Chaos (Day 3)

If one – just ONE more person tells me to stop moaning, to chill out and appreciate the fact I am getting a new kitchen, I swear next “new bathroom” I get will be part of my jail cell.

Yes, I understand completely that I am getting a new Kitchen, a new Bathroom, and a new Toilet.  Yes, I get that I am paying nothing for it, that my housing association are footing the bill and getting it all done for me.

I get that.

However, what I AM really unhappy, angry and pissed off about is the way this is being done.  Yesterday morning, men arrived on my doorstep armed with hammers and... well, pretty much just hammers.  There may have been a screw driver involved at some point, but for the most part, it was hammers.  Also with them was The Electrician, whom I shall refer to as Mr Sparks.

The two armed chaps came in and set to carnage.  Within a couple of hours, I had a pretty much empty room where I had a kitchen.  They’d left the sink in for me, but that was it.  They’d also torn off all the tiles (as planned) but in doing so, they’ve also torn the side off of the double glazing window that is in there.  And half the other side.

They chucked all the broken former-kitchen out on the front garden, said thanks, cya tomorrow – and left.  Leaving me with Mr Sparks.

Now, first off, I will say he’s a nice enough chap.  Except personality a good craftsman doesn’t make.  I am sure that what he is doing is as per every single standard in the book, but holy shit, I don’t have to like it.

He’s old.  I mean, he’s so old, he is struggling on my stairs, wheezing and coughing, plus he has a gammy knee.  He stops half-way up on some journeys to catch his breath.

You may ask “But Dan, why is he up and down the stairs if he’s doing your kitchen and bathroom?” Well, that’s a good question.  See, this whole chaos is thanks to the house needing to be rewired.  And now Mr Sparks has decided to do it and just get it over with.  So as of writing this on Tuesday morning, I have:

1. No Running Water;
2. No Electricity;
3. No Gas;
4. No Kitchen;
5. No Internet!!

As you can probably imagine, I am stressing.  You also cannot comprehend the level of chaos that has developed in this house since just yesterday.  See, it was bad enough, having to empty the kitchen, bathroom and toilet.  Most of the stuff from the kitchen is in the dining room and living room.  The stuff from the bathroom and loo is in the living room and Jaysens room. 

NOW on top of this, I have had to make all my electrical plugs, sockets and fixtures accessible to Mr Sparks, who, as I have mentioned before, is a bit... doddery.

He’s currently talking to himself in front of me...

Anyways, back to apparently moaning over nothing.

Having emptied the kitchen/bathroom/loo, I have now had to trash every room in my house.  EVERY ROOM.  I have had to partly-empty my fishtank in order to move it so he can get past it with some cabling.  I now cannot refill said-fishtank, as I still have no water.

And then, there are the smoke alarms.  Apparently, I have to have mains-operated smoke alarms.  So, silly me, thinking he’d run a wire from each light fitting to power them, I said yep, no worries, you go for it...  Only to find he’s put the top-floor one off centre of the ceiling, with conduit running from it, to the wall, then more conduit straight down the wall, THROUGH the skirting board and disappears into the floor...  Only to pop out the ceiling below, where he’s stuck the next one on the middle floor.  That one then also has conduit running across the ceiling, down the wall, and through the floor, into the ground floor, where it pops out the ceiling, and runs conduit across to the middle of the ceiling...

The kitchen is sort of sporadically conduited.  It comes in through the ceiling, follows along the edge between wall/ceiling, down the wall the just above the floor, then across the wall a few inches, where it stops, and more cable spills out of it.  Some cable goes straight up to a socket, the rest carries on along, disappearing in two feet of conduit, before reemerging, some goes up to a socket, the rest then hangs on the floor, and runs along the the floor, around a corner, disappears into a couple of feet of conduit, pops out the other end, of which some goes up to a socket and the rest carries on...

And here it gets a little weirder.  SOME of the wires are tucked behind my central heating pipes.  Some of the wires are hanging in front of the central heating pipes.  The then trail all along the floor and up into three more sockets.

As I write this, Mr Sparks is currently going through my house, removing, replacing or repairing sockets.  In a couple of places, he’s actually ADDING sockets as there is a distinct lack in this house.  The living room – where we are currently – has one double socket.  Two plug sockets.  Bare in mind, in here I have;

• TV
• Playstation
• DVD Player
• Stereo
• Fish tank (Light, Pump, Heater, Filter)
• Modem
• House phone
• Laptop

And they expect me to use TWO sockets.  So now I have four.  Which will mean slightly less in the way of extension leads/multi-plugs.

Joy.

Half of the people that have been telling me shut up and stop being ungrateful have now been told what is going on here – and they’ve made some comment about conduit being gross or lazy or whatever...  Helloooo I know this – hence my former pissing and moaning.

I KNOW, were it just the kitchen and bathroom, that yes, it’d be a bit chaotic for a while, and yes, it’d be dusty as hell.  I knew this.  But having the electrics sprung on me as well was bad enough.  Having a 900-year-old fossil do it is also something else.

I like and NEED to know plans.  If I plan for X Y or Z to be done,then X Y or Z being done keeps my OCD in check.  If they add A B and C to X Y and Z then I start to struggle.  The dust everywhere was bad enough, the mess is enough to make me want to cry...  And the WORST thing is, there’s absolutely NO point in cleaning it up, as it’s all still being ripped, torn, hammered and sawn.  Any clearing up I do will be undone within minutes.  Last night, I had to do SOMETHING, so took to sweeping at the dust and toot all over the floor...  It reappeared pretty soon after...

Once Mr Sparks is done with whatever he’s doing in whatever room he wants to trash, I am going to rip it apart, chuck out anything that is pissing me off, wipe down everything as best I can, then sit, breathe and ignore the world.  I’m done with saving junk on the off chance I will need it, I’m done with the organised chaos, and I’m done with having to move random junk.  Once the kitchen is done, everything I own is getting washed up again before being put away too ;)

So anyway, this post is taking me ages to write – I’m actually writing it in Notepad as my electric is still off, plus I am up and down and up and down answering questions, or moving things, or trying to ignore certain things.  Once everything is done with the refit and they send out the chaps to see what’s been done and if I have any problems, I will be pointing out everything I don’t like, and ask if they’d have it in their house, or if they can do anything to make it better...  Otherwise, 0ddness will be getting a rather lot of photos published to it of shoddy workmanship.

I am sure once it's all done, it will be excellent and wonderful and perfect.  I am sure that it will look bloody amazing and I will live in my kitchen forever more... But for the time being, I want it done yesterday.

Kitchen, 08/06/2010 @ 0800

Kitchen, 08/06/2010 @ 1030