So I need to not comment on how often I'm updating. Mainly because I end up updating again.
Five updates in four days is a bit overkill, and I would have just updated today's earlier entry with this, but as the day went on I thought it a good idea to keep putting this update off until I know the full extent of the er... bad luck? I don't suppose it's particularly bad luck as such, but more things happening that would have been better not happening.
First, there has been gurgling in the sink for the last couple of days. Then just after our wonderfully wet rain that we had between 2pm and 4pm (seriously, it was like the lake district had decided to take a holiday in SE London by way of a parachute drop). Anyway, these gurgling noises got worse and then the rain buggered off, and the gurgling stopped. Then at 5 I realised I had to do something about the dinner (Chicken chasseur, which will be important later - and was very tasty!) so I went and washed my hands and set to it. Daddy called me in and we had a discussion about me having just caused gurgling by washing my hands. I headed round the shed to put a wash in (Help, domestic hell! I promise, it gets more interesting) after sticking the dinner in the oven and found three inches (or so) of standing water in what's supposed to be a drain. I told Daddy, and after some discussion we decided we must investigate the two drain covers that we have on our property. Unfortuately that required a couple of screwdrivers and some heavy lifting on my part, and some standing water and nasty smells on the part of the drains. So we've called the big guns in. Or at least, we've called Thames water - who hope they're the big guns, since nobody else would help us. Of course, these things never happen on their own, so not only do we have a blocked drain problem (no doubt caused by previously mentioned extra-wet rain), I was turning the chicken over in the chasseur (I told you that'd come up again) and unfortunately splashed a large amount of gravy. The gravy that had been in the oven (with the chicken) for an hour. The gravy that was unfortunately rather thick and therefore clingy. Where did the splash land? On my wrist - naturally. I rushed to the sink, and cleaned off with very cold water (causing palpitations fo my father no doubt because I was adding to the standing water) and yelled a bit. It still hurts a bit, but there's no serious discolouration and it hasn't blistered or anything so I think my wrist will be ok.
We're still waiting for the Thames water people. Nope, actually they've just know knocked on the door. Hopefully this young man (who looks about 14, although I'm no judge these days, he's probably 20 or so) will be able to clear the drains and make it so that the gurgling noise is history. He made it in three hours - which is quite impressive since they quoted six. *crosses fingers* He says it needs cleaning, but other than that it's fine, it's just that the drain was all plugged up. We're laying the blame squarely at our next door neighbours door, because this has happened twice in the last three or four years, and never before, and they moved in four years ago. I don't know what we're going to do about that however, because we don't reckon that they actually noticed that the drains were blocked, and therefore even if we tell them they'll probably not believe us. All I can say is YUCK.
Hum. So today should really have been Friday (what with Friday being the thirteenth and all), and we're just waiting for the other shoe to drop, in the sense that bad things come in threes and we've only had two. *touches wood about a thousand times just to be sure*
First, there has been gurgling in the sink for the last couple of days. Then just after our wonderfully wet rain that we had between 2pm and 4pm (seriously, it was like the lake district had decided to take a holiday in SE London by way of a parachute drop). Anyway, these gurgling noises got worse and then the rain buggered off, and the gurgling stopped. Then at 5 I realised I had to do something about the dinner (Chicken chasseur, which will be important later - and was very tasty!) so I went and washed my hands and set to it. Daddy called me in and we had a discussion about me having just caused gurgling by washing my hands. I headed round the shed to put a wash in (Help, domestic hell! I promise, it gets more interesting) after sticking the dinner in the oven and found three inches (or so) of standing water in what's supposed to be a drain. I told Daddy, and after some discussion we decided we must investigate the two drain covers that we have on our property. Unfortuately that required a couple of screwdrivers and some heavy lifting on my part, and some standing water and nasty smells on the part of the drains. So we've called the big guns in. Or at least, we've called Thames water - who hope they're the big guns, since nobody else would help us. Of course, these things never happen on their own, so not only do we have a blocked drain problem (no doubt caused by previously mentioned extra-wet rain), I was turning the chicken over in the chasseur (I told you that'd come up again) and unfortunately splashed a large amount of gravy. The gravy that had been in the oven (with the chicken) for an hour. The gravy that was unfortunately rather thick and therefore clingy. Where did the splash land? On my wrist - naturally. I rushed to the sink, and cleaned off with very cold water (causing palpitations fo my father no doubt because I was adding to the standing water) and yelled a bit. It still hurts a bit, but there's no serious discolouration and it hasn't blistered or anything so I think my wrist will be ok.
We're still waiting for the Thames water people. Nope, actually they've just know knocked on the door. Hopefully this young man (who looks about 14, although I'm no judge these days, he's probably 20 or so) will be able to clear the drains and make it so that the gurgling noise is history. He made it in three hours - which is quite impressive since they quoted six. *crosses fingers* He says it needs cleaning, but other than that it's fine, it's just that the drain was all plugged up. We're laying the blame squarely at our next door neighbours door, because this has happened twice in the last three or four years, and never before, and they moved in four years ago. I don't know what we're going to do about that however, because we don't reckon that they actually noticed that the drains were blocked, and therefore even if we tell them they'll probably not believe us. All I can say is YUCK.
Hum. So today should really have been Friday (what with Friday being the thirteenth and all), and we're just waiting for the other shoe to drop, in the sense that bad things come in threes and we've only had two. *touches wood about a thousand times just to be sure*