Monday, Day 46

On Memorial Day, I went to Cleveland.

I was on a medium-sized plane and a small plane. 

Andy picked me up at the airport and we went home to Miles.

We went for  a short walk where Miles liked looking up at the trees.

We had to hurry home to avoid a Midwestern thunder shower. Miles spent his time inside helping to sort Mom and Dad's keys.

No projects today.

Sunday, Day 45

No painting today. A visit from Ted. Bookstore work for me. FOB* time for Tom.


I put about half of the books back on the bookshelves, and I'm almost out of room. Where am I going to put the rest?

I'm still weeding books -- trying to be good about it. I motivate myself by watching episodes of "Hoarders."


The best part of unpacking, according to Random, is the empty boxes.

 Random is looking up at Tom, as if to say, "Did I do a good job?"


Tom takes off for the wilds of Cleveland tomorrow morning at 6:45.

*FOB=flat on back -- a camp term!

Saturday, Day 44

Poor guy! Despite not feeling too well, Tom put the first coat of paint on the bedroom walls. He also carted a bunch of boxes to the sale place (so we could move around in the bookstore!).


He has mostly slept and looked pitiful so far.


Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: lost in ennui

Friday, Day 43

Although he struggled with a cold most of the day, Tom still did a little work in the room. Mostly the big accomplishment of the day was a carpenter putting plywood down to replace the soft boards.

I'm not sure what it means when the best part of the day revolves around plywood.

Tom has had to help me with carting stuff for the booksale. I say "stuff" instead of books for the booksale because of the donation we picked up this morning. Many people have seen the newspaper articles about Phil's fire and the fundraising booksale. One person didn't quite understand that "booksale" meant sale of books and tossed in a lamp and vase and other unidentifiable stuff. Oh, well, if it sells, that's more money for Phil!

This is more or less the constant state of our living room now: boxes of all sizes with contents spilling onto the floor.

Tom is playing poker right now. Biscuits and gravy tomorrow morning maybe. Yum!

Project count suspended for lack of energy.

Thursday, Day 42

"You have a cold?" I hollered. "How could you have a cold? You haven't been anywhere. You've been stuck in the upstairs bedroom painting!" Oh, wait. Phil Margolin's signing on Tuesday p.m.  Conclusion: Phil Margolin gave Tom a cold.

Despite the cold, Tom slogged on and is painting the ceiling of Ted's room. Of course, it will need two coats. Will there be more paint on the ceiling ... or Tom? I swear Tom had paint IN his nose. Where was my camera when I needed it?

Anyway, this is Tom succumbing to his cold. It looks remarkably like the picture from Day 1 or 2 or 3, in which Tom is enjoying his sabbatical. Since I know Tom well, I'll tell you what the difference is. When he's well, he leans on his left arm and puts his right behind his head. Now you know.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started: 12, Completed: 11.24.

Wednesday, Day 41

It was a day of this-and-that. Tom did more patching. He did more carrying and hoisting, however.

A local bookstore burned down a few weeks ago. There's a fundraising booksale for Phil, the owner, mostly organized by other bookstore people. He was uninsured and lost 90,000 books. He needs the money for demolition of his building.  :(


So, Tom carried box after box of books to where the sale is being held.


There was another fun (not) trip to the dump. Good-bye 24-year-old handmade drapes. (Good riddance.)


We both had to have massages yesterday after all that carrying and hoisting.


Our evening's entertainment was the finale (and after-show dish) of "Ru Paul's Drag Race." Here's Ru watching with us from the fireplace.

It's time to sashay away!


Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-12, Completed-11.2355

Tuesday, Day 40

What to do, what to do? French Open, finals of "Dancing With the Stars," or tape and slather Ted's bedroom? I choose ...


We're still waiting for the asbestos report. Probably won't get it until Thursday. But we have a plastic dropcloth on the floor, so Tom has started to tape the cracks and slather joint compound on it. Ted's bedroom is like Frankenstein's monster. Look at all the cracks!

There were so many cracks and leak spots!

And this is the color (the green on the left) we're painting the room.

Tom came to the signing at the bookstore tonight. I'm sure he was thinking the whole time, "Gee, I wish I were taping and slathering." Not.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-12, Completed-11.235.

Monday, Day 39

Random has taken the opportunity of the chaos in the house to re-establish the chain of command. He used to stay mostly downstairs. He slept in the downstairs bedroom at night, rarely making it upstairs until the early morning when he got hungry. Now all that has changed. This is what I found Tuesday morning -- I know the blog heading says "Monday" -- when I went up to take a picture of what we (meaning Tom) did on Monday.

This looks like Random is declaring open warfare on Hobbes. Who will reign supreme?

You can see the curtains Tom was putting up at midnight. I, the lovely assistant and tool fetcher, fell asleep leaning against the door.

Earlier we had unboxed the shelves at the sides of the bed and they were the wrong ones. We had to go back to the store and exchange them. Aargh. Up the stairs and back down the stairs. Who needs Stairmasters. We've climbed up and down our stairs hundreds of times -- no, thousands of times -- over the past couple of weeks.

Dave, our general contractor, came to look at the soft floorboards in Ted's old room. Since the house is over a hundred years old, it's anybody's guess why the boards were cut so many times. The apparent flood from the shower at some point didn't help, I'm sure. He also took a patch of the floor covering to see if there's any asbestos in it. We are soooo hoping for a cheap fix: no asbestos and a quick slap of plywood on the weak spots. Cross your fingers!

"Our" general contractor makes us sound rich, doesn't it? It just means we have an old house that has needed way too many fixes over the years.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-12, Completed-11.231.

Sunday, Day 38

It was mostly cosmetic work today.


We got a flatscreen TV to replace the monster we sent to the Goodwill graveyard. We had lots of fun (not) figuring out how to get the danged thing to see the channels. (Yes, we do work a lot with computers and machines. We will not let this defeat us, no we will NOT!)


Two small bookshelves have replaced our yucky nightstands.


Our thousands of books are still in the basement, however. It seems a shame to sully our clean bookshelves with the books. Maybe we'll just have empty bookshelves in our bedroom.


Ted came over to have dinner with us and (inadvertently) watch "Holmes on Homes."

And yay! the French Open has started. See you in two weeks, Tom!


Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-12, Completed-11.23.

Saturday, Day 37

Uh, oh! We thought the floors would all be the same: ugly but solid. Tom took off the carpet in Ted's old room and it didn't look anything like the floor in our bedroom. There was some cardboard-y thing covering the wood. Some of the wood had been slashed to add electrical lines. Some of the boards were creepily soft and bendable. We're probably going to have to call someone to come and look at it. More delays ...

And there's a big stain that we think must have been from a prior shower problem. The shower is just on the other side of that wall. The soft boards are right near the stain, so, I repeat, uh, oh.


Most of the furniture is moved back into our bedroom, but the smell of the new carpet is still stinky, so we'll abide downstairs a mite longer.


Matt came over and helped Tom move some of the heavier pieces out of Ted's room. Moral of the story: always live near people with strong backs. (And if you have a strong back, don't have neighbors!)


Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started: 12, Completed 11.2.

Friday, Day 36

Well, the color in Ted's room was sort of ewwww-y, so it's back to the drawing board. We picked up a greenish color. Maybe ...


I forgot to post this photo of Tom loading the pickup truck on our way to the dump.

It was a nice sunny day then. But that was then, and today it rained like a son-of-a-gun.


The carpet guy came this morning. Yay! He put in the carpet. Double yay! We snuck a peek at the padding, and even that was vast improvement over the crappy floor.

It's so nice and clean in this picture, isn't it?


This is later, after we had started to move stuff back in ... and then some, because now it's time to do Ted's old room. Chaos rules.

Tomorrow we are going to try to move out all the furniture which we had cleaned out of the other two rooms and moved into Ted's old room. We must have a 1000 books!


Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-12, Completed-11(!).

Thursday, Day 35

Late last night we went to see the daughter of a friend sing in a club. We were -- by far -- the oldest people there. This is Autry:

People over 21 got in free. We were so far over 21 that I think they should have paid us.

We packed up more of Ted's room. It wasn't as tough as our bedroom, because it has gotten cleaned as Ted left, then left again, and yet again. But there were still things like lots of Nerf war weapons. OMG, what kind of parents were we that we let Andy and Ted have so many weapons of destruction? On the other hand, they are soft ...

It rained, it hailed, the sun shone, the wind blew big gusty sighs, then it rained some more. At work I heard drumming, and it took a while for me to realize it was big hailstones falling on our skylight.

Tomorrow we test the paint color I picked for Ted's room. It better not be ewwwww ...

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-11, Completed-9.726.

Tuesday, Day 33

There was a little more packing. Very. Little. I brought home more boxes from work. More boxes. More boxes! Ever more boxes! Nya, ha, ha!

Tom painted our bedroom door on the hallway side -- the first two coats, at least. (Tom had to put four coats on the doors in the bedroom.)


What else did Tom do? Mumble, mumble, ran, mumble, mumble, poker, mumble, mumble, breakfast smoothie. Rinse. Repeat. (He leaves for Cleveland on Memorial Day, so that should break the pattern.)

We left some things outside marked "free" and they were gone in no time. It's like the earth had a giant vacuum cleaner and it sucked everything up while our backs were turned. Yikes!

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Count: Started-11, Completed-9.724

Monday, Day 32

 Ow, ow, ow! We got rid of our two heavy televisions, gave them to Goodwill. They still work -- actually, they work pretty well -- but this is our last chance to get them down the stairs while Tom is still manly enough  ... ahem, I mean physically capable. I tried to help and just wound up slightly straining my back. Oh, Tom, I'm helpless. Would you peel me a grape?

We also picked up a pick-up truck, took the ratty carpet from our bedroom to the dump -- along with various broken things we'd accumulated over the years -- returned the truck, signed a carpet contract (carpet probably coming on Friday -- yay!), trips to two banks and then -- finally -- food. Thank you, Lunch Fairy!

See picture of the Lunch Fairy:

Who feels like working after lunch, but we forced ourselves. More junk -- I mean, vital and important stuff -- to the basement. And we sunned and watered the seedling tomato plants.

Then a signing for a blood spatter expert -- he testified at O.J.'s and Robert Blake's trials -- and the nice Chinese dinner that came with it. Fortunately, the presentation was after dinner.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-11, Completed-9.72

Sunday, Day 31

 There was no packing or shuffling today.

Tom played pool. I played mah jong and went to work.


A day of rest.

What are we doing this evening? Gave up on the season finale of "Survivor." It doesn't help that we hadn't seen any of the other episodes. Watching season finale of "The Pacific," the HBO series about WWII in the Pacific.  And staring off into space.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-10, Completed-Happily still at 8.7.

Saturday, Day 30

It's great to see one room painted. It's daunting to realize we still have two more rooms to go. Is Tom having fun yet on his sabbatical?


We packed up a lot of Ted's old room today. Do we have 500 books? Easily. Did I weed any out as we packed? Nope. Good thing we have a basement. Good thing, as of last year, the basement is dry. Or drier. Just in case, Tom put the boxes on planks. Old habits die hard.


I can't begin to tell you how many times we went up and down the stairs (from the second floor to the basement).


We took some time off to watch "Walk Hard," Ted's gift to Tom for his birthday, with Ted. I managed to stay awake this time. Yes, even I have seen this movie more than once now. It's hilarious.


The recent rain and sunshine the last couple of days means the grass has been growing like crazy. So, yes, Tom had to mow the lawn AGAIN. Oh, frabjous day! Callou, callay!


We were both pretty tired, so this evening we started to watch a movie, "Eagle Eye," a really, really bad movie. Tom was so bored he put a toy sheep on Hobbes while she was sleeping. Hobbes was so bored, she let him. We finally gave up watching the movie when we learned the enemy was a computer. Oh, yawn.

More packing and shuffling around tomorrow.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-10, Completed-8.7.

Friday, Day 29

One month and one day into the sabbatical.


And the bedroom is finally completely painted. No carpet so no moving back in, however.



Tom picked up and cleaned up the painting paraphernalia, and that took almost as long as the actual painting! I know I exaggerate, but we sure did accumulate a lot of brushes and tools and dropclothes and newspapers, etc. And when I say "we," I mean Tom.


We went to see our friend Jacqui's entries in an art show at the Rock Creek campus of PCC. Here's a picture of Tom by a drawing of Jacqui's papa:

After a yummy dinner of tamales, I was ready to sleep, but it was time to pack up more boxes instead. Although there is hardly any room to navigate in Ted's old room, we carried down box after box of books, trying to empty Ted's room to work on it next. We felt like poor Sisyphus who was doomed to roll the rock forever uphill. No matter how many boxes we carried downstairs, it looked like we still had the same number of books left.


Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: Started-9 (I forgot that last Saturday we helped with a neighborhood clean-up project), Completed-7.7.

Thursday, Day 28

We saw the Barber of Seville tonight. It was so good I only slept through part of it. Is he related to any of the Barbers of California? I maybe see a resemblance ...

Yet another layer of paint was slathered onto the doors. I guess we went too cheap with the paint and it just couldn't cover the old paint (of a color that has no name). The carpet man came today and the carpet is on its way ... or not.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Total: In stasis or a holding pattern over LAX.

Wednesday, Day 27

This is a picture of the Volga boatmen:

The reason I show this picture is that it represents our painting progress. Hi ya ya nyet nun. Hi ya ya nyet nun. Day after day creeps by in its petty pace, to misquote Shakespeare. We mostly finished the trim, splotching the blue walls with white paint. So we must touch up the blue paint which will, in its turn, probably screw up the white trim again. And on and on ... This is the "Twilight Zone" of painting.


Tom took a break from painting to be our manual laborer at the bookstore. We had a signing so Tom came by at about 8:00 to put chairs away, move bookcases, and other chores. Now that's what I call fun!


We went out for dinner afterwards. Tom had pasta carbonara which is currently making him feel pukey. (I personally think he's preparing the ground to get out of painting tomorrow.)


Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Count: Started-7, Completed-6.62.

Monday, Day 25

Here's a picture of our new bedroom:

Just joking! We're still pretty far away from being done. And just think, we've got only two more bedrooms and a hallway to go!


Yes, there is indeed another coat of paint, but no trim work. Yes, again, we do have carpet, but not quite yet. It probably won't be a couple of weeks before we get the carpet installed. That will give us enough time to box up Ted's and Andy's old stuff and lug it to the basement.

Sunday, Day 24

We got into the "fun" part today: applying the color to the walls. The blue looks really bright in this picture ... and IT IS. It will be like living in an aquarium! I'm thinking sand-colored carpeting ... Please pass the fruity drink with the umbrella, Tom!

It was a beautiful day outside, and we could leave the windows open. That was a good thing because the primer still smelled baaaaaaad.

We went out for a Mother's Day lunch at "The Old Lompoc," a local tavern, with Ted. The sun was hot, the beer was cold. Tom and I were ... shall I say ... "disinclined" ... to work further. But Tom rolled on (get it, "rolled") and I went to the bookstore. Unfortunately, there was still some left to do when I got home, so the handywork where the ceiling meets the wall is mine. Should you see me in the near future, don't ask me about this subject unless you want to hear a long monologue about it!

Tomorrow the second coat, the trim, and finding someplace to sell us some sand-colored carpet.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Tota: Started-7, Completed-6.6.

Saturday, Day 23

Paint, paint, paint, paint. How does paint get on an elbow? I don't know, but Tom had lots of paint on his elbow. And he was painting the ceiling. Maybe he leaned on the ceiling while he was thinking?


I'd take a picture of the ceiling, but it's your basic beige ceiling color, and photograph-wise it wouldn't look that much different. It's cobweb-free and clean and the cracks aren't so obvious. That's what you really need to know.


To break the monotony of painting, Tom decided to do a little R&R -- by mowing. A former neighbor and budding landscape designer (budding ... get it?), Jennifer, planted some great stuff in our front yard, so here's a picture of the new plants with our semi-new wall and the newly mown front lawn.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Count: Started-7, Completed-6.42.

Thursday, Day 21

Tom says it's as slow as painting the Sistine Chapel. And all he has to show for it right now is some trim and a door with primer on it. But I bet Michaelangelo didn't prime the ceiling before painted it, so relatively speaking, Tom has it all over Michaelangelo.


Here is the color we (that is, I) have chosen for the bedroom. It's a robin's egg blue. I'm hoping that it won't be too jarring when it's covering the walls. Since we're never painting the bedroom again, this is the color I will wake up to for the rest of my life. (Oh, man, I hope it's not a jarring color. And if it is a jarring color, I hope we will be moving soon ... maybe to Italy or Tallahassee or Micronesia.)

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Count: Started-6, Completed-5.4126.

Wednesday, Day 20

It has almost been three weeks since the sabbatical began. Where has it gone?


It's gone to bagging and boxing and disassembling and ripping and scraping and puttying and taping and swearing.


We picked a color for the bedroom, but we won't know until it's up and dried whether we like it or not. The thought of painting and then repainting the bedroom makes us think that we'd keep the first color ... no matter what.


After Tom ripped up the carpet and padding, he found a really ugly floor underneath. Really ugly. There had been an area rug at some point, and a prior occupant had painted around the rug. I guess that makes sense -- who's going to see under the rug, anyway?

We've learned about "liquid sandpaper" and that self-adhesive tape doesn't work anymore if it's been on a basement shelf for six years. We've learned how hard it is to find a brown penny on a brown floor. We've learned vacuum cleaners can overheat. We've learned that it takes a village to paint a room.


After a hard day of work:

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Count: Started-6, Completed-5.4.


Like sand in the hourglass, so are the days of our lives.

Monday, Day 18

Empty

Full

Empty

F

Full

Sunday, Day 17

On the road again ... da da de de da da de la da de dum.


Early this morning we left Andy looking for people with whom to run in the rain. Speaking of runners, we rode down on the elevator with two tall men dressed in running clothes and garbage bags. Oh, that crazy Canadian style!

There was an inexplicable backlog at the border, inexplicable until we later learned there had been an attempted bombing at Times Square yesterday.

One charity mah jong game and one author signing later, we're deflated. There's no more gas in this Buick. (Actually, we made it up and back down in our Prius on less than $40 worth of gas! And don't cry for Canada, we left lots of loonies and toonies up there!)

We enjoyed spending time with Andy (who is one of the two sweetest guys on the face of the earth, ever). Tom misses Andy and is sad now.

Anywho, back to the not-at-all-missed bedroom refurbishing...

Sabbatical Practical Projects Running Count: Suspension of belief.

Number of tired little monkeys: 2.

Saturday, Day 16

Andy was Vanna White/poster-boy and Tom was bag-boy today.

Andy got dressed up to attend a pediatric conference and describe his poster of research results. He was Vanna White, only with the mute button off.

Tom followed me on a four-hour trek around Vancouver to visit bookstores. At one point his hand was numb from the plastic handles of one heavy bag. (Oh, don't you feel sorry for him! It wasn't that bad; I did feed him.)

The first store was amazing. It was chock full o'books. Tom said one stack looked like a sculpture -- one that was defying gravity.

I was hunkered down looking at one shelf, stood up, and immediately toppled the pile behind me. After I put that one back together, I backed up (mistake), and toppled another pile. It made a loud sound but no one came running. It makes me think that that sort of thing happens all the time.

It was gray and spitting rain at first, but then the sun came out -- and then it really got cold. We had to come back to the hotel room for more layers and gloves and stuff.

This is Tom about a block before we hit the legalize marijuana protest in front of the Vancouver Art Gallery. Instead of the maple leaf on the Canadian flag, the protestors had a marijuana leaf. I would have taken a picture, but it was too cold to take my hands out of my pockets.

Sabbatical Useful Projects Running Count: Temporarily obscured by frost.

Bookstore Useful Projects Running Count: Started-1, Completed within 2 hours-0, Completed within 4 hours-1.