An American in Provence

When I left this morning to head off to work, I had no idea whether they would come today to install the toilet seat or not. The "I'll call you before I come over" obviously never materialized, as they knocked on our door well before 8 am, as Alain was still in the middle of his morning routine. Turns out he had tiled too much (larger hole for the out was needed) so they had to break some of the surrounding tile.

Came home, and was quite pleased to see the toilet, standing there in all of it's seat-less glory (they couldn't be bothered to install the cover I guess). Took a tentative trial run and was quite relieved- relieved to find that I was not sprawled on the floor with the toilet crushing my legs, dazed, wet, covered in waste and broken tiles. Not sure what the maximum weight that can be supported is, but for now it is holding up.

When Alain showed the plumber the broken tiles this morning he got a reaction all of "Oh. (pause). Darn". Wasn't expecting an overflow of mea culpas, but was hoping for a little more than that. Doubt we will get it fixed by them. (Doubt that on two levels- doubt they will offer and doubt that I would trust them to not do more damage). Might get a slight reduction. Not keeping my hopes up at this point.

Came home to find the house wide-open- balcony door open, windows open. Gee, sure glad nobody could get in. Also there was a message on our machine that something had been forgotten and to please give them a call and let them know when they can come pick it up. Yeah, I think I will hold that hostage until our tile gets fixed buddy. Don't think I would hire these guys again, but at least it is finished.

Tally:

Number of tiles broken: 2

Number of emergency trips to hardware store: 1

Number of times eating at McDo: 2

Meters squared of tile bought: 4