Narnia & other stories…

…the honeymoon period is over.  Shall I tell you how I know?

• The annual ‘escaping cows’ drama has been taking place*. We now know there’s a story behind it**, and they get out a LOT. So I’ve got used to coming face to face with a huge animal when I round a bend on a run. Or looking out the window to see one leaving Sellars Towers. And watching the boys stomp in the giant hoofprints left in the front garden, each of which is basically now a small pond.

• The burglar alarm started searching for its backup battery one Saturday in the wee small hours, and then sounding the warning when it did not find it.  At 12.00.30; 01.00.30; 02.00.30…you get the picture.  We were very happy to see the engineer when daylight came.  Though it searched again without success, next day at 10.00.30.  So now a whole lot of other electronic bits of it have been replaced too.
• The shower is leaking intermittently.  Well, now this is weird, but evidence of the leak only appears after the times I’ve washed my hair. Then, the water seeps up next to the shower tray and the skirting board.  See it there, darkening the grouting?  Happy actual days. I can have speedy showers whilst praying the mixer isn’t the cause, as it’s encased in a wall of mosaic tiles. And my hair gets washed less often.

• I saw a mouse on a Saturday afternoon. Where? Not on the stair… I heard it first, fistling around under the bed. Then it ran out, across the bedroom floor, under the bookshelf – where it was put off by all the Agatha Christie books, and nipped back under the bed. By this time I was standing on the bed, unsure how to get out without being nibbled alive. I later heard it partying in the eaves and tap-dancing on the pipes. But now the wonderful Glenn of Bullseye Pest Control*** has been and the mouse is either wearing slippersocks or has moved out, because I haven’t heard him since.
• There’s a stink**** in the utility room and I have a fine sense of smell, so this has been driving me crazy for many days. On Saturday morning (why are Saturdays the domestic disaster day of choice, I wonder?) I wandered in to the utility room and found a pool of water gathering on top of the (rather old) boiler. Looking up, it was dripping down the outside of the flue. Inspired by the wisdom of a kind and patient plumber imparted only the day before, while he was trying to pinpoint the source of the smell even though only I could smell it at the time, I decided there must be a way to get into the eaves to investigate. I emptied my wardrobe to reveal the entrance to Narnia!

Going in carefully (did not want to meet an angry mouse in slippersocks, or be unexpectedly accosted by an 8-legged critter leaping from a web), I found the source of the smell and the dripping water.  Yes, indeed, a leak through the roof.  Excellent.

But it’s all put in perspective by the wonderful neighbour-party we had last weekend, a year and a day after moving in. Neighbours we hadn’t yet met joined friends from nearby for an afternoon of coffee and cake. The house was filled with chat and laughter, the kids played, the young people hung out, and we spent days eating the leftovers.

A fantastic way to end the ‘honeymoon’ period, since it clearly can’t last!

* See last year’s cow post when I thought it was a one off event…
** That’s for another time, maybe.
*** Haha, Yns, look at the pic of the ‘pest’ on the homepage (private joke, guys)
****Oh yes, crazy drain lady strikes again (another obscure reference…)