Monday 17 April 2023
I can’t quite believe that this is the 101st day of writing or that we moved here pretty much five months ago or that last night was the first night I’ve ever stayed here on my own. Before we committed to moving here, Chris and I talked about whether we’d feel comfortable about staying here on our own. By that stage, it would have taken a lot to make either of us waiver about moving here, but it was something we talked about. After our first or second night living here, we both said that we’d be fine on our own. Chris has spent a week or more on his own here – no issues (other than no water at that time!).
Last night, at curtain-closing time, I felt slightly on-edge, over-thinking being on my own in the middle of nowhere. Within an hour or so of darkness, I was playing music loudly, I had a bath and I watched episodes five and six of series three of His Dark Materials (ie in the dark depths of a colourless, lifeless, wretched death-prison – arguably, a very poor summary of those episodes). I went to bed shortly before eleven and fell fast asleep until around half-five, which is good for me. I knew I’d be fine, though I was surprised to have even an hour or so of overthinking a series of eventualities, most of which would be as much of an issue in the flat in London (falling over, concussing myself, setting fire to something). I neither need nor want to analyse why there are some places I have stayed on my own that make me feel nervy and unsettled while there are others, for example this house in the middle of nowhere, that don’t have that effect. I have always felt that this house looks after us, however many of us there are in the house.
Yesterday was a Mitch day. As a result, among other things, we now have fully working water (the outstanding issue of no cold water upstairs was due to an airlock, as we’d wondered about) and even the dishwasher is now usable again (it would seem that the drainage pipe from the dishwasher was below where it should be so water from various places wasn’t going in the direction it should have been, among other seemingly smaller issues to do with sealant and general pipe layout). Mitch and our neighbour also fitted a new tap configuration to the tank. Chris and I have only a limited understanding of all that has been going on with the water.
By Mitch having sorted two of the three main plumbing issues, it is less of an irritation that the plumber is still ignoring us. We have been told by various people who live out this way, ie over half an hour’s drive from a town, that a lot of tradespeople are reluctant to come so far out. We thought our plumber was a keeper, having been out twice. It would seem not. We might be better off seeing if Mitch can solder (or whatever) the leak from the radiator.
Mitch, along with emergency plumbing and water stuff, is also in the process of taking apart the pig/dog-shed. He’s removed all the old panels and patches and will be making us a shed over his next few visits. The more he does, the more inadequate we both feel when it comes to around-the-house jobs.
Chris is away until Saturday night and I have two friends staying on Thursday night, on their way back to London from a holiday on the coast about two and a half hours north of us, the first time we’ll have had more than one person staying, though there will still only be three of us here. They won’t know yet that they’re guinea pigs (or, rather, one of them is) for the second bed option, which is not much of a step-up from sleeping on the floor. Eek.