Flush in a Flash

My cold (cf my Monday post) has probably kept running a pretty normal course, but especially the coughing has been tiresome. (Still is, even if that too is getting better now.) 

On Tuesday I had the laundry room booked for the afternoon. I was in luck and could start an hour early (11 instead of 12) and didn't have to run more than two loads, but that still felt enough. In the evening I also had to start preparing for ... 

AI generated image

 

... Wednesday, when we (tenants) had been forewarned that plumbers were coming to high pressure flush all the drains in our building, one flat at a time; and for that we were asked to remove anything that might make their access to drains and pipes etc difficult. In the kitchen, this meant not only removing stuff on top of (and in) the sink, but also emptying the cupboard underneath, where I keep various bins, bags and boxes for waste and recycling. And in the bathroom, anything under and close to the wash basin, and near the drain in the shower (which isn't glass-enclosed, only has a curtain). I did not really expect them to find much problem with my drains - but as I couldn't recall this procedure having been done before while I've lived here, I wasn't quite sure how much "mess" to expect... So I pretty much emptied the whole bathroom. (Universal truth: One never really realises how much stuff one keeps in small spaces until one has to move it somewhere else...) 

As I live in the middle of the building (with 18 flats altogether) I knew they weren't likely to start with me; but as I had no idea how fast or slow the procedure would be, I still preferred to be up and dressed and "ready" before 8 on Wednesday (which was their starting time). They did come to me before noon, and as there was no real problem here, the flushing procedure as such was over in "no time at all"... 

... But after they (he) left, for me still remained the job to put things back in place... And as it's rare to have every nook and cranny of the bathroom that empty, I did take advantage of that for a more thorough than usual cleaning of that room before putting "stuff" back. Like behind pipes - of which there are a lot more in reality than in the AI image above... (AI did  well with the Wisteria pattern on my shower curtain, though!) 

All in all, combined with the remnants of my cold, enough "work" for me to feel rather exhausted afterwards...

... Although it can't really have taken me as long as it felt, because I know I then spent most of the afternoon watching the funeral of the Norwegian King Harald on TV. (I took some photos off my TV screen of that, but out of respect I think I'll put those in a separate post!)

How To Annoy Bing Image Creator

 

I asked Bing Image Creator for a cartoon image of a senior woman cleaning the floor with a dry mop, with a vacuum cleaner ("of Scandinavian design") in the background. In the first attempt (alas I forgot to save that one!) the woman was looking way too happy about the job, so I asked for a remake with a "more neutral" facial expression (result as above). 

Then I discovered the double hoses on the vacuum cleaner, and asked Bing to remove the second hose. Bing did obey my order - but please note the change in the woman's facial expression in the next picture... I don't think Bing appreciated having to redo it again! (LOL)

And when I asked for a third correction... Bing claimed my request to be inappropriate, and refused to make another attempt! 

Originally, the image was supposed to illustrate my "indoors workout" today: cleaning my flat. Because of my present slight handicaps, it occurred to me to just use a dry mop to go over some bare floor surfaces this time, as the mop is so much lighter to handle (especially reaching in under furniture etc). I only used the vacuum cleaner on the carpets.

The Tip of the Tap

 

Of course I was up and dressed at 7.15 today, even if it seemed unlikely that my flat, right in the middle of a building, would be the very first to get a visit from the plumbers who had forewarned that I could expect them to turn up some time between 7.15 am on Thursday and 4 pm on Friday (cf previous post).  

Actually I rather expected they wouldn't be showing up at my door until Friday - but they (two guys) did ring on my door just before 2 pm today. It also turned out that the whole job only took about 5 minutes rather than the predicted 20. In the kitchen it was only the "tip" of the tap that they replaced; and in the bathroom the shower hose and head. 

They also did some quick checks for leaks; but there was no exchange of the actual taps (faucets) involved. 

 I suppose the whole project is about trying to minimize waste of water. 

The new shower head is much larger than the old one and somehow looks a bit intimidating... I haven't tried it yet but suspect it may take some getting used to? 

While waiting for the plumbers, not knowing when or if they'd come, I was vacuuming the rooms that they would have no reason to enter; and it occurred to me to also undertake the very rare task of also pulling out the extra bed from under the sofa in my living room - which is a sofa-bed in itself, but also has an extra bed tucked in underneath. I had no idea when I last did that (it's been years since the extra bed was used), or what dusty horrors might be revealed... It wasn't too bad though. There's really very little room under there even for dust to gather. 

One surprise that turned up from under the sofa was this little guy, though - who I vaguely recall missing last Christmas...

 

 

I gave him to Skipper now, to look after until December...  
 

 ...when he can be reunited with the Santa Claus family...  

I was happy to find this classic Swedish Christmas song below translated to English on YouTube. Saves me the trouble of thinking of other ways to explain why my brain connects both "tip" and "tap" (cf the heading I chose for this post) with Christmas!

What a Week

I was looking forward to a quiet week this week. Nice summery weather too, so I was hoping to spend some time just relaxing and reading out on the balcony. That’s not quite how it turned out, though…

On Tuesday morning, going out to do my shopping, I found a notice on the entrance door, informing the tenants that “exterior cleaning and painting will be starting soon”.  Oookay… That was the first I heard about it, so I took this to just be an advance warning, and more information to follow.

The same afternoon, looking out through my kitchen window, I realized that ooops, “soon” in this case should probably be interpreted as “tomorrow”... Because by then they were already at it with pressure washing of the balcony side on the next building (or rather, the building that comes before mine, meaning we’d be next in turn). Even if their main target seemed to be the gutters and downpipes… watching for a while how they went about it, I realized that even if we had not been ordered to empty our balconies, it certainly seemed like a good idea to do so…

So there went my Tuesday afternoon/evening and Wednesday morning. Or actually, the rest of the week; with extra shoulder ache and rekindled “tennis elbow” as unwelcome side effect…

A pity really, having to clear the balcony so early in the autumn - but of course no point in putting most of the things back out again. My good sunchair and some other things taken down to the storage room in the basement, floormats removed and washed (which has to be done in a special washing machine for carpets, which we don’t have one in my building, so I had to take them to the laundry room in another building to do that); parasols down, one flower box emptied and cleaned, and two moved indoors for the day, the clematis plants on the trellis against the wall covered (for the day) with a thin fabric (made for the purpose of covering plants – I have no idea what you call it in English).

… And then of course cleaning the balcony floor after they were done (well, it was a good thing that I did take everything in!!!), and putting some of the things back…

… And now my sore elbow is screaming at me to stay off the computer, PLEASE… All right, all right.

If you don’t see me around for a couple of days, you now know why.

There are no photos of this whole mess because I simply had too much to do.

But my Clematis plants survived! :)

Saturday Surprise (‘Allowed To Peek’–2)

In my last Booking-Through-Thursday post, Allowed To Peek, I quoted from Moominland Winter by Tove Jansson. It came to mind for me again today, for a different reason.

In that book, Moomin wakes up in the middle of the winter and can’t go back to sleep (Moomins are usually in hibernation from November to April). With the rest of the family still snoozing away, Moomin feels very lonely. He goes out into the empty kitchen. There he suddenly becomes aware of a pair of eyes staring at him from under the sink…

   

This morning, sitting at the breakfast table,
I suddenly became aware of a glint of blue under the fridge…

I thought it must be a clip for plastic bags that I’d dropped.
So I found some kitchen tool with a long handle
and bent down to poke “it” out…

Imagine my surprise when I found a pair of eyes staring at me!

 

Especially since it was a pair of eyes I had never seen before!

On second thought he reminds me of someone…

He must have been hiding under the fridge ever since I moved in (2 years 8 months ago). Probably longer! (A young family lived here before me.)

What on earth made him suddenly come out now? Have I not been leaving enough cookie crumbs on the floor for him???

Spooky… until I remembered that I made a half-hearted attempt last week to stick the vacuum cleaner under there. Even my extra thin tube didn’t get in properly though, so I gave it up. The suction must have been enough to draw him half way out anyway.

Now I wondered what else might be under there! So I had to figure out how to remove the grid, without actually lying down on the floor. (Not too sure I’d be able to get up again without injuring myself if I did that!) I managed to solve it sitting on a low footstool. Phew. No more “monsters”... ;) Just a bit of dust.

Now the cookie monster is sitting on the freezer.
There might be some cake left in there… or not… 

… … …

PS. Scroll down for today’s weather report.