Christmas is over, so it’s back to the grind. We’d like to get the chaufferie floor tiled before the heating man comes back to install the stuff in there, so it had to be emptied. As they will live upstairs, the obvious place to put the cooker and fridge, weighing 130 and 150kg respectively, is upstairs, but we don’t have stairs at the moment. So Nick and Kieran rigged up a system to move them, using ladders, ratchet straps and a lot of brute strength, with me to position the wedges. It was a relief when we’d finished; now they’ve done the chape on the floor, when it’s dry we can tile it.

At the gite owned by the cycle club, they’re putting up an extension, but to keep costs down, club members are helping. Nick was asked to help Richard hang a door today; he said he wouldn’t be long, but………..  2 hours later, he returned, delighted to have discovered that Richard, a retired menuisier (carpenter), has a massive workshop, with huge planers, band saws and all the other boys’ toys that Nick hankers after. I suspect he might be going round there to play quite often.