Yes.  I am also learning how to tape up seams in drywall.  It's actually sort of fun and satisfying.   I must admit that I would be having MORE fun if the drywall mud were purple or turquoise  or even lime green instead of off grey.  


They could come up with something like that.  Right?  Kind of like purple fade to white elmer's glue-in-a-stick?  
I also must constantly fight the instinct to just run to get the duct tape and spray paint, but the process of smearing goo into a crack in the wall and smoothing it down is a lot like painting.  Or pottery.  It's messy.  It accomplishes something.  Your work is immediately visible.  I like that.







I do not like this.
















Or This.

What crazy person put this toilet and sink in here before finishing the drywall?  I mean, really.  Who can reach in there?

I can't even fit the blade in this corner.  Oh - wait - yes I can - If I crawl Underneath the sink and carefully wedge the corner knife up between the sink and the wall, I can sort of smear it downwards . . .





Oh - and installing this light fixture before mudding was a brilliant plan.

You would think this guy was under some pressure from his wife to get a functional potty room into the house NOW or something.

I'll tell you something else brilliant.  It turns out that the water supply fixtures for this sink have some sort of "emergency flow restriction device" or something.  Which means that if you turn the water on full blast too quickly, the sink seizes up and shuts off the water on you.  For HOURS.  Or until a plumber comes and takes the Whole Bloody Apparatus Apart  and resets it.  It's supposed to protect homeowners from water damage if their faucet breaks and starts spraying all over the place.

Well, do you know how many times I've had my faucet break off and start spraying water all over the place on me in almost 41 years? 

None.  Never.  Not at all.

Do you know how many times I've had something go horribly, hideously wrong in the kitchen or the studio and need several gallons of water at 40 tons of pressure NOW! in order to contain the damage or rinse out dye or spilled paint or caustic chemicals or just to pressure wash the burned rice off the bottom of the pan?

Daily.

There had better not be little flow inhibitors on my studio and kitchen sinks.  Let me tell you.


This photo makes it look like I've been put in time out, but I'm actually putting mud in the corner behind the toilet.  (I wonder if there's a difference?)  While Moly runs around taking pictures of herself with the cat. . . .   BTW - that cat has been through about 5 names already.  The latest being something Irish which I can neither spell nor pronounce but which means "she who inspires terror." 

We are still holding the line on it remaining a barn kitty.  Molly may have to go live in the barn, too.  I am appalled at the amount of garbage this kid has.  There's no way I want it all to come into the Beorningsetead.  She has more laundry than most third world villages.  But she thinks up awesome names for cats.

I've spent a lot of time at the Beorningstead hanging about feeling utterly useless.  Let's face it, I am my mother's child.  That means I am not really a perfectionist.  We could be related to Red Green.  We like Duct Tape.  We just want to get it done.

My Sweet Beorn, on the other hand, can (and will) dig a painstakingly perfect square hole.  He measures three times and cuts one.  And if that isn't good enough, he does it all over again.  He doesn't care how long a task takes as long as it is done properly and well.  I honestly don't know how he can stand to live with me sometimes.

So a couple of weeks ago, he showed me how to install outlets.  I was amazed at how easy the first couple were.  Sure, I had to crouch on the floor and use an irritating little non-ratcheting screwdriver - but the process itself is simple enough.  Black wire gets hooked around the gold screw, tighten it down.  White wire gets hooked to the silver screw and the copper wire has to hook on the green screw.  No problem.

But sometimes you have to lead from one outlet to the next.  That's not so bad because you just connect the second wire to the second set of screws except that there's only one green ground screw so you have to connect a short extra length of copper to the two copper ground wires, hold it all together with a wire nut and connect that third length of wire to the one green screw. 

Then you have to cram all of those wires into the box, and screw them in. 

This sounds easy.  It is not.  This is why electricians have big, meaty fingers with which to apply hundreds of pounds of pressure on unruly wires, squeezing and folding them to fit with one hand while pushing the outlet into the box with the other.

Sometimes you have to do this in very tight quarters, almost standing on your head.

Sometimes you go through the whole process and discover that you have installed the outlet Upside Down.

Then you have to unscrew the outlet and turn it right side up and try to get the wires to all fit in again in a new configuration.


This is why electricians are paid big money.  This is also why they have ratcheting screwdrivers.  I bought one the other day.  It makes me happy.

Yes!   A shower at the Beorningstead!















And this is what Molly wants to bring home. 

How can we refuse?

(Please - help me find a way to refuse!) 






It's so soft.

And cute.

And fuzzy.

And it rides on her shoulder.

















And it hasn't actually pooped on anything or clawed up any sofas or barfed any hairballs yet so I'm still susceptible to the cuteness.   Beorn is remaining strong, though.  He says it must live in the barn and she can visit it out there.  He remembers stepping in cat puke and having shredded furniture with much more ire than I do.