Well, I have officially re-entered my life, and as usual there is much to catch up on!
Work has been busy as usual, and I’m happy to announce they’ve extended my contract for another year, so I must be doing something right! Yay for job security! (ish).
I now have an EXTREMELY sexy new washing machine, that plays tunes when it’s done, and weighs your clothes to calculate how much water to use, and many other cool and groovy things. There was a slight snafu when I came to install it however….
You see, the thing is, there is always a sequence of events. Idiotic things rarely happen in a vacuum.
It all started when I called out my lovely handyman O at the weekend after I returned from Nairobi. It turns out while I was away, not only did the boiler break down and the washing machine died, but a door handle fell off, and the toilet seat broke, and a light bulb got stuck in the socket, and all sorts of other bits and bobs went wrong…
Technically, if I dedicated enough time and thought to the problems, I know I could have figured out how to do most things by myself, and I actually quite like a bit of DIY now and again, but it would have taken me all weekend, and I was tired, and everything was broken, and I know O could do it all in under 2 hours.
So he came round, and polyfilla’d the holes and re-drilled them so my door handle worked again, and he got out the broken lightbulb that was stuck in the ceiling, and he replaced my broken toilet seat, and fixed the wobbly bits, and found a website that might have replacement oven knobs and generally pootled about fixing things effortlessly and instantly.
And I did feel a tad silly paying someone to change a lightbulb for me, but whatever, I work hard, and can’t be superwoman around the house all the time (although my mother somehow manages to make it all look so easy….).
However, I did develop a rather sheepish feeling at my failure to Do It Myself, which inevitably caused the series of events that led to my latest pickle.
You see, my shiny new washing machine was delivered, but when they tried to install it, they discovered that when the old one died, it blew out the fuses in the socket. Meaning I had to go out and buy new fuses, and the delivery guys had to leave without putting the machine neatly away in the space where it lives.
Off I went full of grim determination to Do It Myself. as I’m not a helpless idiot.
New fuses purchased, plug fixed, smug Steph plugs everything in, it all works.
Smug Steph then attempts to heave the shiny new washing machine back into place by Doing It Herself. Smug Steph had watched O get the old one out, and reasoned that it couldn’t be all that hard.
Which is how I ended up calling my lovely handyman and begging him to come over and help, as I’d now got the shiny new machine completely stuck, wedged half into the space, and could no longer move it in or indeed back out again. It was properly stuck, jammed, wedged and immobile, and I felt even more sheepish than before.
I was beginning to wonder if I’d have to take the radiator off the wall…..
Luckily, dear O came to the rescue immediately, and made me feel much better by explaining why it got stuck (the new non-slip feet are designed to stop it rocking on the spin cycle by sticking to the floor like sucker-cups, which mean it doesn’t “slide” in like my old one did). O, being the resourceful handyman that he is, popped some bits of plastic bag under the suckers and got it in the space for us!
Here it is finally in it’s rightful place, all lit-up and sparkly!
Had we but world enough and time... 