Random weekend mutterings

This weekend we were mostly renovating the house. I decided that two months down the line I really ought to finish off that skirting board that I’d been avoiding so much. Helen wants my tools out of the house as they’re cluttering up the area under the stairs. So I got up early Saturday morning, armed with two mitre saws (one electric – thanks Chris, one manual) and a pile of wood. I was impressed by the dry-wall screws I’d picked up since I could easily screw them directly into masonry without using rawl plugs. This saved a bit of time and certainly made for a better finish. Installation along the long, seven meter wall was only broken in flow by the fiddly bits around the hearth but still I’d gotten over half the room done by the end of Saturday and I really felt like I’d earnt my evening curry.

Sunday proved less fruitful as no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t do good work like I’d done the previous day. It was a nightmare – the drywall srews suddenly became rubbish so I opted for some hammer-ins which were also rubbish. My mitres wouldn’t match up no matter how carefully I cut them. I gave up, frustrated when my screwdriver snapped in half when I tried one last time to screw in a dry-wall screw. So I’ll be getting back to it later. We started this project in March! It’s now nearly September. Helen was a little more successful in her attempts to paint the kitchen. I’m not so sure on the colour ‘toffee apple’ yet. Whilst the juxtaposition with the white units is certainly nice to look at, I’ve found spending any considerable time in the kitchen to freak me out a little. It’s a little like being in an abattoir, I imagine. I’ll probably get used to it. The previous light blue was certainly a little more calming but I’ve always liked blue. Never been a particular fan of red. I have voiced my concerns to Helen. She loves it though. I’m not sure how prospective buyers would feel about it but we can always change it if the need arises. Despite my reservations about the colour I, there can be no denying that Helen did an amazing job on the painting – something I never have much patience with.

We capped the weekend by watching Jeepers Creepers on channel four. It started well but soon became a bit naff and certainly didn’t justify all the warnings that channel four promoted it as having. Of course it was the second event that had been way too hyped up on Sunday. The first being the women’s Olympic marathon which Paula Radcliff decided not to finish with a mere three miles to go. The BBC had taken it as a given that she’d win. So we had her pre-recorded talking head on/off during the race to get an insight into the great runner. No focus at all on the other three brits in the race because Paula would of course be getting the gold. But she didn’t and that’s that. Our male long jumper couldn’t even manage to do a legal jump but he did have a pretty cool red hair-do. Despite the fact that he couldn’t jump and I don’t like red, he was a cool guy who managed to talk the officials into giving him one more go. He failed that too. Ah well.

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