waiting and waiting

The building project is at a complete standstill. My energy and inspiration are wearing thin and I feel trapped. The lousy weather and a debilitating head-cold have not helped to cheer things up. As a person who suffers from complete absence of patience, I find this waiting game intolerable. Let the new year bring on the builders, the light and brighter prospects.

keeping warm

As compensation for not having a kitchen at the moment, I have been watching Nigella Lawson cook up some Christmas goodies, which I will be trying out as soon as I have the new kitchen in March! It is never too late to spoil oneself.

no kitchen for christmas

No wine today, the builder’s gone away

The bottle stands forlorn, a symbol of the hope

No wine today, it seems a common sight

But people passing by don't know the reason why

 How could they know just what this message means

The end of my hopes, the end of all my dreams

How could they know the palace here is planned

Behind the door my kitchen is not manned

 No wine today, it wasn't always so

Manu and team were gay, they’d turn night into day 

 But all that's left is a place dark and lonely

A terraced house in a mean street back of town

Becomes a building site when they aren’t here

Just two up two down….. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClQepFF-Sr0&feature=player_embedded#!

fine dining in style

If it weren't so cold, we could have planned the big christmas lunch in the new dining room. Check the view... spectacular urban construction covered in crispy fresh snow.

hope springs eternal in the human breast

I have had to vasbyt * and swallow my disappointment when Manu told us that the new windows will not be ready till January 12 at the earliest! If setbacks come in sets of three, then we have had the three: blocked sewer, below freezing temperatures (builders cannot work in extreme cold) and now late delivery of windows. As far as I know, Alexander Pope coined the phrase "hope springs eternal in the human breast" in his Essays on Man. We hope, we dream and imagine. In the meantime, we are selling (and sampling!) wine for the season's festivities.

*vasbyt : Afrikaans expression for biting hard or fast when you need to persevere.

getting closer

you may say I am a dreamer

But I am not the only one. Even Manu and my other half can already visualize the new kitchen. And yesterday I met with the kitchen man. There is progress indeed. I fear though that the deepfreeze temperatures will return by the end of the week, in which case everything will come to a grinding halt.  But not my hope that my kitchen and I will be as one. 

Last week was of course the 30^th anniversary of John Lennon’s death; we were all reminded again to imagine.

the joys of a flush

Never take your flushing for granted. Appreciate it. The Nivelles Commune heard our desperate cries and sent some gallant knights in shiny armour, riding on a huge beast of a machine with mechanical snorting rocket engine pipes, suction contraptions and more extravagant pumping devices. They pumped and sucked all day, removing the SS debris from the ancient street sewer. A relief in more ways than one for sure. 

Je vous remercie pour votre dévouement pour nous sauver.

Furthermore, the builders are coming back tomorrow as the deepfreeze is thawing! But the kitchen man did not arrive for our rendezvous, hmmm... this kitchen remains elusive.

neolithic nivelles and fighting SSO

You can’t think underground sewer without thinking history, right? On the left see a corner in the cellar, just so that you understand our fear of SSO. Bear with me while I tackle the history aspect first before I attend to the SSO aspect.

How old is Nivelles? Danubian peoples apparently cleared forests and cultivated fertile soils here starting in 4000 BC. They made pottery and kept domesticated cows, pigs, dogs, goats and sheep. Here we are talking pre-bronze age…The region was gradually turned into agricultural land and then a couple of thousand years later the Romans came along, destroyed everything, built it up again. By now (my understanding anyway) we are apparently talking about the Iron Age….The Roman settlements were destroyed again and built up again by the Germanic invasions if the 3^rd century. How much infrastructure remained we cannot really tell but by the 7th century, the territory was part of the Austrian Frankish kingdom. Modern Nivelles was developed around the abbey founded by St. Gertrude, Pepin of Landen's daughter, in 648.

The main cause of SSO (Sanitary Sewer Overflow) usually stems from serious rainfall or a sewer line blockage. In our case it is because we live downstream from four restaurants, where food solids end up in the municipal sanitary sewer and this sewer is blocked by said debris. “The combined flow of wastewater and stormwater can exceed the capacity of the sewer system ….This circumstance is most prevalent in older cities whose subsurface infrastructure is quite old.” Nivelles is rather old. We know the sewer and our house are about 300 years old, or older in the case of the sewer. Who knows what iron age artifacts lurk there, adding to the debris?

The pictures below show two men struggling with SSO, one in India and one in Nivelles. 

letter to the mayor

Dear Mr. Mayor,

Would you believe that we live right in the centre of your town and we are victims of a total municipal sewer failure? How would you manage if you and your family could not flush a toilet, nor have a shower, nor wash the dishes, nor wash the laundry for nine days? And all this in the middle of freezing temperatures? We have tried to alert your works department already several times and there is nothing they seem to be doing about it. We are in the middle of a major renovation and we find the situation extremely challenging. We are now considering checking into a hotel this afternoon and sending you the bill.

Yours sincerely,

Stek

PS Since the street sewer backup is overflowing into our cellar as I write this, we have taken the liberty of pumping this stuff into the street.

new kitchen floor

The new structural sub floor looks more like a flaw to me. It remains a challenge for the imagination to see the walls with sparkling new kitchen counter. But I have to be positive: at least the general area is already white. Today being a snow-day, there is no school for me. But of course the builders also need the odd snow-day. They have already taken four this week. To keep the minus 6 degree frosty draft from blowing up from the cellar and the ground floor, I hang a curtain over the stairwell. Our two critical off-springs offer advice. Consider yourselves rich and fortunate they say.

If we didn’t have the sewer issue as well, it may have been easier to take up the suggested consideration. The street sewer needs unplugging, as there is a lurking threat in the corner of the cellar, where all my precious cooking tools and technology is stored, patiently awaiting the new kitchen. My other half is going to again see the chaps at the commune this afternoon; he will try and see the very mayor himself. We were promised a clear sewer by last Monday. On the menu tonight? Choucroute garnie with rookworst and smoky bacon.