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This year's Christmas crisis
Dec. 21st, 2021 02:34 amOver the last few years I seem to have had an expensive crisis of some sort nearly every Christmas - in 2011, for example, a section of flat roof over an attic window blew off and I had to get an emergency repair done over the holiday, which wasn't cheap and wasn't covered by insurance since the insurers classed it as normal wear and tear.
This year's crisis was smaller and cheaper, but just as annoying - I came home from shopping today to find that the lock of the door to my flat wasn't working. Fortunately my neighbour was in and helped me to get the door window off and try to open it from the inside, which didn't work, then lever the frame it until it popped open - the lock's designed so that you can't take it off the door unless the door is open. To cut a long story short, the dead bolt itself had broken from the internal mechanism due to metal fatigue or something, and since it's a 60+ year old Ingersoll security lock the only way to fix it was to buy a replacement for the lever and deadbolt etc., more or less everything apart from the cylinder itself.
Fortunately there was just time to nip a couple of miles to the local locksmith shop before they closed, and buy a replacement for a mere £119 plus VAT, £144 in total.
I'm sure that there are better things I could have done with the money...
This year's crisis was smaller and cheaper, but just as annoying - I came home from shopping today to find that the lock of the door to my flat wasn't working. Fortunately my neighbour was in and helped me to get the door window off and try to open it from the inside, which didn't work, then lever the frame it until it popped open - the lock's designed so that you can't take it off the door unless the door is open. To cut a long story short, the dead bolt itself had broken from the internal mechanism due to metal fatigue or something, and since it's a 60+ year old Ingersoll security lock the only way to fix it was to buy a replacement for the lever and deadbolt etc., more or less everything apart from the cylinder itself.
Fortunately there was just time to nip a couple of miles to the local locksmith shop before they closed, and buy a replacement for a mere £119 plus VAT, £144 in total.
I'm sure that there are better things I could have done with the money...
