The Bilin' Lavvie! (and other conspiracy theories)

So now I've been in the new hoose a few months, I've started to notice odd things about the place. This could be due to sinister things, chilling plotlines and scandalous gore of the past... or it could just be due to some dodgy DIY.

Consider the following:

Evidence 1:
When you leave the kitchen light on for more than 10 minutes, it gets hot enough to burn your fingers off. Yes. It could just be dodgy wiring... but is it?
Surely there was an episode of Most Haunted where a poltergeist was blamed for electrical problems throughout an ancient mansion? Lights were going on and off, radiators were getting hot! The phone was ringing at strange times and it wasn't just Heavy Breathing Henry getting some of his usual jollies...
Maybe my kitchen is haunted! Aaaah you may scoff. But just wait until you hear about evidence number 2!

Evidence 2:
So the first thing you do when you move to a new house (except cleaning up the butterkist that was behind the tv unit all coated in dog hair) is EXPLORE. If it wasn't part of human nature to thoroughly explore new places, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe would never have happened... Let alone Alice Through the Looking Glass. (I read that once at University. It was sufficient to ensure I never dabbled in illegal substances).

Now I'm not sure about the rest of the world, but in Scottish houses of a certain age, there is always a "cupboard under the stairs." Basically a place for hiding stuff like brooms and stock-piled cans of pink salmon in case the apocalypse happens. Also a good place for hiding all the empty wine bottles when your mum comes round. The "cupboard under the stairs" is also hilariously referred to by those of a certain generation (and the estate agent that showed me round) as "the glory hole." Now I know what that means and I'm sure many of you out there also know what that means, but that's no reason to stop it being used by little old ladies selling houses. Perfectly charming I think! "And here's the glory hole. Young Willy used to keep his Mecchano down here."*larf*

But I digress... So in day two in the house (to be said in a Wearside Jack type Big Brother voice) we decided to check out the Glory Hole (lol). What did we find? Well, initially I thought it was just a couple of floorboards that had been removed to put in the central heating. But was it!? I accidentally knocked a dust pan down there. I paused. I waited. Probably only seconds had gone by, but it seemed like an age before the dust pan hit the bottom. So I did what all sensible young girls should do... I poured myself a glass of wine and shouted for The Boy. (Yes, he came with me. I didn't have the heart to leave him behind).

The Boy got a broomhandle and poked it down. He poked it down into the deep hole within the glory hole and do you know what he hit!? Nothing. He ran out of broom handle and arm before he managed to hit solid ground. We tried shining torches down there, but the batteries were always mysteriously dead... We tried using a lighter, but a mysterious wind always blew it out. Eventually I got the leg bone of a skellington that was sitting in the glory hole, ripped off some of it's hair and wrapped it round the leg bone and dipped this in the chip pan. I set that alight as an impromptu torch and lowered it into the deep hole within the glory hole and saw... nothing.

Curiouser and curiouser... So I phoned My Dad. He came up and asked no questions but nailed some fresh floorboards over the deep hole within the glory hole. So sorry to end a tale like this, but we've no idea what'd down there. I might be tempted to say that the space was big enough to fit an entire Austrian family.... but I'm not that sick.

Evidence 3
But a few weeks back, I had some friends over to do a serious bit of drinking in the back garden to celebrate the last day of warmth before a miserable Grey Toon Winter kicks in. Songs were sung, wrongs of the world were righted and eventually we retreated into the house where certain members of our party were free to go off and Talk To God on the Big White Telephone. (ie peuk down the lavvie.)

Now I'm not saying that there is anything at all wrong with The Grey Toon shire's water department, but is it NORMAL for at 4am after a few good flushes for the water in the cistern to boil?

Honestly. Our friends had left, I had a shower to stabilise myself slightly before passing into a coma, and I opened the bathroom window to get rid of the steam... leaning on the cistern for balance. And wtf? It was hot!

So I flushed the lavvie - and believe it or not, STEAM. Steamy hot lavvie water! Now I ran the cold tap in the bathroom and the kitchen and they were both running hot - at 4am on a sunday morning.

Plumbers and water department of the shire... I beg you... Is this NORMAL? Or is there a ghostie in our cistern?

Hmm. At least come the cold winter months, we can gather round it on a cold day. Rather like Van Gogh's The Potato Eaters, but with a lavvie instead of a plate of tatties...