"Dirty."

Yesterday I hired my trusty labourer Michael again and we finished most of the floorboards. 

While we were doing this a worker came around from the big building site behind my house. They're doing a railway expansion project at the moment to cope with all the growth in the Western suburbs. The guy wanted to know all about what we were doing. He offered me potential use of electricity from the generators on the building site. I thought he was just being polite but sure enough he came back later, having tried to organise it but said they could not risk running the cable over the laneway behind my house. I thanked him and said I'd make them all nice cold drinks as soon as I have a kitchen.

Today I went back to the house to see how the big straightening project was going but they weren't there! My guess is it was too hot - they probably don't work days over 35C. Well.. neither do I....

I then went to the beach.

Using the gutter as a cutting bench. Well there's nowhere else!

Michael under the floor - luckily he offered to do an unexpected hideous job of squeezing through the 350mm subfloor.

I asked him to stick his hand up for a funny photo. It was hard to hear each other. I took the photo then walked away and did something else. Then I came back and his poor hand was still there. I forgot to tell him I had taken the photo. OOPS! 

Removing the false ceiling uncovered several decorative features. Including this vent and picture rail border thing 

Evidence the house was once nice!!! I should probably think about restoring these features. Hmm. 

I will remove the false ceiling joists and restore the ceiling height back to the original (3m) ? The newer back living area has much lower ceilings but there's not much I can do about that. 

Most of the flooring is now in.. Couldn't quite finish it last night. The next major step will be getting the plasterboard on- but I'm months off that yet. I have to first do the stud/ wall restoration, ceiling carpentry, electrical wiring, insulation, doors and windows.

I need this guy to come and clean the dusty filthy house at the moment. (Black Books fans will understand)