To some extent I am delayed staring on the electrical work until the plumbing is finished and I have had a chance to discuss a few questions with Richard.

So today I decided to work on knocking down the tall winter weeds before they become a fire hazard in a month's time.

Also I intended to intersperse this with paint stripping the toilet door.

With the amount of methyl chloride I will need to use - I would probably be better off having the door dipped.

However, I think this is an oregon door and I have seen these etched in to the soft wood in other dipped doors.

Also I would probably have to wait a month or so to have this done commercially.

The end result of the day is that I stripped (almost) one side of the door and knocked down an area of weeds.

I don't know where the day went.

Over the years I have learned a few things about paint stripping:-

1) Do it out in the open air - methyl chloride is very nasty stuff.

2) Give it a good wash down first, otherwise the first coat of paint remover gets wasted on just taking off the dirt layer.

3) Have a good strategy for catching the scrolls of paint that come off with a scraper.

Initially I used to sweep up afterwards. Then I progressed to laying out paper underneath. Then to old sheets of villaboard. Finally I realised that the cleanest option is to have a cardboard box next to you and to bang each scroll off the scraper, straight in to the box - much, much cleaner.

I have been looking in to creating a dropped ceiling in the kitchen as recommended by the electrican.

Initially I was aiming at a cavity of say 90 mm to allow for some of the eventual overhead plumbing.

For this I am seeing prices of $500 to $800.

I then had a revelation that if I eventually install a large sloping shower with a waste grill against the appropriate wall then I already have a designed cavity that will accept the p trap for the floor waste.

This might mean that I could get away with just using some 40 mm ceiling battens - which are much cheaper.