Day 34: Didn't I Tell You, Tina...?

I got into the knob-less closet.

I didn't get a chance to start doing anything around here today until before I knew it Johnny was calling to be picked up from work. The weather is too gross and sticky for staining or painting, too gross and sticky for any work harder than staining or painting, and Goody (who, by the way, is pissed at having been locked down celler for the weekend) wouldn't let me make my very first day back also be my very first self-declared day off.

So on the way to go get Johnny I decided if I could get into the closet, that would be enough. It might not be that hard -- it might take all of thirty seconds -- but if there's one thing I've come to know about this house it's that you never know.

Lesson: Magic flowery screwdriver does not open handle-less doors.

Well, I'm stumped.

Prudence...

Oh, fine.

Wait a minute, wait a minute, I know! All the doorknobs in this house are the same, and original -- they pulled the trim off the windows in the dining room and replaced it with horrid plywood crap, but somehow every single doorknob in the house made it through a hundred years unscathed. Well, almost every single...



The point is, I can take one off of somewhere else and poke it through the hole, then give it a twist and open the door just like -- well, like opening a door.

I know where I'll rob the knob from, too.


Not a door that's getting pulled shut accidentally. Poor old thing. Just the thought of reaching up there to take her down makes my back go into twelve different kinds of spasm -- lord knows if I'll ever be able to actually put her to use again. But in the meantime I give her a rub with Murphy's oil twice a year or so and let her know that she'd still loved.

One screw on the knob was stripped and one was wedged behind the hardware (if there's one thing that I've come to know about this house...), but still it only took a minute and a half to pull it off. Another thirty seconds to open the door and screw it into it's new home...

And oh, crap, here comes Goody.

The thing is, Johnny did mention on the way home that he was going to paint the bathroom finally (wahoo!) as soon as the humidity broke. Who knows when that might be, but it would be nice if this closet was ready to paint while he had the rollers out. If I get it clear today, I can wash it out and sand it down tomorrow...

So that's how the wire hangers got thrown out. Johnny wouldn't have let me do it if he'd known, because, I don't know, he'd want to make soup out of them or something. But they were mostly here when we bought the house. He actually made me save them when I pulled off all the moldy-oldy clothes when we moved in. And they've been rotting in this closet ever since. So this time I didn't even ask.

As a -- oh, let's call it a concession -- I did save all the plastic ones. Even though all the closets are full and there's nothing left to hang. I think that's mighty big of me. Who knows, maybe they'll come in handy when this closet's finished, for all the other moldy-oldy, making-soup clothes that Johnny's bound to be dragging in. And where'd I put them in the meantime?

Yoink:

Scary cubby under the stairs.

Hey, I never said I could keep the entire place in order all at the same time!

Oh, speaking of order. Today I also did this:

Oh no wait, I mean, hang on... Okay, I did this:

Watermelon on the freshly-tidied desk... Who would do that?

Not me, that's for sure.

Day 34 (I may be confused about that but I'm sticking with it): Accomplished

Time: ?? 40 minutes?? I forgot to count. I'm out of practice.

Cost: Nothing, if I can keep the watermelon off the keyboard. I mean -- what watermelon?

Being A Weather Whim Away From Getting Two Painting Tasks Accomplished: Priceless, provided nobody tells Himself about the wire hangers...