Pompadour

Wednesday 24 February 2010

Sparks fly

I should have known yesterday was going too well.
Last night I had a call from the electrician to say that he would be around this morning to sort out our electrics. The old electrics in this house are a mess, and as we have been renovating one end of the house, Neil has been putting all the wires in place to be connected, but in the meantime we have been using a shocking (no pun intended ) old system of wires.
In my excitement to clear paths to all the sockets last night (previous comments about clutter come back to haunt me), I knocked a plastic box against one of the old wires, there was a spark and the part of the house I am using was plunged into darkness.
I called Neil in the UK and asked where it may have tripped and what I could do about it. In the cellar was the reply.
Unfortunately we have now replaced the hatch to the cellar with a concrete floor so the cellar is only accessible by a ground level window at the back of the house. Needless to say it was pouring with rain and I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for.
Lack of power here means lack of modem, which means lack of phone, so I was unable to call anyone to help although I wasn’t keen to as it was ten oclock at night.
I decided to just flick the main power off to disable it completely so we would at least be safe for the night and so with nothing else to do I went to bed, climbing up the ladder in pitch darkness with only a silly wind up torch to guide me.

So this morning I have my trusty le cruset kettle on the woodburner and I am writing this on battery power on the computer waiting for the electrician to come and save me.
I am only hoping his plans haven’t changed, as he couldn’t let me know even if he wanted to……..

He's here now, power is on, house is safe. Stop worrying mother!!

6 comments:

  1. It all comes back to me...the insistent cry of Mr. Fly...'It's working, whatever you do, don't touch anything...'

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  2. Oo-er. Sounds rather a challenging scenario to say the least. Mightily relieved your electrician turned up and put things right. Top marks for not panicking in the face of adversity.

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  3. Good, glad the electrician's sorted it! Our village house is in much the same state, with the old wiring being a complete hotch-potch of every sort and thickness of wire imagineable.

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  4. What wiring! We have coils of extension leads running everywhere, running off the mains box which is out by the gatehouse and if it rains very hard and gets wet, then the whole lot trips out. Ah the joys of renovating! But going up that ladder in the dark! Wow! I bet you hung on for dear life! And what is most remarkable is that you kept your humour! I find that keeping humour on board is a must...better to have laughter lines than furrows of worry.

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  5. Hopefully the whole point of writing this blog is that one day, and it could be some time away, I will be able to look back on this renovation and laugh at all the (hopefull) triumphs over adversities!!! By that time though I think all the laughter lines and worry lines will have met and I will just look like a ancient old crone!!!!

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  6. Top Blogging Roz. Makes me feel like our tribulations in France are ten steps removed from your more immediate concerns!

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