Nice people thread 2 - now even nicer

PasturesNew

lostinrates wrote: »

re airing taking days: I'd suggest the airer needs resiting, near an open window maybe? If it takes more than a long day/two IME it starts to smell less fresh...not good!

Well, choice comes with wealth

I was in a studio, one room ... so having the windows open wasn't always an option - especially if I were out at work all day Mon-Fri. However, I do turn everything regularly on a drier, about 4x a day. Removing immediately those items which are dry.

PasturesNew

vivatifosi wrote: »

I have a duvet door. Also works with a duvet bannister, ...make sure that the top of the door is dusted first to avoid grey stripe on nice clean white duvet:rotfl:.

My previous (SO) studio had the bed on a balcony, with those you get a lot of bannister space, ideal for drying, IF it's a painted one. Mine was wood and stained, so I'd not risk putting wet/damp things on that, but the bannister was brilliant for making the bed as I could get the duvet inside the cover, then hold it over the bannister (so above/into the living room) and shake it to get it all even.

I dry bath towels on my bannisters when I have bannisters though.

PasturesNew

misskool wrote: »

for those who need to feel better about themselves, we moved about 2 years ago and we still have things in boxes along a line in the dining room. and the loft hasn't been touched with whatever got slung up there. We've had 2 skips (granted, most have been building work), about a zillion freecycled and more to charity shops.

I'd moved and packed a few times and in 1999 I packed up a load of stuff into storage, it came out in 2000. Some of the boxes went into a cupboard... when I moved again in 2007, they were still there. I finally binned everything in them this time though

lostinrates

PasturesNew wrote: »

Well, choice comes with wealth

I was in a studio, one room ... so having the windows open wasn't always an option - especially if I were out at work all day Mon-Fri. However, I do turn everything regularly on a drier, about 4x a day. Removing immediately those items which are dry.

Not always wealth, but definitely facilities. LA inner city high rises for example, often have a balcony big enough for an airer. Studio living indeed does make it harder. If bathroom has a window that could do. At uni I had a ''study room'' which had a small window that was safe enough to leave open, so I left it open all day, but when pushed left some washing in windowless bathroom with the extractor fan on (not greem and not free). I did mainly handwashing then, so the other bit was easy enough: washing a little at a time so less moisture in the drying atmosphere. And yes, turning and hanging far apart. For me I'd find it worth puting heating on for an hour or two as opposed to having washing taking four days to dry :o

GDB2222

PasturesNew wrote: »

My previous (SO) studio had the bed on a balcony, with those you get a lot of bannister space, ideal for drying, IF it's a painted one. Mine was wood and stained, so I'd not risk putting wet/damp things on that, but the bannister was brilliant for making the bed as I could get the duvet inside the cover, then hold it over the bannister (so above/into the living room) and shake it to get it all even.

I dry bath towels on my bannisters when I have bannisters though.

Do bear in mind that the moisure is still there, in the flat. You are putting several litres of water into the air when you dry a washing machine load. So, unless you have the windows open, you can get mould and so on. Same with a tumble drier unless it's vented outside. A sensible compromise is to use a vented drier on a cold cycle. Having said that, we dry stuff on racks in the utility room, but we have the window open in there.

I remember at uni doing my washing in the college laundry. I used to save it up until I had a machine load - by which I mean I had to push quite hard before I could shut the door. I now know why it never came out terribly clean, and all the white stuff was a bit grey.

misskool

silvercar wrote: »

Before our last move we emptied our loft to find boxes of things that we hadn't opened since the previous move 13 years previously. They went straight into the skip, only to find the neighbours fighting over them.:)

We've had the loft super insulated here, so we can't store anything in there as the insulation is higher than the beams, so we can't see where to place boxes. I thought it would make us less cluttered but there is a spare bedroom and garage which are gradually filling up.:(

On the washing/ ironing front. I never iron bedding or undies, but everything else needs ironing. When I fall behind with the washing I take all the towels I can find and get them service washed and dried at the launderette. My treat to myself, but otherwise it would take forever to dry them all.

I'm sure my dishwasher uses less water than hand washing dishes and so I can environmentally justify running a tumble dryer.

re the loft, you can raise the across the joists (I think) and then you can board it up. Might be a bit late if you've already laid it.

Otherwise, the solution is to have space boards on top of the insulation rolls, giving it the 270mm required (http://www.space-insulation.com/board.html) we're saving up for that one. Need the energy to empty the loft first. :rotfl:

PasturesNew

Last night I started reading Rich Dad, Poor Dad.... fell asleep reading it, but as I reached over to "disconnect" the broadband I deliberately left the window open so I'd continue reading it this morning, which I've done. 130 pages. Good book.

I now need to read it again, think more about what it was saying. There's a lot of resonance in there with the way I've always thought.

Bonus is, once I've read it through 3x I'll write about it of course! Create more "noise" on the Internet

silvercar

misskool wrote: »

re the loft, you can raise the across the joists (I think) and then you can board it up. Might be a bit late if you've already laid it.

Otherwise, the solution is to have space boards on top of the insulation rolls, giving it the 270mm required (http://www.space-insulation.com/board.html) we're saving up for that one. Need the energy to empty the loft first. :rotfl:

We didn't think it through. Clicked some link on MSE and we were eligible for part funding, you then chose a company from a list that could take these grants. I chose a company that provided work to NEETS ( youth that are Not in Education, Employment or Training Schemes). They came, measured, installed, tidied up and that was it.

Its the same insulation and cost whichever company you employ (I think British Gas and B&Q also do it). These lads were interesting to talk to. They'd all fallen out of school and there was there way into employment and adulthood. Clearly now motivated to be workers but for whatever reason they had not picked up a normal skill set for life in general. One told me that he now knew to set an alarm in the morning to get up on time for work and another said he worked better if he ate something before leaving the house. They were rewarded with a driving lesson each week if they turned up on time every day.

300mm deep insulation going between the boards and across the top. Keeps the heat in in winter and the house cool in Summer, but storage would be difficult.

PasturesNew

GDB2222 wrote: »

I now know why it never came out terribly clean, and all the white stuff was a bit grey.

That reminds me of the first time I used an automatic washing machine. I was about 34 and had managed to get my hands on a second hand automatic. But I'd never used one before, never seen one used, so wanted to get it right - and there was no instruction booklet, as it was 2nd hand.

So I put my clothes in, thought about the dials, chose some selections, pressed the START button and off it went. Genius - a machine that does washing, no more hand washing the big stuff.

All went well, but it didn't look clean. I wore it anyway to work and I remarked to somebody at work "I used a machine, this shirt doesn't look clean, it looks grey". She asked "what powder did you use?"

Well, bugg4h me ... I'd forgotten to put any in!

lostinrates

silvercar wrote: »

. These lads were interesting to talk to

Oh, I hope we can do that when the time comes. with the garden fencing that was an emergency we got four quotes, but the best by far was from a local informal drug rehab scheme acting as offshoot to NA, and let me feel good about it. The fencing is (for what it is, a panel fence) really good, but the poor guys did it by hand, and it wasn't easy. They were not very relaible at all, doing it sporadically and finishing job a week after agreed deadline. I understood the sporadic nature, but feel unable to use them for next batch of fencing, which is a great shame: I can't have days and days with no fencing, when the existing barbed wire is down I need the next lot to go up promptly. They were very hardworking while here though, and I tipped up to the value of the next quote, because IMO the work was harder than they thought it would be and their quote was not high enough: I want value, not slavery!

edit: our current roof insulation is bales of straw:eek: even more scary now the chimney is condemned :eek::eek: I can't work out how they got them through the tiny loft hatch....I reckon they went up when the roof was last done...early or mid last century