We've been renovating and extending a house. Twelve months after the builder started work, we moved in. Oh, it's not finished, we just got sick and tired of waiting for the builder. For 6 of those 12 months, I was the unpaid labourer on the site. Learnt a few things - mainly that I'm too old and too slow!
We're moved in now, and I don't think we've seen the builder on site since then. That was 4 months ago. Seems to me that he's worked out that it'll cost him X plus Y dollars to finish the job, while we only owe him Y dollars under the fixed-price contract. So he's not so much disappeared, as just never available.
In the meantime, I've been learning. Mainly I've been learning how NOT to do things. I try to do something and make such a mess of it that I have to demolish it. I try and limit my activities so that they are outside. If It goes wrong, there'll be no long-lasting, structural damage to the house.
My beloved has now decided that she wants some low garden walls in brick. What I know about laying bricks is . Got a few brickies in to give quotes, but most didn't want the job and priced themselves out.
However, one guy was interested and interesting. Gave us a quote and then came back about a week later to check up on my digging of trenches for the foundations. Made a few alterations, and said he'd be back the next day to start work. The next morning, he was there. I could see him shaking his head, just like the archtypical tradie. Then there were the 6 excuses why he couldn't start work - mainly that my digging was wrong, even thought it was exactly what he'd said the day before. So he left, saying that he'd ring on Sunday and be back on Monday. He didn't and he wasn't. And now he isn't. And now I am.
Oh dear!
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