Sunday, December 16th, 2007
Well, that was fun. Not really.
I sanded for the better part of yesterday and now I am a little sore. I do have to say that I am very happy that I bought that respirator mask. It has come in quite handy and it’s nice to know that I am not breathing in the crap I am working on.
Yesterday morning, the sanding was going very smoothly. I was more than half way done. I was working on a particularly tough spot (with lots of glue) when I began to smell something. I looked down and the motor of my brand new DeWalt belt sander was smoking. I gave it a break and tried again…no power. I burned the motor out. I guess not even DeWalt can handle me. I ran down to Lowe’s to return it and grab another one. Once back, I finished up pretty quickly, paranoid that I was going to burn this one out too.
When sanding something like this, with old glue on the floor, is to sand a bit, then sweep, then sand, then sweep. You have to get the glue particles out of the way, or else you will heat them up again and spread them out on what you just sanded. Things went faster once I figured this out. Also, a good tip would be to get those knee pads…I didn’t.
I snapped a chalk line for each joist and re-screwed the subfloor down.
This is the finished floor…all sanded. It doesn’t look great, but will be a heck of a lot better for tiling. It’s also much smoother on my bare feet, and that’s important.
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Tuesday, December 4th, 2007
This place stinks.
I mean, it really does. I woke up this morning with a plan. My plan was that I was going to make a plan…no, I mean it. I am talking about the kitchen. I’m sorry, but whenever I think about sanding and spackling walls, I get very demotivated. It’s helpful to think of projects in small chunks. My plan is to tackle a bit of the kitchen each day…one wall at a time.
Well, today I painted the ceiling. It’s not exactly a wall, but it did need to get done. There wasn’t really anything wrong with the old ceiling color, besides the fact that there was something along the lines of spaghetti sauce spots on it. Laura and I kept looking at a rather large one for about two years, until I got the courage to wipe it off. Who knows how these things happen. Anyway, now it’s a nice bright white.
The other thing that was wrong with the kitchen ceiling was its yellowish tint. I think someone who lived here was a heavy smoker. They had to be…all the walls were yellow. At one point, I’m sure the white ceilings were whiter, but the tar in the cigarette smoke took care of that. I believe the people who lived here had kids too. Good luck with that. The kitchen is the last room that needs to have the yellow covered up. It felt great to roll a new shade of white over the yellow white.
Also, today I bleached the walls of the shower/bathtub. I needed to really clean the grout so I could seal it. If you have ever used straight bleach to clean with, you can understand what I am talking about. Those noxious fumes can bring you down. I tried to hold my breath, but had to keep running in and out of the bathroom so I wouldn’t faint. That’s all Laura needs to come home to.
That’s why this place stinks. There is a wonderful mix of drying paint and bleach floating through the air.
I took this picture of Simon the other night. He was sleeping with his head up. Sometimes he does that, so I thought it would be interesting for my readers to see, especially if they don’t have a cat capable of doing something like this. He is for rent. Call me.
In other news, last night was a windy sonofabitch. I hate the wind. I kept getting up to see if the recycling cans on the porch blew off. If they did, I would be spending the day cleaning up paper. Good thing they didn’t.
The picture above is the front yard with a little bit of snow on it. It actually was snowing, but the camera didn’t pick that up. You will have to use your imagination.
I miss you.
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