All the patio and building work has been done and now we wait for the painter.
I have never quite understood why builders can´t put on a couple of square feet of paint, but I guess there are (trades) unions here as there were in the UK in the 60s. New Dani, or Dani #4, (or Antonio as he is really known) came and did the remainder of the building work (putting some angled rebar in the patio corner wall) then went up aloft to do the satellite dish and replace tiles. Now I could understand builders not being roofers, but it turned out that this one is both, and a satellite engineer. Luckily a bit of a lightweight too, with a special technique to always put pressure on two adjacent tiles so as not to create more mayhem than replacements.
Firstly he went up a ladder to take down the dish, but not before I got him to rope himself to the rejas outside my bedroom. It took a while to unbolt the dish, and no-one was sure what it might weigh as it had quite a sturdy mounting post, but eventually it was off - and on the way to "metal-mickie" who is our local scrap man.
Next scurried aloft from the top patio, well, he was about to scurry aloft, but I insisted he put on a harness and had a rope attached. He agreed, then went up with a stack of tiles and some fixative (not cement, something special in a pistol-gripped tube with a long nozzle), then he disappeared for 15 minutes. I also wanted the chimney painting, and, showing my inability to learn practices, was still surprised to find it was not going to be him, but someone else was coming to paint the stack at a later date.
Anyway, Antonio replaced the 3 ridge tiles that I had spotted - then a couple more I hadn´t, then said he just turned back over the ones that had turned-turtle in the gullies. (Note I had been up on the road with the "bins" and hadn´t managed to spot these issues, but then I am not a trained tiler). I reckon it took about 40 minutes in-all, then he was back safely, much to my relief (if not his - he seemed quite happy wandering the rooftop).
Dani Dos had been assisting with ladder-holding and I was holding the rope, so we all contributed to the successful topping-out, but I relinquished my role as safety officer and dropped out of the subsequent demobilisation as they moved all their equipment to the gate, thence onto the lorry - a final brushing and hose around and then they were gone.
Brilliant - no need to wake up at sparrow´s in order to open the gate for them and no need to be around in case they needed anything. Now I can get back to the serious work of trying to replace my (now out of production in model and / or colour) toilet cistern. Old age is catching up with the house as well as me.
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