THE Prepping thread - a new beginning :)

maryb

Rooms in the cottage would have to be big enough for a four poster bed. Curtains keep your heat in during the winter and keep the draughts out. I'd probably find it unbearably stuffy meself but people get used to anything. I have to have the window open at night now it has warmed up a bit but I do sleep with it closed in winter. It always astonishes me how the French seem to prefer hermetically sealed rooms at night no matter what the temperature.

GQ You've mentioned that your flat is on the ground floor and some of your neighbours are not entirely upright citizens. Are you able to leave your windows open?

Been thinking about this as we may downsize as we get (more) decrepit and one possibility is a flat. But blocks with lifts have high service charges and much smaller rooms than 1970s blocks which are quite comfortable when upgraded with double glazing and insulation. So I'd be tempted by a ground floor flat but DH worries about security

[Deleted User]

Not necessarily a 4 poster bed but a 'cupboard bed' might be the answer as it is built in against a wall and has 3 sides and a top and then either closing cupboard doors or thick curtains to pull on the open side, if you suffer with 'stuffiness' or 'closed in yuk' they were often built so that they surrounded an opening window and a window shaped opening was left so you could open the window when it was hot and have a cooler sleeping space. It's something we saw in Sweden in the rural life museums there and I believe it was common in medieval Scotland too? Perhaps Mar might know?

GreyQueen

I have double -glazing on the LR/ BR side which is the type which tilts inwards a few inches and I will go out and leave it like that. I wouldn't go away for a period of time and leave them ajar.

The window fitter declared them safe to be left like that and a police crime prevention officer declared them unsafe. Because of the position of my flat within the complex, it is impossible to get at the windows on either side without being under many many peoples' eyes. It would take a cool customer to attempt to break in. A MET Soco, met socially, when described the layout, reckoned it would be unlikely to be broken into, and he spends his workdays attending burglary after burglary, so presumably knows whereof he speaks.

It's worth remembering that many burglaries are walk-ins when people try it on, and those try-ons do happen in this neighbourhood as we're a very dodgy place and well-known to the Police.

Having said that, there are many good people here who keep an eye out for each other. And, of course, some of my neighbours are hardened ex-cons and anyone robbing them would probably live to regret it.......... :rotfl:

Pauses to itemise my many valuable belongings;

1. 16 year old desktop PC.
2. TV (nope)
3. Stereo (nope)
4. Games consoles (nope)
5. Smart phone (nope - £15 n0kia)
6. Jewellery (beads, pot metal, glass and plated - unexciting)
7. Designer clothes/ bags/ shoes (nil)
8. Bottles of booze (zero - have honegar and ACV tho)
9. Cigarettes (none)
10. Illicit drugs (none)
11. Prescription drugs of the opiate nature (none)
12. Fine art/ antiquities/ collectables (none).

In fact, I think I'm probably fairly unlikely to be burgled and don't have much to lose if they did get in.

mardatha

That's a box bed MrsL, old houses had them. They look cosy but I'd be too scared of dangly things with lots of legs dropping on me during the night!!
https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/a-scottish-interior-the-box-bed-106914

maryb

We don't really have anything either - we spent all our money on the DDs brains, lol. But we are in an area that has been targeted by violent spree burglar gangs and it does worry me. I've decided to keep some money in a kitchen drawer so that they might be satisfied with that.

Bit worried this afternoon when someone came to the door saying he was doing some work for a neighbour and did we want our patio pressure sprayed. The only way he could have seen that we have a patio is by prowling around and looking over the fence. Told him our builder was coming back next week to do some work, hopefully that will put him off

Elona_2

MrsL

The cupboard beds were still around in the 1950's in Scotland in some places. An American site suggested that rather than a four poster a pop up tent could be used on top of an ordinary bed to provide warmth and shield from draughts.

I am hoping a kelly kettle, several hot water bottles, spare blankets, big vacuum flask will help if gas and electric are affected.

[Deleted User]

I reckon you could build sides, top and back round any existing bed and box it in that way and then put doors or boards to block off the space under the bed and run a rail at the top that reached to both sides and make heavy curtains to hang from it, you'd be snug as a bug in cold weather like that, specially if you had a hot water bottle into the bed to warm it up first. It wouldn't be hard to do even for non-carpenters.

GreyQueen

:eek: maryb, if you haven't done so already, please fill in a webform/ call 101 and file a report of the incident with your police force.

I was accosted at 9 am this morning leaving my block by a stranger who gave me some wildly impausibable story of why he needed to borrow my phone. Yeah, right, and borrow it permanantly, I don't think so.

Just told him sorry, don't have one, and walked away.

I'm glad Kid Bruv (well over 6ft of him) lives with our elderly parents. Anyone comes to the door, he deals with them, ditto at the phone.

DigForVictory

So where are your garden tools, GQ? As a seriously sharp mattock would be of use to the ungodly, albeit they might need a few reminders from A&E about how to hold it.

Anyone who burgled our place successfully *might* think yippee. However, they have first to get in (& the alarm works) then get upstairs and not be distracted by an entire floor of rooms which you might hope contained PCs, hifis, computer games (not with a brittle epileptic in the home), phones, jewellery, designer clobber (oh gods as if), booze & cigs (not on my budget), drugs licit & illict (hey, I 'fix' on tea), & genuinely valuable collectibles (books but finding the ones worth absconding with will mean checking All The Bookcases & that takes Time).
All amidst the detritus of three teenagers' occupancy?! Then find the door to the shed which is not in the logical place and then into the shed where chests of things are covered in more things all of which will leave trace evidence in your lungs let alone on your clothes & skin. Frankly, a shrewd dog could identify who'd been visiting.

Probably simplest to grab the little painted war figures - but they're documented on two gaming websites during construction, so anyone selling will have to explain how come there are web notices saying nicked on X date, crime ref no QQQQQ please advise if offered...

Or go for our identities, which I digitally patrol anyway.

And if we meet these folks? Then it gets seriously disconcerting. As phones. One to broadcast a live feed to Facebook (and their defence can thrash out where the boundaries between human rights & this fascinating new "right to be forgotten" lie), one to call for police & one to grab stills. I think burglars had it simpler when all they had to worry about were dogs.

maryb

I did feel a bit uneasy but more because I thought they would try and harass me into saying yes. That's why I said our builder was coming next week, hard to argue with that and it puts them on notice there will be someone there during the day. We live in the sort of suburban area where you always hear pressure sprayers going at the weekend but I'll look out to see if anyone has had any work done