Today I've mostly bin...

[giraffe]

.........stripping (wallpaper). Dug wallpaper steamer out from the shed, opened box warily because of cobwebs and mouse droppings on lid, and found lots of shredded cardboard, mouse droppings, birdseed husks (used to keep bag of birdseed in shed until I learned my lesson). Tipped it out and got the steamer out, only to find Mouse had also snacked on the cable. Fortunately OH is off today, so he shortened the cable, then we found that the steamer was removing the paint as well as the paper, so decided not to use it. Most of the paper is now off two of the walls.

[Bunnylump]

Ugh what a horrible job. I just had a phone call from my brother. He's hiring a van on WEDNESDAY to be moving more stuff from my Mum's. He hasn't thought about the fact it might be sensible to identify what needs to be taken where first... Looks like I'll be getting my Dad over from Essex again with no notice... Another lovely day of dust and toxic chemicals...

[giraffe]

Today I have two helpers, but tomorrow OH is back at work. We're trying to do it while K is away, so Lally has moved into K's room, but her wardrobe only made it as far as the landing before getting stuck. Our landing is a funny shape and very small, so the wrdrobe is at the top of the stairs and you have to squeeze past it to get to F's room or the bathroom. No hope of getting Lally's bed past it, or the bookcase, so we are having to shuffle round those to get at the walls.

[giraffe]

Oh no! Dust sheets are in the loft and the wardrobe is under the hatch so we can't get up there!

[MBH]

Practical Puzzling - I love it

[Bunnylump]

Aaarrggghhh
Brother rang this morning, saying he has this week off...we need to hire a van on Wednesday to move things...he's away on Thursday...when was Dad coming down again...we can't open the garage door...etc. etc. You get the general gist. Big panic.

So, I rang my Dad, he drove the 40 miles, in hideous traffic to get here. We get round to the house, to find my brother just leaving. "I'm on holiday, you know."

So, I spent 6 hours lugging machinery around, sorting through filthy 50 year old books etc. so that we could get to some of the things which needed to be moved. I had to start labeling things because brother likes to look at things, decide he might want it, then puts it back in with a pile of stuff which is to go to the charity shop.

I'm absolutely exhausted. Does everyone have this amount of aggro when they are clearing out a house, I wonder?
Sorry, should have been on the whinge thread...

Giraffe, I'll swap you for some decorating...

[LAT]

When we were sorting my mother's place, my sisters and I looked through to make sure we had anything we wanted and then paid house clearance people to take the rest away. They gave anything suitable to the local charity shops and disposed of anything with no value. And they left the place really clean afterwards too.

But she had spent the previous few years sorting through some of her stuff so "we wouldn't have to"

[gill216]

...complaining. Maybe this should be on the whinge thread?

The short version is I spent quite a bit of money earlier this year on garden "things" on the net. The company I bought from provides a guarantee that if their produce fails to thrive then it will be replaced - at a cost of £6.99 p&p. I asked the question "Does this apply per item, or as a job lot, because quite frankly very few of your supplies could be considered to be thriving. The rest of my garden is close to producing more than I can cope with, none of which were purchased from your goodselves"

I got such a condescending reply. I felt that it was the appropriate time to point out that I wasn't just a silly woman gardener and that my husband was qualified in horticulture and arboriculture and held a pesticides licence too. They actually tried to tell me to water the darned things! Watch this space.

[giraffe]

....moved wardrobe, went in loft, moved wardrobe back. I hope the pasting table isnt up there.


My grandfather left a big collection of very good quality tools. Mum didn't know what some of them were, so had someone in to value them, and buy any he wanted. There was a small cabinet with shallow drawers and it was full of type faces. Grandad worked for a printing business and when things became obsolete couldn't bear to throw them out, so took them home. There were probably a few stray limbs around as at one point he had a contract to repair display dummies. As a small child I was terrified to look in the back of his car as you never knew what severed limbs would be in there!

[Bunnylump]

I bet they are quite glad that they are on the internet and aren't there in person...

[Bunnylump]

Severed limbs would be enough to freak kids out, I should think. Mind you, I keep finding scary things at Mum's - like pickled things and boiled skeletons. And the chemicals are EVERYWHERE. Dad said today, "Oh, sorry to hear about your numb leg" (brother spilled something toxic on himself) "I'd forgotten there was all of this here. In fact, thinking about it there are quite a few things which should be on the poisons register..."

Scurra, watch out...

[giraffe]

I wonder what Mum did with the grenade Grandad had? I think she threw out the german helmet, and the bayonet is in her wardrobe.

[tricia]

I think there is a german helmet in our loft and an old taylors dummy andsome small tables that my grandfather made But as i do not like spiders I have not ventured up there for a long time

Tricia

[Bunnylump]

Dismantling and moving a piano, sideboard, freezer, cupboard, giant chest of drawers, dismantling about 300 books (separating card from paper), moving a lathe and half a ton of engineering machinery. We started at 8am (that's when we got the hired van) and have just finished. Well, when I say finished, I mean, done a little bit of what there is still to do. I ache in places I didn't know I had.

[LAT]

Gosh, I bet you're exhausted.
Feet up and a large glass of wine?

[giraffe]

.....Glossing! And now both my helpers have set off for Kent to watch the golf.

[Bunnylump]

Gosh, I bet you're exhausted.
Feet up and a large glass of wine?

If I HAD any wine, I would.

[tricia]

I have a spare bottle of Red you could have

Tricia

[Bunnylump]

I'll be there. Probably in about 9 hours? So that would make an unusual breakfast...

[Laura]

Bunnylump, please tell me I misunderstood that? You dismantled a piano????

P.S. Internet being stupidly slow again at the moment, so may be missing for a while. x