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Emptying the septic tank

This house is too far out into the middle of nowhere to have mains gas or mains drainage. It’s also too far from the nearest telephone exchange to stand any chance of having superfast (or even adequately fast) broadband – a fact that really used to upset Christopher. I’ve become resigned to the fact that internet access is more of a crawl than a sprint, and I’m happy to do without gas for cooking or heating. But the lack of mains drainage means that I have to deal with the septic tank.

The previous owner of the house didn’t believe in emptying it more than once a decade – his theory being that once you have a suitable mix of bacteria etc established, it more or less takes care of itself. Unfortunately, that doesn’t really take into account modern cleaning products. They may claim to be “septic-tank friendly” (usually in very small print that is barely readable –  I’ve been given very funny looks for peering at bleach bottles in the supermarket) but I’m not 100% convinced. Standard advice is that the tank ought to be emptied annually.

Well, it’s coming up to nearly a year now since Chris died, and I knew full well that I hadn’t done anything about the tank. And we didn’t get it emptied last year either – with Chris so ill, we had other more pressing things on our minds. I had a vague recollection that Chris organised to have it emptied soon after he was made redundant, in autumn 2009 – I think I put it on his list of things to do. But the most recent evidence I could find in the form of an invoice was from 2008. So one way or another it clearly was well overdue.

I arranged for a licensed tanker to come on Friday to empty it,  and very fortunately – because I went back to the company we used in 2008 – they knew where the tank and access hatch were, so I did not need to be around to supervise them. Thank goodness – that would not have been pleasant! In fact, work sent me to a meeting down in Hampshire on Friday, so I was well out of the way, and came home to a note through the letterbox saying that it had all been done. Good timing!

I’m really noticing how much harder it is to run an old house now I’m on my own, compared to when Chris was around to share the burden. There is always something that needs doing, and it’s hard to keep on top of it all. Hopefully that’s it for the septic tank for another year (or several……). But as soon as I cross one thing off the list, another goes on – I have just noticed an area of brickwork by the kitchen that is going to need repointing before the winter. Oh well.

04 07 2011 Gillian house Comments (2) Permalink

More trouble with the roof

I went up to the top of the garden on Saturday, thinking about all the work that would be needed there. I happened to look down on the house (the first terrace is pretty much as high as the house, the upper terraces are considerably higher). Hang on, I thought, I’m sure the roof ought to have more tiles on it than that…….. There was a considerable area of roof with missing and badly shaled (i.e. disintegrating) tiles, which clearly needed replacing.

I was rather annoyed with myself, because I’d had workmen up on the roof only a few weeks ago, and if only I’d noticed the missing tiles earlier, they could have fixed them at the same time. To be fair, it wasn’t the workmen’s fault – the house has a very complicated roof structure, with many ridges and valleys, due to the original cottage being extended multiple times over the past 125 years. The dodgy area is above the kitchen and would not have been visible from the roof above the bathroom where they were working.

I decided not to get the same people back to do this repair – it didn’t warrant the full backup of multiply-skilled people (carpenter, joiner, scaffolder, roofer) and I certainly didn’t want to pay for that. What I needed was a jobbing roofer with a long ladder and a supply of replacement tiles, and to have him spend a day up on the roof replacing the worst tiles.  It’s a job we have generally needed doing every five years or so, and it’s just part of living in an old house.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t remember whom it was we used last time. Chris arranged it, and I had nothing to do with it. But since it was a fairly small and hopefully self-contained job, I thought I’d try an on-line search for a builder. I came across www.ratedpeople.com which has an interesting business model, and decided to give it a go.

The site is free to use for the end user. You post a short description of the work that needs doing, plus contact details and a budget. Builders in your area can search through the job descriptions and pay a fee to the site to buy access to your contact details. The site will sell the lead to up to three tradesmen, and emails you to tell you when someone is interested in the lead. It’s then up to the tradesman to contact you, and arrange to visit and quote in the usual manner. You can then search online references for those builders, and pick the one who looks the best. You then indicate on-line when you have selected a tradesman, so that they don’t continue to sell your lead on to others. When the job is completed, you are asked to rate the tradesman and leave a comment – but you can only rate on the one company that you have already accepted on-line – which should cut down the amount of spoofing and fraudulent references.

It’s the sort of business model that Chris would have really liked – though he would have grumbled at the poor website design and bad user-interface decisions!  He was very interested in concepts of “trust” on-line, and how to build communities to put businesses directly in touch with consumers.

I’m pleased to report that it has worked out well for me. I raised a job request on Saturday night, and got an email on Sunday night saying that a builder from north Gloucestershire had bought the lead – I’d never have thought of looking for builders in that direction, though it’s really not very far away at all. The roofer phoned me on Monday morning, and came around to quote on Monday afternoon. I might be keen on web-centric business models, but this is my own money I’m spending, so as well as looking him up on ratedpeople, I also insisted on some old-fashioned references and phoned up to speak with someone who had used him. The quote was within budget, and the references – both on-line and real-world –  all stacked up, so I agreed to go ahead. He arrived on time today, spent all day up on the roof, and has replaced the dodgy tiles with some reclaimed ones from a Victorian cottage in Gloucestershire – so the replacement ones all blend in well with the originals. I have dutifully fulfilled my part of the bargain by giving feedback on the website.

So once again, I think I have a sound roof over my head. Let’s hope I’m right this time!

30 06 2011 Gillian house Comments Off on More trouble with the roof Permalink

Arguing with npower

All our utility bills were in Christopher’s name, so when he died one of the  things I had to do was to move them all into my name. Our electricity supplier was npower, and they responded very quickly acknowledging the situation and returning the death certificate.

So I’ve been rather narked that all the bills I’ve had from them since have been addressed to “The executors of Mr C Booth”, rather than to me personally.  I got another bill from them today and I’m afraid I snapped. I phoned them up, and established who I was – they clearly had my name on their computer against the account number. I told them that they clearly know that I’m a widow, and I know perfectly well that I’m a widow, but why do they have to keep reminding me with every bill? It is getting annoying and upsetting. Please would they change the account immediately to be in my name.

At that point I was put on hold for quite a long time while the telephone operator tried to work out how to deal with my request, which she acknowledged was entirely reasonable. Apparently, it is their practice to mark the account as run by the executors, and do not have a means to easily transfer it into a new name. I said that it was entirely possible that I’d be living here for years, and that their position, whilst understandable in the short term, was entirely unacceptable in the long term. I didn’t get as far as threatening to move suppliers, but that would clearly be the next step.

The operator assured me that she would deal with it, and get it sorted out to my satisfaction, so I have left it with her for now. If the next bill is still addressed to Christopher’s executors rather than to me, then I shall really lose my temper and transfer my business to a competitor.

28 06 2011 Gillian invective Comments (3) Permalink

Saturday Lunch

As I’ve mentioned plenty of times before, Chris used to do all the cooking. But while he was happy to cook dinner every evening, he flatly refused to cook Saturday lunch. He wasn’t keen on making Sunday lunch either, but that was usually left-overs from Saturday dinner so was less of an issue. But no way would he cook Saturday lunch.

So, right from when we first started going out, 21 years ago, we always ate out for Saturday lunchtime. One of us had to be very seriously ill for us to eat at home – a raging migraine with projectile vomiting would just about count as an excuse, but dying of cancer didn’t. Even when Chris was very sick last year, he insisted on going out for Saturday lunch as usual – the only exceptions being when he was in the middle week of his chemotherapy cycle and his immune system was heavily compromised, when he would grudgingly agree that it was safer to stay at home.

Before we got married, when money was very tight, we would regularly have a jacket potato, side-salad and soft drink at a cafe above the bus station in Worcester. Slightly more salubrious than it sounds, but not much! Or even a snack in the cafe at the big Worcester Tesco supermarket. Or a frugal lunch at the shabby-but-genteel Bluebird Tea Rooms. Over the years we had a range of favourite cafes / restaurants / pubs which came and went out of favour as the chefs moved on, or our circumstances and tastes changed. I remember the Lemon Tree in Worcester, Ceci Paolo and the Feathers in Ledbury, the Anchor at Welland, the Fig Tree in Malvern and most recently the Plough and Harrow at Guarlford. However, although we ate out once a week, we hardly ever did so in the evenings, sticking with the more limited (but generally much cheaper!) lunchtime menus.

Christopher’s absolute favourite restaurant was a place called White Season, in the centre of Malvern. We ate there virtually every Saturday lunchtime for a few years – we were there so often it almost became embarrassing!  In fact, Kevin the chef automatically booked us “our table” for 12:30 each Saturday unless we explicitly told him we wouldn’t be coming in the next week! I remember one time Chris getting rather annoyed when they changed the sugar that came with the coffee from demerara sugar cubes to fancy unrefined sugar crystals.  He didn’t actually take sugar in his coffee, but liked to dunk a sugar cube in it and eat it as a sweet – which he couldn’t do with sugar crystals. From the following week, a special bowl of sugar cubes was kept at the back of the restaurant and produced specially for him! We really enjoyed it there, and were really sorry when it closed down several years ago. Right to the end, Chris was wont to say how much he still missed Kevin’s cooking.

All that Saturday lunch tradition has stopped now of course. I really don’t like eating out on my own, and particularly not in places we used to enjoy going to together. So now I have to get my own Saturday lunch. But there is a problem. For twenty years I’ve got into a very strong habit of always eating out, so not having to think about it when we did the shopping. So now, even ten months after Chris died,  I still have a huge mental block about remembering to get food in for it. And I’ve been sleeping so badly for the past year that there is no way I’m going to get up and go shopping on a Saturday morning in time to get home and start cooking. Time and again, it’s got to around noon on a Saturday, and I’ve realised that I’ve got no food in, so I’ve had to rummage around in the larder and the bottom of the fridge to find a collection of leftovers that I can put on a plate / in the frying pan / under the grill and call lunch. I’m certainly getting plenty of practice at “scratch meals” – cheese on toast, cheese omelette, egg-bread, baked cheesy egg with toast soldiers – basically any permutation of cheese, eggs and bread, all of which I usually have in.

I really need to train myself to think about it in advance and get some nice – but easy – food in. I can really see Christopher’s point – cooking Saturday lunch is a right pain. But I’m sure I can do better than cheese-on-toast if I put my mind to it!

25 06 2011 Gillian food Comments (2) Permalink

Deleting the facebook account

I’ve been reading in the press recently that lots of people are getting disenchanted with facebook and deactivating their accounts. And that reminded me that Chris had an account with them, although I don’t think he used it very much. I have, however, been getting annoying reminders from facebook telling him that he hasn’t checked in recently, and that his “friends are waiting for him”. Well, yes, but they’re going to have to wait a very long time I suspect! So I decided to try to close down the account.

That was quite hard. For a start, I didn’t have his password, as it wasn’t on the list of “important passwords” he had left for me.  So I had to get his account password reset by email. That was probably strictly against their terms of usage, but as his “personal representative” and executor, I feel I have justification enough. I don’t think facebook actually want to make it easy for you to leave them, as even once I managed to log in I had to look quite hard for the option. I didn’t want to just “deactivate” the account – I wanted it closed and deleted entirely. I don’t trust facebook and their cavalier attitude to privacy, and want anything they hold on Chris to be permanently deleted. I think I’ve managed to request that, though they’ve given him (i.e. me)  a 14-day cooling-off period in which they merely deactivate the account, during which time it can be reactivated. I suppose that’s reasonable, as otherwise the system would be open to abuse from people maliciously deleting their friends’ accounts.  So hopefully in another two weeks I’ll be able to cross another action off my to-do list.

21 06 2011 Gillian status Comments (1) Permalink

Insulted by my pullover

I bought a new sweater this week – nothing special, just a lightweight cotton/linen mix sleeveless pullover that will do fine to wear for work. And I got it in the  sale which is a bonus. But when I put it on, I noticed that the label said:

“US   S; UK   S; DE   S; FR  M”

i.e. what will pass as small in the US, UK and Germany is considered a lard-assy medium by the svelte French!  I’m all in favour of companies selling internationally, but not at the expense of insulting their core clientele. Huh! I was definitely not impressed.

19 06 2011 Gillian invective Comments (1) Permalink

Changing the answerphone message

Up until now, I’ve kept the old outgoing message on our answerphone, which was Chris saying “I’m afraid we can’t come to the phone at the moment…..” etc etc.  I rather liked being able to listen to his voice whenever I wanted to.  Also, since I’m dealing with a load of workmen at the moment and have them phoning and leaving messages regularly, I’ve found it helpful to let them assume there’s a man around unless/until I choose to disabuse them of that notion.

However, I’ve been getting comments and complaints from several friends and family members who find it upsetting if they phone me when I’m out and they unexpectedly have Chris speaking to them. So I’ve given in and changed the outgoing message to be me. Sad in a way, but another step forward I suppose.

15 06 2011 Gillian cancer
status Comments Off on Changing the answerphone message Permalink

Lunch with my ex-stepfather-inlaw

I was trying to explain to a colleague at work today whom it was that I had arranged to have lunch with today. I decided that the technical term for my relationship with my late husband’s step-father surely had to be my “ex-stepfather-in-law”.  Anyway, whatever the technicalities, Peter was on his way home from a holiday visiting friends in Wales. He goes there most years, and always stopped off for lunch with Christopher and me on his way home – it’s a convenient break point on the long journey home to Kent.

It was unfortunate that he was travelling home on a Monday, as that meant that my favourite pub was closed. And, as I found out when my friend Katie was here the other week, most of my preferred restaurants in Malvern town centre are also closed on a Monday. So I plumped for a not-nearly-so-good pub that was  (a) actually open on a Monday lunch-time, and (b) very close to work. I’m a bit busy at the moment on a bid, and couldn’t really take two long lunch-breaks in a row as I had tons I needed to do this afternoon. So the food wasn’t up to much, but it was sunny and fairly warm so we sat outside on the patio. We hadn’t seen each other since Christopher’s funeral, when I wasn’t really in the mood to talk, so we had a fair amount to catch up.

We’ve agreed that next time he’s travelling home from Wales, he really needs to make sure it’s not a Monday, so that I can take him to the Plough and Harrow and we can have a really good lunch.

13 06 2011 Gillian food Comments (2) Permalink

Locked in the Ladies

I’d arranged to meet an ex-colleague of Christopher’s today for lunch – in fact he was one of the friends who spoke at the funeral. I’d chosen a pleasant little restaurant in Malvern which was one of Christopher’s favourites – it does good Mediterranean-style food at a reasonable price.

My work laptop broke this morning, and I’d had to take it along to the on-site repair centre to have M$ Office rebuilt, so I left early for lunch and got to the restaurant before Neil. Great, just time to pop upstairs to the loo before meeting him for lunch. But as I closed and locked the door behind me, the lock came off in my hand! I tried to put it back, but the shaft it fitted onto had pushed itself through the door out of reach. I was well and truly locked in!

There was no one else upstairs, and it was still early for lunch so the restaurant wasn’t busy. It could be a while before someone else’s bladder drove them upstairs and they found me….. I hammered on the door quite loudly. Then when that got no immediate reply, I hammered out SOS in Morse very loudly.  That hurt my knuckles, but got a speedy response, and the chef/proprietor soon released me. He was extremely apologetic, and I was just relieved to get let out again.

After that unwarranted excitement, I had a very pleasant lunch with Neil. There was no point hurrying back to work, as I’d been told that it would take a while for them to do my laptop, so we had a leisurely meal and coffee, catching up on several months worth of news and gossip. I enjoyed it – but next time I’ll try to be less heavy-handed with the lock on the loo door!

10 06 2011 Gillian food Comments (1) Permalink

sharp knives again at last

Chris not only used to do all the cooking, but he was in charge of just about everything in the kitchen, including the knives. He was very fussy about keeping them sharp, saying that a blunt knife does more damage than a sharp one. He had a steel, which he used regularly (at least weekly, if not more often) on all the knives.

Unfortunately, I never got the hang of using the steel. I did try, several times over the past months, but it was a complete disaster. Partly, I think, down to sheer ineptitude on my part, but also I suspect because Chris was right handed, whilst I am very firmly left handed. So I think I must be holding the steel at a different angle to how he used to. Whatever the excuse, whenever I tried to use the steel, I ended up taking the edge off the knives rather than sharpening them! I also learned the truth of his adage, through doing my right (non-chopping) hand considerable damage by slipping when slicing vegetables with  increasingly blunt knives.

It is clearly uneconomical to keep buying new knives whenever the old ones get dangerously blunt, so I had to do something about it. So last weekend I bought myself a fool-proof ambidextrous knife-sharpener. It works remarkably well, and a few minutes work on Sunday got all my knives back to an adequately sharp state. I tested them by slicing some tomatoes for a  salad lunch, and they passed with flying colours.

 

09 06 2011 Gillian food Comments (1) Permalink