bathroom

I have renovated two bathrooms in my life and it was two too many. The last involved a runaway plumber in West London who demanded cash payment half way through the job and then failed to come back. Subsequent calls to his mobile switched immediately to a soundtrack of machine gun fire.

My fear of plumbers might explain why I have put off renovating my French bathroom for so long. But it very badly needs a facelift. Behind the open door [shown left] lies a shower tray that takes half an hour to empty, due the fact it was used as a receptacle for builders rubble early on in the house renovations. Taking a shower is thus an exciting race against the clock: you have approximately two minutes before the tray fills up and overflows onto the floor [which is tiled in the manner of a public convenience circa 1960 with hideous beige speckled tiles].

But I am now in the final stages of planning the makeover, which will be carried out by Monsieur Artus, the excellent local plumber. He too disappeared the last time he worked for me. The difference was that he had done the job [connecting my house to the mains drainage] superbly and had not asked for any payment at all, other than the original, neatly typed and detailed devis. I had to pursue him in order to pay - and even then it was three weeks before he finally got round to sending me the bill. Imagine! Dear old Monsieur Artus has (almost) convinced me that not all plumbers are crooks and brigands.