New bits for bread machine

Over three years ago, I bought my current bread machine. And since then, it has baked a loaf for me almost every second day. That is over 500 loaves. That must show. And it does.

One thing that happened is that the anti-stick layer of the bread pan deteriorates over time. It gets harder to get the bread out. Another thing is that the bread pan is made of fairly thin aluminium, and when the machine is kneading dough, the dough is pushed strongly in one direction, which inevitably means that something is applying force the other direction. And by the looks of it, this slowly distorts the pan. Mine started out rectangular, but is now more a parallelogram. And I am sure this contributes to that it is getting increasingly difficult to get the bread out.

I didn't automatically assume you could buy them separate; I didn't even expect it. But it was worth having a little google to check. Lo and behold; you can! So I ordered a new bread pan and it soon arrived. It is a bit higher than the other one, but it does fit my machine. And it works! It is lovely and easy to get the bread out. I'll just have to adjust the settings; with identical settings, you get lighter bread with new pan.

The old and the new

Another issue is that the shaft that drives the kneading paddle is more or less the shape of a half circle. The pedal has a similarly shaped cut-out. Initially. But the shaft is clearly made of harder metal, and it is on a mission to erode the material of the paddle away until in the end, the half circle has turned into a circle. And then the whole machine doesn't work anymore.

The paddle with the hole for the shaft; the red line indicates the approximate initial bottom of said hole

I should have ordered them at the same time, but I wasn't quite switched on enough to do that. I ordered a new paddle separately. And a message it had been delivered arrived soon. But there was no sign of it! A bit like my initial cabinet door handles. What a nuisance. 

I don't know how this will pan out; I hope they will send me a replacement. But I think the paddle will last long enough to allow me to keep baking while this situation is being resolved; let's hope at least that will be the outcome. At least I have my pan!

I also hope is that the actual machine keeps functioning for a while. It would be sad if I had a new pan and a new paddle, and then the actual bread machine gives up the ghost! Let's hope not…

 

PS the paddle is found! It had been chucked through the window of the kitchen extension. I hadn't checked that. And now my bread machine is as good as new again!

Ceiling update

I was so distracted by all the other things that needed doing that I really neglected work on the ceiling. All the scars that the installers of the infrared panels had created were still there. In late winter and early spring they had at least stopped being holes, but they were still quite conspicuous. Focusing my attention on the kitchen wasn't helping that at all.

That changed when for the first time, a kitchen cabinet door didn't want to give up it plastic lining. When I pulled it off, with difficulty, little bits of MDF came with it. That stopped the originally very smooth surface from remain so smooth. All the doors I had done previously had given up their plastic without a fight, so they still very smooth. What to do? I was trying to give them all a comparable look.

I decided to make a bit of filler, and keep it quite liquid. I had done most of my other filler-related work with ready-made stuff, but I still had a remnant of filler in powder form lying around. And once you make that, you have to use it up. So after I had put a little skim on the damaged parts of the kitchen cabinet door, I used the rest on the ceiling. And that worked quite well.

I had another round like that, with another door that held on to its plastic. So that was two rounds of additional filler; by then the scars were becoming inconspicuous. And after some light sanding, you would hardly notice the scars were there!

Ghostlike outline of the biggest hole in the bedroom ceiling 

Spot the two small ones! 

After that I had run out of powder filler. And I figured it needed one last round of touching up; then I could to the final sanding, and potentially paint it. I already bought a new box. I am glad there is some progress in this work too!

Something happening with the collapsed wall

Readers with a good memory might remember that in February 2022, my neighbours’ wall collapsed. That was a pity! I suppose the big draw of that house was that it had generous decking right above the river. In summer, you can sit there and have a drink while taking in the amazing view. However; without a wall to hold up the decking, that is not a good idea. The decking was cut back to minimalist proportions. 

The neighbours had to have a wrangle with the insurance about who would pay for this. And then they needed to find someone who would actually do something about it. If you do that work, you have to do it right on the riverbank. There is no path going there. 

One day I noticed a cement mixer and some tonne bags by Alan’s (the neighbour) house. I was a bit surprised; would he really have such a big project on? But the day after I saw Gwawr, the other neighbour. She said she finally had found someone to do the work. It had started! That explained the equipment. She hoped the work wouldn’t cause disturbance for me. I had faith it wouldn’t. 

I later had a look and the work is showing progress! I’m glad something is finally being done. I have faith it will soon be as good as it was, or better. It’s not actually anything to do with me but I am clearly emotionally involved! 

Progress! 

Next kitchen cabinet gets makeover

I felt really good about having stripped and painted two of my kitchen cabinet doors, so my hands were itching to do it again. And the obvious next target would be the kitchen cabinet above the oven. Because of the heat of the oven, its veneer had suffered a bit. But my thinking had already evolved a bit from the initial attempt.

The first difference was the yellow paint. I had initially used some leftover paint I had used on the bathroom wall, and some wall/ceiling in the kitchen. But it was probably a good idea to use paint a bit more suited to this particular application. A bit more durable, and more easy to clean. I could still use the same colour.

The second difference was how I would go about it. I had painted the first two doors in situ. I had been a bit nervous about being able to hang them back afterwards. But Neil recommended I try it anyway. He figured it would be fine.

The third difference was the handle. I don't like the handles the kitchen came with. When I was at it anyway, I might just as well change them. I had a little Google and bought a few hand-wrought replacements. They were not the same size; I could only use one of the drill holes. I would have to drill an additional one, and fill up the redundant one. But that shouldn't be too much work.

With that in mind, my first step was to go back to B&Q, to have some paint mixed for the purpose. The next step was to take the cabinet out; I put it down in the conservatory. And this time I applied again two layers of primer, and three layers of white paint, but only one layer of the yellow paint. That would not be enough, but I figured I would wait with the second layer until I would replace the handle. Hopefully, painting the second coat over the filled-up hole would make that invisible.

My plan is to also put a layer of this new paint over the yellow paint of the first cabinets, but again I am going to wait until after I have fitted the new handles. I only bought three; I will see how I like them. I am painfully aware of the contrast between hand-wrought iron and MDF. They would undoubtedly look better on old oak! But it might work. I will have to see them fitted to know. If I am happy with my choice I will buy them for the remainder of the doors and drawers as well. 

If you don't stand too close to this last door you don't notice it is missing a coat of paint. It is helping making the kitchen look a lot better than it used to! I am quite excited about this whole project! Watch this space to see it develop...

Progress

No trace of damaged water pipe anymore

It has taken a long time, but the work is finished! I had already blogged about the electrician drilling into a water pipe, after which the whole pipe had to be extracted from the wall and replaced. That obviously left a big gaping hole in my wall. And the first step of doing something about that was packing it with wood. Then the work stalled. Then I filled the remaining depression up with filler. The next step was to sand the filler down, but it turned out the sandpaper I had wasn't up to it. But by now I have bought new (coarser) sandpaper, sanded it all down, touched up the paint, and then put the light switch back. And now you can't tell anymore that an emergency took place! You can still see a bit of a scar in the wall, but this wall is full of scars. It's just the nature of the wall. I'm happy with the result!

Trying to un-sag the kitchen cabinet doors

When I was working on the kitchen cabinets anyway, I decided I should really do something about the fact that several of them are sagging. I had tried to deal with it before, but with no success. But I had another look at a YouTube video about how to deal with a situation like that, and gave it another try. And this time I figure I made real improvements.

It is a bit of a dark art! But I am quite happy with how it has turned out. Maybe Neil will give me a hand making it even better. He is a perfectionist, after all. And more experienced with this sort of matter. But I am not in a hurry anymore. The way it is now something I can totally cope with!

Before

After

Giving two kitchen cabinets a new look

When I bought my house, the kitchen was in a relatively good shape. I turned most of the rest of the house into a building site. In the kitchen, I basically only did painting. It was not as if there was nothing else to do, but at least everything else functional. But I didn't like the fitted kitchen. The big gripe were the kitchen cabinet doors. They were basically made of MDF with a plastic liner over the top, in an ugly non-colour. And the handles were dull. And to make things worse; the plastic lining of the two cabinets underneath the sink had split. And there was minor damage to the lining of some other cabinets.

I have been dreaming of redoing the whole kitchen. But that is quite a thing! And I know that I don't have mainstream taste. I would really love to have it custom-made from reclaimed wood. Where do you find someone who can do that? And how expensive would it be? If I would try to do it myself, it would take forever.

I had also been dreaming of somehow getting the liner off, and then just painting what would come out from underneath. But I was worried that it would only be easy to remove the plastic where it was already coming off. And that you would end up with the edges refusing. A bit like trying to get a sticker off. It's hard to get the whole thing clean off! And if you don't, you've made the situation worse. 

The big change came when I saw online someone taking a heat gun to a cabinet just like that, and taking the plastic off without any effort. Would it really be that easy? It was worth finding out! It turned out that heat guns are actually quite inexpensive, and also not overly big. It was well worth trying.

After its inaugural task of getting my bicycle mirror fitted again, it was time to be deployed for what it was really bought for. I took off the handles cabinets to get ready.

The original state of the cabinets (except that I had already removed one handle)

It really was as easy as I had seen it online! Point that heat gun at the plastic and it comes off just like that. 

With the plastic off

I then had a rummage in the garage for some paint. I had thought about what colour I would do. The colours already there are white, yellow, and green. I first thought of green on the outside and yellow in the middle, but then I thought it might be a bit dark. Maybe yellow on the outside and white in the middle? But I first needed to put a coat of primer on anyway, so I had some time to think.

With primer

I had some indoor wood primer but it was old and quite lumpy. I put one layer on, which obviously wasn’t very tidy, and then I decided I probably should chuck that stuff away. And then improvised with some outdoor primer.

I had some white eggshell for the inside, but that turned out to have dried up. The yellow paint I had used elsewhere in the kitchen was still ok. So I painted the outsides, and bought some new white paint for the insides.

Finished! 

Two coats of yellow and three of white later, and the handles reinstated, and I could put my new design to the test. Would the paint be able to cope with the kitchen environment? If not, I might sand them down again, and buy some more hardy paint. Once I have decided I have something reasonably sustainable I might do all the other cabinet doors as well. I don't like any of them! I might even do a bit of green somewhere because I can. We'll see! But I am quite chuffed with that I don't have to look at these split sheets of plastic anymore. They were an eyesore!

Heat gun

I have a new toy! A heat gun, obviously. I bought it because I had seen a video of someone very easily stripping the plastic lining off the doors of cheap kitchen cabinets. And I have cheap, plastic-lined kitchen cabinets. And I had been thinking of getting the plastic off. But until I saw that video, I wasn't sure if that was feasible, and if so, how. 

New toy

The first task I made it do was not kitchen-related, though. Many months ago, Neil bought me a little present: a little rearview mirror for my bike. It is really handy! And it is mounted on some sort of ball-and-socket joint. So you can aim it precisely how you want it.

One day my bike fell over, onto the little mirror. It popped out of its joint. I didn't manage to push it back. And when I got home and tried it with less distraction, I still didn't manage. Neil couldn't do it either. I suppose the ball has to fit quite snugly into the socket for it all to work.

It came off

As the construction is made of plastic, I then tried heat. Surely that would make the plastic softer? (Yes I know, not all plastics work that way, but I suspected these would.) Maybe then I could fit the mirror over the ball socket? I dipped the little mirror in boiling water and then tried again. Still no success. 

But now I had a heat gun.

I laid the mirror reflective side down on my oven plate. And then aimed the heat gun at it. I had my oven glove nearby so I could pick the mirror up and try to whack it back over the ball socket when I thought it might be hot enough. Lo and behold, in two or three attempts I managed it! The mirror is back where it belongs! I already like this heat gun thing! And I barely got started…

DIY on days off

There was a lot of DIY left to do after the previous round. And with some days off, I got to do some of it. Some of it unspectacular; repairing clothes, for instance. And, of course, snazzying up the kitchen, and making the trophy shelf. But I also made progress on the erasing the damage done in order to put up my IR panels. And that felt good! You can’t tell anymore that there ever was a panel at the top of the stairs. 

No sign anymore of the mess the installer made

The big hole in the wall due to the installer drilling into a water pipe, which was a much bigger job, is slowly vanishing. In March I packed the big gully in the wall with wood. Now I have put two rounds of filler on top. 

I will have to now sand and paint it, so more work to do, but there is clear progress. Success! 

Hole filled! 

Giving the lawnmower some maintenance

I inherited my lawnmower from Rose. I have no idea how long she had it. It might have had quite some years under its belt. 

Sometimes I accidentally run it over a stone. That’s not good for it, obviously. The blade must be getting a bit of a battering. 

If my garden shears suffer a bit of wear and tear, I sharpen them. I had never done that with the lawnmower! I figured it was about time. But I figured the tools needed to be a bit clunkier. I got a file out. 

It’s not much work! I hope it made a difference. I will find out next time I use it. Which will probably be soon. It’s early summer and everything is growing like cabbage, including the grass! 

Fighting water wastage

There was water coming out of the asphalt of a little street around the corner. That's not good! This was happening on a dry day, so it didn't look like sewage seeping through. I suspected it was drinking water. So I contacted Welsh Water. Nothing happened for a while, but then I got a text. It thanked me for my message, and warned about that doing something about it might take a long time. It warned, for instance, that if a road closure would be necessary, it could take twelve weeks to obtain permission for that. I could imagine one was indeed needed.

Almost two weeks later I got another text. I was warned about potential low water pressure. I was sure it was related. And indeed: the next time I went to work I saw the road had been closed. (No months of permission seeking going on here!) Someone was already warning people about it. It's a tiny road, but it does lead to a school, so I can imagine closing it significantly affects the school run. People would have to approach that school from the other side.

And something was indeed happening! When I got home later that day there was a hole in the road surface. It looked like I had been right! And it had been a leaking water mains. I was glad I had contributed to stopping that.

The next day I left for work there was activity there, and when I got home the hole in the surface had already been filled. There had been nothing happening these few weeks in the beginning, but after that, the water company seemed to have been very much on the ball! That is great. For a country with so much rainfall we seem to have surprisingly many water shortages. And I think one should never take Drinkwater for granted. Letting it just leak through the road is not a good idea!

A leak?

Road closed, hole dug

The hole

Ecosystem saves the day

My 19-year-old little car (aka the Ecosystem) is not very glamorous, and admittedly not very well maintained. I sometimes am a bit negligent with maintenance, and sometimes that causes trouble (like here and here, although the latter was in a way because of maintenance, not a lack thereof). And I don't clean it very often on the inside, and never on the outside. One would think that all cars around it outperform it. Not necessarily so. 

When, after our cleaning spree, Neil  wanted to go home, his car was having none of that. It treated him like a burglar. It wouldn't let him in, and the alarm went off. And, quite eerily, there was strange thumping sound by the boot. 

He first wondered if the battery of his key fob might have been empty. But that wasn't it. A bit of googling got him in. More googling suggested maybe it was the car battery. If that was the problem, he should be able to jumpstart it. So I drove my little car as close as possible to his. He has jump leads.

It worked! My geriatric little car had enough power in the battery to jumpstart his engine. If the weather wouldn't have been so atrocious, maybe I would have taken a picture of the situation. Neil could drive home, where, just to be on the safe side, he charged the battery further using a plug-in charger. And the next day, everything was fine again.

We still have no idea at the time of writing what the scary thumping sound was. What on earth was that, and why would an empty battery cause it? I'm sure someone knows. Not me though. But I was proud that my little old car could revive his much, much newer, well-maintained and gleaming Ford! 

My charger, not Neil’s

More ceiling work

This is actually a summary of two weeks’ worth of work. I didn't get around to blogging about it after one week. And then these two weeks, a fair amount of progress has been made making the downstairs bedroom ceiling look like a ceiling again, and less like a building site. We're leaving the little hall by the front door for now, as in the long run I also want an electric shower fitted, and the plumbing and wiring for that might have to go through the ceiling as well. No use putting a lot of effort in a ceiling that will be destroyed in a few months’ time again!

This round was basically entirely done by Neil. I did other chores while he worked on the ceiling. I didn't want to get in his way, or compete with him for things such as pallet knives and filler. I'm not even sure what I did the first weekend when he attacked the ceiling, but the second weekend I attacked the big gap in the wall in the living room, where you looked right at the repaired water pipe in the wall. Neil had suggested I first pack it with food or plywood or something, and then put filler over the top. So I started doing that. And I got quite far with it!

There is still a heck of a lot of work to do, but it's nice to see progress. And the ceilings will never look the way they looked in the beginning, but I'm sure we'll get them looking acceptable in the end!

The big work in the bedroom

Small holes getting inconspicuous 

Gash in living room wall having been packed

Finally: bike maintenance

I tend to bring my bike in for maintenance quite often. I do many miles on it! This time I was a bit hesitant, as Neil had said he can actually do everything my bike repair man can. But would he actually want to do it when push came to shove? Or would he prefer to go on a hike? So I discussed it, and we agreed that probably I should just have it done professionally. So I phoned the repair shop.

The first time I did that they didn't answer. The second time, same thing. Oh dear! Was something be amiss? The third time he answered. And he explained that he was temporarily closed, for building reasons. Oh dear. I had already left it a bit late! But he booked it in for when the work was supposed to be finished.

Then I got a text. The work took longer than expected. He would have to postpone the booking. That happened twice. Two more weeks! But then I could finally bring it in.

James, the repair man, explained that the work actually hadn’t even been done. I wasn't sure why he had been closed then, but there must've been a reason for it. He said he was going to close again in August, hoping to get it done then. But at least I could give him my bike, and I was going to get it back with new brake pads, and possibly new cables, and probably a new chain, and all the things that tend to get done when I bring my bike in.

I got it back quicker than I thought. It looked impeccable again! And he hadn't even needed to do too much. I was wondering soon if he might have underestimated how much wrong with it; the gearing was a bit awful when I got back. Maybe the derailer should've been replaced after all? But at least it braked again like a new bike. And I'll probably have to bring it back before he closes in summer, as he didn't think the chain would last that long. And I'm not a bike snob, but the bike needs to be reasonably good to get me to work in an efficient way, and back!

As new!

Faffing with the stove

I hoped I had it sorted! After lots of frustrating gluing back of the fire rope that is supposed to seal the door and keep the fumes in, I bought a fire rope in a different shape and size. I glued it in position and hoped that it would stay put for a while. The original rope seemed a real mismatch! 

The new rope undeniably fit like a glove in the little gully on the inside of the door. But after using it a few times, it became clear it didn’t stick out enough. It wasn’t sealing! 

For the time being, I just swapped the doors of the two stoves around. The other stove had been sparingly used, and its original fire rope might stick for a bit. In the meantime, Neil (who has similar issues) bought some other sizes. Hopefully, one of them would fit! 

The first (and bigger) size was clearly too big. And by the time I found that out, the door with the original rope  started peeling. I had to glue it back to keep it going for a bit. 

Gluing the original rope back

The other door, with the too-thin rope in position, and the too-thick stuff for comparison…

The next step will be to try the smaller size. I hope that will do the job! Otherwise we might have to rip out the door and take it to a shop that sells all sizes to make sure we get it right. These doors are heavy! Or otherwise; just get used to doing a LOT of gluing…

Being inventive with sealant

I made some progress on the ceilings. I put two more backboards in. And the next step is to glue the repair patches into position. And that, obviously, requires an adhesive.

I had been wondering if I should buy something. But I've bought things like that before. I knew I had several tubes in stock; some of them already partially used up. So I decided I should just try to use them again. But it had been a while since I had used them. Would they have dried out by now? And they are tubes; the adhesive comes out of the nozzle, but the nozzle, of course, gets clogged up quite quickly after use.

I first looked at the material I had used for repairing my render. The nozzle was surely clogged up, but there was a complication: this nozzle didn't look removable. And you can always cut it off, but that is a bit drastic. I had a look at the other tube of which I wasn't quite sure what I had used it for; maybe making the conservatory waterproof? Or for (re-)sticking antislip to my garden stairs? 

That nozzle was also clogged up. I took it off, and pushed something through the bung underneath it. There was clearly some material underneath it that wasn't dried out yet. But I didn't see a way of pushing it out. And then I decided to just cut off the entire top. It was either taking drastic measures or having to throw all of it away! And I got rid of the bung. 

I used a little spatula to get to the usable material. I think it worked! I'm glad I could save this compromise tube of sealant. I had nothing to lose! I always like salvaging things through slightly unorthodox methods. And so far it looks like it worked.. 

More cat developments

Cats like sharpening their claws, and mine is no exception. She has a scratch post in the downstairs bedroom, which I have already had to refurbish several times. And in the living room, I just wrapped rope around the banister of the stairs: instant scratch post! She really likes both. And I had never refurbished the one in the living room (quite unlike the other one). But I decided it was time.

Before

It's actually made up of two bits of rope; the lower and initial one, which is sisal as I know it, and the upper one, which is a later addition, which I think is jute. I tried to have both the same, but the shop just didn't have sisal in stock. 

It is almost exclusively the lower rope she uses. So when that was pretty much worn through, I decided I might just as well move the other one down. So I did.

After

I hope she likes this rope as much as she did the other one. She has already used it! And it might be a bit more hard-wearing. If she doesn't like it, I might have to just find an alternative use for this rope, and get some sisal when I can get it. Time will tell! 

Starting on ceiling repair

When the workmen started to put in the second round of panels in August, they had to put the wires somewhere. The logical place is in the ceiling, but that means having to get into it. This involves a lot of making holes in the plasterboard. Some small ones, where they just made a hole and left it; or big ones, where they basically cut a part of the ceiling into bits, and sort of stuck them back in more or less the same position when they were done. Both is not very pretty, and needs to be sorted.

Now that they are done it is up to me to sort out the damage. I have never really dealt with this before! I started out with a little instruction video on YouTube. The obvious place to start! And it spoke of backboards and joint tape and all sorts of things. I was learning.

I have now tentatively started. I ordered some repair patches. Plasterboard normally comes in enormous sheets, but of course there are people who take leftovers and sell them on eBay. Suits me fine.

I just started by tracing the outlines of the holes on paper, so I would be able to transpose that onto the plasterboard, and cut out (sub-)patches of the right shape and size. I also started to think about the backboards. The idea is that if you have a hole in your plasterboard, you make sure that you fix something above the hole, and you stick the repair patch to that. That's the backboard. That might be substantial if the hole is big. With small holes you might not need it; maybe the filler you need for putting it in place will just hold it in position.

I didn’t take chances. I screwed some small pieces of wood into the first small holes, and cut a beam to size for a big hole. I didn’t have screws long enough to put it there, though. I will need to buy these. 

I didn’t get very far. But there is a start! That is always the hardest part. It will take a while, but I have faith I will get there. I don’t know how seamless (or otherwise) it will look in the end, but I’m sure I’ll manage to improve it from what it is now! 

Preparatory artwork

Two small holes in the bedroom

Mini backboards fitted

A big hole that needs a big backboard

Infrared panels finished

It is finished! It is mid-January but it’s done. The previous time the electrician had left with two issues unsolved: several panels without a thermostat because they hadn't brought compatible ones, and a hole in the wall because he had hit a water pipe.

When he showed up again to finish it off, I was surprised to see him and a colleague carry large boxes out of his van. These thermostats aren't very big? But he quickly explained: they were not going to install compatible thermostats; they were going to exchange the installed panels with panels that were compatible with the thermostats they had used so far. That sounded like an unnecessarily labour-intensive way to go about it, but so be it. It did mean more time, more mess, more disruption, more annoyance by the cat.

I got to work upstairs and they sorted things out downstairs. But at some point he wanted to know where I wanted to thermostats. I like them near the light switch. All the controls for a room in one place! And we figured from the light switch, the cable would go up. So we put the thermostats below it. That we had miscalculated. And the man still didn't have the device that detects metal wiring in a wall, so he chanced it. And tripped the fuse. 

The latest problem

He had to drive to Bangor to buy what he needed to fix the damage. But when that was done, he was sorted. He suggested we fix the last thermostat with double-sided tape. Fine with me! And the hole in the wall was not something he could do anything about; he was an electrician. They would have to send a plasterer.

I agreed with the company that they would just take some money off the bill and then I will sort out a plasterer myself. So that's it! I now have a full set of infrared panels! And they work. I did have to bicker with the company about the bill; I suspected they had lost track of what they had actually installed. So I wanted an itemised bill. They were reluctant, but I was right to be stubborn about that; it turned out they were trying to make me pay for the installation of two panels that had been installed in 2022. Cheeky! 

I now don't have to deal with this company anymore. I must say it has been a bit of a struggle! But now I can just enjoy my panels in peace. At last!

Light switch in hallway back in business

Infrared panels are often best placed on the ceiling. Unfortunately, the same holds for lamps. So when I decided to have my whole house fitted out with infrared panels, several ceiling lamps had to yield. I had agreed with the company putting up the panels that they would move some of these lights; this is not a big job if you're an electrician, but it is if you're someone like me.

The problem was a bit that the process took many months longer than expected, and lights are actually quite a good idea. In the master bedroom, the ceiling lamp was moved to the side, which basically means that only half the room now has adequate light. In the little space behind the front door, there was no light whatsoever, so I put a standing lamp there. That was not ideal.

On a day with rubbish weather and Neil and I decided to act. Or rather; he acted and I watched and learned. I could not make sense of the wiring the electricians had left by the front door, but Neil could work it out with some of the equipment he has. And then he just fitted a wall mounted lamp I had bought for the occasion. It is absolutely lovely to have proper light there again!

We also considered the options for the master bedroom. For symmetry, it would be best to just buy another lamp like the one that has been moved. We checked how we would connect the wires, though; that doesn't seem to work. The wires would have to go through the ceiling, but the joists seem to have a crossbar and there's no way you could get past that. So I'll just put up another wall mounted lamp. The same model as the one in the hallway, but in a colour that matches the bedroom. Progress is being made!

 

Light! Next to my infrared panel.