Last week at work was spent metering mail. This is an extremely boring job. I stand all day at a machine pushing envelopes through to be stamped with postage. The long hours give me all day to think, and I had an entire week. By Thursday, I was bored out of my skull and started thinking of weekend projects I could do. And I decided I could take on the enormous project of painting the garage. I went to Lowe's after work and purchased everything I needed (Bryan was conveniently working and was able to 'help' me with all my customer needs; more like shop for me). I picked up a 5 gallon bucket of paint and a paint sprayer, as well as a power washer. I got home and cleaned up the driveway and started power washing. I was sopping wet by the time I finished. Especially since I was an idiot and tried to detach the hose while the water was still on. Saturday morning, Bryan was up early to go four-wheeling with some neighbors and I was up right as he left to get going on my project. I started off by pulling all the trim around the garage. When we first bought the house, I thought the country blue rick rack was somewhat cutsie, but now I hate it, and I was excited to pull it all off. I was also armed with several cans of wasp spray and killed about 30 nests that each had about 20 wasps. I then finished the power wash job and put together the paint sprayer. I read through the instructions several times, and once again as I put everything together. I carefully filtered the paint into the container and slowly twisted it onto the spray gun. I plugged it in and walked over to the garage and started to spray. And it worked! For only 3 seconds. Then it globbed big splotches. I immediately stopped and pulled everything apart and cleaned the inner workings. I tried again with the same exact result. I pulled it apart again, cleaned the parts, and poured out half the paint and added some water to thin it. The same blotchy result again, and boy was I ticked. I cleaned everything, laid it to dry and took off for Lowe's to buy rollers and tray liners. I was going to finish this project even if it meant all day painting. It actually went a little faster than I thought. I did the west wall first and then moved out front. The ladder situation for painting was...scary. I'm not too afraid of heights, but I don't like heights on rickety ladders with angry wasps. I've been stung enough times to really hate the suckers, and each time they came near I wanted to jump off the 12 foot ladder and run like a bat out of hell. Somehow I finished without hurting myself or getting stung. I took a break for lunch and figured Bryan would be home soon. After lunch I started on the east wall and looked out front every time someone drove by. Where was he? I was getting tired and he was having fun. By the time I was on the back wall I now had a vendetta to try and finish the project before he got back. However, I kept losing the battle with the wasps. And I was out of spray. I went to Lowe's and bought more ammunition. I was intent to win the war; both the wasp war and the time war. I had about 1/3 left of the back to do when Bryan suddenly appeared at my elbow. Bummer. He was blown away by how much I had done and jumped in to help me finish. By 4:30 we were done. Hurray! All I have left is to paint the trim around the garage doors.
The next day we tackled our bedroom window. Both of us were tired and sore, but I had more right to the moaning than Bryan. And once again we uncovered a nightmare of Johnson. The window had never properly been seated and was sagging along the top. The header? Just 2x4s, extremely rotted. And to boot? The Reiers who had replaced the roof had put the new rough over the top of the old rotted one. Brilliant! Once we finally removed the rotted wood and moldy Sheetrock, it was off to Lowe's again to get new supplies. We replaced the header with 2x6s built up with particle board and OSB; a new mini beam. The windows went in easily enough and we trimmed them out. We had to pull off one piece of trim as the blinds could not be installed. And it was so late, we nixed installing the blinds (as it meant painting first) and cleaned up. We went to bed extremely late to fish bowls. I wasn't too concerned about anyone peeping in, but the bright flashlight of moon was obnoxious. Yes it was beautiful, all yellow through the smoky haze in the sky, but I wanted to sleep! And it was hot. The cooler installation is going to require some engineering and we had gone for just a fan in the window. About 30 minutes into sleep Bryan got up and put a pillowcase in the window to cover the moonlight. From that point, I was up about every 30-45 minutes freezing. Bryan obviously had been freezing too, and had stolen all the blankets. I huffily pulled them back and tucked myself in. Then 15 minutes later I would wake up boiling and would kick the covers off. At about 5 am, the sun started to peer over the mountains and it was now morning. It was like camping, and I HATE CAMPING!! My alarm went off at 7 and I got up to get ready for work. Bryan is lucky he didn't have to be up for work as I was cranky. Unreasonably cranky.
The first duty today? Paint the window trim and install the blinds! I'll post pictures tomorrow when it's light enough to get a decent photo.
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