And now you’re all eager to know how our swapped home turned
out – I know. It is a spacious house that can easily accommodate 7 people,
clean but showing the sign of the times in some rooms. The family room
furniture must have been handed down from grandmother’s time whose picture is
on the wall. Very dark wood and lots of bric-a-brac (or collectibles) from that
era. The thatched roof gives it a very cozy feel but is also responsible for
some mess on the ground. The birds on that roof like to play with the
straw. The outside swimming pool has
brown water in it, not out of neglect but it’s taken from a nearby lake of the “blue
flagged lake “variety. I only read about blue flagged beaches recently in the US.
Florida got none, CA only one. It’s too cold for these Floridians anyways.
They just recently installed a fancy new bathroom upstairs for
their teenage kids, something you will see in hip hotels. Thank goodness there
was room enough left in the closets for our stuff in contrast to last year’s experience.
In the meantime, it has gone so cold that we lit a fire in the living-room.
That doesn’t warm the bathroom where I need it most. First the radiators started
to warm up a little- and then there was none. A sure sign of having run out of
oil/ kerosene. Hubby asked how I knew. I only know too well from my experience in
Ireland and Germany. In a normal summer, you don’t need heat and oil and turn
it off in the spring when the weather picks up. You reorder some time during
the summer months watching heating oil prices like a hawk and strike when it’s
low. We had a tank of 12,000 l; so a difference in price of 2-10 cents makes
quite a difference. But low and behold, especially in Ireland, the weather gods
weren’t in the mood for summer and in the middle of July, more than once, I ran
out of the last drops.
Who needs heat in the summer? I do when daytime temperatures
hover around 14 Celsius and nights are even colder. Delicate me wouldn’t have
made it far down the line through Evolution…
Yesterday, the last night my son was here, the “Men”
barbecued outside while we had the fire going and watched Mamma Mia. We were happy
we only had to do the kitchen chores. Now it’s sheet changing time because my
daughter is on her merry way from Berlin to visit us. Yeah! She wants to visit on of the seaside resorts. In this weather?
I fought and lost a battle with the dryer which is of a new
technical generation we hadn’t encountered yet. Thanks to a technically minded
husband the problem was solved. This apparatus doesn’t blow hot air out anymore
while spinning and drying but accumulates the water in a plastic container on
the top left where a washer has its soap dispenser. So now for you. My daughter said,"Of course, a condensation dryer!"
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