Today has been a flurry of activity. My frustration with the current state of affairs; namely waiting for other people to do things. Like, for example, waiting for my universities to send forms to the US. Waiting for the embassy to process our application. Things I have no control over and am entirely dependent on others…
…these things make me cranky.
Also, I’ve suddenly be struck by the realisation that if we’re to be moving in October / November, that’s *really f’kin close*. And the house is, you guessed it, not yet finished.
The List (which is now really ‘the house list’ as we have ‘The Great Escape (list)’ on our wall, thus meaning they should be distinguishable, I suppose) is actually looking a hell of a lot better. Although I keep finding small items to add to it just as I cross things off.
But, the additions to the list not withstanding, today has been a day of progress.
– The boxing I made for under the stairs has been filled. Most of that filler will end up coming back off when I sand it, but the hardboard needed a bit of fillerly-love because there were some ‘slightly iffy’ joints.
Irritatingly, I actually broke out the mitre saw and made some beautiful cuts which would have made really, really nice boxing. Had I then not just thrown it together with a few screws and no-more-nails.
But, hey, it looks okay and it is just a bit of boxing to sit over the fusebox. Feh.
…I have filled (and now painted) two more sections of the kitchen skirting (base)boards.
They need another two coats but it just leaves the two piddly bits next to the fireplace and the big long section with the sockets under the bench. That should be quite ‘entertaining’ because I also have my special bits of hardboard to go around those sockets to sand and attach too. It took me quite a while to come up with a good solution to the sockets because they weren’t quite sunk into the wall far enough. Hopefully my solution will look okay.
…I have removed the two rotting planters and made a new raised bed (with no soil in it, as yet)…
Pleasingly I managed to salvage quite a lot of wood from the grotty planter I threw together (last year?). Which means that the wood is not merely recycled, it’s re-recycled. Heh.
…I’ve planted a bunch of leeks that my mum gave us (and some swiss chard, too).
…I have cut and installed a blanking plate that allows all the cables that run to the TV / Hi-Fi / etc out of the wall. It was, until today, just the bare metal box sunk into the wall with the cables hanging out of it. It’s not something that people will probably even notice (thankfully, because I didn’t do that great a job of cutting the blanking plate and I wasn’t going to disconnect all the cables to try and feed them through a nicer outlet), but it’s better than it was and it now bothers me much less. It also doesn’t sort of scream at you from across the room, which it was doing (at least to me).
…I’ve also sanded and put two coats of paint on the old handrail that goes on the other side of the stairs. I probably should have removed it permanently, because it’s not that nicer rail. Something which has become more apparent to me now I’ve been cleaning it up (it’s got some massive knots missing).
But given the choice between, at this point, removing and filling the rawlplugs in the wall and then attempting to paint over it and putting the rail back up I’m going with the latter.
