a quiet evening. Urban-Cub was staying with Cousteau-Cub and Ellie was at Pistol Pete’s. We settled down to binge-watch the last 5 or 6 episodes of Bosch series 6. What excellent TV that is. Now we have to wait for Series 7 and who knows when that will be filmed and released.

There was only one real task for this morning. The Gorse Fox had to finish fitting the pull-out baskets in the cupboard. Fortunately, he had the knack based on yesterday’s experience. It still took quite a while to finish and clear up, but then the Silver Vixen had to take over and reload the cupboards. That took her ages and the Gorse Fox is sure it will take a while to get used to the fact that the cupboards have swapped contents and the shelves have been reloaded differently.

This afternoon the Gorse Fox returned briefly to the video editing, starting on a 1992 family holiday in Cornwall. The first rough cut has been done, but there’s a lot of work still to complete.

Basket Case

The Silver Vixen has had a bee in her bonnet regarding the accessibility of "stuff" in the kitchen cupboards. The solution adopted by Two Hats was to install pull-out wire baskets. The bee became focussed on the wire baskets. These were originally ordered pre-lockdown and were the wrong size so returned and re-ordered as the lockdown commenced. Eventually they have arrived and as Ellie was to be with Pistol Pete and Urban-Cub was going to spend time with Cousteau-Cub this weekend, it seemed like the ideal opportunity to install said baskets.

The food cupboard was emptied and spread over the kitchen. The doors removed and then the existing shelves. The existing shelves were cut down to become a central partition within the erstwhile double cupboard. After a great deal of effort, the central partition was installed and the runners for the first basket were fixed. The Gorse Fox grabbed the wire basket. It didn't fit. He consulted with Two Hats. It still didn't fit. He consulted with the Silver Vixen. It still didn't fit.

The solution to the problems was to switch cupboards. Two Hats, in an identical house, has two cupboards like ours. One slightly larger, one slightly smaller. We too have a similar pair. The difference is the position of the larger of two cupboards. For us it is in the middle of a run, for them it is on the end. It was the cupboard on the end we were trying to address. The solution was to re-purpose the two cupboards. Crockery would move to the end cupboard, food would move to the middle, larger cupboard.

The Gorse Fox dismantled the small cupboard and re-installed shelves (taken from, and cut-down from the larger cupboard). Then he re-installed the partition in the larger central cupboard. The process of installing the runners began again. The first attempt didn't fit, but the Gorse Fox realised the central partition had slipped during installation and was the problem. The runners were removed and the central partition refitted. Runner installed again, and wire baskets finally fixed. It has taken him about six hours but he has finished four of these baskets. The other two can wait until tomorrow (assuming the Gorse Fox can even move by then).

Fitted

Well the fitters have finished.

The work tops are in. The sink is in, and the hob awaits reconnection.

Unfortunately the sink needs to be plumbed in still and that may actually be a snag. The Gorse Fox's gas chappie said he will take a look an see if he can help when he comes to do the hob. If not it may have to wait until tomorrow.

Fitters

The fitters have arrived and the new work tops are being fitted.

They have given us a small chopping board made out of the same material. It is incredibly heavy... so goodness knows how heavy the 3.2 metre run must be.

Flushed with success

The engineer called. He was exactly on time, he was polite, and he removed his shoes as he entered. The tap that had been causing the occasional leak had been dormant for a few days, but exactly on cue it started to leak copiously this morning. As the tap was moderately expensive and still under the 5 year warranty, the Gorse Fox had called the manufacturer. Hence the arrival of the engineer.

He took one look at the problem and explained that it the o-rings, not the valve. It it had been the valve, the tap would drip; but as it's the o-rings the barrel leaks.  It didn't take him long to rectify the situation and his diagnosis was that the water pipes hadn't been flushed through properly when the house was built and small bits of grit had got in to the mechanism. Seemed plausible, particularly when he dug out just such a piece of grit. All sorted now - just in time to have the worktops fitted tomorrow.

Most of the rest of the day has been spent writing code. There are a few things that the Gorse Fox wanted to tidy up in the blog and it is easier to write a program than to go through each relevant entry and make manual changes.

Nothing to see here

It's been a fairly quiet day - nothing too exciting to report. The Gorse Fox started with a trip to his kitchen worktop supplier. He had agreed to a substantial discount but we had never actually seen the bottom line (obviously we knew the full price). As the Gorse Fox will have to withdraw some funds, it was time to get the actual numbers. He was pleasantly surprised. Indeed, very pleasantly surprised. The Gorse Fox phoned the bank manager to ensure there would be problems and was assured everything was just hunky-dory.

Tuesday is the big day when the new worktops will be fitted. The Gorse Fox has mailed the gas chappy to try and schedule the reinstallation of the hob on Tuesday afternoon... but even if we have to wait another day or so, it won't be a major issue.

Other than that, most of the day has been fairly lazy. There has been a number of household chores to work through - but thats all finished now. Now the Gorse Fox is preparing a 'Spanish Chicken" tray bake whilst he writes this. He has no idea what it will taste like, but the recipe seemed promising. It is interesting trying to go for a week without the use of a hob. You tend to become inventive with the oven.

The Gorse Fox can't sign off without mentioning the fact that it is his brother-in-law's birthday today. He's only a youngster at 60, but the Gorse Fox hopes he's had a wonderful day.

Relief

Well that's a relief. The problem with the oven was really quite minor and the engineer fixed it very quickly. The electrician, it appears, had failed to tighten the screws which held the terminals into the power supply in the wall. It could only be solved by removing the unit, so was not something the Gorse Fox could have sorted himself. The chap did have a very useful appliance. It was a stand, on wheels, with a screw jack that allowed a table-like surface to be raised or lowered. This was raised to the level of the oven and the oven was simply pulled out onto the appliance and oven out the way. Simple, and a single person job.

Sorted.

Powered Off

The Gorse Fox has powered off the West Sussex Data Centre again. The Neff engineer is due today and the Gorse Fox expects the power will take an interrupt at some point. It will, however, be nice to have the new combination oven working again. Ten minutes is all it's managed so far. That seems a little short in terms of its built-in cycle of obsolescence.

And breathe

It all started at nine o'clock. The kitchen/gas chappie knocked on the door and started to disconnect the hob. Twenty minutes later as he was finishing, the kitchen fitters arrived. As we ushered out the gas man, we ushered in the fitters.

The fitters looked around. Drank some tea and coffee, sucked on their teeth and then launched into the task of dismantling the old work tops.

They had been well fitted and were not going to come out easily. A little bit of persuasion (with hammer and chisel) made all the difference and soon the cabinets stood free and topless.

Two Hats and Tinkerbell are having the same outfit do their kitchen so the fitters went next door to get started. Jasper came to investigate and curiosity demanded he have a wander around in the top of the units.

A few minutes later one of the fitters returned. He had left his mate to destroy dismantle next door's kitchen and he had come back to start creating the templates for the new work tops. This was essentially a manual task, using traditional skills. Large acrylic sheets were laid on the cabinets and manoeuvred to created the semblance of the new work tops. Measurements were taken, the sheets were marked up, and slowly the vision started to take place. Overhangs were calculated, corners rounded and fixing points identified. It took him about an three quarters of an hour, but  the Gorse Fox was impressed with the care that was being taken.

Soon it was done and whilst the template chap went next door, the demolition chap returned to replace our old worktops. It was done. Now we just await the stone to be cut and the chaps to return next week and finish off.

The Silver Vixen and Gorse Fox spent a while returning everything to their respective cupboards and making the kitchen moderately serviceable again.

The afternoon involved some thought about supper and how we will cater for the next few days with no hob. Tonight will see roast vegetables, baked potatoes and the remains of yesterday's chicken casserole. Meanwhile a meatloaf is cooking in preparation for tomorrow.

Nostalgia

Another very chilly start to the day. The Gorse Fox was pleased that today's football was scheduled for the indoor arena.

The game itself was fun - though, at 7-a-side, was a little busy in the short-form pitches. When the teams were first selected it looked like another case of defence versus attack - but the Gorse Fox's team of defenders did ok and ran out 5-2 winners. The Gorse Fox was pleased to score a fine goal with a volley from the half-way line. Very satisfactory.

Back home there was preparation needed. Tomorrow the fitters come to remove the existing work surfaces and create a template to describe the new work surfaces to be cut and installed. This meant a going through and emptying the top shelves of all the units and cupboards. Fortunately we have the Orangery so the kitchen doesn't look too cluttered - but there was a lot of stuff to shift.

The rest of the afternoon has been spent working on old diaries, again. This, while not categorised as 'fun', is at least an opportunity for a little nostalgia. The Gorse Fox may be making progress, but it is very slow and there are many more diaries still to go (some years the Gorse Fox was fairly terse but other years he was expansive in his description of the day) - it's going to take a long time.

Engineer

After some to-ing and fro-ing this morning the Gorse Fox has managed to secure the visit of a Neff engineer to try and sort out the failed oven. As we are likely to be without our hob for a week or so (while the worktops are replaced, it would have been nice to have a working microwave).

Meanwhile, the rest of the morning was spent coding. An existing program has been radically extended so that it fulfils a much wider brief than its original design requirement. Merging code from several routines made it a lost easier, and the fact that the Gorse Fox always follows a particular style and standard makes the merger very simple. Code is now running and has triggered a whole slew of further ideas. In its own right the code added a further 186 entries into the Gorse Fox's private blog - so progress is being made.