A Parade for the local would-be councillors. The bowmen followed, surreal.
The tope of Arthur's Seat. I begged him to leave the bandana behind in Japan. Begged.
Our poor door.
Do you think anyone will notice?Sunday 31 May 2009
Some Scottish Sights
A Parade for the local would-be councillors. The bowmen followed, surreal. The tope of Arthur's Seat. I begged him to leave the bandana behind in Japan. Begged. Our poor door. Do you think anyone will notice?
Ok, sorry about the extended break there, have been quite busy. Anyway, back to that damn ladder...
We have been swearing and giggling and banging the ladder against the building so much that we have caught the attention not only of those out on the street, but also our neightbours, who all lean out of their respective windows, and almost in a chorus pipe up with suggestions:
"have you tried calling the landlord?" "Is the chubb lock on?" "that ladder isn't tall enough" - they were of course being friendly and helpful, but it's all just compounding our hopeless situation. We are beginning to reconcile to the fact that we either have to break down the door, or sleep in the garden.
Thankfully one of the neighbours invites us in to defrost and regroup. Darren and his wife Jennifer are lovely and expecting their baby in 6 weeks. Unbeknownst to us, they have already been on the internet trying to find a number for our landlord. That doesn't work, so they ask one of their friends around (it's 10:30pm by this stage I should mention) who owns a contruction business and knows an amenable joiner who may come out at mates rates (we are still contemplating how we are going to pay the exorbitant fees of a 24hr locksmith), and Jennifer is even at the stage of lending us money. We of course decline this last suggestion, on the grounds that we don't actually have any money to pay her back! As it turns out, the joiner is out and has had a few, so won't be able to help out.
There is nothing to be done.
So Darren, who is a big, tall guy, (and who also, as per my facebook status update, has the desperately depressing job of collecting dead bodies for a living, usually from motorway accidents and is therefore burdened with an understandable amount of latent rage) suggests simply forcing the door open. Stu and I are unconvinced. The door is massive, and heavy, and twice locked with the kind of sturdy devices usually saved for prisons. Still, we can think of no other solution, or we are tired and want to go to bed. One of the two. We imagine Darren will simply tire himself out and maybe for once have pleasant dreams.
Instead, what happens is he issues one startlingly thunderous kick after another. The whole building shakes and trembles as he reins terror down upon our door. Slowly but surely the door begins to groan, there's movement, cracking and splintering of wood. His exersion is obvious as his smokers rasp intensifies. With one final swift kick, the door is open, the two locks in ruins. It really was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen, and Stu and I are finally in. The first thing I do is run to the cupboard for a jumper. The second thing we all do is take in the sight of splintered wood and cracked plaster all over the floor and the sad sight of the chubb lock bent at a 90 angle. Ahhhh, um. The initial euphoria dies away, and we realise that tomorrow we're off to Liverpool and we effecttively have no front door. The kicking has of course gained the attention of our top floor neighbours, who have an adorable 4 year old girl, who as it turns out is an astoundingly heavy sleeper. Alan is a contruction worker from Aberdeen. His wife Tamara is a legal secretary turned masseuse from Sydney (she went to Tara dad!). He takes one look at the Yale lock (apparently, I was downstairs collecting our now defunct ladder) and pieces it back together, attaching it to the door frame and making us, once again, in possession of a front door of sorts. Ok, so the situation isn't perfect. The door is still very much broken and any would-be thief ambling along would see the makeshift barrier for exactly that and take us for everything we're worth (about the price of one 3 year old laptop actually), but it's enough for now.
We are exceedingly grateful to everyone who has helped out, but we are dubious about the door and what can be done to fix it with our limited financial resources. Still, at this point, with the promise of a hot shower, some food, and then a glass (or 3 bottles) of red wine at Alan and Tamara's, we don't care.
We drink the wine, get quite boozed, and then finally pass out sometime around 2am in our own bed. In the mean time, Derek (the landlord) has received the message explaining what has happened in the morning and comes over to check out the damage. He's a nice guy, and so isn't too put out, but when he sees the state of the door he can only shake his head in bemusement. Apparently he had been on the High street getting a few beers before Coronation Street started (seriously) at around the time we were lugging the bloody great ladder home from work. How we missed eachother we'll never know. He actually had the spare keys on him at the time.
The long and short of it is that we need a new door, and new locks, and new keys. Hence we are down about $600 to Derek, who nicely enough has agreed that we can pay him back in installments. Ironically, joining a gym would have saved me money.
We have been swearing and giggling and banging the ladder against the building so much that we have caught the attention not only of those out on the street, but also our neightbours, who all lean out of their respective windows, and almost in a chorus pipe up with suggestions:
"have you tried calling the landlord?" "Is the chubb lock on?" "that ladder isn't tall enough" - they were of course being friendly and helpful, but it's all just compounding our hopeless situation. We are beginning to reconcile to the fact that we either have to break down the door, or sleep in the garden.
Thankfully one of the neighbours invites us in to defrost and regroup. Darren and his wife Jennifer are lovely and expecting their baby in 6 weeks. Unbeknownst to us, they have already been on the internet trying to find a number for our landlord. That doesn't work, so they ask one of their friends around (it's 10:30pm by this stage I should mention) who owns a contruction business and knows an amenable joiner who may come out at mates rates (we are still contemplating how we are going to pay the exorbitant fees of a 24hr locksmith), and Jennifer is even at the stage of lending us money. We of course decline this last suggestion, on the grounds that we don't actually have any money to pay her back! As it turns out, the joiner is out and has had a few, so won't be able to help out.
There is nothing to be done.
So Darren, who is a big, tall guy, (and who also, as per my facebook status update, has the desperately depressing job of collecting dead bodies for a living, usually from motorway accidents and is therefore burdened with an understandable amount of latent rage) suggests simply forcing the door open. Stu and I are unconvinced. The door is massive, and heavy, and twice locked with the kind of sturdy devices usually saved for prisons. Still, we can think of no other solution, or we are tired and want to go to bed. One of the two. We imagine Darren will simply tire himself out and maybe for once have pleasant dreams.
Instead, what happens is he issues one startlingly thunderous kick after another. The whole building shakes and trembles as he reins terror down upon our door. Slowly but surely the door begins to groan, there's movement, cracking and splintering of wood. His exersion is obvious as his smokers rasp intensifies. With one final swift kick, the door is open, the two locks in ruins. It really was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen, and Stu and I are finally in. The first thing I do is run to the cupboard for a jumper. The second thing we all do is take in the sight of splintered wood and cracked plaster all over the floor and the sad sight of the chubb lock bent at a 90 angle. Ahhhh, um. The initial euphoria dies away, and we realise that tomorrow we're off to Liverpool and we effecttively have no front door. The kicking has of course gained the attention of our top floor neighbours, who have an adorable 4 year old girl, who as it turns out is an astoundingly heavy sleeper. Alan is a contruction worker from Aberdeen. His wife Tamara is a legal secretary turned masseuse from Sydney (she went to Tara dad!). He takes one look at the Yale lock (apparently, I was downstairs collecting our now defunct ladder) and pieces it back together, attaching it to the door frame and making us, once again, in possession of a front door of sorts. Ok, so the situation isn't perfect. The door is still very much broken and any would-be thief ambling along would see the makeshift barrier for exactly that and take us for everything we're worth (about the price of one 3 year old laptop actually), but it's enough for now.
We are exceedingly grateful to everyone who has helped out, but we are dubious about the door and what can be done to fix it with our limited financial resources. Still, at this point, with the promise of a hot shower, some food, and then a glass (or 3 bottles) of red wine at Alan and Tamara's, we don't care.
We drink the wine, get quite boozed, and then finally pass out sometime around 2am in our own bed. In the mean time, Derek (the landlord) has received the message explaining what has happened in the morning and comes over to check out the damage. He's a nice guy, and so isn't too put out, but when he sees the state of the door he can only shake his head in bemusement. Apparently he had been on the High street getting a few beers before Coronation Street started (seriously) at around the time we were lugging the bloody great ladder home from work. How we missed eachother we'll never know. He actually had the spare keys on him at the time.
The long and short of it is that we need a new door, and new locks, and new keys. Hence we are down about $600 to Derek, who nicely enough has agreed that we can pay him back in installments. Ironically, joining a gym would have saved me money.
Thursday 28 May 2009
The Saga Continued
Sorry, had to go on with the rest of my day. Damn the world for interrupting my rant. Long story much shorter than intended:
Keys not in pocket. Dreaded feeling in pit of stomach ensure, followed by hour of fruitless combing of the fields we'd run through. Slightly incredulous that Stu hadn't seen it fall out of my pocket, as he had been behind me the whole time. Incredulity subsides and realisation that we are very much locked out of house, in slightly sweaty shorts and t-shirts with the weather going south of warm. For once in his life, Stu has not brought his phone.
Keys are nowhere to be seen, so we give up the search and rack our brains for other options. We know the landlord lives close by, we just don't know where. We know Stu has his number, in his phone, in the house (where his keys lie on the hall table). We know that, for the first time in ages, Mez has locked both the Yale and Chubb locks of front door because, ironically, she didn't want Stu having a go at her for not locking up properly. We know that the bathroom window is slightly ajar ... and that we live on the third floor of an old old building.
So Stu has the incredibly foolish idea, well, to be fair, brave but foolish, of scouring the neighbourhood for suitable ladders. We find a few, but unfortunately the owners are largely absent, as it's Friday night and everyone else is out having fun. I'm skeptical anyway, the bathroom window is really really high! It's been about 3 hours now, so we do the only thing I can think to do, we trudge back to my work to use the internet and see if we can track down our landlord that way.
Interesting fact:
In the UK, you have to sign up to be listed in a phone directory (as opposed to Australia where you have to request NOT to be listed). Landlord can't be found. Manager at work has a ladder though. So we trudge back home (a mile or so), hoisting our prize ladder with hope (ok, with me it was doubt) in our hearts. It's getting really cold. The ladder venture proves successful only in that Stu successfully manages to avoid killing himself and landing his dead weight on my head as I hover under an exceedingly shakey ladder. You know how a ladder, to be safe, should be about 1:4 ration horizontal to vertical. Yeah, well that only got us halfway to the window. You do the maths. Amazingly, he makes it to the window. Unfortunately, the window will not budge further. Unsteadily, Stu climbs back down.
We try the front windows, but due to the height at the front being even greater than that at the back. We are cold, hungry and tired by now, and we also have an audience in the form of practically the entire high street, who customarily wait in a line at the icecream shop two doors down from us every night. Our ladder antics (honestly, it could have been a silent movie, it was ludicrous) by this time have gained the attention of our neighbours.
Sorry, to be continued, again. It's late and I have to work tomorrow.
Stay tuned.
Keys not in pocket. Dreaded feeling in pit of stomach ensure, followed by hour of fruitless combing of the fields we'd run through. Slightly incredulous that Stu hadn't seen it fall out of my pocket, as he had been behind me the whole time. Incredulity subsides and realisation that we are very much locked out of house, in slightly sweaty shorts and t-shirts with the weather going south of warm. For once in his life, Stu has not brought his phone.
Keys are nowhere to be seen, so we give up the search and rack our brains for other options. We know the landlord lives close by, we just don't know where. We know Stu has his number, in his phone, in the house (where his keys lie on the hall table). We know that, for the first time in ages, Mez has locked both the Yale and Chubb locks of front door because, ironically, she didn't want Stu having a go at her for not locking up properly. We know that the bathroom window is slightly ajar ... and that we live on the third floor of an old old building.
So Stu has the incredibly foolish idea, well, to be fair, brave but foolish, of scouring the neighbourhood for suitable ladders. We find a few, but unfortunately the owners are largely absent, as it's Friday night and everyone else is out having fun. I'm skeptical anyway, the bathroom window is really really high! It's been about 3 hours now, so we do the only thing I can think to do, we trudge back to my work to use the internet and see if we can track down our landlord that way.
Interesting fact:
In the UK, you have to sign up to be listed in a phone directory (as opposed to Australia where you have to request NOT to be listed). Landlord can't be found. Manager at work has a ladder though. So we trudge back home (a mile or so), hoisting our prize ladder with hope (ok, with me it was doubt) in our hearts. It's getting really cold. The ladder venture proves successful only in that Stu successfully manages to avoid killing himself and landing his dead weight on my head as I hover under an exceedingly shakey ladder. You know how a ladder, to be safe, should be about 1:4 ration horizontal to vertical. Yeah, well that only got us halfway to the window. You do the maths. Amazingly, he makes it to the window. Unfortunately, the window will not budge further. Unsteadily, Stu climbs back down.
We try the front windows, but due to the height at the front being even greater than that at the back. We are cold, hungry and tired by now, and we also have an audience in the form of practically the entire high street, who customarily wait in a line at the icecream shop two doors down from us every night. Our ladder antics (honestly, it could have been a silent movie, it was ludicrous) by this time have gained the attention of our neighbours.
Sorry, to be continued, again. It's late and I have to work tomorrow.
Stay tuned.
Change can be a good thing...
Hey all,
New country, new blog. At least that's what I tell myself. The truth? Are you truth handlers? Ok, well the truth is that I hadn't blogged for so long AND my last blog was set up for me by someone who probably used settings she would immediately recall, but that I could not, that I couldn't remember my password. So here we are, starting afresh. For those of you who care and have a yearning for historical context, you can always go back and read about my life in Japan at www.mezlamb.blogspot.com hmmm, that doesn't look right, but oh well, I'm sure someone out there still has a link (H).
Anywho, starting again like this in a new country seems fitting.
I can't say how often I will get to blogging. I can't even be sure anyone will read this, but as one die-hard blogger once said, the blog is more for yourself than for others. So, on that note:
Dear Diary,
Well, this past week has contained moments of frustration, prolonged periods of tweedum (boredom is boring) and the occassional moment of insight. I won't start from the beginning exactly, because for those of you who are familiar with my facebook page, the photos of my previous exploits should pretty much bring you up to speed.
Last Friday night started out in a fairly regular fashion. Having just finished a rather pointlessly tense day at work (work is not so great at the moment, but I'll save that for another post), I decided the best thing to do, considering the uncharacteristcally bright, sunny, warm Scottish evening, was to go for a run. In yet further uncharacteristic fashion, Stu decided to join me. He's not much for the running. Off we go. The weather is so nice, I opt for shorts and t-shirt instead of the usual trackies and hoody. Blah blah blah, run run run, occassional glance behind to see Stu panting behind, (and then when he realises I'm looking, plaster on a brave "I'm loving this" face that barely masks the pain of his lost masculinity). Sorry Stu, but we both know it. We're running through a field that borders the seafront, it's really quite picturesque. Then, as I sense that Stu might be slightly over it (he's about 50 metres behind having slowed to a clod-kicking walk), I turn around and tell him that if he wants, he should head back and I'll meet him at home. As I say the words, and read the pure relief on his face, I reach into my pocket for out house keys ...
New country, new blog. At least that's what I tell myself. The truth? Are you truth handlers? Ok, well the truth is that I hadn't blogged for so long AND my last blog was set up for me by someone who probably used settings she would immediately recall, but that I could not, that I couldn't remember my password. So here we are, starting afresh. For those of you who care and have a yearning for historical context, you can always go back and read about my life in Japan at www.mezlamb.blogspot.com hmmm, that doesn't look right, but oh well, I'm sure someone out there still has a link (H).
Anywho, starting again like this in a new country seems fitting.
I can't say how often I will get to blogging. I can't even be sure anyone will read this, but as one die-hard blogger once said, the blog is more for yourself than for others. So, on that note:
Dear Diary,
Well, this past week has contained moments of frustration, prolonged periods of tweedum (boredom is boring) and the occassional moment of insight. I won't start from the beginning exactly, because for those of you who are familiar with my facebook page, the photos of my previous exploits should pretty much bring you up to speed.
Last Friday night started out in a fairly regular fashion. Having just finished a rather pointlessly tense day at work (work is not so great at the moment, but I'll save that for another post), I decided the best thing to do, considering the uncharacteristcally bright, sunny, warm Scottish evening, was to go for a run. In yet further uncharacteristic fashion, Stu decided to join me. He's not much for the running. Off we go. The weather is so nice, I opt for shorts and t-shirt instead of the usual trackies and hoody. Blah blah blah, run run run, occassional glance behind to see Stu panting behind, (and then when he realises I'm looking, plaster on a brave "I'm loving this" face that barely masks the pain of his lost masculinity). Sorry Stu, but we both know it. We're running through a field that borders the seafront, it's really quite picturesque. Then, as I sense that Stu might be slightly over it (he's about 50 metres behind having slowed to a clod-kicking walk), I turn around and tell him that if he wants, he should head back and I'll meet him at home. As I say the words, and read the pure relief on his face, I reach into my pocket for out house keys ...
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