Keeping a row of 300 year old cottages running isn’t as easy as it sounds. A row of 300 year old converted cow sheds (which is what this place actually is) is even harder.
Almost overnight I had no choice but to become a handyman, to quickly fix leaks, an a gamut of other problems that constantly spring up. Everything from no tin opener to no electric is my problem, and I have to think fast when someone knocks on the door complaining that their Kintyre retreat isn’t quite as it was sold to them.
More often than not, I’m expected to fashion a repair using what limited resources I have up here, made all the worse to by an owner who often doesn’t like buying anything other than the cheapest of equipment. My toolbox is poorly stocked with screwdrivers that bend and buckle, and a drill that struggled to drill holes in anything except plasterboard.
Painting is made tricky because of cheap brushes that shed their bristles (it’s viewed as more cost effective to buy cheap brushes and throw them away, rather than spend money on cleaning materials), and the endless supply of twenty year old paint tins with an inch or two of crusty paint in their bases doesn’t make the task any easier.
Never the less, always up for a challenge, I’ve been plodding on with tasks over the past two months, to hold up my end of the deal. And I’ve learnt to make do with what I have, often with fairly pleasing results.
This week, I’ve:
- Built and fitted a DIY kitchen
- Removed the old kitchen to the local tip
- Laid a new lino floor
- Painted two park benches
- Painted three external windows
- Painted an interior wall
- Mowed the (extensive) grass
- De-weeded the gravel driveway
- Removed a dead Starling chick
- Removed the tail, hind legs, and lower torso of a brown mouse
Me and my little pal build a new kitchen
Rhett takes control of the hammer
Ways to wear your own car out
Not my choice of colour!
I’ve also arranged an electrician to fix a broken hot water timer after complaints from guests that their shower was cold, and arranged a roofer to check out the leaking ceiling in another cottage. Not easy when you don’t speak fluent Scottish like the local tradesmen do. Directions to our cottages are my Achilles Heel; even Google lists our postcode as being two miles south of where it actually is.
Juggling repairs around guests being on site is all part of the challenge, made especially hard when we have a full house, as we did last week.
And keeping track of the keys isn’t easy either. I have a bunch that quite literally makes me look (and often feel) like the head jailer - this week alone I've managed to lock two German guests out of their cottage twice. I think they think I’m rifling through their things when they’re not here, but a lifetime of living in the city has brainwashed me to check doors are locked at all times, even if people have very deliberately left them unlocked. Of course, up here, the only people likely to wander past usually have four legs and a sheepskin coat on.
Generally speaking, because the place is in such disrepair, jobs can, and often do wait. If the sun is shining, or the son is crying, I tend to drop everything, and head for the nearest beach. Life, after all, is short.
The owners seems pleased with progress - I've worked my way through nearly everything on their list - and besides, I guess the real reason we’re here is to keep the place occupied, and see guests in and out.
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