Tool time

I often think the best thing about being rich must surely be this phrase, "Honey, the house needs painting, so let's have the painters in, shall we?". Or, "Sweetheart, there is an annoying drip in one of the jacuzzi jets...do let's set up the plumbers to come while we're scuba-diving in Belize?" All said with a Boston accent, or British, and about anything that alludes to the fact that we wouldn't have to do it ourselves.

But alas, we are not rich. And that is painful to type. Because you see, I do really intend to buy that winning lottery ticket any day now. Still, as it stands, when something needs doing, the herewegoagains swing into action. And, by golly, we do it ourselves.

The guys are busy with the deck. I'm fairly, wildly, ecstatically happy about that, so I decided to tackle a few of the other little things myself. We live in a house straight out of 1977. By that, think "cool, way more updated than the Brady house of 1970"...I mean, we don't have orange formica in the kitchen, but we do have white sparkly stuff. We bought the place from my dad, who had in his own designer sense of "1979 was the latest and greatest of all years" actually installed brownish/purplish/sculpted shag carpet in 1994. The doors are stained dark brown. That's ugly enough, but with the dog scratches they have reached a new level of beyond-ugly-now-we're-white-trash. So, I decided THAT would be my job. I would paint them. All six of them. I am woman, hear me roar. (Just keeping the 70's references going strong here...)

OK, so, the guys took the first one off the hinges for me and put it in the garage on a saw-horse thingy. I personally got the paint and brushes. As for the paint, I was just sure that the paint I had purchased for sweet girl's room last October would be fine. Well, it was a bit, um, thick, but hey, no problem. I thinned it with some water. Don't they do that on home improvement shows all the time? Then I got out my brushes. Well, ok, not brushes. I use the foam pad things that most people use for crafts. Not only that, but if I'm keeping the same color, I wrap them in foil and freeze them. Yes, it's true. At my house, you will likely find nothing but frozen old foam brushes in the freezer. And stale healthy bread (because we all hate it, but I spent $5.00 on it, so I can't chunk it).

Back to the brushes. Hadn't used those since October either. I figured they would thaw out, the paint would smooth out, and the doors would look great in no time.

Well, how was I to know that paint does this lumpy thing when it gets old? It looks fine, but as you paint it on, small flecks of hardened paint appear. Add to that a frozen foam brush which is losing lumps of its own, and it's just not um, a professional job.

It looked horrible. I left it there to dry out overnight, hoped no one would actually look at it--as in "Hey mom, let's see what you've been up to". When I went out there to finish the job today, the crowning glory was the cat vomit all over the floor. They (those rotten felines) did barely miss the newly-badly-painted door, but they managed to get everywhere I would have to stand or walk. As I cleaned it up (cursing them), I grabbed a rag on the utility sink. Which had a SCORPION in it (the cats are supposed to eat them, not whatever furry/feathery creature they barfed all over the garage). Screaming and yelling brought my brave men in to stomp on the scorpion and mop up the cat mess. My heroes.

But, that was it. I turned in my paint rags. I'm done. The more I think about it, the brown doors are just fine. After all, they go nicely with the carpet and formica.

In my next life, I'm not only calling the painters...I'm getting brand-new doors.