Thursday, 22 March 2012
This evening, I began preparing our bedroom so that we could paint it tomorrow. Now, when I say “we,” I pretty much just mean Jennifer, as she is the superior painter and is very particular about how the job is done. I’m lucky if I get to tape the molding.
Living in this new place has really given me an appreciation for a good paint job. The prior owner did a poor job. You can’t tell right away, but as we’ve been living here, I’ve noticed some things.
It appears that, in many places, he didn’t even bother to tape. There are splashes and entire swathes of paint on molding in various rooms. In other places, he did tape, but he then left the tape on the molding. He also didn’t bother to sand the walls that well prior to painting, so in some spots there are bumps and ridges that he painted right over.
The good side of this half-assedness, however, is that just about anything we do here is an improvement. So, tomorrow we my wife will paint our bedroom walls. This will mark the first time – ever – that we’ve she’s painted all the walls in any bedroom we’ve ever had.
Friday, 23 March 2012
Besides taking Owen to school and keeping Isla out of Jennifer’s hair today, my biggest job was moving our bed.
We sleep in a king-sized behemoth made out of wood. The end tables are attached to the bed, and we have an extra cushion-y top on the mattress. All of this adds to the weight.
I lightened the load somewhat by first removing the mattress. This in itself is quite the task; the problem being more one of awkwardness rather than weight. I then tried to remove the end tables, but they are attached from behind, so I still had to pull the bed out about a foot from the wall in order to get back there.
Anyway, I finally succeeded. I pulled my back out in the process, so now it feels like there’s a knife on my right side, just above my pelvis.
Saturday, 24 March 2012
This morning, Owen and I participated in another Build and Grow session at Lowe’s. My friend Eric and his two sons joined us again.
This was a great opportunity for me to point out to Eric that I now have the superior refrigerator. Allow me to explain.
When Jennifer and I were at Eric’s home for a New Year’s Eve party, I noticed that he and his wife had the same refrigerator that we do. I noticed the filter cartridge on the bottom of their appliance lacked the plastic cover. Eric immediately noted that this caused him and his wife great frustration as, when they moved into their new place earlier in the year, they set about replacing the filter. Opening up the instructions, they noted that step one called for pressing the button on the plastic cover. They looked everywhere and couldn’t find the button. After, like, a half hour, they realized their fridge was missing that part.
I then made some sarcastic, cocky comment (I know, it’s hard to imagine) about our fridge -identical in every other way – being superior to theirs by virtue of having an in-tact plastic cover.
“No,” my wife corrected me (I know, it’s hard to imagine). She then explained that the ice dispenser does not work on our fridge, thereby rendering Eric’s fridge superior.
Well, yesterday, as Jennifer busily painted the bedroom, an appliance technician came to our home and replaced the fried-out part. Though my wallet hated replacing such a spendy part, my ego was happy, as it proved the problem was beyond my ability to repair and, thus, a technician was required.
Anyway, our fridge is better than Eric’s now. I pointed that out to him a couple of times, and told him we would have his family over this summer so they can look upon the greatness that is our kitchen appliance.