Two Steps Forward .........

It has been an odd few weeks. I know that plenty has been done, but it doesn't seem as though we have managed to achieve much. As the old saying goes "two steps forward, and then one step back". Even my computer seems to be suffering from a similar malaise. Either that or it just has a mind of it's own. I know that the recent weather, which has had a few big thunderstorms, can affect the Internet. Sometimes it will post things two or three times, and at other times it will refuse to post anything at all. Sometimes trying to e-mail people in the UK I get the feeling it would be quicker to walk there and hand deliver the message. It does get a bit frustrating though when you are trying to keep abreast of important things, such as the latest football scores. Very important at this stage of the season.

I have finally got round to joining the 21st Century, and my old mobile phone has been relegated to the substitutes bench. I now have one of these 'new' smart phone thingies. I am almost through War and Peace (AKA the Instruction manual) and nearly know how to drive the thing. I'm sure that it also makes tea and coffee (as it seems to do everything else), but I haven't found that chapter yet. I have managed to make and receive phone calls and texts, take photos and load them onto the computer when it was behaving. I have even managed to set the different ring tones for various events. I did have to take it back into the shop to find out how to find out my own phone number though. Nothing is easy when you have fingers like bananas, and two 'buttons' get pressed at once, but you do get some surprising results.

With the weather once again we have had a field deciding to migrate into another field. Unfortunately it had to cross a road to do so, whilst on the road it decided that it liked it there and so stayed there until the village tractors decided to help it on it's way. So for a while one of the routes out of the village was impassable. It seems to be a yearly problem now, ever since they started to strip back the shrubbery between the fields and the road. At the moment it is clear again, but who knows what might happen come the next big downpour. Hopefully we can manage to avoid them, and with any luck the sun might be making a more regular appearance, at the moment it is definitely feeling more like the English weather we had hoped to escape from.

Our water meter, which worked and didn't leak, has recently been replaced. Admittedly the old one had more arrows and dial than a 1950's power station, and the new one is just figures so that even I can read it. I even gave Nikolai, our village water man, a hand to fit the new one. Washers were selected and rejected until he was happy with the fit. Unfortunately when he came back to read the new meter a couple of weeks later it had developed a drip. Fortunately for me it was on the union before the meter. So a couple of hours later he turns back up with his bag of two spanners and a couple of wrenches, and a handful of what might well have been horsehair. He was happy enough doing whatever it was that he was doing, so I left him to it as my assistance was not required at that point. I have to admit that from the first time I met him he has always reminded me of Mario, he even wears a little cap at times. He is a quiet unassuming man, and always willing to offer help and advice. He does speak quickly though, and mumbles a bit, which can make understanding him a wee bit difficult at times.

The garden is enjoying this erratic weather, and even though the hosepipe is out I've not had to water anything yet. We are being plagued by the EU dandelion crop though. The rain finishes and I give it a couple of hours for the lawns to dry and the mower is out, ready to do battle with the next wave of them. I get the main lawns looking neat and tidy, and then overnight there has been another sneak attack by them. I eventually had the chance to break away from the main lawns, and attempt to tackle the wilderness out the front of the house. Which is what I was doing when Nikolai arrived to fix the drip. The grass was still too wet to cut with the mower so I decided to strim it. All was going well until the strimmer started smoking, which is never a good sign. Our neighbour decided that he would have a go with his electric mower, which started well until it tripped our power.

That was just after Nikolai had finished fixing the drip. So he is then out the front supervising the two of us. After mumbling something he goes off carrying his bag of tools. To prove it wasn't the leads they were plugged into the neighbour's house and everything works. I was just checking our trip box when Nikolai returns with an electric screwdriver and a multimeter. He then proceeds to check the leads (which we knew were working) and gives them his official seal of approval. He then wants to see where the leads had been plugged into indoors. So he is then prodding test leads and his screwdriver into various sockets, before pronouncing that my very short extension lead is kaput. Once he has done this he was back outside supervising the grass cutting, and I took the chance to replace the blown fuse in the adaptor. With power restored I was ready to start strimming again, while our neighbour got on with cutting his own grass. The strimmer had to be inspected too, and I was told it needs two strands of strimming cord and not just the one I was using. I know that he was being helpful but he did remind me of a certain TV character.

Meanwhile the car has been to the garage again. I tried to book it in the other Friday, but was told that couldn't happen as it was the Easter holiday. So I said the following Monday, which was OK. So on the Monday I drove to the garage only to find it shut. Tuesday I repeated the journey and explained what I wanted doing, which would hopefully cure the on going problem. Ignition coils are expensive here 550 Leva each (about £230), but none are available anywhere in Eastern Europe. They are about £65 in the UK so we now have to wait for them to come through the post. The bits that were changed have made a bit of difference, as the fuel economy is much better. So hopefully next time round matters might even be solved. While they are doing that they can also sort out the clonking noise from a worn bush on the front driver's side wheel, which has since developed.

As the vegetable has finally been rotorvated we thought we would go to the market at Kamen, and stock up on tomato and cucumber plants. We've already get the Butternut Squash in ready. Once we'd got there I needed the loo so we headed for a cafe. As we were there it seemed rude not to have a coffee. We met some friends there and by the time we had finished catching up and general nattering the market had closed. The next option was to try the fruit and vegetable market at Popovo. It was a sunny day so we thought why not. The plants they had on offer there looked limper than the lettuce in a British Rail sandwich. So we had a mooch round the town and a bite to eat before heading home, still without any tomato or cucumber plants. There are always the markets at Polski or Gorna to try.

Going home we noticed the sky getting darker and darker, so perhaps it was wise not to get any plants. The rain which followed shortly after we got indoors would have battered them to pieces. It is just a shame that the same thing doesn't happen with the Dandelions. It looks like myself and the lawn mower will have to continue our battle with them. We will prevail.

It's Almost Like A Water Sport

Many people will tell you that you are often confronted with a string of related problems with a house. They can be structural, electrical or like us it can involve water. We have had water where we don't want water, we have had to move water away to prevent it taking up residence in the cellar, we have had to put water where previously there wasn't any. We have fiddled and faffed around with clean water, grey water and 'orrible stuff too. We have had leaks where we don't want them, blockages preventing water actually getting where we do want it to go. It's just like a form of water sport, in as much as it involves water and I normally end up getting hot and sweaty sorting it out. The latest episode involved our hot water boiler in the bathroom, as the name implies it is there to provide us with hot water.

Sunday morning everything is working as advertised, operate the hot tap and hot water comes out. Go for a shower and you can adjust the temperature to your own desired setting. During the day it had behaved itself, but when I went for a shower that evening (and its not even my birthday), where's the hot water? Net, who had had a shower before me, hadn't noticed a problem, but at this time of year you don't want to turn the bathroom into either a sauna or a sweat lodge. The power light outside the bathroom is working, but no power light on the boiler. I made a mental note of where the temperature indicator was sat and left it alone for 10 minutes, just in case it was the LED in the switch which had gone. After 10 minutes there was no change, so it was a slightly tepid shower for me. Thankfully it wasn't the depths of winter.

So Monday morning I arm myself with a multimeter, and start checking voltages. Voltage coming in, voltage going into the switch, voltage coming out of the switch, the thermostat seems to be working fine. So it looks like the element has given up the ghost. I remembered someone saying that the element itself can be replaced, which is great if you have the parts, but being out at the back of beyond we are quite limited on DIY stores. I remembered that a neighbour had previously had boiler problems and it was taken away, sorted out and refitted all in a day. So I thought that it can't be that difficult to disconnect it all, and remove it from the wall. I always like to have a go myself, then if I run into problems I will then call for the cavalry, but at least I will have learnt something.

So having already removed the base cover from the switch area, I thought that I would make a start disconnecting it electrically, remembering to first isolate it outside the bathroom and at the trip box. Now for those not familiar with Bulgarian wiring, there is often no colour coding, so how to identify which wire goes where. My method involved a CD marker pen and my mobile phone. I first marked the various white cables, and then I photographed then in place before I started disconnecting them. There are possibly easier ways of doing such things, but I thought it was a great idea for me on a Monday morning. So feeling quite pleased with myself I disconnected the electrical side of things, that seemed to be the easy bit out of the way.

So now I have a water tank holding 80 litres still on the wall. It seemed a logical step to remove said 80 litres of water before attempting to do myself a mischief, as 80 litres of water is going to be a bit on the heavy side. So I thought I had best disconnect the cold feed in first, after closing off the shut-off switch. So now no more water can get into the tank, surely I only needed to open a hot tap to drain the water from the tank itself. Unfortunately it doesn't work like that, which is a bit of a bugger. One foot is now getting a bit damp as the shut-off switch when it is in its closed position doesn't fully close the water off, so water was still dribbling out of the main supply. So I sort that out before I squelched my way up to the shed to find something to help drain the tank. We now have a sawn-off hose. More by luck than judgement I had cut off enough hose to go between the boiler and the sink. So if the water wasn't going to leave via the hot tap there was no point in the hot water pipe being connected, so that was disconnected too.

So now no water can get in, but I still had to get the existing 80 litres out. There is a small spring loaded lever as shown on the cold water feed, but see that small itty-bitty pipe just to the left of it, 80 litres of water has to come out of there. Trying to hold the lever in while keeping the length of hose in the sink is easier said than done. After the first 10 minutes you try changing hands, a further 10 minutes and your brain has switched off and entered into neutral, and the hose that should be in the sink is now soaking your other foot. At least I could now squelch in stereo. All in all, with interruptions, and a coffee, it took me over 45 minutes to totally drain the tank. If it wasn't a wet room before I started, it was by the time I had finished. Unmounting it from the wall was relatively easy, and thankfully lighter as it was empty.

So with dry feet, and the water heater in the car I set off for where I had been told they did boiler repairs. Unfortunately I must have arrived during Mrs Monday's fag break, as she didn't look overjoyed to see me. The only thing she was interested in was did I have the guarantee and the documents. When I explained that we were not given these treasured bits of paper she lost even more interest and turned to wander off. I politely asked if she knew anywhere else in town which could do the repairs, but that was just met with shrugged shoulders. Realising that I wasn't going anywhere she called her smoking partner over who spoke some English which almost helped. I went through the whole pantomime again with him, only to be told that they no longer did repairs, but he knew a man that did. Unfortunately he knew that this man was at the sea, but he could phone him if I liked and find out when he would be back. So he phoned his mate and they were having a nice natter, eventually he got round to asking about boiler repairs. It turns out that he wasn't at the sea at all but had been busy for the last few days. So I was given his name and number and told to phone him the next day. I didn't think that was too bad, until I asked if he spoke any English, the answer being a big fat no. OK so how do I find this man if I can't understand his directions, which was met by more shoulder shrugging. I did ask if smoker's mate could find out directions, but was told that I would have to phone the boiler repair man the next day, however if I wanted a new boiler he had some that were on special offer that day. So I was given various prices for different models, but still left there with a knackered boiler, a phone number I couldn't decipher and the name Ivan.

As I had other bits and pieces to do I thought that I would do a price comparison with my normal plumber's merchant. So I went in and there were the same boilers at exactly the same price, so his special offer can't have been that special at the other place. As I was there I thought that I might as well ask if they knew anywhere that did repairs. Now neither of them speak English, and admittedly my Bulgarian isn't brilliant, but as best I could I explained the problem. I was stopped so that a phone call could be made, I was then asked where was the boiler. The answer being in the car, up in Kaufland car park. OK says the main man, drop it off later and you can pick it up tomorrow. The difference between the two places was like chalk and cheese. He even gave me a hand carrying it into the shop, and also out with it when I picked it up today. It has been repaired all for the princely sum of 30 Leva, he did say what was wrong with it and I am fairly certain it was the element. So I did all of that running round in yesterday's heat and humidity, and ended up sweating like the last chicken in Colonel Sander's back garden.


Actually fitting it back up in the bathroom was quite easy with my handy reference bits and pieces. The only problem I had was that I had to dismantle part of the shut-off switch to enable water to fill the boiler back up. The good news is that the little LED works in the light switch, the thermostat changes the water temperature and the indicator changes with the different temperature. I also managed to keep both feet dry. So as I said earlier plumbing type jobs are almost like a water sport for me, and today despite the humidity I only ended up like Sweaty McSweaty of the clan McSweaty, rather than the usual Marine in a spelling test. At least I have been able to have a proper shower, which makes it all worth while. Rather than the old boiler being junked it has been given a new lease of life. By following the Bulgarian example of trying to fix things first, I have saved myself money which can't be a bad thing.