Happy Ed Balls Day to those who celebrate it 
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Ed Balls.
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Finally resurfaced after getting back from the UK, and oh so glad to be back. A very very busy time, especially the last few days in the UK, as had a change over of tenants, with outgoing tenants managing to break a few items, but new tenants do appear to be alot more caring 
Also moved all the furniture etc down to France, which was an effort, but went very very smoothly, especially regarding customs, which I was a tad nervey about. A bit of a drama at the airport coming back as I arrived early for my flight, but then spent time ambling around in a bit of a daze 
then suddenly realized I must check the flight status, and to my absolute horror, the board said āGATE CLOSEDā. You can imagine my panic. The gate was one of the furthest away to get to, so sprinted along, dashing up/down escalators, then finally arrived at the gate. Amazingly there were still folks lining up to get boarding passes and passports checked, so a very very huge relief. When it got to get my docs getting checked I asked the guy why the board said āgate closedā and he said that ordinarily it should be but the flight was running slightly late. First time Iāver been pleased, no, absolutely delighted that a flight was delayed. So the panic and dread turned into complete euphoria! But I was rather warm at that point Anyway, back home after a little over two weeks away and the place looks like a jungle, with everything going crazy with the Spring weather, but so much more relaxing. Chilling today, before trying to sort out a rather enormous amount of furniture, artwork and a multitude of other stuff shipped back! As one of my hiking group said, you need to go away to come back and fully appreciate where you now live and what you have
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Couldnāt agree more. 
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Me too. Got the ā bien Ć©tĆ© enregistrĆ©e ā¦ ā 9 days ago ! So there! 
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Not so much ācheerfulā news but a minor accomplishment - re-placed, re-fixed and re-plumbed the loo in ājuniorāsā house after one of his lodgers literally ripped it off the wall.
OK, to be fair we knew the pan wasnāt screwed down and it turned out that the screws holding the cistern to the wall had completely rusted through so it was something of a case of ābreathe on this too hard and it will fall apartā and āripped off the wallā probably gives the wrong impression - it had shifted about 2" but nevertheless enough to mostly pull the pan outlet from the soil pipe and to cause the mains water supply to the cistern to be leaking.
Probably Ā£300, had we had to get a plumber.
Only cost me Ā£400 in parts as well
Just joking, I did need to spend a bit on buying stuff as a *lot* of my plumbing kit is in France and the price was magnified by the fact that Screwfix tend to sell things in boxes of 100, when I needed two of them - still, thatās 98 in the āfor next timeā stock.
Actually, there is a cheerful element to this story - I was in Screwfix this morning buying a new isolation valve as I could not get a watertight seal on the connection to the float valve inlet yesterday - the valve fitted was one of these āservice valveā types
The old washer was encrusted with limescale and never going to seal - I had some replacements but in retrospect they canāt quite have been the right size as they were never even close to watertight.
I wound up ordering bit of flexible hose with included isolation valve and male 1/2" BSP end to mate with the inlet.
However there was a chap in Screwfix who was obviously a plumber, Iād picked the wrong size (3/4" BSP rather than 1/2) and was just swapping it with the counter staff when he asked me what I wanted it for - he literally offered to solder up whatever bit of pipe/fitting I needed as he had his van outside, for free.
I didnāt take him up on the offer, and although I did thank him it wasnāt nearly enough to be honest. We forget, when faced with all the crap that is on the news, that there are still decent people around who are willing to help when needed. Chapeau to that man.
Oh, and thereās definitely something from Alice in Wonderland about the pricing of 1/2" BSP isolation valves from Screwfix
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One is full bore, the more expensive one. The others restrict flow a bit, so cheaper.
Yeah, I noticed that a couple of minutes after posting
Wow theyāre alot cheaper than in France. In fact I think alot of diy material is cheaper in the UK. On my recent visit back to UK I purchased a new four bar roof rack for my van and it was about half the cost of what it would be in France!
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None of this did I understand but Iām very glad you reached a happy ending 
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TL;DR - seriously broken toilet mended at a fraction of the cost of an emergency plumber; faith in human kindness restored along the way.
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Is this a haiku? Feels like it ought to be.
Seriously broke
Toilet mended. āLong the way
Found human kindness.
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Iād have got his phone number in case I needed him on a later occasion.
Sanitary fail:
Fittings loose; yet soon mended
Like a broken heart.
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I should have taken a before photo when the shower unit was still on the wall,but anywayā¦
Progress. Now we await the bath etc Wozza kindly ordered for me.
After my earlier comments about the pipes around the light switch, seeing how things have been done here only reinforces my feelings about bodging. I can bodge with the best, but some things have āsurprisedā me.
The toilet is still there btw - the hole in the floor was left by the guys that moved it away from the shower to the other end of the room. Conveniently itās almost exactly where the bath waste will go, so a happy accident.
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The toilet might be but " mind the gap" how far off the wall is it? Another badly executed bit of work. Maybe an offset pan connector will allow it to go back to the wall?
Sorry thats going to be historic now the bath is going in. Hope it all goes well
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Is your first line 6 syllables? I thought it was supposed to be 5/7/5? If so, fail? Love the sentiment.
We do need to see an after picture.
I love other peopleās projects.
Well spotted!! I have fixed it.
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Donāt ask about the waste pipe that runs down into the bathroom below. 
It could comfortably have been 4 inches nearer the wall. The reason the toilet sticks out so far is that the hot and cold pipes for the previous basin rise behind it, and rather than shorten and cap them off, the guys just left as-is and butted up to them. I forget the need to be very explicit in direction sometimes - this may well be the last job these guys do for us.
BTW with super French water pressure is 14mm pipe enough to feed a bath? Iād have said yes based on flow to the shower, but not sure.