Stuff

The old house - now up for rent

Several days ago I shared some thoughts and feelings about climbing ladders. I was contemplating the completion of a painting job at my son's old house. Several bloggers remarked on my dilemma and nearly all discouraged me from climbing higher. For example, this is what Anna wrote:-

I managed a private psychiatric unit and we opened a head injury unit a little later... our patients in the HU were all male, the young usually with the effects of road traffic accidents, but it seemed that every adult male had fallen off trees, garage roofs, ladders etc. If you'd seen the ruined lives I saw then, you'd see the sense of hiring scaffolding, however expensive.... Don't risk it!!

That comment was the straw that broke the camel's back - if you will excuse the analogy! Instead of suppressing my nervousness, I decided to phone Dan who has a small property maintenance company in Sheffield. He said he would finish the job off for me for £60 which seemed like a lot for an hour and a half's work but I nevertheless agreed.

He came along with his assistant Jake and two sturdy sets of ladders with stabilisers on the legs. I provided the paint and the brushes and spread dustsheets at the bottom to catch any drips. The job was done in the estimated time and Dan also re-sealed the joint in the wooden guttering. He is a good man. Whenever I have employed him in the past he has been courteous and efficient. Unlike many tradesmen he keeps his promises.

View from the old house. To the right is the corner pub and
behind it The Copthorne Hotel and Sheffield United's football ground.

Now I have finished working on the old house and so yesterday I took the plunge and signed up with a lettings agency to get the wheels in motion to secure reliable tenants. This prospect fills me with some anxiety but hopefully when we have people in and the dust has settled I will feel a hell of a lot better about it,

Many thanks to Anna and to other bloggers who discouraged me from climbing higher with a paint pot and brush. Having the jitters at the top of a ladder is not a good idea as those fellows in her head injuries unit discovered to their cost.

A few years ago a middle aged married man was a lonesome regular in our local pub. He was an electrician. I remember vividly his thoughts on women and marriage. He said, "The sex is all right, it's all the other stuff I don't like" ...All the other stuff? You mean like talking, going on holiday, eating meals together, raising children, gardening, watching TV shows, helping each other, living life? 

Anyway, whilst up his ladder doing an electrical job he slipped and tumbled to the ground. His spine was broken and he ended up in a wheelchair, paralysed from the waist down. The last time I saw him he was being pushed by his long-suffering wife into  the local Toby Carvery from his adapted disabled vehicle. And when he greeted me there was a look of abject desperation on his face. All he has now is "the other stuff". Is that justice?

The back wall - now painted white right to the top