Still here

A momentous post this: first blog post done from our cottage.  We have broadband now, thanks to a community DIY broadband project (none of the big companies had any interest in cabling our out of the way little village, it seems) and that means laptops at the weekends.  In some ways I am sad about this as I kind of liked the freedom from technology but there is no getting away from the fact that it is handy.  Being able to check the tide tables for Holy Island before you set out for the causeway is useful, for example.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that anyone out there was still aware of my existence so, in the spirit of public service, your questions are answered as follows:

Cassi:  I don't drive that car much in Edinburgh.  We tend to save it for the long drive down to the Borders at weekends, stacked full of people and stuff.  I am terrified that I might scratch it if I have to drive in traffic!  As far as your remodelling project goes, can you tell me your scary story next year?  Around February/March maybe when it will be less likely to make me crawl trembling into a cupboard to hide?

Jen:  Yes, the late tree was indeed a culinary bay (didn't know those were called bay laurel - see what you learn on the internet?).  It is now in the bottom of a skip under most of the rest of our garden.  Which now looks, after days 2 and 3, like this:

 And this:

Bellus is not impressed.  There used to be foliage here where he could hide before leaping out to terrorise the local wildlife.  He is expressing his displeasure by tracking mud all over the kitchen cupboards.  And the top of the washing machine.  And the fridge.

To cheer you up after the photo of sulking cat, I give you a sample of the kind of e-mail my husband gets all the time.  Today's best example:   

Am Engr william philip.I hail from lancaster UK,I attended oxford university,where i studied marine engineering,Am 47 years old single and work as a marine engineer in the submarine section. Am elegant,vibrant,vigorous and full of life I was opporturned to glance through your page and personnality profle.You seem to be the woman of my choice.You scarlet lips,ebong hair,well biult physique charming face,sedycing eyes are of great intersest to me.In fact,your entirety commands my variety of interest

Funny, he comments on Husband's scarlet lips and ebong hair and entirely fails to mention the beard.  

I am probably the only one reading this

Well, I sort of lost the habit of posting for a while there.  Gentle and not-so-gentle hints from the family did little to prompt me back to Blogger (which has been changed again since I last looked, dammit).  However, here I am, back recording the scintillating goings-on at Schloss Loth and I have been prodded into doing so by the latest development here.  More of that shortly.

For the sake of completeness, I should note that there has been a fair amount going on here over the summer.  We bought a new car for the express purpose of trogging up and down to the Borders.  This is it.  It is red and shiny and we love it a lot.  The cat loves it too:  when it is parked outside our house, he can sit upright underneath it and survey his domain in the dry.

 We went on holiday to France (I will show you some pictures some time if you like and if I can be bothered to upload them).  This was quite a success too as we ate a lot of very nice French food and Second Born got to speak French "in the wild".  We had dinner out one evening in a lovely restaurant where the staff did not speak English and SB sufficiently charmed Madame running the place that she gave him "20/20" for his French and kept telling him how wonderful he was.  SB coped with the adulation admirably.

But the main thing that has prompted me to recall my password for Blogger is The Great Chateau Loth Project 2012.  We have decided to extend our little house a bit to make room for (a) visitors to stay overnight if they wish, particularly my Mum and Dad, and (2) FB and SB to watch endless episodes of The Big Bang Theory without Husband's head exploding.  We are also, for we are gluttons for punishment, going to knock through the wall between our kitchen and dining room and re-do the whole room. 

I quite fancied having some sort of record of what the house was like before and after all this work and the blog here seemed to be a good place to do it.  So with that in mind, here are the Before Pictures of the back garden before the builders get their hands on it:

That tree in the middle is my very overgrown bay tree.  I shall be sorry to see it go but it has got a bit out of control.

Note the cat trying to escape before I snatch a photo of him. The new room is going right where Bellus is standing - it will be accessed from that door beside our wheely bins.

My clothes dryer (or whirlyjig as we call them here) seemed to sense its days were numbered and committed suicide a few days ago.  All 3 of its arms now point in the same direction, which makes it pretty useless as a clothes-drying apparatus.  It looks a bit like a dead daddy-long-legs.

 And now, we come to today, which is the first day on site for the builders.  Our garden path has shrunk somewhat and our doorstep has gone.  Bellus is not terribly impressed so far.  Much further for him to go in order to clamber elegantly through the catflap

It's like we are deliberately trying to piss off the cat.

I plan to document the progress of the works (perhaps not on a daily basis, for I am not that diligent, as you know) and I may even recruit anyone reading this to give their opinion on decisions still to be made.  For example, we have already bought the new kitchen units but will need to decide on flooring for the new kitchen/diner.  We are thinking tiled floor.  What do you reckon?

If I can summon up the courage, I will photograph the inside of the kitchen before work starts.  It's not pretty.

For excuses, see below

I have not posted for a while but in my defence, things have been a wee bit hectic around here recently.  Lots and lots of stuff is happening, most of it good, some of it less so:

Good Stuff That Has Happened Recently

• We had a wonderful time at the village fair last weekend.  There was a dog show as part of it (Waggiest Tail, Cutest Veteran, Dog that looks most like its owner, that sort of thing) which meant there were lots of dogs about.  Second Born was in heaven as a result and ended up offering an informal dog creche.  Anyone who expressed the view that they would go into the village hall for a cup of tea were it not for their dog found, as if by magic, a small boy at their elbow offering to dog-sit.  He was ecstatic.  The fair organisers are thinking of making it an official service next year.
• On the day after the village fair, the population of the village (or at least the interesting part of the population who could be bothered) turned out for a communal photograph to commemorate the Jubilee.  We all squashed together in front of the village hall and grinned like idiots.  Oh, and lots of people had their dogs with them.  This time, Second Born managed to wangle an invite to someone's house to collect their dogs.
•  After the photo session, the residents of our little row of cottages had an impromptu street party.  It is, after all, our street, and we can close it whenever we like!  We hauled various tables outside, scoured our cupboards for suitable edibles and hung up bunting and union flags scavenged from the village fair.  It was great fun.  There was an inter-cottage egg and spoon race, which metamorphosed into an inter-cottage cherry tomato and spoon, pickled beetroot and spoon and pickled onion and spoon race.  The pickled onion won.  Flatter bottom on a pickled onion, you see.  Better adhesion to the spoon.
• We were awakened at the cottage one morning by a swallow which flew in the gap in the open window looking for likely nesting spots and got confused by the curtains.  This started out as a Bad Thing, but turned out a Good Thing as we managed to catch it and release it completely unharmed, getting a really good close-up look at it in the process.  It seemed entirely unfazed by the experience.
• Our new shower room has been fitted!  Mostly.
• Second Born won a Silver Award in the Scottish Mathematical Challenge (I know, it's like he's not our child) and got to go to a cool awards ceremony to pick up his certificate.  I got to go and watch him and beam proudly.
• We bought a new car on the internet.  (This is what happens when you combine boredom, broadband and a credit card)
• We decided we enjoyed having the garden full of builders' rubble so much that we are going to knock down an internal wall in our house later this year.  Gluttons for punishment.

Not So Good Stuff That Has Happened Recently

• Our plumber succumbed to an attack of gout part way through our shower refit and could not work for over a week.  Meanwhile, the remains of the old shower room sat in our front garden with the grass growing round them.  Grass is now about a foot high and we still have a toilet in front of our living room window.  Neighbours are stopping and staring as they pass our house, clearly wondering when the Clampetts moved in.  
• Plumber's mate did a wee spot of grouting on his own, accidentally dislodged a valve on a radiator before he left and we returned from the Jubilee weekend at 8pm on Sunday evening to find evil black water dripping  through our living room ceiling onto our carpet and furniture.  
• Second Born's Silver Maths Award certificate was on the table under the leak and is pretty much ruined.  He was quite upset.  (I have contacted the organisers to try to get a replacement.)
• We now have to find time to accommodate a decorator to fix the ceiling and a carpet cleaner before Saturday when we have a Taiwanese exchange student coming to stay for a week.  No pressure, then.
• Shower refit is still not finished.  The toilet does not flush (pretty essential function, in my opinion) and the pump for the shower can't be fitted yet because the plumbing for same is not where we thought it was and we are going to have to have a hatch cut in an adjoining wall to access the necessary area.  (Not doing that until after exchange student has left.) 
• The cat is thoroughly enjoying the wilderness of long grass in our back garden caused by the short burst of hot weather followed by a more normal extended period of rain.  This is not a good thing because it makes it easier to stalk small creatures and then bring them in to dismantle them on our kitchen floor.
• I have a cold, kindly donated by First Born who likes to share these things.  This is why I am blogging at 4.30am.  I cannot lie down without my head filling up with gunk. 

Off now to make more tea.

Oh dear.

I think Dolores is having a bad day.

Random weekend stuff

I have absolutely no coherent train of thought to share with you today.  The strain of juggling the complex morning routine made necessary by 4 people sharing one bathroom (and one of said people having VERY strong views upon the timing of morning activities) has left little brain power to spare.  So all I have is photos and random musings.

This cairn was built by my husband and Second Born, by the beach near Lindisfarne Castle on Holy Island.  I thought it was really rather cool  - it looks like it is about to waddle off into the distance as soon as our backs are turned.  Other people also thought it rather splendid - a father was spotted photographing his sons through the "legs" as we left in search of lunch.  It took all of our self control not to run back and shout "We made that!!!"

This is the light fitting in our living room at The Corbies.  I have absolutely no reason for showing you this, other than that I really like it.  The individual shades look like medieval bronze Cornettos.

This sign I spotted on the door of a cubicle in a public toilet.  The toilet in question was  in the bar of quite a nice hotel where we stopped for lunch on the drive up to Skye a couple of months ago.  I took a photo because I was puzzled:  Who takes their used teabags with them into a hotel public toilet to dispose of them?  And why?

And that, as we say in Scotland, is me for now.

Oh the horror

We have an interesting take on garden design going on at the moment.  Our front garden currently contains grass (in dire need of a good mowing), a half-alive and half-dead hedge, some very confused daffodils who currently think it is autumn 2013 and a toilet.  And a sink.  And some bits of shower cabinet.  In fact, practically everything that used to constitute our en suite shower room is now in our garden.  Very classy it looks, too.  We should really take the wheels off our W reg Astra and stick it up on bricks, just to complete the effect.  (There is in fact actual moss happily growing on the window seals of the Astra which makes it a garden feature already in my book.)

Thankfully, Fraser The Gentleman Plumber and his trusty sidekick are working hard to instal a shiny new shower room for us and that should be ready in about, ooh, two weeks or so.  But in the meantime? 

We are having to share a bathroom with the boys. 

*shudder*

(And yes, I know, being reduced to one bathroom between four can hardly be called a hardship.  Nonetheless, there is no getting away from the fact that, much as I love my children, I can't wait to not have to share showering facilities with them.  Doubtless they feel the same, judging by the eye-rolling going on every time I point out that the cardboard centres of toilet rolls do not climb into bins unassisted.)

Hurrah!

Delighted to see Laura being fired from The Apprentice tonight.  She uses "myself" when she means "me" and she repeatedly talks about "working smart".  Both capital offences in my book.