Inset sinks

Whoever invented inset sinks should be turned into a dishcloth and made to live in the space between the back of the sink and the (usually) wall.  If he, she or it predeceased this post I hope God makes them do the washing up.  Yes this does have to do with pottering, you just have to use your imagination.

Update - Hotpoint Aquarius washing machine alternative uses.

This is the latest version of the drum log store. The first one posed a small tripping hazard because of the use of pillar taps which are quite long and stick out a bit.  This has bath taps which are shorter but fatter and I think more suitable.  I was at the local transfer station where I had gone to look for taps and when I stopped my van there they were ready and waiting, remarkable what a little positive visualisation can achieve.  I did have to pay for them though, gone are the carefree days of wandering about on the nearest council tip from where I usually brought home more than I dumped.  All in the interest of recycling, health and safety (of course) and transferring: transfer from home to car, from car to appropriate skip, from skip to somewhere else and so on, that's how it works today.  Mustn't grumble though some kind of progess I suppose.

Blog pottering

I have spent some time (unspecified) changing the layout of the header on this blog and I think this could be called 'blog pottering'.  There is a clue in the first sentence.  This could also be a form of perverse perfectionism which might be time wasting which pottering is definitely not.  I think this might be a contradiction; pottering is not as simple as it would seem.

Never jump to conclusions or make assumptions - a cautionary tale for serious potterers.

I think this is fringe pottering because it started with the intention to carry out an almost essential maintenance task.  The degree of importance depends on on your cleanliness threshold, mine varies considerably depending on what contaminates I have been exposed to.  On a scale of 1 to10, public lavatories would score 10 and bit of gardening 1 or 2.  Anyway to get to the point, the shower drain was blocked which I didn't discover until about 10-30pm, and after an unsuccessful attempt to clear it via the trap, accessible from the top, I decided the only way was to cut a hole in the ceiling to get at the trap from below, but by about 12pm had not been able to unscrew the sump of the trap.  So false assumption No: 1 the bottom of the trap is removable, well no it isn't actually and fortunately due to my cautious nature I decided to check this before doing any damage.  First trawled the internet for technical drawings to show how it came to pieces to no avail (probably because it doesn't).  Gave up for the day.

Next morning I rang plumb centre to find out the awful truth - "if it comes off you've broken it".... well fortunately I hadn't so time to reassess the situation.  False assumption No: 2 just because you can't see it doesn't prove it isn't there.  This refers to the fact that there is actually access to the pipe from above but although you can't see it, it's there all the same and you have to feel around until you find it then attempt to clear it by poking something along the pipe such as the drain clearing wire I already had.  This was were having already cut a hole in the ceiling proved to be useful because I knew that I had to get the wire round two 90degree bends before getting very far.  Eventually success, I removed a large plug of hair (not mine) from somewhere and then things began to return to normal, pretty revolting but that's why it's pottering on the fringe or extreme pottering, not something to be undertaken lightly or without being aware of the possible consequences.  Every cloud has a silver lining though,  I could see the possibility of mainline pottering on the horizon; the hole in the ceiling which would require enlarging to make access, should it be necessary in the future, easier.  A removable hatch would be needed to cover the hole and look tidy and yes, real pottering, I could do this in my workshop.  But I was in for a shock. While enlarging the hole what does one do to check for any debris that might be present? put your hand through the existing carefully researched hole feel around and find a bit of brick, ok, some bits of plaster, etc, and a dead rat, WHAT! yes a real semi decomposed dead rat in the joist space.  Well now I really did need a shower and after bravely surviving the day with my subconscious contamination warning gauge hovering around the 9 mark I managed to test the apparatus and get relatively clean at the same time while reflecting on the possibility of extending the pottering potential of this episode to include a filter of some sort to prevent a further occurrence of hair blockage.

The moral of this story as already alluded to - assume nothing but also expect a dead rat to turn up from time to time.    

Hotpoint Aquarius washing machine alternative uses

In case you don't get the significance of this comment the washing machine casing is now being used as a log store..........and the drum.

Rain