So. Yes. Update.
I’ve mainly been on nights, y’see. And Kathryn’s mom was here (which was lovely, I wish it could have been longer – it went far too quickly). And yeah. So. There has been progress.
The worksurfaces went in* and I started the tiling around the worksurface to provide a splashback. This was done by chopping our floor tiles roughly in half (not quite, because asthetically we liked approximately 3/8ths of a tile). As I pootled through the (many) tiles required, I thought:
“Gosh, for a cheap tilecutter** this has done pretty well, just a few more tiles and then the bathroom and it’ll all be done”
One can, if one isn’t me, see what happened next. Literally, next. Literally the next tile. Part way through the tile, the power tripped. Hrm, I thought, and wandered out clicked it back on, vaguely wondering what had tripped it (since it only previously occurred when we’re using the iron, and even then, not that often). I sat down in front of the tiler, switched it on again, and lo out came the magic (and acrid) smoke. I don’t think I’m overstating it to say I was a trifle upset.
Having seen what was available, I headed back to B&Q to get essentially the same crappy tile cutter, which has got less good. In fact, the blade supplied was completely awful – so bad that the old blade from the old saw was better than the new one.
Anyhow, many more tile cuts later and:
A whole bundle of sealing and grouting later:
Having finally managed to get the sealant down around the edges to something approaching my satisfaction, we could do important things like… installing the kitchen entertainment centre:
Annnnnd…. Put up the shelves (YAY!):
While I was in the mood for shelving, and also wiring ethernet up, I created this shelving solution:
Behind the tomato puree lies the beating heart of our network connectivity. We have… 3 ports (I can’t remember where the third comes out. It’s either under the stairs or under the consumer unit – in readyness for a moment when someone might want to use it. I think I put it there so I could put the WiFi box by the consumer unit and phone line, but it seems happy enough in the lounge). I am pleased to report that while Lauren may weep if she sees the quality of the alleged Cat5e cable, it does work well enough over the distance it’s running so that I clunked the network cable in… and the Link Good light illuminated, and when the EntBox powered up it was there. RIGHT THERE! on the NETWORK!
WE CAN HAZ WIRED NETWORK!
Which means that it can SUCK data off the internizzle. Which would be *GREAT*, if our internet connection hadn’t gone to shite a while back.
Anyhow, Happy Thanksgiving to USAlians. We’re celebrating on Saturday, and have a FEARSOME list of food to get. I’m glad we separated it out from our weekly shop because otherwise I’d’ve openly wept at the tills, which is never a good look.
The dinner looks thus, at present, excluding things other people might bring:
Turkey
Pheasant (from our Farmhouse Cookbook)
Sweet Potato Casserole
Mashed Potatoes (from the River Cottage cookbook)
Roast Potatoes (from my head)
Stuffing
Cheese Drop Biscuits
Green Bean Salad (from the (nyum, nyum) Ottolenghi Plenty cookbook)
Pumpkin Pie (but with home made crust from PieMinster cookbook)
Glazed Carrots with Cider (Farmhouse Cookbook).
I am awfully excited, and our kitchen is going to get a proper workout! :)
* Dear god am I glad that Allan did that. After much adjustment, and quite a bit of swearing, it became apparent that our cunning idea of having a gentle slope on the worksurface, that was less than the gentle slope on the floor, wasn’t going to work. Unfortunately, this meant that the cabinet at the end needed to be raised a further 3cm (~1.2″!). This was beyond the capacity of its adjusty feet, and so Allan’s had to make a plinth to go under the plinth to adjust out the runout on the floor. Also, the walls are not straight and there was quite a lot of planing and sanding to get them in, despite being cut to fit.
** I bought it to do the bathroom in the old house. If you remember, that was tiled up to 4′ above the floor, and the entire shower section was tiled. It also did the entryway and the pantry.
