Matthew's Journal

For various uninteresting reasons, most of the adult choristers at GSM now vest in the vicar's study. This has quite a strong hinged-arm closer (like this one) - you have to pull quite hard to open it, and it slams the door somewhat.

Yesterday, just before the Maundy Thursday service, I opened the door, and the frame started to pull away from the wall, with a very alarming creaking sound! I let it close again, and Marion and I inspected the damage. Most pressingly, the way the frame was coming off, it was now fouling the arm of the door closure, which meant it took us a while to manage to get the door opened at all (and probably meant that the door would be hard to non-destructively open from the outside). So we propped the door open with a chair, and left several large notes saying "do not move door nor chair". Of course, we then spent some time trying to tell people what had happened, and still kept finding people about to shut the door...

The problem, it seems, is that the closer arm was screwed into the wooden frame, but not really into the plaster wall behind, and the wooden frame was only tacked in place. Perhaps surprising it's lasted this long! But still, not really the way to begin the Maundy Thursday service. Hopefully I'll break nothing else...