Throne Woes
Well, guess who broke the toilet?
After lunch, I nipped out to the bog for a much-needed pee, flushed the loo and... something went CLANG and the handle went limp, and resolutely refused to return to its pre-flush position. I guess I knew it was only a matter of time: our water is quite 'hard' here, and the toilet handle was starting to get a bit crufty with limescale - we've been favouring it a little when we flush for a while now. Shamefaced, I shambled back to the lounge to tell Steen what had happened, and left our landlord a plea for assistance. There's little in this world more onerous than being throne-less, after all... :-)
Setting aside our chosen afternoon's viewing (Guy Ritchie's take on Sherlock Holmes), we decided we'd best clear up a bit before our landlord arrived, so there much washing-up and deck-clearing for half an hour or so before our landlord arrived, toolbag in hand, to restore our throne to proper working order. Bless his adjustable spanner, a new throne handle was fitted within minutes and order was restored. Much to our delight, our landlord then offered to look at the malfunctioning taps in the bathroom and kitchen whilst he was around, which was most welcome, especially since we'd complained about the taps already during his last visit back in the summer to deal with our chimney/bird interface problem. The cold tap in the bathroom had seized up altogether (there's that limescale again), and the hot tap in the kitchen had a bit of a washer problem - you had to turn it on and twiddle it a fair bit before any water issued forth. After examining the problem faucets for a little while, he decided that he didn't have the parts to hand that would fit the taps (naturally, as with everything else at Hippy Towers, our taps are a non-standard size), but promised that he would be back tomorrow with the parts to effect repairs.
All in all, a profitable visit - and it's nice to think that my inadvertent throne abuse had some side-benefits, and that we now have a fully-functioning throne in readiness for the festive period, when the throne is always given a particularly tough work-out... ;-)
We've just finished watching Sherlock Holmes (not bad, really: one of those films where you can turn your brain off and enjoy the ride, though props to Robert Downley Jr. for making Holmes a believable and likeable character - not like the emotionless laudanum-casualty that seemingly every other TV series/film has presented him as), and now it's time to get out the Open University literature and finish my first assignment for my current course.
After lunch, I nipped out to the bog for a much-needed pee, flushed the loo and... something went CLANG and the handle went limp, and resolutely refused to return to its pre-flush position. I guess I knew it was only a matter of time: our water is quite 'hard' here, and the toilet handle was starting to get a bit crufty with limescale - we've been favouring it a little when we flush for a while now. Shamefaced, I shambled back to the lounge to tell Steen what had happened, and left our landlord a plea for assistance. There's little in this world more onerous than being throne-less, after all... :-)
Setting aside our chosen afternoon's viewing (Guy Ritchie's take on Sherlock Holmes), we decided we'd best clear up a bit before our landlord arrived, so there much washing-up and deck-clearing for half an hour or so before our landlord arrived, toolbag in hand, to restore our throne to proper working order. Bless his adjustable spanner, a new throne handle was fitted within minutes and order was restored. Much to our delight, our landlord then offered to look at the malfunctioning taps in the bathroom and kitchen whilst he was around, which was most welcome, especially since we'd complained about the taps already during his last visit back in the summer to deal with our chimney/bird interface problem. The cold tap in the bathroom had seized up altogether (there's that limescale again), and the hot tap in the kitchen had a bit of a washer problem - you had to turn it on and twiddle it a fair bit before any water issued forth. After examining the problem faucets for a little while, he decided that he didn't have the parts to hand that would fit the taps (naturally, as with everything else at Hippy Towers, our taps are a non-standard size), but promised that he would be back tomorrow with the parts to effect repairs.
All in all, a profitable visit - and it's nice to think that my inadvertent throne abuse had some side-benefits, and that we now have a fully-functioning throne in readiness for the festive period, when the throne is always given a particularly tough work-out... ;-)
We've just finished watching Sherlock Holmes (not bad, really: one of those films where you can turn your brain off and enjoy the ride, though props to Robert Downley Jr. for making Holmes a believable and likeable character - not like the emotionless laudanum-casualty that seemingly every other TV series/film has presented him as), and now it's time to get out the Open University literature and finish my first assignment for my current course.