Moving in Stages and Water Tank in the Attic

It is starting to look like we are moving! Reminds me of last year, but thankfully on a much smaller scale!! I sometimes look around and think how much there is to do and then I remind myself that most of the stuff I am looking at is staying right where it is!

We've started to pull stuff from the cabinets so we remember to take what is ours while leaving behind what was here when we arrived. Books are in piles. We are eating stuff from the freezer. I am organizing loads and deciding what to take in which suitcase. Bill went through his books and decided not to take several of them. I'd read a few in the past week and added those to the bunch. I put them all in a box to give to our neighbor. We gave her some several months ago and collected a box plus another decent pile after that, which I gave her a couple of weeks ago. She keeps some and passes others along to people who want them. It's like a little free library up here! She seemed happy to get them and I was happy that people actually want them!

This time we will take two rolling suitcases and our smaller backpacks, though Bill's backpack will have to be light. Mine is has smooshy yarn stuff on the bottom with books on top. I have left room to carry my lunch. I also have a canvas bag that has books, sock yarn, and a skein of yarn to work with on the ride. The suitcases will go into the luggage compartments on the buses.

It will be nice to get there and dump another load! We will bring back one of the suitcases empty, but will leave one up there along with the canvas bag.

This is the Old Coastguard Station.

The part on the left is called "The Tower House" by the locals, I think. To the right of that as you look at the photo are 5 terraced cottages, one of which is ours.

Bill started a photo gallery of Killybegs, which can be found here.

In the meantime, back in Ballinrobe we have had a bit of water drama. Our neighbor had to call our landlord when we were gone a couple of weeks ago because the water dripping from the roof overhang above our door/walkway was constant and getting worse. Someone was supposed to call to set up a time to come and fix the problem on the 11th. They didn't. Bill called the landlord before we left last week and asked if we should leave a key so someone could get in and fix it while we were gone. No. Landlord called while we were in the letting agent's office last week. Bill called back. Landlord said that someone would call the next morning to set up a time. He did, while we were on the bus. He told Bill to call when we got home. Bill did. Left message. No reply. Next morning, Bill called again. This time a call back! Said he'd come Monday (today). He would call first. We waited to see. He called and he came, but forgot his ladder. He went off to get the ladder, came back, went into the attic and fixed the problem.

When I first became aware of this dripping thing, I wondered about why it happened when we were out and/or not using the water. Someone told me there are water storage tanks in the attic. I googled and discovered that this is pretty standard. As I understood it, the water comes from the main line through the kitchen. Then it goes beyond the kitchen to this tank. Water to the bathroom and the immersion water heater is gravity fed from the tank. The tank has a ball cock on it like a toilet tank does. If this malfunctions, water keeps flowing into the tank and it overflows. This is channeled towards the outdoors. That is why we had water dripping from inside the overhang. It seems to me that there are a lot of potential pitfalls with such a system and I would be freaking out about the possibility of water damage. I could not get to sleep the other night because I kept hearing water running and was imagining the attic being flooded! No one else seemed all that concerned about water damage, but when I was googling I did come across a story about a young couple who bought a house and only later discovered extensive water damage as a result of an overflowing water tank. Who knew?

Bill talked to the landlord today, who wanted to ask if there was any way someone could come in on Friday and look at the place. A friend of his brother might want to move in as soon as we move out. They arranged stuff and I changed my timetable. I was going to save the big "spring clean/move out clean" until the bank holiday weekend. I figured that by then we would have almost everything of ours out and that would be the last thing I had to do. I will now do it tomorrow instead, since someone will come by on Friday. There isn't a lot that needs to be done, but I will vacuum and wash the windows. The piles of stuff will just have to stay where they are for now!

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