To summarise, one after another, day after day, aspects that were agreed long ago would be part of our new home, now have to be compromised or paid for as an extra on top of the original price.
The key element to all this is timing. We are in the very last stages and they know we are desperate to move in, so the idea is that we will pay whatever they ask in order to do so. The architect referred to it as a type of ricatto (blackmail) and coupled with yesterday's experience with the ice cream maker (see Things I've taken for granted in UK: consumer rights!) I'm feeling a touch jaded.
(All this reminds me of a joke my Italian builder told me a few weeks back: When God created Italy and saw how very beautiful the country was he had to redress the balance, so he created Italians!)
Thankfully, there is as ever, a song which helps. This has been on repeat either on my phone or in my head most of the day. It's haunted me from the first time I heard it, so let's share a little soothing:
P.S. Perspective check: just incase it needs to be said, I do know of course that there are more important things in life than this project. Someone who has been kind to me every visit I've made to Puglia over the years, lost his wife this morning. My difficulties are small in comparison. Of course it's just a house and only money, and it's not lost on me the irony that the song Long Nights was written for a film about walking away from all such things to live in the wilderness!
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