fixing the latch at last

2025 · 12

Fixed the door. The spare room latch, the one that's been drifting open with that slow creak since October. It took, and I want this on the record, about fifteen minutes.

It was exactly what I'd assumed and been ignoring. The metal plate on the frame had slid down a couple of millimetres, so the latch had nothing to catch on. Backed off the two screws, pushed the plate up until the tongue clicked home, tightened them again. That was the whole job. Weeks of that door hanging open and it came down to two screws and finally standing there deciding to do it.

Shuts with a proper little clunk now. I've opened and closed it more than any grown person needs to, just for the sound. M. came past, shut it once, gave a nod, then did the old firm-push out of habit before remembering it doesn't need it.

So the running tally of things this flat needed and finally got: the drawer, wax on the runners, still silent, still the best of them. The chair, reglued in the summer, holding. And now the latch. The dripping tap is still on the list. But I'm learning these jobs are never the thing the dread makes them, and the little good feeling after is wildly out of proportion.