The writing on the wall

An extraction hood was bordered, but the plaster on the wall is a bit loose, is dirty, ugly, etc. And, loose plaster is a highway for termites and other unholy creatures, and we don't want those. Our builder, empresa Simon, is a bit busy at the moment,
so I'm doing some work in advance, as you can see. Quite an improvement, no?

Much plaster is easily removed with just a spatula. That is because modern plaster was applied onto a lime mortar wall. And that does not stick well. After 20 years or so the plaster will come off. But, especially at the top of the wall there are ares of modern cement, where the modern plaster sticks extremely well. And that's too tough a job. I quit.

After a plaster removal session you have a lot of mess and dust. That is easily cleaned up, it's dry, but it's a hassle. This job is more than a week for one engineer Jansen with a spatula, so more than seven times a mess to clean up, while it's just a day for three empresas Simon with electrical chisels. And a cleanup only once.

Another reason the plaster separates from the wall is that the walls are relatively humid. They were made of lime mortar, and attract humidity from the soil and cellar. Modern plaster is completely sealing, especially if you put "plastico" wallpaint on top. Quite wrong. Under the plaster the wall indeed feels damp-ish. Not a big problem, the doors and windows are always open in a Spanish house, so ventilation is okay. But the paint must go.

Quite interestingly, the old walllpaint becomes visible. They quite liked light blue, apparently. This color was used in the past, and is called "azulete". Even more interesting is that the walls are scribbled full of text. Well, more figures with a word here and there. I suspect they did bookkeeping on the walls, as I think I see the word "kilo" here and there, and a "Pepe". It could be they handed in sacks of wheat to be milled, and part was kept as payment. (see below)

I'd like to show you another example of "Ansteystyle" renovation: the terminal block of this switch was simply plastered in, outside the switch. And some cable ends here. Well, of course.

Ansteystyle renovation.

Termite detection

A house on the Spanish campo needs protection against termites, as they are abundant here. 12 detectors were bought. Those are plastic containers with a piece of wood, and a baiting substance. The containers are placed in the ground around your house. Where there are termites they will find the detector, eat the wood and bait, so you know: ah, termites. You then replace the bait with poison, and get rid of them. Termites are very useful, but not in your house.

In the upper part the container with bait, at the bottom wood. Needs checking every 3 months..

The starling, the roof tile and the bottle

Today engineer Jansen risked his life (again) on a wobbly ladder. There is a roof tile that missed the blob of cement on the outside, and a smart starling noticed that, and thinks: nice habitat! It is right, but it's already mince. And I don't want any vandal starlings with a nesting urge. That only gives us grit in the house. These roofs are not more than a layer of gypsum/clay on reeds under roof tiles. At the arrow an old 2-liter cola bottle was inserted up it's front door. Soon the roof will be maintained a bit, and the opening closed with cement again.

Servicos higienicos lavabo

Today one of the oldest peeves in this house was finally resolved: installation of a small hand wash basin in the loo on the first floor. In Spain all you can get are huge wash basins. Probably due to the water shortage. Anyway, when you sat on the loo the wash basin was pushing in your side. We gave up locally and ordered a small one via the interwebs with Amazon. Installed this week. Not in one go, as the sizes of all connections differ from the old basin and taps. Various car rides later we now have a spare siphon, and some connection hoses.

Oh, and some silicone. All over me, of course.

Hm, where do we put the soap?

Big Frangipani!

Yesterday dropped by the garden center to look for new bougainvilleas, preferably yellow. And a blood orange tree./ But, "even better": a very big frangipani for 25 €. Standing alone at the back, leafless (normal in this season), loveless, in a very small pot. But that doesn't matter with frangipani, they can do with very little soil. All will be well. Lucky day!

And luckily I have a roofless car, else I could not have transported it.

This already is the new pot, I don't have a bigger one now.

The hood 2

We decided on the Falmec Concorde 120 cm. Ordered at Italian web shop, with the oven, and paid. Got a mail today the courier wants €90,- more. No way. Prices are prices. Curious how this will end.

No this is a photo from a brochure.

Happy Birthday to P

Happy birthday, the 24th, P. And for those that forgot: hm.

cappucino setas, foie in white chocolate, non-Oreo made of black olive and goats cheese, something in bitter chocolate.

Croquetas: gamba, chipirones, galibo

Pheasant paté

Tomate raf, powder of foie (fantastic!)

Tartare de langostino

Finished. Op!

Gambas de Garrucha y alcachofas

Sole.

Venison with blueberry sauce.

Sorbet, in the unavoidable signature marble eggs :-)

Dessert with CO₂.

Gourmet coffee.

Oven

An existential matter is the choice of an oven! Pizza! We missed that. And again: big is beautiful. Only, if you bake a cookie in an oven of 115 liters, is that okay, or will it start to feel lonely?

The German Häussler one is big and beautiful, and expensive, and needs a 400V net connection. The Belgian Rofco is especially goof for baking bread (stone oven), while the Smeg is a huge allrounder. Just let us know what you think.


Häussler Primus - Das Schmuckstück für Ihre Küche

Rofco B10 - broodbaksteenoven

Smeg SF9390X1 - 115 liter!

The hood

All that is missing in Our Life™: and oven and a hood. And there's no end in choice in that. We dicovered Falmec, an Italian brand, and quite affordable. With a Collection. Capital C.

Look, there are the wallmount versions: (link):

So what'll it be? We're thinking 120 cm, because big is beautiful. See these photoshopped pics, and let us know what you think?

Concorde, sleek modern look:

Marte Pro,  true restaurant atmosphere:

Master, snack bar look:

Hob continued continued continued continued (4)

It works, and we are not (yet) exploded.

You did not think all would be well in one go, did you? Of course you didn't. And with reason, as it did not. The burners burned, but what this whole things was about fo me: small flames, and very low burners: nope. The control range was very bad. Big flames yes, small flames no. We could have kept the old Boretti. *snirf* *boohoo*.

But, the Boretti had small control screws under the gas valves to set the smallest flames. our lovely, wonderful, great and wonderful beautiful Atag in NL had those too, so this one probably as well. Yes. Small screws near the gas valves. So the glass cover needs to be removed yet again. Forth time. screw screw screw, sigh.

You need to turn the bypass screw all the way in for butane, and extend it for natural gas. Of course they were extended, for natural gas. Lucky I have a Torx screwdriver, the very same that was used to open Macintosh 30 years ago.

After putting back the glass cover and the burners you need to reset the hob. Remove the plug, put the right gas valve to '9', plug in the plug, set the gas valve to '0', and the display changes to 5 times 'C' for calibration. And then, finally, it works okay.

I hope to have taken apart and re-assembled this thing for the very last time, as the intimacy with this gas hob's innards start to bother me.

If you would like to admire our nice copper gas conduits and valve, do scroll down.

Question remains: would there be people that have had their gas hob converted to butane properly? The technicians here have no clue how to do this. It can't be right that buyers have to adjust the internals of their newly bought gas appliances?

Pervert!

Hob continued continued continued (3)

The technician who came today to fix the gas connection between bottle and hob said: "A hose, in the house? No es permitido". Not allowed, in Spanish. It must be made of copper, all the way to the hob if there is an oven underneath. And it needs an accessible gas tap. He'll come back tomorrow. Another lean day today. 

About the not possible opening he said: ah, I think we need to shorten the pipe-like thing. Ehhh. I want the correct manual, please.

But it's fixed. P. saw that the gasket (blue in the picture) was in the way, because the burner had been disassembled yesterday, and the gasket was deplaced a bit. That is now positioned correctly, and the 11 mm distance is possible. 13 mm, too.

Lucky we're two engineers, although one is more theoretical.