Almost time for a rest!!

Now then hommes and hommesses (a bit of French to kick off this week.) Back in the hot seat again after Mrs D stepped in last week for her take on the DIY, damn good it was too!!

With my stint in the unmentionable (bathroom, sorry said it) now over I have managed to escape outside to sit on the decking with the old feet up. Well not quite as I managed to engage Mrs D in some concrete mixing duties whilst we concreted the area to the side of the decking prior to fitting some proper steps. The old ones, carefully constructed by Mrs D (see blog Feb 5th 2009) are now past their best and have been demolished. I fell down them once and tripped up them a couple of times but without too much injury.

Concreting done, Mrs D on painting the unmentionable above, I am left with knocking up some wooden steps and a bit of rendering then Reg will be here on Friday!! Wow is it September already, so much for our break over on the mainland. Oh well hopefully there will be another year.

Regs' arrival signals the start of a stream of visitors through September and into October. This means we get a rest and chance to play host and show folks around this lovely island. We have a few chores lined up for some of our guests, nothing too strenuous though.

Time wise we have almost done a year out here, give or take a few weeks break in the UK. We have thoroughly enjoyed it and love the very easy lifestyle out here. At first it took a bit of getting used to the culture, the shopping and the way things are done out here. The house has changed so much in the last twelve months and yet there is still so much we want to do to make it better. It feels more comfortable and like a home now than it did last November. Of course the unmentionable is the shining star in the place but the old one and separate toilet were not good at all. Mrs D has been very patient with my swearing, throwing of implements and other such antics when things were not going so good. I don't think this happened too often.

Next few weeks, in between guests we are going to get out and about a bit more. Deservedly so say I, after the weeks and weeks of bathroom entrapment!! There is still so much to see and do here as we have only scratched the surface.

We still manage to do early doors at the local in Sidari - this is a ritual just like at home in England, you've just got to do it!! They don't serve any Tims here but the old Mythos grows on you over time.

The veg garden continues to flourish with cucumbers, toms and beetroot all on their way. Another feather in Mrs D's cap of many tasks!

Talking of which, Id best sign off now and see how the painting of the boiler cupboard in the unmentionable is getting on. Mrs D and paint and varnish brushes on the loose really should carry government health warnings....bye y'all for now and see some of you soon.

The shower is now in the building........

I thought it was about time y'all got the female view point so while 'himself' puts the finishing touches to our re-built bathroom and before we open our chilled champagne, here are a few words. There's no doubt about it, the renovation of the bathroom has been a mammoth task. The grandiose array of laboring tasks assigned to me is worthy of note: get me a bucket of water; sweep/mop this floor; can I have an orange & lemonade drink; hold this door open for me; can you get me a new bag of cement please; hold this piece of wood while I saw it; stand on the end of this tile while I use the angle-grinder on it; you can paint this ceiling now; is it lunch-time yet ? ........... to name but a small few. Actually it has been very hard work, obviously exacerbated by the heat - sweat has quite literally dripped from our faces onto the floor - but I realise I cant expect any sympathy on that front! The tiling was a much harder job than I had expected but I did have a go. As to the grouting, well I was going to have a go at that but I was told, and I quote, "Well you can have a go but the job has to be done properly" In other words, just stick to your laboring duties - so I did. The only remaining job, apart from getting a new shower curtain, is for the boiler to be boxed in for tidiness and I dont think that will present much of a challenge to Mr 'No job too big'. Anyway I think that the bathroom is now just a wonderful room and I plan to move in there - I just hope Mr D thinks it has all been worth it - and I refer here to the swearing, the sweating, the bruised body parts, the aching back, the stiff joints, the eyes & lungs full dust and cement powder etc etc. He was certainly enthusiastic about actually being able to take a shower in the house last night so something was right. We may keep the outdoor one in place just for fun and to remind us of desperate remedies.

The next blog will not mention the bathroom (!) but there are photos and a video attached here so you can do a before/after comparison. This chapter of the house re-vamp is now closed ...........

Lazy, sunny, summer days - I wish!!

Saturday today, sunny, 34dgs in the shade and I am having a rest from bathroom chores. Mrs D is up to a spot of painting in, yes you guessed it - the bathroom. I will be glad when it is done and we can have a well earned rest. It gets a bit tedious looking out at the sunshine everyday (sorry.)

Apart from the bathroom whats happened this week......we went to see a Jacko tribute artist last Sunday - he was very good at it too...apparently he won stars in their eyes on UK TV. He does a slot here in Sidari twice weekly and turns up in a big black limo. It was quite funny because the same night there was an array of tribute artists within ten yards of each other; there was a Freddie Mercury, a Robbie Williams, a Meatloaf and an Abba....such choice. Wednesday eve we went to see some local guys doing rock covers in a bar we frequent called 1 for the road. It is run by a Greek guy who calls himself Napoleon (Nappy locally) and he runs a very good bar. There is always good music, free drinks in various colours, a grand little spot. Last night we went out with friends to see a comedian who was a little on the Bernard Manning side.....don't think we'll be rushing back to see him again. Tomorrow eve there is a beach party with live rock music happening over in St Stephanos beach, we thought we'd give it a try.

So you see we do have a little bit of playtime.....The bathroom this week has not gone without incident with 2 tap problems on Monday and plasterboard adhesive everywhere on Tuesday when we attempted to mix it. Mrs D learned some new choice words - not funny - I was seething. We hope to be tiling tomorrow so our make shift shower in the bathroom will be out of action.....but we have rigged up a temporary one - in the garden. A bit public, but it does the job. Problem is as it is usually evening when you shower & you have to leg it from the shower to the house and try and beat the mozzies!! If you don't move quickly you get bitten to buggery tripping across the garden. All good fun and makes for a good tale.

Well 4 weeks today our autumn visitors start to arrive and it looks like September and October will be like June was. Two rounds in September, one September/October and then another in October. Times flying, we will be making our way back to the UK before we know it at this rate.

We did promise ourselves a bit of a break over on the mainland after the bathrooms done, we will see how times looking. We fancy going over to Ioannia and camping and looking at the Vikos Gorge - which according the Guinness book of records is the deepest in the world!! Its about 60 miles from Igoumenitsa which is the mainland port we would sail too from Corfu.

With the gentle waft of paint fumes now blowing over I'd best go and see if Mrs D has keeled over in the heat - been struggling a bit the last few days....will keep you posted.

Y'all keep in touch now . . . . D & L

What a job . . . . .

G'day bloggers (if there is anyone following this!) Well, the tiling when we eventually get to it should be easy compared to the prep work so far. On Thursday I think I won the sweating for Corfu 2009 contest after mixing boatloads of concrete to fill the massive chasm left by the bath! Mrs D now adept at mixing the right proportions of sand gravel and cement was also dripping wet but sorry we were not allowed to enter her for the wet T shirt contest or take photos... Oh well, we have just about finished preparing the floor. The plaster boards came today, the tiles are here, all the adhesives are here too we just need the new taps, floor drains and a new bog then we are off. No, no not off to the bog.... off to a flying start with the tiling!! When this is done the rest of the house will look a little behind the times . . . oh no, more jobs and so it goes on.

Lets get this out of the way - it's almost 10 o'clock at night here and its 31dgs in the house. Mrs D is flagging with the heat (I mean she's tired not taken up a new occupation with her new building knowledge) I must admit it does get a bit much on a night sometime. We see from the BBC website that the met office are now back pedalling and are back on blaming the Azores High again for your awful wash out of a summer again! We do hope you get a little bit of sunshine.

So what news from Kopsocheilades . . . .hmmmm we went to a local festival last Sunday evening. We arrived around 6ish, nothing doing apart from 16 whole lambs all rotating on spits over coals. So we went for a beer, went back lots of chairs had appeared the lambs were doing nicely but still no people. We went back for another beer like you do and went back around 10 o'clock and half the island was crammed into the field, with beer flowing, souvlaki BBQing and lambs getting dizzy by now, all was in full swing. A good time was had by all especially the Greeks as they love to get up and do some traditional dancing. All ages and genders, no street cred issues, it is lovely to see it. Mrs D suggest we join in next time, depends on the beer amounts I think!!

What else, we now have in addition to several Elvis' in Sidari a Freddie Mercury, spitting image must have modelled himself on him and also a Jacko!! We will give them a try and report back. The veg patch continues to grow with the toms doing best closely followed by some sort of lettuce - rocket thing and trailing behind are the beets. We discovered today we had been nurturing some weeds (not carrots) so Mrs D dug them out. Didn't look much like the carrots I used to see on Bugs Bunny . . . ah well all good fun. Oh on the way back from the festival we picked up a dog - could have had something to do with the bag of lamb we bought, see him above..he stayed a while then we had to lock him out as he did not want to go or wanted more lamb not quite sure which!!

I had better get off now and see if Mrs D is OK as she was last seen sat by the back door fly screen trying to cool off and mopping herself down.......more later D&L