Jo had bought them for me at Christmas, very expensive and oh so comfortable a Rolls Royce of slippers……………

Having had quite a hard day at work and had eaten more than was probably good for me at dinner, forty winks were in order. Kicking off my slippers I settled down for a doze on the sofa. I can’t have been asleep for more than ten minutes when something woke me, reaching down to put my slippers on I noticed that one was darker than the other…………wet in fact…………. Jo mentioned that she had seen Katie (one of our cats) in the room for a few moments…………normally she puts her head in one slipper and goes to sleep, (Jo says it’s the smell that knocks her out) but what made her pee in one God only knows????

The food order arrived in a very reasonable time and on Hot!!! plates no problems with the quality and taste.

Just one gripe the draught Bass was off again but on talking to the manager I found that he has to boil up eight gallons of water to clean the pipes, so fair comment with the ongoing water problems, I would prefer to have a decent pint than a poor one from unclean pipes.

As posted before we had decided to fit a fully floating solid oak floor as this will allow the wood to expand and contract in the varying temperatures and humidity levels found on a narrowboat. So having sorted out the original floor removing the gripper rod and staples and added many more screws to hold it down we laid a thin foam plastic underlay, this is to allow the new floor to move and acts as cushion.

The oak tongue and grove planks are supplied in in varying lengths from 300 mm to 1200 mm so you have to be a bit good at jigsaws to get away without much wastage and to get a decent random effect. Once we had glued and layed the first two rows work went on a pace helped by the use of a pair of ratchet clamps, ( Screwfix £4.99 cheaper than B&Q £12.99) these really pull the boards together far better than just tapping them with a soft faced hammer.

Even with only half the boards laid the effect was stunning. So with my back and knees complaining we decided to stop and give the glue chance to set………ok  ok  a weak excuse but I needed a beer.

So it looks like we will be going for the chairs from IKEA.

I looked around B&Q today for solid wood flooring and liked the look of the 150mm wide natural oak planks.

From a laying point of view there would be less planks to glue and fit but I think that the wide planks look better in a narrow situation, I do stand to be corrected and probably will be.

So my next task is to find out the best way to fit the flooring, find a local supplier and buy it.

The staff at Enfield Timber there are so helpful, nothing is too much trouble. They machined up the exact sizes I needed and gave me advice on the best way of preparing the timber for varnishing.

I was supprised that I would need seventy feet of timber to complete the linings but thats nine windows worth.