We've got power!!!!

Yahoo!  We have real electricity in the house, as opposed to borrowed electricity via extension leads.  The electrician has been here for the last three days and we now have working lights in the kitchen and utility rooms, sockets upstairs and downstairs working and all the outside lights work!  Wow, it's so strange to walk in and just flick a switch or just plug stuff in without trundling extension leads from the temporary sockets in the meter box.  We're now waiting for it to get dark so we can go and see what it all looks like. 
The light Bob is hiding behind will be over the table, so eventually we won't bang our heads on it . . . . . in the meantime, we have a tally going of who bumps into it most and Bob's winning so far.

These spotlights will shine on worktops, cooker, etc rather than straight down the walls as they do here, hopefully (looks a bit like a museum with them like that).  Except for the ones mounted on oak in the kitchen, we went for plain white sockets and switches with rounded edges and definitely no red blobs to tell you they're on.  We seem to constantly be battling to find things without writing, coloured bits and lights on them - think at this stage we're capable of knowing when a socket is switched on without constant reminders (sorry, this is one of my bugbears)!  Finding a cooker switch that wasn't bright red took ages and we did get fobbed off at one stage with a brass one with a red switch being told that they had to be red.  Luckily I didn't believe them and checked t'internet and found this one (right-hand one in the picture), phew, good job I checked.

The pile of 'spaghetti' in the corner of the utility room is a bit tidier now with the first lot of cables stripped and attached to trip switches in consumer unit number one.  Below that will be a smaller one for the six underfloor heating trip switches and next to that is the immersion heater timer.  Under all that will be another box to house the underfloor heating controllers.  I feel a cupboard coming on to hide all that lot!  I think the electrician was a bit disappointed not to have got more done, but he worked flat out for the three days, so he can't do more.  Connecting to the mains wasn't straight forward.  Scottish Power had mounted the box really low down with very little room to get the cables (which are very thick and unbendy) in and then something wasn't done properly which meant our electrician had to take his life in his hands to tighten a screw between two live wires - he said his heart was thumping!  I think the lights in the kitchen took quite a while too.  In all there are twelve separate lights - goodness that sounds awful!  They are all small lights rather than one big one . . . . . no wonder it took a long time really is it?

It has been quite awkward to get on with things as we don't want to get in the way, but at the same time want to be available to answer questions/help as necessary.  We installed the basin in the en-suite and Bob has been on hand making wooden pattresses so that the lights sit well on the uneven stones.  This afternoon I felt like a bit of a spare part so I did some very much needed hedge weeding.  Everything either stung or had thorns so my arms are tingling, red and covered in bumps and scratches.  I've done about two thirds of it, but I expect it'll all have grown back again by the time I get round to finishing it!

The chickens have found a new bath . . . . . in the remains of a bonfire!  Oh, what a mess they looked covered in black dust.  I think it must be the chicken equivalent of a dead sea mud spa treatment!  Needless to say, Elvis didn't see the need for such beauty treatments!  Tomorrow we're doing the village hill walk.  It is an annual event to raise money for charity.  16 miles over the local hills with the option of a shortcut . . . . 10 miles!  We'll be taking the shortcut!