Thursday 29 October 2009

Living the life of Noah.....

I am sure you all thought I have written nothing because life has gone all quiet and everything went to plan, errrr right.

With Tuesday in full swing I woke with another recurrence of tendinitis, Probably thanks to the madcap wall drilling SDS escapade.

Recruiting Bethan and Branwen as assistants (to do the work I could not do) we got the tank all plumbed up and into the roof it went. Things went rather well and holes were drilled and all looked seriously well with the world.

Soon radiators were starting to go on walls and with Bethan as my ace assistant the plumbing was rapidly coming together.

This was looking seriously good and pushing the boundaries of time I was ready to prime the system late on Tuesday. Best do it then as of course yesterday was a day of university and work.

At first all went well, then it started to rain, not outside but inside....

And revealed not one but two leaks in the supply tank in the attic, faults sorted by Taliesin and Bethan using a blend of tools and swearing.

Then fill the system and - nothing.

Now the way to fill a central heating system is to have the supply tap on low then let water trickle in and if you find a leaky joint you switch off the supply and sort it before switching it back on and filling a little bit more.

Something though was not happening.

Nothing seemed to be filling.

Detailed check and there was an air lock between the tank and the system, clear that and the water ran.

The whole 40 gallon header tank came down in one hit.

No little trickles of water there were fountains everywhere.

This was not a first for this event, apparently you can read about the last one in a book called Genesis, it all happened to some chap called Noah blame apparently was down to some other fella called: God.

There was water towels, bowls pans and more buckets that 3 Green Goddesses carry - it was not good.

Overseen by a management in bemused bewilderment.

There were a lot of leaks but only two inundation points, one was the central heating pump. Dealt with expertly by Taliesin, the other was a joint above the living room (naturally) that was spewing water like a wet volcano!

The problem was only partly mine, the pipe had a big score in it adjacent to the joint that prevented the joint working properly, replacing the bit of pipe brought things under control.

One of the advantages of using modern plastic pipework is that this is a 2 minute rather than a 20 minute job so we got that done without completely flooding the house.

She says it was a good weeks work though; I saved us about 2 thousand pounds by not calling in a proper plumber to do the work.

She of course (or so she said) saved us about 5 thousand pounds by not getting a contractor in to repair the damage...

So that's 7000 pound saved on one job, impressive eh???

She didn't seem to see it quite that way.

So yesterday she headed off on contact bent and I went off to Uni to pretend to be clever.

Back home, more medication and today I went round sorting the various leaks we had identified.

Well no

Last night she came home and I was already stuck into sorting the leaks on the stove.

Then today, all day on sorting every leak.

Then more trying to sort the mystery airlock upstairs and we have a house that is really not warm

No, it's bloody hot!!

Much of today with earthquake rumble airlocks as the system sorts itself out.

Walls shook, jets of vapour poured up the system (maybe I lit the stove a bit too soon)

But we got there, people have come and complained about their radiators and not that they are cold...

This sort of eclipsed in real terms something that matters, young P, returned to mum decided to come "home" here for half term.

Much of it he has chosen to spend here.

Is this good?

Maybe?

Maybe not.

He has spent so many years here and he chose to come back for more half term than he might have spent with his mother.

I'm sure he will see less of us from now to Xmas.

This return to parents thing is not easy.

The district team have just checked out, fostering, they are not exactly on the scene either.

We are left to cope again - as usual...

Of course that's because they trust us and out skills and our judgment.

We have skills and they have recognized them.....

Or have they just abandoned us to it, again.

But the fire - god bless us

That works.

R

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