Feels Like Fall

Summer must have its bags packed and sitting near the door, ready to make a quick exit at anytime. It’s downright chilly this morning (just under 50 degrees). Brr. We’ll see only 65 today. Nice, but definitely below average for this time of year.

It would appear that the driveway survived the rain from the start of the week, though I’m still going to wait until tomorrow (one more day of sunshine and air-drying) before I put the car back on it. Here’s hoping that it really is OK. It was waaaay too much work to have it all come sliding off on me!

It’s supposed to stay dry and get progressively warmer as the week wears on which is good news as I need to 1) cut the yard and 2) get going on Pimp My Shed. That will be this weekend’s big projects. They aren’t predicting rain again until late Monday night which I hope is correct. Son of Lawnmower Man is coming sometime Monday to dig out the remaining shrubs from hell and relocate them to their new homes. Yay! That means that once I add the finials to the new porch railing we will just have to put down more rock, set up the brick squares that the mother wants where each of the shrubs used to be, and put flower pots in place. Finally, the front of the house will be done!

Well, except for all that damn gingerbread I get to put up. But that should be easy compared to all the other jobs I’ve done so far.

I had hoped to get to clean the porch and walkway with muriatic acid and seal it. We’ll see if the weather holds out long enough for me to get to that. I do have to put those last few bricks in place on the side of the porch and I’ve got to add mortar to some of the joints or I don’t think they’ll survive the winter. I have to find time to get that done because it would really suck to have a number of bricks either cracked or popped out of place come spring.

So you'd think after a long, busy summer, followed by what will be a busy fall, that I'd get to hibernate for the winter. Think again. We'll just move the work indoors ...

And So It Begins

What a difference between yesterday and today. The chief difference being that today I made progress. Real progress.

It took a meltdown to get me there. Sometimes that's just the way it is. Genetic I guess. The mother is the same way. (She just gets obsessed by more things than I do.) When she can't figure out how to make it work, she can be a real pill. She is like the calm before the storm and then she flies through like a tornado until she gets whatever it is done. And I'll be damned if that wasn't what happened to me. I'm sure I was a whole lot of fun last night and early this morning.

Clearly, last night I was frustrated beyond imagination. My plan was not working yesterday, and I didn't know how to fix it. I'm still not entirely sure I know how, but at least today I ran at it from another angle and it seemed to work. (The bricks look a little weird in the photo because they're still wet. In the top photo, that's what the porch looked like on July 8. You'll see there's still sidewalk in front of it.)

Of course nine hours of sleep and some pain meds didn't hurt. Then I drove to get more supplies before I got under way today and it was like the iPod knew just what I needed giving me everything from The Ramones' "Sheena" to The Cure's "Hot, Hot, Hot!" to Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy" and K.T. Tunstall's "Black Horse and Cherry Tree.'

When I got home, a few things had happened. I was calmer and I had a plan. I also had the bullseye, which did in fact happen to be the perfect solution for the porch posts, and I decided some door plinths (Gene's gonna love this) would would work for the mother's plan for the old salvaged post (that's for a different blog item)and all felt right with the world.

I got my shovel and I took out most of the sand and put down more gravel and more gravel and more gravel and then sand and mortar. And from there, I got to here. There's a lot more to do, but I finally got it started.

I'm tired. I'm sore. I'm happy.

P-A-I-N-T

The mother is a painting fool! Since yesterday, she has painted:

• Four 4x4 posts
• Finials for each of the 4x4 posts
• Roughly 34 linear feet of handrailing
• 24 spindles

This was all virgin wood, so she’s done each piece twice. She even painted into the night after we carried all of this in to the family room. (Just in case it rained.) Now the family room, in addition to already looking like a warehouse, now smells like a paint factory. All this stuff needs to be ready to go for Saturday when Lawrence will come to assemble and install it.

This tally doesn’t include the old posts (that she made me salvage from the old rail) a bunch of decorative pieces , and a 24-inch round wood piece that sits atop the air conditioner each winter.

I’m afraid to stand still in front of her – she might slap a coat on me!

Luckily, Mother Nature held out for a fifth consecutive day – FIVE WHOLE DAYS – with no rain except for a spritz on Sunday. (It wasn’t even enough to consider it a shower.) They’re saying there’s only a slight chance for rain today which would make it SIX days.

Soon, the mother will be ready to start painting around the foundation of the house. That means I have bricks to move. UGH. I had planned to have them out of the way and actually in the walkway by now, but as you know, that just hasn't happened --yet.

I guess we’ll just have to see how far I get this weekend, when they are predicting rain again.

As If I Could

I get a daily horoscope via email just for fun. Today's edition made me laugh:
This would be a good day to stay home and spend much of the day in bed, NV! You have been working especially hard lately, juggling both home and work with your usual aplomb. But today you may be feeling a bit worn out and overwhelmed by all that remains to be done. Give yourself a day of rest. Spend the day with a good book or some romantic videos. You will find this solitary time refreshing.

Startlingly accurate, though completely impossible to heed even though technically this is a vacation day. I did get almost seven hours of sleep (about 30 percent more than normal) but Lawrence will be here soon. Today's plan: finish the fence and cut the boards for the porch rail. I'm hoping that we might also put the posts in for it today, but we'll see.

I've got my drill charged and plenty of water in the fridge, plus a few damp rags in the freezer. It's supposed to be a super nice day weatherwise. I'm thrilled. Besides, I think I'm owed a few of those. In fact, it's forecast currently to be nice ALL WEEKEND. This I gotta see to believe. But I can hope, right?

I'm going to try again to post yesterday's doomed "pretty picture." While only a few of them are still alive, my assistant surprised me with these last week as we didn't have an office birthday gathering 'til the other day.

So ... here I go. Off to feed pets and then grab breakfast to feed people. And to caffeinate. Must supercharge to get things done today! Wish me luck.

Take THAT, Mother Nature!

Mother Nature -- Look lady, you've really been pushin' my buttons this summer. But, you can slow me down, you can knock me down, you can even occasionally get me down. But you'll never keep me there ... for long.

But hey, in spite of your best shot, I still get to say four words I NEVER thought I'd be able to in the same sentence: THE PORCH IS DONE!

Mother Nature tried to drown out my joy over FINISHING THE PORCH by not letting me start my walkway this morning. I napped instead. I did a brief happy dance this morning before I covered it, after ensuring that the last bricks had set up.

I didn't wake up very invigorated from my nap, but returned to the mud pit and started digging. (Yesterday's heat took its toll, combined with having the thumbs and index fingers on both hands bloody and raw because at some point, I never put gloves back on. Have you ever tried to do anything with FOUR BAND-AIDS on? It doesn't work very well.)

I took out 60 gallons of dirt and debris before calling it a day. Unfortunately, it was a relatively small dent in what needs to come out. While I was working, Mean Old Man (he from my near throwdown episode) walked by. He stayed on the other side of the street though and didn't even look my way. Smart man.

When I came in a few hours ago, I called Lawrence. He's got a dicey week ahead, so we're tentatively on for Friday to finish the fence. Here's hoping!

A Brickyard Throwdown?

DIY isn’t for everybody. I’ll be the first person to admit that because sometimes, I don’t even think it’s for me.

Most people I know are complimentary of the work I do. They’re very supportive and encouraging. They decry their own abilities when it comes to doing similar things at their own homes. Truth is, I think most of them could do it if they really wanted or needed to. But, they neither need nor want to. It’s just not their thing. I respect that.

Some people, however, can be just plain rude. Last year, while painting the house, I came dangerously close to b*tch-slapping a former colleague whose contribution to a conversation I was having with another colleague about the project, was: “Can’t you just pay someone to do that?” And it was uttered in the snidest of tones.

I wanted to reply with an equally acidic response (pointing out the fact that not everyone makes what she does, and she has a second equally large source of income in her house, to boot) but bit my tongue. I instead calmly said that I don’t like to pay people to do things I can do myself. That leaves that much more in resources available to do other projects or to pay for having things done that are way out of my league. Because, that really is the truth.

Then, over the weekend, there were two more contrasting opinions. First, my neighbor’s girlfriend came over. “That’s looking great,” she said. “I know it’s a lot of work.” Later, as I was wrapping up, one of the “neighborhood walkers” as I call them offered me his two cents. “Kind of taking you a long time, isn’t it?”

The tone took me right back to last year’s slight. Yet, I remained polite. I agreed, acknowledging that masonry, after all, wasn’t my day job. (I mean except for putting up the fence, every minute of available time has gone into this project. Should I set up floodlights and work at night? Hmmmmm …. that’s an idea!)

“Then maybe you ought to let one do it.” His tone dripped with snideness and disdain.

Oh no he didn’t! Even if he thought I was doing the crappiest job he’d ever seen, he did not just say that to me. My dander was not only up, it was doing back-flips. This dude is spoilin' for a brickyard throwdown. (I’ve been wanting to use that word since Ann’s post last week!)

“Are you volunteering?” I asked. “Because if you are, I could use a mason’s help, though I’m sure my rates are a lot more reasonable. And if you aren’t volunteering, talk is cheap. Very cheap. Effort, now that costs a little more. So I’d put a little effort into continuing my walk.”

I don’t know where it came from. (I obviously stunned him. Hell, I stunned myself. ) The look on his face was priceless. He kind of harrumphed and resumed walking. I'd made my point with a limited amount of rudeness.

DIY isn’t pretty. It’s messy. It’s time-consuming. It’s costly. And it can be bad for your health if you put your two cents into the wrong project.

(Particularly if you deposit them in earshot of a feisty little woman who is burning up, exhausted and starving – and has an assortment of sharp handtools within easy reach. Not to mention hundreds of bricks.)

The "Evening" Post

The evening post got a little delayed due to last night's extended light show. So much for my bright, sunny day. The latter half of the evening became the classic novel line, “It was a dark and stormy night.” I was violently awakened at about 2 by thunder that rolled on and on for at least a minute, rattling things all over my room.

But hey, I got two consecutive dry days in, so ask me if I cared!

I did not finish the porch. Yeah, I know. This is becoming a running theme with me, isn’t it? But I worked on it a very long time today. Yesterday’s snags had really slowed me down. So this is as much as I was able to get done. I only pray that everything was sufficiently dry and that my plastic will be enough to protect it from the downpour. You can see my "mudpit" in the pictures. (And, if you look carefully, you’ll see Toby in one picture and Ozzie in the other. They were both in the door at one point, but Toby disappeared before I could snap the two of them.)

I can tell you this: Laying bricks upright takes infinitely longer and is unbelievably more complex than just laying them flat. It also requires a great deal of patience, so you can imagine how frazzled I am, me, the queen of Impatience. I am doing three rows on the face of the porch. The first row is structural. It will be masked by the layers of gravel and sand that will precede the actual bricks of the walkway. Not all of the bricks are the same distance from the base, thanks to the jagged foundation, but they’re all level. I have nearly finished the second row. It will intersect at some point with the walkway bricks. The third row will connect the face of the porch with its floor.

I decided to do a running bond pattern on the face. It will be stronger structurally and it will be a good transition to the walkway which will have the same pattern. The mother came out to inspect my progress as I was wrapping up. Except for me, she’s my harshest critic and she said it looks great, so I guess it does.

I’m just hoping that when I am able to go back to it again and I pull away the plastic I don’t find a heap of bricks that used to be the porch face!

The Sins of the Previous Owners

Jayne over at Dainty Digs was plotting some oh-so-deserved punishment for the "sucky previous owners" of her home today. And I have to say I know just how she feels.

I got nothing done today. (Except for mowing the front yard.) I had hoped to get all of the perimeter bricks in place and FINISH the porch. Yeah, that's what I'd hoped.

Instead, I spent no less than three hours in the burning hot sun fighting with the porch. Fighting with the porch because, while I had been busy demoing the sidewalk, I had failed to notice that the nice, solid slab under the porch flows out from under it. That's why there was that funky layer of caulkish like stuff connecting the porch and the sidewalk. They just poured the sidewalk in front of it and thought no more about the shoddy job they'd done with the porch slab.

In order to get the face bricks to line up square, I tried to smooth the jagged edges of the slab. Easier said than done. The RotoZip helped some. I used the masonry wheel to wear some of it down and then put a chisel into the saw lines. Then, in sheer and utter frustration, I started beating the hell out of it with a hammer. That actually worked to a point. Well enough anyway that I got the brickwork started.

I cut some other bricks for the side of the porch edge and started digging at the dirt along the edge of the walkway, trying to get that lined up. I'm glad I covered the pit with plastic. It was pretty damp even so, but once I uncovered it and the sun got on it for a while, it was fine. Without the plastic, I'd have been working in a mudpit. As it was, the second half is a mudpit. The plastic was covered by no less than 4 inches of water! So, I drained it, pulled it off, cleaned it off and then put it back. (They were predicting rain but now ... who knows? Hoping for NO rain!)

It's been a long, hot, frustrating day. I guess the only consolation I have is that I don't have to worry about exacting any vigilante-style justice (by making them even out the jagged edges WITH AN EMERY BOARD) on the idiots who poured this porch to prevent them from doing it to anyone else. They're probably already dead.

Now what?

That seems to be the question on everyone’s mind when it comes to the walkway. The quick and ultimate answer: bricks. But first, there are a whole lot of “now whats” to be done.

Right now, the entire walkway is covered in heavy gauge plastic. We may get rain tonight and maybe again tomorrow. After all those years of having the sidewalk to safeguard against water seeping beneath the house, I sure don’t want to leave it exposed for any longer than I have to.

First, I have to finish the perimeter of the porch. Once you can no longer see the gray facing of the plain concrete, the porch will be complete. Then, once those bricks are in place, I get to play with rocks and sand. LOTS of rocks and sand.

Before I do that though, I have to even out the dirt sides and put in some metal landscape forms. Technically, I don’t have to do that, but I’d rather do it than risk having no barrier between where all the landscape rocks and the yard meet the bricks. Then, I will put down a few inches of gravel and level the whole thing and tamp it down firmly. This is going to take a while. In the pictures, the walkway may not look very big, but it’s about 30 feet long total and more than 2 feet at its widest.

Then, I get to do the same thing again with a combination of mortar mix and sand. Fill it up, level it out. Tamp it down.

And finally, I will get to lay bricks in what’s known as a running bond pattern. (I chose this first, because I like it, and second, because I saw several references to this being the easiest pattern when doing a curved walkway.) I won’t have that several rows of straight lines in between. It’s just a continuous curve with the rows of bricks having a staggered start. I think it’s simple and classic and won’t clash with the pattern on the porch.

Then, I get to sweep in mortar and sand and mist 'er down. I'm sure I'll be doing it a little at a time. Look how long it took to do the porch without all this prep work! *Sigh*

It’s going to be a lot of work and I’m not sure how long it’s going to take. I'm hoping to have it done by the end of next weekend. A lot will depend on Mother Nature’s cooperation and she has been quite the beeotch this year, so I won’t hold my breath. We'll just have to see what happens.

I keep telling myself it's going to look great, it will all be worth it and I'll be sooo glad I did it.

Uh-huh. Keep on talkin.'

An Alternate Plan

I've decided that I'm going to entertain some bids for demoing the remainder of the sidewalk.

However, rockhead that I am (pun intended), I've convinced myself to develop yet another alternative. (Yeah, you knew I was too stubborn for it to be that easy to just walk away, right?) Since a) this was the first of the blocks and b) it was semi-anchored to the porch and c) I now know what thickness is involved and d) it was also the biggest of the slabs, I might be able to get the remaining slabs up whole.

At any rate, my plan is to try to this week. (NOT tonight. I'm doing good today to move around though I'm not in as bad of shape as I'd feared. The sunburn actually hurts worse than my muscles!)

If it works, or almost works, great. There's my next step. If not, hand it over to some burly dudes.

How Ambitious Am I?

During our second year at This D*mn House, the old widow lady on one side (we were bounded by them when we moved in) moved into a nursing home and a funny old couple moved in. Mr. M. would ALWAYS greet me whenever he saw me working outside with, "My, you're ambitious!" And I would laugh and sometimes tell him, "No. Just stupid with a touch of crazy."

Sadly, the Ms have both long since died, but I feel a little of that sentiment today. It is GLORIOUS outside. Sunny. 70s. Light breeze. I just unloaded my latest brick purchase and am going uptown to grab a few items before I delve into my day. My day, which includes the following list: Empty and scour catboxes and associated tread pads. Mow lawn. Cut out monster root Dago left during fence removal. Take all clippings, plus two bags from Carole's weed adventures, to dump. Break up first and largest concrete slab in walkway. And finally, last, but certainly not least: FINISH THE FRIGGIN'PORCH.

I'm hearing Mr. M. about now ... Wish me luck!

May I Please Present ...

My porch! I know I've been promising photos of the porch forever, but I'm proud to report that, as of earlier this evening, the porch is COVERED! I still have the perimeter bricks to complete, but all walking surfaces are covered!

I never could imagine actually having it all done.

We got a massive rainstorm earlier and I'm hoping that it had set enough to have not been washed out of place. I guess I'll find out in the morning.

I can't look at this without smiling ...

When Fantasy Becomes Reality

Get your mind outta the gutter. It's Sunday, and it's not an x-rated blog!

I was moving slow all day Saturday. It took a lot to get me going and a lot to keep me going. Somehow, I think today is going to be even tougher. I didn’t take my planned day off on Friday and I stayed up late to boot, so I didn’t get off to the greatest start.

It seems like half the neighborhood came over to look at the porch. That was very gratifying, interrupting, but gratifying. People I knew – and some I didn’t – were going by and pointing or waving. Now that they can see what I'm doing, maybe I don't seem as nuts anymore. My neighbor says his porch "is next."

One of my bus drivers was working and she drove by and gave me a thumb’s up.
I can say that the first part of the porch is officially done. I mortared in everything I had down and put in a final piece on the transition step that will hold the mortar in place underneath the front door. And that, was that.

I only got a few additional rows on the second part of the porch done, but since it’s so much smaller than the first, it actually looks like progress. All of those rows also got mortared into place. (Pictures tonight. It was too dark by the time I wrapped up and the porch light throws everything off.)

The timing of the shrub removal is perfect. That will make it SO much easier to put the next round of perimeter bricks in. And, since I next go to the sidewalk project, better to have a truck going through the yard now rather than after the walkway is in progress, or worse yet, done.

I’m still just about giddy thinking about the prospect of those evil shrubs being gone. They have been here for about 20 years and my dealings with them during all that time have been nothing but miserable. I seriously have fantasized about having them plucked out.

Seriously. And now, it’s about to enter the realm of reality.

Pinch me.

Now maybe I can work on that Powerball fantasy ...

The Porch: Part 1

Well, folks, don't try to adjust that screen -- the first part of the porch IS COVERED!!! It's not complete, but it IS completely covered. I even started on Part 2 late this afternoon. It was very exciting, after nearly three weeks of pretty consistent work.

I had planned to take the day off, but I'm glad I didn't. It was SO gorgeous out that I would only have been cursing myself for wasting such awesome weather. Mom even felt well enough to go outside and work. She had to pull weeds. (All this chaos here and the woman is obsessed with weeds. Lord, please let me never get to that point.)

It was less than 80, sunny, with an occasional breeze. An absolutely idyllic day for outside work. I am so grateful after all of the funky weather of late. (Including downpours which soaked me to the skin while trying to get home yesterday.I even had to wring out my unders!)

Tomorrow, I will get as far as I can on the second part of the porch (hopefully that is done) and then I will mortar it and the last part of Part One. Then it's onto the sidewalk ...

Welcome Back, Netvibes!

No idea what was up with Netvibes yesterday, but it's back this morning, thank God. I didn't realize how dependent I'd become upon it for my initial news, blog reading, and of course, Twitter.

I know I promised pictures and I would have delivered because I actually did make progress last night. Mother Nature, however, was a rude cow and literally rained on my parade as I was wrapping up. I managed to safely shuttle all of my working gear into the shed before anything could get too wet, but I forgot to put bucket o'dirt under the carport. (It's now bucket o'mud.)

I gave my neighbors the night off from the NEEEEENUHHH whine of the RotoZip, opting instead to do one of the parts of the job I've been dreading: digging out the front edge. (My knees and back are feelin' it today as a result. BIG TIME!) I've dreaded it because the front is bounded by Hell's Shrubbery. For some reason, Carole has a thing for vicious vegetation. The more brambles and barbs it has, the more determined she seems to be to plant it in our yard. Love it! (Read: sarcasm x10). One of my fantasies is having a truck come and yank those suckers right out of the ground. (Yes, I lead a very exciting life. My fantasies even involve house projects.)

I'm almost to the edge that meets up with the nearly complete side edge. Both bricks will have to be cut to fit and it shouldn't take long to get all that in place. Then, I can actually put down the half-bricks that will complete the LAST ROW of the first half of the porch. I guess I shouldn't get too excited at that prospect. There's still a whole lot left to do.

Porchified

New word, boys and girls. Porchification: The act of experiencing malaise brought on by the handling of hundreds of bricks and playing in mortar, occasionally in a crouched position.

I hustled home from work and got in nearly three hours of work last night. I feel like the bus I rode home on last night splattered me in the street, but I got down to just two rows, including the row of half-bricks! It will take a while to cut those babies, but that's a different day's efforts.

It was hot, but not miserable, and the porch was in the shade completely by the time I got out there. The wind picked up occasionally but was calm for the most part. I even managed to start misting while there was some light left. Makes it much easier when you can see what you’re doing. There wasn't much of a moon but there were tons of lightning bugs. I played with them for a bit. They're so cool.

It was strange to go out this morning and see the one portion almost completely covered. (I’ll try for pictures tomorrow. I’d like to get everything but the half-brick row down first. Otherwise, it might not look that different to you.)

The cutting will slow things, as will digging out the front edge. But with any luck, I can get that done by tomorrow night. That would get me ready to do the smaller part of the porch – and then onward to busting up the sidewalk and building a walkway.

It also means I have to figure out whether to cover the bases of the columns. I think it might look weird to have them exposed, but Carole doesn’t want them covered. (Reminding her that I am a writer, not an engineer, or even a union bricklayer. Those folks would know what to do.)

As Clint Eastwood’s “Dirty Harry” once said: “A man’s got to know his limitations.” Holds true for a woman, too. And this one knows hers. But I've got at least a day or two before I get there. So, while I'm quoting movie lines, I'll steal one from Scarlett O'Hara: "I'll think about that tomorrow."

Workin' on a Moonburn

My iPod is a better predictor of rain than any forecaster ever dare be. I should have known on Saturday when during my many errands, back to back, it played: BB King's "Stormy Monday," "Rain King" by Counting Crows, "Red Rain" by Peter Gabriel, the Doors' "Riders on the Storm"as interpreted by Creed, and "When I Look to the Sky," by Train of which the entire opening is about rain.

This is the second time in recent weeks that it has done that and it has rained like hell within the next 24 hours. (Deluge out of nowhere late Saturday night and on and off rain all day on Sunday.)

And, of course, since I have to work, it's going to be dry Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. And, since I get off early on Thursday and am off on Friday, it's supposed to pour. Also storm chances on Saturday and Sunday. Not sure what the first part of the week looks like but it will probably rain then, too, as I am taking vacation Monday and Tuesday.

So, it appears I'll be workin' on a moonburn through midweek, going straight from the job where I make the money to the other job where I spend it. It's particularly aggravating because, except for digging out the front section and putting in bricks, I'm very, very close to having the larger portion of the porch DONE. So close, but not done.

We'll see what the iPod says tonight …

Don't Look Now: Progress!

I've figured that I have six more rows to finish the larger portion of the porch. I worked last night until every vestige of light was gone. The lightning bugs were keeping me company, but so were the mosquitoes, or I'd have flipped the porch light on and kept going.

See how far I got. The first picture is from June 15 while the other was snapped just this morning.

There’s something satisfying about mixing up a small batch of mortar, slathering it all along the edges of some foundation bricks, and returning a short time later to find the whole thing setting up nicely. No wobbling. I’m always amazed when I come back to find that it didn’t fall over. Perhaps I did this in a previous life. (The life I wasn’t a pack mule in. See, I hate to make more than one trip to load or unload if I don’t have to, something I think is left over from my life as a pack mule. But that’s another post.)

As slow as the porch process is going for me, you’d think I was trying to replicate The Great Wall of China. It must be incredible to actually be skilled and be able to build things like houses. (Hard to believe that centuries ago people did just that with some mud and straw.)

Still, I have to admit that this has been more satisfying of a project than I anticipated. And two evenings of work have moved things along nicely. Of course, it doesn’t yet involve the destruction of the concrete walkway. I’m thinking that leveling the concrete will be a fantastic stress-reliever, although incredibly tiring. And what do I do with it, once I break it up? It’s questions like that that keep my mind racing at night.

What bizarre, house-related quandaries cost you sleep?

Brick by Brick by Brick

I didn't get a whole lot done over the weekend. In fairness, I still felt like crap on Saturday, but I got up and got moving anyway. I just didn't accomplish as much as I'd have liked.

I did get the front mowed. The back, however, retains it Vietnam qualities. I'll get to it. Where's it going to go?

I'm proud however of how the porch is beginning to look like a porch instead of just a collection of bricks. Several rows are now mortared down and I got the perimeter dug out to close off the borders. It's slooooow going, but I'm pretty pleased with the results so far. You can judge for yourself. It occurs to me that maybe it doesn't look that different from my previous photos, but believe me, it is.

I just need to be a little patient I guess. (Yeah, right. Like that will happen!) One thing I did get to: try out my RotoZip with the special cutting attachment for mortar and steel. But that's another post.

I intended to finishing mowing yesterday and make some more progress on the porch. Mother Nature, however, had other ideas. By 9 a.m. it was pouring down rain, and it did so off and on most of the day. At 5 p.m., the sun come it. (Some days, she's a real b*tch with a bad sense of humor.) But I took it in stride. I got some household things done, spent quality time with Oz, and felt completely decadent after crawling back in bed at NOON for a nap. I could get used to that. I swear I could.

Unfortunately, rain is on the menu as a possible choice for EVERY DAY this week, so who knows if or when I'll get anything else done. More of that patience stuff is required ...

Working on the Weekend

The weekend is here and except for today, the forecast is dry. Or so they say. I've learned not to trust the forecast. But, assuming there's no rain, where do I begin?

I'm thinking I start with the porch. There's one corner against the house where the concrete is collapsed. While caulk and paint were fine for the aesthetics, when it comes to laying brick over it, it needs to be level.

I think Lowe's has concrete on sale, too. If it's going to be dry, I can mix a small batch and get that corner filled and drying. I also need to buy four new posts for the front porch railing. I already have railing and spindles to replace what's out there now.

During our conversation last weekend, Lawrence and I talked about moving the railing off the porch and into the landscaping. (Currently, two posts are and two posts aren't on the porch. The move would put all four out there.)

Sadly, while we had made a decision on the fence, the sale was off by the time we'd discovered it. It was one of those holiday weekend deals instead of a sale from Saturday to Saturday. I know now that Lowe's puts their fliers online, so I'll never miss another one. (Eight panels at a $19 difference in price each comes to $152, or enough of a savings to make me wait it out.) There will always be another sale though. Summer hasn't even officially started yet, despite the soaring temperatures.

And there's always Bedroom 1 to get started on. I have the wallpaper, crown molding, bead board and chair rail just waiting downstairs. Of course, there's at least a day's worth of prep work to be done, too.

So rain or shine, it's going to be a busy weekend.