The first week of the year

The year has started for us with tragedy and farce.

My husband went back to work on Thursday to find that a dear friend and colleague had collapsed and died on the bus on the way to work. He was only 57 and was in apparently good health. The whole office is devastated. He and his wife were looking forward to going to Australia in April for the wedding of their son to an Australian girl. Truly, our lives are fragile and uncertain.

And the less tragic event?

Ten years ago, we built a new kitchen on the side of our house. The vinyl floor covering was getting a bit worn and today was the date chosen to renew it. We did consider getting the more fashionable ceramic tiles instead, but the kitchen is quite large and it would have been expensive. It also occurred to us that a tiled floor in the middle of a Scottish winter night would be a chilly thing for little furry feet to walk on: the catlets spend their nights in the kitchen. So that decided it.

Yesterday evening, then, it was necessary to remove everything from the floor in preparation for the vinyl laying chaps today. This included the fridge, the freezer (both quite large and heavy), the tumble drier, washing machine and dishwasher (also quite heavy and in the latter two cases, attached to the water supply), a biggish table, six dining chairs, a rocking chair and footstool, an occasional table, a pot rack, a rubbish bin, a recycling rubbish bin… in other words, quite a lot of stuff. My husband is not necessarily a man whose favourite activity is unplumbing things and dragging them across floors.

We got up bright and early today to receive the vinyl layers. Then we discovered that they were actually booked to come next Saturday. We had the correct date marked on the calendar but somehow… we hadn’t checked.

But in the scheme of things, it doesn’t matter. Our washing machine, dishwasher and tumble drier are sitting unemployable in the dining room. The fridge and freezer are in the back hall – plugged in. It’s a bit unusual to have to walk from the kitchen, through the dining room and into the back hall to reach the fridge, but we’re getting used to it.

Daughter 2 has returned from seeing her actor boyfriend in his panto. Son has been writing an essay and telling us of his plans for after the summer.

And that’s what’s been happening this week.