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Painting the Balustrade (Again!) and a Relaxing Day. 7 - 9 Sept.

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Tuesday - First job of the day was booking a train and hotel - we've decided to spend the weekend in Bordeaux. We have visited the city once before, a couple of years back, but saw nothing but the Ikea store. Its a 5 hour round trip so, with time in Ikea, not really a day-trip. Hence booking the weekend away - and this time we're going by train - an 8-9 hour round trip - but, hopefully, stress free. The rest of the day was spent painting the balustrade and rubbing down the study window sill (like the balustrade, only painted last year). The issue with the window sill appears to have been the French filler we'd used - wherever I'd filled, the paint was lifting/flaking. This time I'll be using Wilko's wood filler - a filler I really like. Before I fill, however, I'm also going to apply some wood hardener - but that requires a trip to Leroy Merlin. Once those jobs were taken as far as we could, Sally returned to stripping the 'future' bathroom - she...
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Last Few Uzerche Days & Paris Nights. 20-26 July

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  Tuesday - After we both had a reasonable night’s sleep (we slept downstairs as it is much cooler than the second floor), Sally made bread (in the Air Fryer) and fudge (the latter is a gift for Simon and Katie when we go for drinks tomorrow) and did yet more stripping of the stairs. I gave the inside and outside of the over-stairs cupboard a coat of paint along with the back of the door. I applied some filler to the front and stripped and painted the latch. The afternoon was relaxed, with a stroll to the bottle-bank by the Papetierre, where the Tuesday tea-dance was in full swing. In the evening, we took a walk up to the town-square and enjoyed a display of acrobatics and juggling. Wednesday - Finished painting the over-stairs cupboard door and fitting but did little else to be honest. Felt guilty as Sally continued to apply herself to the banister and floor on the top floor. 5:30 we headed to Katie and Simon’s for drinks. Sally had made fudge to take as a gift but, sadly, i...
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The Rewiring Commences in Earnest - 06 July

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Today started with Isaac, the plumber, arriving on schedule (08:30) unlike his first visit and repairing the boiler. An hour later we had the main event - the arrival of Alex, the electrician who'll be rewiring the house. You may remember the original intention had been to rewire it myself (guided by Tim, our neighbour (and a UK electrician) back in England). That had proven to be over optimistic and so, about 18 months ago, we had Alex quote for the rewire and had asked him to start this Spring. Covid scuppered that schedule and it was only today that the work could commence - and this is the primary reason we're out here for these two months. Alex arrived on schedule (almost unheard of for a British tradesman - long may it continue. Today he got the GTL (hoses the RCDs etc - basically the consumer unit) fitted and the earth rods driven in. Whilst Alex got on with the electrics we refilled and bled the central heating, rubbed down (and refilled) the balustrade that was showing...
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