There is good news and bad news. The good news is that the roof tiles were delivered and they have started to lay them. I didn't get a picture of the ones they had put down, there were only about 6 when they left for the day, but here they are in the box. The really good news is that I still like them since I couldn't remember what they looked like. They are ceramic not stone and the surface is actually level without any rock-like nooks and crannies. That's good since the dogs use the roof and I had some real stone removed from the downstairs garden because removing dog poop from it was... well, think cream cheese and an english muffin. Sorry. Anyway, these tiles look like stone but they aren't and they have a slightly sandpaperish feel to them so they aren't slippery when wet.
The bad news is that today was the day when they had warned us that there would be no gas and no water from 7am to 7pm. Hah! That part was true but they didn't finish so there is no gas and no water tonight either and we will see about tomorrow night.
Down here we do not have piped in gas, it is delivered by a tanker truck (which is only allowed at night into the central part of the city where we live) and put into our large 500 liter tank on the roof. We usually fill it around this time every year so that it is full for hurricane season, thus heavier. We haven't filled it though and it has about a 40% load. They brought in a guy who somehow freezes the gas so he can remove the valves and change them out without losing all of it. We need a new fill connection that has an extension for the tanks new location. They said that we would only lose 10% to 15%. We will see. Today I learned that it is good to change all the fittings every 5 years anyway to avoid them failing from the heat. It's been 6+ years so we opted to have them all changed while the tank was already frozen and disconnected. The whole thing, parts and freezing, cost a little less than $200us, refilling the tank will probably cost about the same. We already have the tank sanded and painted if there is any corrosion every year. Just another maintenance item that didn't exist for me up north.
I showered last night and we have a big bottle of water for coffee (boil water in microwave) and drinking. If we need to we can use the house next door as it is one of the ones I take care of when the owners are not in residence. So really, we are not badly inconvenienced. We went out to dinner tonight, I may go out for coffee and breakfast tomorrow and we'll just hope that all is completed by tomorrow night. We carried a couple buckets of water from the swimming pool to the upstairs bathroom so we can flush during the night. I'm thinking of it as practice if a hurricane hits us. Although, in that case we would probably not have electricity and that would make everything a lot harder.
