Lull

A quiet Sunday. Seems to have been a quiet Saturday too: Once I'd left the welding youth must have been out of there like a flash, leaving Chang Poon on his own and progress stalled. We're still, to coin a phrase, four tiles short of a full counter. Nek was there when I arrived, pacing nervously, waiting for another instalment. I subjected him to the usual psycho-terror, and Knotty was dispatched upstairs to paint the walls. Not sure if that's to be welcomed, so I told CP to go up occasionally and avert the worst.

Kitti had more or less finished his job, and very nicely too. All that remains is to attach the breaker box, move one socket because it'll get in the way of my desk, and, once the bed has been airlifted into the third floor, hang the Chinese lanterns outside. I can't expose them to the danger, having invested all of 400 baht in keeping the ancient craft extant.

The owner came to take her rent and everything that wasn't nailed down, including Big Jim's vast industrial fridge. She also told the neighbours to move their plants so they don't trespass on my bit of pavement no mo' and then whispered to me to plug the holes in the manhole cover because otherwise they'd 'pour food down there.' Yes yes, I said. The American neighbour's mother-in-law, a member of the farming community, had a look round and shouted at me to get the broken cover out of the sewer in the courtyard. I shouted back there's no hurry, and we had a high old time.

PS: Looks like the worst was averted in the sense that Knotty disappeared the moment I left, having in two days managed to paint one coat on the bathroom walls only, a job that would take me -- even me -- about 45 minutes. 'Do it yourself then.' No. I'm paying, aren't I, so I don't have to.