Because the 2 X 4's were 8 foot longer than the 6 foot bed of my pickup, I put one end down in the tailgate, rested it on the cab of the truck with the other end was sticking out over the hood. I wrapped it tight both bottom and top and headed down the interstate.
Not one of my brighter ideas... Those 2 X 4's sticking up in the air acted like a kite, even though I tied them down snugly, or at least so I thought. The ends over the hood were raising up and down like a kite. I decided I should travel city streets to the house.
Good thing too!!! About 2 miles from the house, the 2 X 4's had slipped to one side and slid off the cab next to my door. Startled the heck out of me and sticking about 2 foot out the side of the truck. Quick dip into the Red Cross Headquarters parking lot and Robyn, Copper and I were on our way again.
My primary responsibility today while Robyn was finishing up trim cleanup was to get a working faucet in the kitchen so we could clean walls before painting. The handles were broken off the existing one and the valves wouldn't turn. Here's why:
They were full of gook. And of course, in a house with a few years on it, the water wouldn't shut off completely. Robyn and I decided to grab some lunch at the restaurant across the way, Leo's Chow Mein, on the way to the convenience store to get my next tool.
Stuffed in the tubing to stop the water drip.
A few minutes later, I had replacement valves on and was ready to start on the faucet... If I could ever get the old one off! It was so gooked up, I unpacked my new Dremel and ground the plastic nut off. Which promptly fell in that 1/32" opening between my glasses and my nose, leaving me with a nice little welt.
Ohh... and the hoses I bought at Home Depot a couple of days earlier were about 8 inches too short. And they were they were the longest ones they had. So off to a new hardware store, Seven Corners Hardware store in downtown St. Paul. Founded in 1933, it is a really cool old-style hardware store.
Forever later, I had the faucet hooked up, and the water turned on. And just hot water, without a lot of pressure. I suspect that gook was other places than the valves. Fortunately, the pipes are readily available just below the kitchen in the basement. I was going to have to replace some of them anyway because someone had mixed copper and galvanized pipe... a no, no.
So, in the meantime, Robyn has finished cleaning wood work with the Goof Off, Goo Gone and Oops and is ready to wipe them down with Murphy's Oil and mop the floors. Only problem was I hadn't finished pulling the crown molding out of the rooms yet and got some of her work dirty. Pain in the butt because someone had put the crown molding up with finishing nails about 2 1/2 inches long... serious overkill. But my new Dremel came in handing cutting an opening so I could get leverage with a crow bar to pry it loose.
After we paint, I'm planning on putting up stained crown molding which will look better. (And has the additional benefit of we don't have to mask off between the ceiling and walls.
Here's a shot of the popcorn crown molding I mentioned...
Seriously... this has to be the ugliest application of popcorn texture I've ever seen.
Popcorn texture can cover up quite a few flaws, so we aren't removing it from the existing ceilings. Just touching up with an aerosol product.
So as the day wound down and Robyn finished up mopping the walls, I spread another layer of spackle and tackled this bad patch job in the dining room ceiling.
The directions say to drape off the area to avoid overspray and bounce back of the texture. I figure how messy could it be... I was only doing a small area. As it turns out, it can be quite messy. I had to go get a cheap shirt so we could go out to dinner at Pat's, Robyn's coworker. But the initial results of the touchup aerosol texture aren't bad.
We'll see how it looks tomorrow when it dries. Here's a short video of us as our work day wound down.
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