Random aside to our activity. I got a great message from a lovely girl that I had never heard of – Armelle. It seems that she has picked up on the blog from New Year and one of the wallpapers inspired her to paint it. Not only was that a lovely thing to hear but clearly she’s done a great job. Also really convinced me that we need to reuse this design somewhere, it looks so fresh in her wonderful painting.

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Super Saturday

Matt was up reasonably early to drop down to the shops and woke me up to a surprise lunch. It seems he’s made bacon and egg pie. Winning!

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Looking out at the garden you can hardly imagine that it was snowing yesterday (and in fact last night but clearly became rain later on). Pic de Gar was looking pretty with some snow around it though.

After the first half of the Scotland game we had to go to get our photos taken before our meeting on Monday at the prefecture (in bloody Toulouse again) as part of the Carte de Sejour (residency) process. [I know, if we’d known earlier we’d have collected the kitchen on Monday rather than travelling nearly 2 hours each way just for two 8 minute meetings.] Dropped the recycling off on the way back and still made it in time for the second half of the Scotland game.

Matt was going to change the oil in the car but seems he got the wrong sized part so had to go back to St Gaudens. While doing so he left me alone, at home with rugby and an SDS drill…

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All done by my own fair hand (I say fair but they’re looking pretty battered and grazed to be more accurate, particularly since the drill got stuck and smacked it against the wall). Ran out of time to get any more done but hopefully mange to get down to the rest of the floor boards tomorrow.

Super proud of Matt though. Seems that without me he managed his first solo conversation in French which apparently involved asking where the oil filters were, buying one, taking it out to the car, going back inside and explaining that it was the wrong size, and then trying to purchase the correct one.

Time for some rest and relaxation. Although watching the France vs Wales match wasn’t exactly relaxing, nail biting to the last seconds (and more). I thought they’d thrown it away with that stupid red card but what a finish! Just enough time to sit back and watch some TV before updating the blog once Matt has gone to bed. Anyway, now it’s done I can also finally head off to bed. Night all

[20 March 21]

Sunday

Managed to get a reasonable lie in while I could hear Matt tinkering with the car (also known as an oil change – fingers crossed this will fix the problem and we can cancel the trip to the garage next week.)

I started to watch a little TV before I got up. Unfortunately Matt had other ideas. Once the SDS drill started I knew it was time. Downstairs and he’s been cutting up the old worktop. That thing has some serious metal through it and still only just able to lift it between us at about 70cm long.

With that out the way though I could crack on with the floor. Plenty done by lunchtime so looks as though we may reach the target of getting all the floor out by the end of the day.

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Lunch was more of Matt’s amazing pie. After lunch there was more work on the kitchen while Matt took the car out for a drive to see if the oil change was working. When he got back we played a game that I call ‘Polar bear’. Matt was the polar bear and I was the Orca. The polar bear pushes the slowly melting ice (or cement) towards the orca to prevent it getting too close. The orca collects the ice (puts the cement in the bags) to get to the polar bear. Whatever happens the polar bear loses. The ice melts and it has nowhere to go but jump into the sea or the orca gets to it first and drags it into the sea and destroys the ice island itself. Seems Matt is pretty tired of emptying all the bags I’ve filled up though. Probably shouldn’t have been the polar bear 😉

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Eventually however the cement was all up and it looked brilliant. As you’ve probably noticed, the construction of that end of the room is quite different to the first part we took up. It’s fully boarded and little excess pressure on the joists (most of which currently look to be in pretty good nick (I hope I haven’t spoken too soon).

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There is one dodgy joist right by the wall however it looks as though they have already put in a second next to it so could have dodged a bullet there. We will probably still reinforce the central beam (I don’t think it’s necessary but Matt does love to over engineer things).

Next up was an excessively long discussion about where the fuse board and data whotsit were going to go. Turns out that Matt finally found the only room in the house that is considered one of ‘mine’ that I don’t have an obsessive need to micro manage (in terms of the design of course). So long as the washing machine is on the left that and the dryer on the right. [This is key as the doors open different ways and you need to pass the wet washing easily from one to the other. Beyond that it is a utility room that I don’t expect people to see or at least to spend time in. It is meant to be utilitarian and a bit industrial.] I did however finally manage to clear the sinks that Matt had filled up.

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While down in the basement I found out that Matt has been creating a secret stash of the good wine and spirits. I had been wondering, I was sure I hadn’t been drinking it as quickly as we’d bought it.

Rang mum.

Before dinner we made one final small push. Joists cleaned, glue on and finally screws in. That’s the first 9mm board down. Forward, forwards – always much quicker than the backward forwards stage but if it’s not done you have to do everything again.

Time for fish tacos and definitely some showers. The first time you wash your hair its like having having a putty block on your head. There may even be more cement in the drain now than in our kitchen 😉

Back to the sofa for some TV and a glass of wine. Now Matt’s off to bed I can finish updating the blog and hopefully in bed before the mattress heater switches off. Hope you all had a good weekend.

[21 March 2021]