Industrious epihany day

Today has been our second industrious day in a row - check us out, we're cooking on gas!

In the past, when returning to work after Christmas (or any other holiday for that matter), I've always found the first day back at work to be hard, but something of a novelty, and it's the realisation that I have to get up and do it all again the next day (and the next, and the next...) that's the real killer. So today was Day 2 of back to work for both of us - a real test. 

I must admit to being anxious about how Stuart would be feeling after having done a whole day's hard work yesterday, and half expected him to have relapsed again, as he hasn't felt up to doing that sort of work for weeks, and recently anything that has caused him to feel tired (be it cat sleeping arrangements or man cave demolition) has had unpleasant knock-on effects. It was thus with a little trepidation that I said "good morning" to him and asked him how he felt when he came downstairs just as I was packing away my exercise equipment. The reply was an uncertain "I'm not sure yet, I'm still waking up", but I thought I detected a slightly brighter tone in his voice and a brighter look on his face as well. Things looked promising.

I should mention at this point a little incident that happened last night and which has slightly dictated how our day has gone. Just as Stuart was locking the front door after taking Reggie out for his bedtime toilet trip, I heard him say a slightly stronger version (I'm sure you can use your imaginations here) of "oh drat". The cause of his consternation? The key had broken in the lock. We were locked in the house.

We've had a run of bad luck with the keys to the front door - we've misplaced not one but two, meaning that we only had one operational key between us, plus a spare which is held by Sue. The key we've been using is very thin, and a couple of weeks ago it bent as I was locking up. Yikes, it looked slightly cracked too, so we made a mental note to get the spare from Sue and get some new ones cut. 

I should also mention that, like many things in this house, the lock itself is very temperamental - sometimes the key just spins around in the lock doing nothing and in order to remove the key you first have to lock it from one side, take the key out and then use it as you wanted on the other. All very frustrating, but we will be getting a new door (with new lock) soon, so we hadn't been too bothered by it. Anyway, suffice it to say that we hadn't yet managed to get the spare from Sue (New Year's Eve was a little too alcohol-fuelled to remember - plus of course we did a runner in the morning when our brains were too frozen to remember in any case), and thus we were still using the slightly fractured key, which had now broken in two.

This was quite an alarming situation, I felt. Stuart simply swore at it and stomped off to bed, while nightmare scenarios ran through my mind in which all 5 of us were stuck inside the house, the dog not being able to get outside for his toilet requirements and no locksmiths (not that we even know the word for a locksmith) being available with it being a bank holiday. Thankfully, while I was brushing my teeth, Stuart came back downstairs and fiddled with the lock, before coming back upstairs to tell me that if you carefully put the other half of the key into the lock, it will still work in conjunction with the half that's stuck inside, so we can at least unlock (and lock) the door from the inside. That was a huge relief, and enough to let me sleep soundly (or as soundly as Lucca and Florence would allow).

Of course, this does still leave us unable to lock the door from the outside - meaning that, for the time being, we can't both go out at the same time. This meant no family dog-walk for the three of us today, and meant we had to think carefully about our movements. We hope to get the spare from Sue tomorrow, and then see if we can somehow dislodge and extract the broken part from the lock.Watch this space...

So back to today: I spent the morning shivering in the office (although I was warmer than I might have been, thanks to cosy socks, slippers that are like mini sleeping bags, fingerless mittens and a head warmer, all of which were much appreciated Christmas presents from family and friends concerned about how I would get through the winter in that cold room), while Stuart warmed himself in the morning sunshine whilst finishing off the fence and building a gate for the side/back of the house. By lunchtime the fence was finished and it looked great. It's a relief to have a more permanent and sturdy solution to the keeping-Reggie-away-from-the-cat-flap issue, and will also mean we can let him run about in the garden a bit more freely.

Stuart suggested we had lunch al fresco. I wondered if he'd lost his mind, but when I stepped outside, bundled up in all my office clothes, I realised that there was a lovely gentle warmth in the sun, and we spent a lovely half hour lunching in the sunshine. In fact, it was so nice that I decided to put office work on hold for a couple of hours to make the most of the sunny afternoon - cloudy weather is forecast for tomorrow, and rain after that, so it seemed a shame to waste it.

So, after I'd put fresh sawdust in the goose house, I grabbed my new favourite petrol-powered tool and headed to the terrace beneath the house for some more bramble clearing while Stuart went to the garage to fill up the jerry cans with more fuel, then got the chop saw out to cut up more firewood.

We both packed up our tools at around 4.30pm and came back inside - I did a little more office work while Stuart put the first coat of wood stain on the new worktop, which is looking really great and gives us some much needed extra space for food preparation.

So there you have it, two industrious days in a row and we're still standing! Tomorrow will be the middle of the week already, and by then we'll almost have cracked it. All that remains for this evening is to cook up some Tuscan bean soup for the freezer and something good for dinner, then relax by the fire until bedtime.