Day 54 - The day from hell!

Arrived at work in a positive frame of mind today............... Should have known better! What a day....

First of all, the plumber was 4 hours late. YES, 4 HOURS LATE! I wouldn't have cared too much normally, as I'm pretty laid back, but unfortunately there were members of the property managemant company waiting outside from the moment we arrived at work, constantly asking where our plumber was. I felt like a criminal. I actually started to doubt whether or not I had actually called the plumber in the first place. Not only were they asking in person, but we were receiving phone calls from the management company as well. I knew that they were all thinking that we had palmed them off by pretending that a plumber was turning up. We rang his mobile, his non work mobile, his home number, but to no avail. No answer. What were we supposed to do? All this while trying to run a business........ Oh, forgot to mention, just to compound things, the workmen working on the road outside decided to be extra noisy today

Finally, at 1pm, Matt the plumber arrived. Yeeha! Well, actually not yeeha....... He set about his work in shall we say a 'no nonsense' fashion. What I mean by that is, he pulled out a drilling tool reminiscent of something Arnie would have used in 'Terminator'! Without so much as a ' sorry, there might be a little noise for a moment or two' he rammed it into the wall to attempt to locate where the leak was coming from. What a noise!! The whole building shook! The look on the customers faces spoke volumes. Suffice to say that we didnt have a particularly profitable day! The drilling and 'leak finding' continued for most of the day until the source of the problem was found. We had to completely remove the fittings, work top and all the plates, cups, saucers etc from the prep room behind the kitchen while Matt knocked hole after hole up the wall. Eventually, I heard the cry I've found it', coming from the kitchen. Guess what...............? The split in the pipe was not caused by us! According to the plumber it was a 20 year old soil pipe that had been cracked for years. He'd even found a crack that someone had tried to 'bodge up' in the past.  So we were in the clear! NO, WE WEREN'T! The management company have said that when we took on the lease, we took on any problems that came with it. How on earth were we supposed to know that there was a split pipe behind a wall?????????????????????? Our only move at this stage is to pay the plumber and attempt to get the money back by contesting the decision. Problem, we're in Spain...Say no more.........

So all that mess, noise, uncertainty, stress and strain cost us the princely sum of 325€. The chances of getting it back are incredibly slim, but I wont lie down........

 On to tonight and week 3 of 'All you can eat' Thursday & Saturday. We had 12 in tonight, 6 of whom had come on Saturday night and enjoyed it so much that they wanted to come back and have  a last meal before returning to the UK. That was nice to know. They and the other 6 seemed to really enjoy their food and we got some more excellent comments. Most heartening was the fact that 4 of them were locals! I didnt really eat tonight, just picked at some excess chicken and had 2 or 3 chips coated in home made BBQ sauce and when I got home I hade a fat free yoghurt and a handful of nuts!! I managed to swim for about 20 mins, but came inside when I realised it had gone midnight!

So that was my day! Lets hope tomorrow is a better one. Can it get any worse.......

Sleep well and I will speak to you all again tomorrow ;0)