What a wrench

Problem of living somewhere else #2 - Not having the right equipment, or knowing where to get it.

Miklos had pointed out to me why the shower was broken, that we needed a new tube. He unscrewed it with his hand, showed me, then screwed it back on. Problem, the idiot screwed it back on so tight I then couldn't undo it with my own hands later on.

So: a) In the UK I have several wrenches; b) In the UK I know exactly where to buy a wrench

In Budapest I have no wrench, and there are no Homebases or B&Qs, and little hardware shops are somewhat daunting (truly, I find hardware shops in the UK daunting, because the staff often talk to you like you're an idiot, unless you can talk hardware jargon). Also, they seem to prefer spanners here (why!? they only do one size fitting, wrenches are adjustable!!). So I headed off to my fallback option: Tesco. Sadly the little wrench I brought home was about 3mm too small. Grr!

I popped into a local shop and did the various mime actions one must for wrench, then being shown a spanner, and mimed a bigger spanner. The man did his best, but I decided his tool was too small.

I popped into another supermarket, which I knew had electrical goods, and chanced it. Pliers, but not much else.

I headed back to Tesco, and tracked down a bigger wrench, which looked barely bigger than the first I'd got there. "Cross your fingers, hope, and pray you get to Neverland," I said to myself. Fortunately, it turned out I did have a little pixie dust.

I was able to replace the shower tube, and we had a shower. Hurrah. Then we realised the head would probably need replacing, too, and we needed to unscrew it to check. Problem #3: No screwdriver. Oh well, another problem for another day.