On Monday, I received a letter from the Teachers' Pensions organisation telling me that they had made a mistake when first calculating my occupational pension. They were very sorry but as a result of this error I owed them just shy of £100.
On Tuesday, I received a letter from the NS&I (National Savings and Investments) telling me that I had won £100 on the Premium Bonds - inviting me to confirm my identity and secure the prize.
"The Lord giveth and The Lord taketh away" - Book of Job (Chapter 1). Or in my case "The Lord taketh away and The Lord giveth" - Book of Pudding (Chapter 13).
Pressure from her ladyship has resulted in me agreeing to update our small front room. We have already paid out almost £1000 to replace our old inefficient living gas fire with a new glass-fronted, and infinitely more efficient fire that we might actually use this winter instead of always relying on the central heating radiator.
We have also arranged for our leather Layzee-Boy sofas to be reupholstered. They should have served us far longer but two of the armrests have disappointingly worn out in just five years. The new covering will be of a lighter coloured, good quality fabric.
On Monday, we went to "Atkinsons" department store to order a new carpet and we have plans to decorate the front room when the sofas have been taken away but before the carpet is fitted. As you can imagine, there's a bit of juggling and finger crossing to do before (hopefully) it all comes together.
But then...
We have never had any significant damp problems in this house. It has been pretty water tight. But two weeks ago we discovered a possible damp issue on our bedroom ceiling. Maybe the flashing around the chimney has been compromised. And then yesterday in the very room we are updating I discovered certain damp on the pillar wall adjacent to our bay window. Oh no!
It is not rising damp. It is rain water that is somehow penetrating the brick wall but where is it coming from? It can be very hard to determine the source of such problems but we really need to solve the matter before decorating the room.
Today I was up our tall stepladders removing the silicone that sealed the gap between the external brickwork and the UPVC bay window we had installed over twenty years ago. I could not see any glaring gaps or cracks in the sealant but there's a good chance that this may be where the water has got in.
Tomorrow morning I will be up that ladder again with a sealant gun re-filling the gap with fresh silicone but with very limited confidence that this work will solve the problem. I just can't figure out where else the water might be coming from.
from Yorkshire Pudding https://ift.tt/9tSWONo
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