One of the many tedious and trite ‘Management’ mantras that everyone is likely to be aware of, is the Six ‘P’s. These, with one ‘R’, sum up my activities of the last week. I apologise that there are very few pictures however, so I will keep this brief!
The last blog mentioned that there is lots of sanding and filling to be done in Granary before we can start the serious rebuilding, and these have been my focus.
The Six ‘P’s for the (very) few who are unaware, are that Proper Planning and Preparation Prevent Poor Performance. To be honest, this is a mantra that I fully agree with. The ‘performance’ we are trying to achieve is to get Granary back to its fabulous state as previously. To achieve this, we did lots of planning at the start (location of sockets; switches; car charging point; new kitchen and bathroom layout) and the preparation began with ripping everything out to allow our electrician and plumber to do their things as easily and quickly as possible.
The preparation continues with the scraping, filling and (eventually) sanding to prepare the best surface to tile and paint. Subsequently, any pictures I could have taken of Granary as of today, will look very similar to those from last week although the work done is essential.
One day was spent back in Brest shopping for additional materials, which gives us the A & E of the title – thankfully not for Accident & Emergency but the, equally well known, posterior and elbow!
The reason for this is, with the new kitchen layout we needed to buy more tiles to extend the splashback in a couple of areas. On a previous visit, we confirmed that the tiles we used in 2015 are still sold, which meant that we didn’t need to strip everything off and start again but simply extend what we managed to retain in the strip out.
However, on this week’s trip, the shop told us that they had none in stock and had no date when they would become available again. We were able to order the boxes we needed (a mere 3) but with no guarantee when they would be delivered. To see if we could reduce the risk, when we got home, we looked at the store online to see if others in the same chain had any in stock that we could collect.
According to their website (which are generally not great for French companies) there were no boxes in Quimper or Saint Brieuc (our closest alternatives) but there were 5 in, err, Brest!
We ordered the 3 we needed, anticipating an email saying ‘sorry, not available’ but, as things stand, they are being delivered tomorrow! Thankfully, we will now be able to continue with the job when we get to that stage although do need to return to the store in Brest in person to cancel the first order!
The final letter ‘R’, is for Roger, David’s Dad, who arrived with us on Wednesday for his first visit since late 2019.
Roger’s visit coincides with his birthday which was a great excuse to visit an excellent restaurant in the pretty town (small city?) of Roscoff. Finistère is a region with 776 miles of coastline and so has amazing seafood, something David loves and his Dad specifically enjoys lobster. Chez Janie is a fantastic restaurant for both and well recommended.
Not having visited us for a couple of years, during which there have been some changes to our local restaurants, it has given us a great excuse to visit our favourites. Friday night was back with the new team at Auberge du Menez in the neighbouring village of Saint Rivoal, and this lunchtime to La Faïencerie in Daoulas after a stroll round the amazing Sunday market.
That, with a kind invitation from a friend for a lovely lunch yesterday which took us well into the evening(!), means that perhaps Granary hasn’t progressed quite as much as I’d have liked but I’m not panicking – yet!
This coming week should see me make much greater leaps with Granary – and so some pictures to show next weekend – and it looks like spring might be arriving, and staying this time, later in the week!
Kenavo.