Week of 19th June, 2017

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Monday, 19th June

The driveway people are here, later than expected, because of sheer weight of traffic. And by the end of the day they've managed to demolish the boundary walls to our neighbour's garden, and remove the "fairy tree" from our garden. Jane was afraid the roots of the fairy tree would disturb the new block paving, even though the tree is a conifer, with the main vertical root of the species. There are peripheral, surface roots as well, and that's what worried her. So the tree is no more.

Meanwhile, our tame Polish builder has started building the new rear patio deck, after his supplier delivered the wood. And I may have maligned the supplier, because he had been told to deliver to "77 <redacted>" which does not exist - there are only 32 houses on our road. Once that was corrected, the lorry turned up in jig time, and unloaded the wood. Maciek then appeared, and started work.

Liz has confirmed that the refund monies for Keth's mobility scooter have arrived in her bank, so that's all well. Meanwhile, the probate on Keith's estate proceeds slowly.

And it's been baking hot, so I've been providing lots of cool water to the workers.

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Tuesday, 20th June

The heatwave continues, so water supply is important for the workers. And they've started work on the third house, as was agreed. This is the neighbour beyond my immediate neighbour. I'm unsure of what is being done there - I know at least block-paved hardstanding in front, and maybe continued up their drive.

Meanwhile, the neighbour's front garden is completely dug down to ground level, albeit not yet excavated for foundations. This is due to the fact that their house is higher, becaue of a slope. Our front path is also gone, as is the remnant dividing wall to the drive. Probably the next thing to go will be our front wall, which is only a single skin of concrete slabs. This will be replaced completely, with a 2-skin brick wall bonded to the existing pillar, which is the border with my other neighbour. The new wall will end with a similar pillar, at a position to be determined.

Later: And I've now found that the front garden wall has also disappeared.

All that is described a bit awkwardly, so I'll mention names, purely for convenience. Remember, the houses on this road are semi-detached, and my neighbours in the other half of the semi are Roger and Linda. Our neighbours on the other side, across the shared drive, are Simon and Hilda, and it's their garden that has been worked on most, thus far.

I bought my admission ticket for the Yeovilton Air Day, next month, by phone. Advance booking is UKP22, plus a UKP3 booking fee, which is cheaper than the on-the-day price of \UKP28. Now to get the travel tickets, which will be a trip to my local station, where I will ensure that I get so-called "Off-Peak" tickets, to allow travel on any train,at any time outside so-called "rush-hour", which only applies Monday-to-Friday. I'll have a listing of trains with me, with my proposed services marked, but I will not accept "This Service Only" bookings.

Later still: Done. Plus some shopping for Jane.

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Wednesday, 21st June

Everything has been dug out now, to below pavement level, ahead of installing compacted small rubble as a foundation for the block paving. And it's still brutally hot.

Maciek continues with the framing for the rear patio deck. Looks good.

Katy has decided that she is going to try to upgrade to a 2 bedroom flat, probably not in her present block, although that remains an option. If she did stay, she would have access to a dedicated parking space, rather than having to street park - which would be a considerable improvement. But the management company are less than competent, and the repair works to the lower gound floor of the block are dragging on interminably. So elsewhere it is.

By contract, the management company get first dibs on marketing the flat for sale. For 2 months, then it's open season. This means that they want to measure and photograph the flat for a brochure. That's this morning, so I have to attend to let the photographer in. Which I did. Only took 20 minutes - and 45 minutes travel each way...

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Thursday, 21st June

It's not so hot today, which must be a relief for the workmen. Front walls are going in, with the terminating pillars, and the foundations are compacted - which was noisy.

At the rear, deck planking is being laid, and as of this evening, it's about two-thirds planked.

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Friday, 22nd June

Still cool, albeit muggy. Simon and Hilda's front wall is complete, ours is about two-thirds done, and the bricks for Sam and Olivia's front wall are being delivered as I type. That's the house on the other side of Simon and Hilda's - the other half of their semi. Now I have to take Holly back to the vet for a checkup after the 5 tooth extractions on Monday.

Then I'll have to take Jane's car to a car wash - two days under a lime tree has left it filthy.

<pause>

Holly is fine. We got some wet food for her, rather than the prescription dry food, which will make it easier for her to eat. Still giving painkillers until next week, but the extraction sites are healing well.

I got Jane's car washed, and it was indeed filthy. But there wasn't much lime tree sap - it was mostly flowers of some kind. All clean, now, so that's well.

The brick delivery was actually the block paving for all 3 drives, and Sam and Olivia's is already mostly paved out - just the trim around the edges, and possibly their drive. The brickie is finishing off our front wall, and Maciek's chippy is still hard at work laying planks at the back.

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Saturday, 23rd June

Sam and Olivia's drive is done. It was a simpler job - they just wanted the entire frontage and the drive paved. Which they got, and very good it looks too.

After that, the driveway people turned to Simon and Hilda's, and our, frontage. I lump the two together because we will have a common parking area and drive, with replacement front steps as required. And by end of day today, most of it is done. That block paving goes down fast. What little remains to be done is mostly fitting around the edges and features, and raised flower beds. They'll have tomorrow off, and return Monday.

Maciek has finished the rear deck, and very good it looks. Now Jane can fill the flower boxes with soil and plants, and once the wood has finished drying out we'll apply preservative. All that remains to be done at the rear is to apply preservative to the conservatory. That'll be next week.

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Sunday, 24th June

The Rainbows are at a strawberry picking event, and Jane is assisting, so I can show a few photos of the driveway works. I took these with the big Fuji Bridge digicam, shooting at 16Mpx (4608x3456) for about 8MB per image. Once acquired, I extracted them via a clone custom USB cable (USB A to custom connector) plugged into tord, saving the results to torrentpi. And that was slow - probably USB1 speed. But it worked. And no special drivers required - a Fuji Bridge digicam presents as USB Mass Storage. This is good, although I could wish that Fuji had chosen a standard connector for the camera end of the cable. And while they were at it, why not allow external powering via that USB, rather than requiring a custom battery-replacing device inside the battery compartment. Note: both these are 3rd party clones, rather than Fuji OEM, and hence cheaper.

8MB is ridiculously over-the-top for this, so here are downsized versions (640x480) for your perusal. First our front, as almost completed. Note the piles of paving blocks, and the sewer manholes partially installed. The wheelie bins are for rubbish (black) and recycling (blue). Collections are alternate weeks.

View of front of house, showing new block-paved hardstanding

This is the drive between Simon and Hilda's house (on the left) and ours (on the right) Note the missing infill along the edges, and the incompletely-installed sewer manhole covers towards the back. Simon and Hilda opted for a different style of front steps. Ours are complete, theirs require further work to block pave infill, similar to the main frontage. Our garages are visible to the rear.

Shared Drive

This is Simon and Hilda's frontage. Note the raised flower beds in front of the bay window and along the side. Sewer manholes are well-seen here. Note, waste water and sewage from both halves of both semi-detached buildings drain via this sewer line to the main sewer in the street. Thus it is a "minor public sewer", and hence the responsibility of our WaterCo to maintain. You may remember a problem with a broken manhole cover last year.

Simon and Hilda's rebuilt house frontage

And finally, for completeness, this is Sam and Olivia's new front hardstanding. This is simpler - no front wall, no new flower beds, just hardstanding for 2 cars. Everything except the paving is as original.

Sam and Olivias's new front hardstanding

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