14^th December

Last night the builders were working till 9. This morning they are here again at 7.30. Two events coincide. A flat-bed truck pulls up outside carrying the five massive steel beams that boss builder took the risk of ordering without the go-ahead from the structural surveyors and Building Control Officer. At exactly the same time the email allowing us to order the steels, that have just arrived, pings in. Good call.

Now Boss Builder with Bartek, Sebastian, Karol, and Rafal have to get the steels off the flat-bed and then, (how?) into the lower ground floor of the flat. Bartek can’t lift anything still because of the injury to his arm playing football in that first week. But he can do a whole lot of other things. They use a short length of piping, such as you’d find in scaffolding, shoved under each steel beam to swivel it into position. Then, old bits of door and planks are wedged over the bags of hardcore and broken concrete that are piled in the front garden. The (new) window, that I had had installed before I discovered that the whole place needed rebuilding, is wide open to allow the steels to be slid in. Boss builder says cheerfully, ‘If we break window we can put new glass, easy peasy lemon squeasy!’

I fear for their backs, not for the glass. But never forget, they are Polish.