Not-Pollyanna

I feel so rotten having a stream of negative posts - it seems to me that I'm moaning all the time.

BUT this is currently a diary of how the building works are progressing, and as much as I love the posts where I get to rave excitedly about all the changes and the occasional lovely surprise, I want to present the process as it is, not some sanitised version.

Would I do this again? Maybe. But I'd think long and hard, and if we were rash enough, I'd become such a total control freak and not trust anybody to do anything without me being there to supervise.

Would I recommend T+B? No. If you are going to spend this amount of time and money supervising the project managers, I suspect it would be just as easy [and much, MUCH cheaper, and quicker] to supervise the builders themselves. I've certainly never had even a fraction of this trouble in the past with asking workmen directly to do what we want. And I've never had the kind of miserable compromises we've had foisted upon us - compromises, sure, but reasonable ones!

Could I recommend any tradesmen? Yes: if you're ever in the south-east of the Aube and need a carpenter, joiner or tiler, get in touch!

Are we going to use Polish builders next time? That's a definite maybe.

Would I advise a friend to do a renovation in France? I don't think I'd give advice - I'd remind them that in the (nearly) six years we've owned this house we've spent more than enough to buy a fully finished house [not including the purchase price!], and had almost six months without builders/being in the process of trying to get work done. I'd hate to think that someone might sign up for this on the back of anything I'd said to encourage them! [Would that make me guilty if they ended up in the loony-bin?!]

I threatened long ago to decide whether I preferred the French system or the English one...

Well, got to go with the English system; it's not perfect, but if your plumber blows you out, that's the builder's problem not yours. He probably knows of several chaps who can step in if he doesn't have one in-house. And as you are paying the builder (who pays any subcontractors), he knows any defects will cost him money, so at least someone is supervising the workmen.

For all the lauded guarantees/trade references the French have in place, they make no difference to whether someone does good work or not, and if you get into trouble before a job is finished the guarantees don't exist!

Now the only question left is whether to tell the maire about the problems we're having with T+B - part of me wants to give him the "heads up" and warn him to be hyper-vigilant, but part of me knows that saying anything would have an element of revenge in there [and that's not a motive I like to act from].

Luckily, it's my lovely husband who chats with him the most, so that's one decision I don't have to make!

OK, so can I get back to posting about startling fauna [today's total: 2 hares & a fox cub], and making fruit liqueurs now?