A mellow day

Yesterday was mellow. Mostly. Our landlord continues to show "our" house in his efforts to rent it after us. It's like selling a house; you always have to be ready for it to be shown. So I had to spend a bit of time having a cleaning/tidying frenzy as it was shown twice yesterday. Er, as well as you can tidy with huge mounds of boxes everywhere.

I started painting the bedroom last night out at the new house. I got most of it cut-in and today I'll get the primer coat rolled on everything and will probably do the first paint coat on the ceiling. I'll also crank up my trim molding painting factory. I like to paint the molding before it is installed, then all I have to do is spackle/caulk and touch up paint the nail holes.

DH spent his time last night working on the new wiring. We're rewiring the whole house. Right now, DH must connect all the new wire to the old breaker box (the one the electrician we consulted with said was no longer listed by UL because it would never trip when it was supposed to). He'll install a new breaker box, but not for about a month, and we need power to the bedroom now as it's hard to work in the dark after the sun goes down.

But best of all, I got to stitch for about an hour and a half yesterday! That may account somewhat for my "all is right with the world" outlook.

Warning! I have two X chromosomes and I know how to use them!

Very heavy sarcasm on. "Hypothetical" situation to follow.

Three people are standing in a room. Two of them have both X and Y chromosomes. The third person has two X chromosomes. When two or more XY people are together, situational deafness occurs. This renders them pretty much unable to hear, understand, or implement anything any XX person says to them.

The XY people are about to begin a very messy job that will get stuff all over the floor. They do nothing during their preparation for the job regarding protecting the floor. The XX person suggests several ways to protect the floor and offers to fetch the appropriate materials which are nearby. The XY people do not acknowledge this information and continue on with the messy job. The job is very messy and involves a form of mud and copious amounts of water.

Fast forward to the next day. The XY person wants to proceed with the next phase of the job, which is painting. The XX person wisely states that the previous job's mess must be cleaned up first. The XY person (who is now able to hear most of what the XX person is saying) says that it can wait and it shouldn't take too long anyway. The XX person insists.

The job of cleaning the mess takes six hours and involves tediously scrapping and both hand- and rotary-sanding the floor. Water damage is discovered and noted by the XX person; this damage is seen and acknowledged by the XY person. During all of this time-wasting cleaning brought on by lack of proper preparation, the XX person remains mostly calm and doesn't speak. The XX person doesn't speak to prevent the loud and probably strident voicing of many, many bad words.

After the cleaning job is finished, the XX person informs the XY person that starting now, no job shall be started unless it is properly prepped. Such prepping must be approved for effectiveness by the XX person before the job is allowed to proceed, especially if the job is to be done by one or more XY people. The XY person accedes to this decree, thankful to still be among the living and not duct-taped to a wall somewhere.

Stomped!

We've been wearing ourselves out working at the new house since Friday. (But I did sneak in a little stitching - picture later this week!)

On Friday, DH and Billy got the last of the sheetrock up.

On Saturday, Billy began taping and bedding like mad. The man is speedy! At work, DH says everyone calls him "a gerbil on uppers."

Because it was SOOOOO hot (over 100 degrees) this weekend, the mud dried at warp speed and Billy was able to get it finished by Sunday afternoon! Normally, it would take four to five days for this!

So we were able to begin texturing! We are using the "stomp" pattern. Billy demonstrated on the ceiling for us and then taught us to do it on the walls.

We all took turns "stomping" the walls and got all finished by 4:30 p.m. on Sunday! Today, we prime and paint one top coat!

DH's boss is...

...a really great guy. I'll explain why. No, the dog isn't ours. No, DH's boss doesn't look like a dog. I got the picture off Photobucket - I thought the dog and his name was cute.

DH has been taking Mondays off so we can spend it working on the new house. We've been spending just about every spare waking moment out there working. We have to be out of our rent house soon, and we're racing that deadline.

The next big job is taping/bedding and texturing all the sheetrock that is going up. DH and I can do all that, and do it quite well, but we both hate doing it with a flaming purple passion. So much so that we are hiring it done. We are hiring DH's technician at work, Billy, (who has done this both full- and part-time for years) to do it for us. And Billy is very fast and is a true craftsman.

Yesterday, DH's boss told him that he was giving Billy and him the day off on Friday (with pay) so that the work could get done sooner. Is that cool or what?!

"John Hancocking" my posts

I stole the website for generating a free blog signature from Michelle's blog. It was fun and easy to do. Here is the website: My Live Signature if you want to make one for yourself.

Knicker Knotter #4

I am one of those people who wears plain underwear. White. Cotton. No lace. My main goal is comfort. My main complaint about underwear? BUYING IT!

I hate the fact that my DH has been wearing the same size and brand of underwear since he was in the ninth grade. The underwear hasn't changed at all during those ensuing years. It probably hasn't changed in the last 100 years. He needs new underwear? He goes to the nearest department store and buys three packages of his usual brand and he's set!

When I need new underwear, I must go on a search and destroy mission to find some. Usually, what I bought last time is no longer made, or it has been "new and improved" to the point where it is no longer comfortable for me. So, then I must go to way too many stores and search the internet, buying many, many brands/sizes to find comfort and fit.

And of course, you usually can't buy just one pair. You have to buy a package of underwear. I end up sending a bunch of packages of brand-new underwear to the Goodwill store with one pair removed from each package. But once I do find "the perfect fit," I buy enough to last me six or seven years. That way, I only have to go through this on occasion. Maybe I should learn to sew my own. Yeah, right.

And I won't even begin to discuss finding a bra that fits and is comfortable; I could write a novel. And isn't the phrase "comfortable bra" an oxymoron anyway?

Sundry topics

Thanks for reading my blog and leaving comments, y'all! I appreciate it!

First off, let me say ippity blippity bleepin' frog! I sneaked in some stitching time this morning and was feeling pretty chuffed (as a UKer would say), when I realized I would have to frog. I found a stitch leg that I had crossed over two legs instead of one. Whee.

I'm not one who minds doing laundry. However, socks are my least favorite thing to sort and fold. Laundry in the summer is nice as there are usually very few socks as I go barefoot 99% of the time. This summer, due to the wearing of shoes while working out at the new house, I have lots of socks to fold. *grumblemumblewhine*

DH and I continue to discover just how bad our contractor was. We noticed that the new windows in the addition are one-inch higher than the new windows in the original part of the bedroom. This is due to the way the addition is attached to the house and where the bottom plate in the wall is located. A savvy framer would have taken this into account and the contractor apparently did not employ one. Now, no one is going to walk into our bedroom and say, "Hey! Did you know that the windows over there are about one-inch higher than the ones over here?" But it's the principle of the thing and the contractor's repeated lack of attention to detail.

On a happy note, we now have sheetrock on all the ceilings that needed it. We also have insulation in 95% of the bedroom walls and are ready to begin sheetrocking them!