Happy shortest day

Today's the shortest day of the year - which means it can only get better from here on, right?

Actually I read something a couple of years ago that the mean temperature lags the length of the day by about 6 weeks, so although in July the days are slightly longer, the temperatures are colder.

Unless of course you live in the northern hemisphere.

All done

Wednesday this week turned out to be rather exciting, even though I was at home sick with a cold. I had a phone call about 9:00 from the electrician's office, asking if it would be ok for him to come around. I said the last time he had come he said the builder had to do something first but it wasn't clear to me what he expected to be done; the office lady said she would ask him to get in touch with the builder directly. Then about 10:30 there was a knock at the door. It was the electrician, who said he was in the area and thought he'd stop by to see if things were ready for him to finish off. It turns out that he was waiting for the units to be installed (I'd been making a distinction between the builder, being the guy from Tradeskills who removed the kitchen and patched a few things up, and the installer, being a different guy who, well, installed the units). So within about an hour he was able to put in a new plug for the microwave, replace the plug for the fridge, and put a new plug on for the phone jack. Then at 1:00 the installer arrived to do the final touches: attach the handles and seal the bench. When he was just about finished the plumber arrived, he had a few hurdles in fixing up the tap, but everything has worked out nicely in the end.

So now I finally have a new kitchen!

... with stuff in it!

Surprise

I received a phone call today that the bench was ready and could be installed this afternoon.
Then later on, another phone call to say it had all been done apart from the handles, because I had ordered two different sizes and they didn't want to guess which ones went where. So they'll come back maybe Tuesday and do that.
Now all that's left to finish off is the plumbing, builder again and electrician...

(apologies for the weird angle on the last photo!)

What do you mean, it's too short??

Wednesday. Yesterday. I had on my calendar, 'Kitchen installation'.

The installer arrived at about 8:30. I showed him the corner unit that only made it into the garage, which he sort of sighed about but started dealing to it, made a couple of phone calls, and by 10:00 it was inside the house and in its proper place. The bench got delivered (in two parts, since it is an L shape), lots of powertool noises outside trimming things to fit.

Then all the noise stopped, apart from a 'what the...?' It turned out that one side of the bench was 10 cm too short. Mr Installer went for a smoko, made a phone call to the guy overseeing the project. Mr Project came out from Wellington, had a look, yup, 10 cm too short. Then they decided to show me and explain what the options were.

Basically it boiled down to someone not thinking about which numbers they were adding together to get the length of the bench.
No problem, the benchtop company can make a new one.
    Only they don't have this particular laminate in stock.
No problem, they can order it today.
    But then it won't arrive until Friday, and they still have to make the bench.
    And Monday's a public holiday.
    And the installer guy is busy on Tuesday and lives in Levin.
But he can come on Wednesday and do it then.

So it means another week of a half-assembled kitchen, and boxes in the dining room...

But at least I can see what the colours look like!

(and I have somewhere to put the phone...)