29/09/2026
YESTERDAY… WHAT A NIGHTMARE!!!! 😩🐟🍟
Good morning everyone! Despite having what can only be described as an absolutely horrendous day yesterday, somehow we’ve woken up this morning in good spirits, with renewed energy, plenty of optimism… and a lovely brand-new list of jobs that didn’t even exist 24 hours ago. 😂
As we entered what we thought was the home straight, with the finishing line finally in sight, I think we massively underestimated just how much could still go wrong. Yesterday was supposed to be one of the easy days — move the equipment in, finish off a few little jobs, sort the last bits of lighting and fencing and generally start bringing everything together ready for testing. On paper, there really wasn’t anything particularly difficult about it.
In reality… it was an absolute flipping nightmare. 😂
We started by collecting the hire van and heading around the island picking up all the equipment we’d bought and had stored with different suppliers. We got everything back to The Chippy, unloaded it, got it into position and started switching things on. This was supposed to be the exciting moment where the kitchen finally started coming to life.
Instead, the dishwasher didn’t work… and neither did the catering fridge. 😭
Now, for those who don’t know, we’d bought a few pieces of pre-used commercial equipment to try and keep some of the costs down. Proper catering equipment is ridiculously expensive and we thought buying some good second-hand equipment would be the sensible, cost-effective option. Well, that plan has bitten us firmly on the arse because we’re now going to have to go out and replace both with brand-new equipment anyway.
I’ve actually had a saying for years: “You buy cheap, you buy twice.” So quite how I managed to ignore my own advice I’ll never know. 😂 In hindsight, we should have just bought new from the beginning, but hindsight is a wonderful thing and now we just need to get on with it. The added problem, of course, is that this is Corralejo — you can’t exactly nip down the road and pick up a commercial catering fridge at the drop of a hat, so that’s another problem we now need to solve quickly.
Thankfully, we DID have a brand-new catering bench delivered, so surely that couldn’t cause us any problems?
Wrong again. 😂
The bloody thing seemed to require a degree in engineering just to assemble, and after around four hours of putting it together we finally got it ready to go into position… only to discover that it doesn’t fit the space properly. Where the plumbing and electrical work has already been installed, we’ve got pipes, trunking and junction boxes sitting exactly where the catering bench and fryers need to go.
Everything in that section of the kitchen has been designed to fit into a very specific space, so it really does need to fit like a glove. The only solution now is to remove some of the work that’s already been done, get the bench into its proper position and then reinstall the plumbing and electrical trunking around it. That wouldn’t normally be the end of the world, but our sparky is now tied up on other jobs, so we’re desperately trying to work out how quickly we can get that sorted.
And unfortunately, the fun didn’t stop there. 😂
Then came the till system. The till system that we ordered EIGHT WEEKS AGO, paid for FOUR WEEKS AGO and was supposed to be installed today. Yesterday we got a phone call telling us they now couldn’t come for another FOUR WEEKS.
WHAT?!?! 🤯
No real explanation, no solution and certainly not much concern about the fact that we’re trying to open a business. Just the good old mañana mentality that can occasionally drive you completely insane over here. 😂 Needless to say, I told them where they could stick their till system, which then meant losing several hours yesterday driving around trying to find an alternative at ridiculously short notice.
Thankfully, we did manage to find a brand-new system that we can install ourselves. It won’t be anywhere near as sophisticated as the system we originally planned to have, but right now we need something reliable that gets us operational. We can always upgrade later once we’re open and trading.
Then, just because yesterday clearly hadn’t kicked us in the balls enough already, while putting one of the TVs up on the wall I managed to put a lovely big dent in the freshly painted wall with it. 😂 So after finally getting all the painting finished, Sean now has another little snagging job waiting for him today. Sorry mate! 😂
By the end of the day it was honestly soul-destroying. We’d started Monday thinking we were about to finish The Chippy and potentially be looking at opening as early as this Friday, and within a few hours we’d somehow created an entirely new list of problems that didn’t exist when we woke up.
There’s no point dressing it up — yesterday has 100% pushed the opening back. What potentially could have been this Friday will now almost certainly be next week, and potentially even later if we can’t find a quick solution with the electrical work. It’s unbelievably frustrating because when you’ve spent months trying to reach the finishing line and you can finally see it, having it suddenly moved further away feels ten times worse.
BUT… somehow we’ve woken up this morning ready to go again. 💪💙
Yesterday has gone and there’s absolutely nothing we can do about it now. Today we’ve got renewed energy, plenty of optimism and a massive can-do attitude. We’ll find the new equipment, we’ll sort the kitchen layout, we’ll get the electrics moved, we’ve already found another till solution and Sean can hopefully make my little TV incident disappear. 😂
That’s business, I suppose. Things go wrong, plans change, money disappears at an alarming rate and occasionally you have a day where you genuinely wonder why the hell you started doing this in the first place. Then you wake up the next morning, dust yourself off and start solving the problems one by one.
So my favourite saying of the last few weeks — “WE’RE ALMOST THERE” — has officially been retired for the time being. 😂 I’m not saying it again until I physically see somebody walking out of The Chippy with a portion of fish and chips in their hands!
We’ll keep you updated as always because you’ve been on this whole journey with us, and that means sharing the nightmare days as well as the good ones. Hopefully today is considerably kinder to us and we can start closing that gap again.
Onwards and upwards, folks. We WILL get this bloody Chippy open if it’s the last thing I do. 😂🐟🍟
Thank you for sticking with us, thank you for all the messages and support, and stay tuned because the story certainly isn’t bloody boring at the moment!
See you all soon at The Chippy. 💙🐟🍟
