A Day at the Architect’s (and the Vet)

Tues 6 December 2011

Up early to catch the cats.  The vet had lent us this all-wire cage for the ‘wildest’ cat, as it has a mechanism which squeezes the cat into an immovable position for injection of a sedative.  With a choice selection of cat food we tempted Schrodinger into the cage and closed the door.  Skits wasn’t alert enough to escape and let me close the door on one of the other boxes.  We left them at the vet’s and went for coffee in the square in Lefkas with about four hours to wait.

With a sense of destiny, we took up position outside the coffee shop opposite Constantine the Architect’s offices, not quite lying in wait, but just considering whether to call.  Constantine came past within 10 minutes, was very pleased to see us and joined us for coffee.  He was full of plans and information and we relocated to his office to discuss next steps.  The money we’d put through the IKA account had been returned (hallelujah) and we could have it back.  We left an amount with him to be available for deposits.  We discussed the foundations and how to manage the tricky join between concrete and cob – they shouldn’t touch, as concrete wicks moisture, and will need a moisture-proof barrier as a minimum.  But the cob shouldn’t start until about a metre of the ground, to protect it from rain splashing.  We will need a stone wall built around the foundation and up the lower part of the wood frame.

Constantine then said what we really needed was a model of the wood framing, to enable us to spec the wood and get estimates from contractors.  He said he had no time to make it, and looked meaningfully at us.  So we volunteered.  I’ve ordered the balsa wood.  We expressed interest in traditional woodworkers, Constantine said the best ones he knew worked very slowly.  We said slowly was good – as long as the job wasn’t priced by the hour!  Slowly means built with care and love, and that’s what we want. 

Left in time to collect the cats, both flaked out still.  Schrodie is male; Skitso female, as we’d suspected.  Both now de-flea’d; inoculated for a variety of things and neutered.  Once home, they started to recover, but we kept them in the boxes overnight, in the shed for warmth.  The next day they ate a little, slept a lot, fell over drunkenly and threw up.  Just like having teenagers.