Wednesday, March 08, 2017

Working Woman

People generally praise me for my work ethic, but I truly consider myself a bit lazy, especially when it comes to manual labor.
When I do complete tasks of manual labor, I always expect a pat on the back. I point it out to my husband or friends for their praise.
Yesterday, by the time my husband arrived home, around 7 p.m., I was dead on my feet. I truthfully hadn't sat down except when driving my car, about 10 minutes each way to and from work, and for about 20 minutes when I ate some lunch. I even stood as I had dinner.
I teach from 8-2 and I don't sit down Even if I'm not lecturing, it's easier to see the computer monitor, easier to notice if the students need help when they are working on their assignments, if I stand the entire time. So that's a normal teaching day for me.
When I arrived home, I sat at the table for about 20 minutes reading the newspaper as I ate a muffin. Then I was determined to paint the living room as part of our preparations to sell the house.
I had already filled some spots on the wall on Sunday, so I hoped to get straight to painting on Tuesday, but I forgot about all the prep work required.
First I rolled up the area rug and moved our two couches to the middle of the room so I could get to the walls. Moving couches means the floor underneath needed to be cleaned. I vacuumed then mopped and then put some "Rejuvenate" on the places where the wood had been scraped.
While I had the vacuum out, I vacuumed the walls of dust or spider webs. I sanded the spots I had filled on Sunday and then sucked up the dust with the vacuum. But, I still needed to wash the walls.
Once everything was clean, I meticulously put blue tape over all of the baseboards, outlets, ceiling trim, window and door frames.
It was just about that time I ordered pizza for dinner. I stood eating the mushroom and black olive pizza, knowing that if I sat down, I might not get up again.
During all the prep, I took numerous trips up and down the basement stairs to get supplies, so I threw in loads of laundry, too.
Finally, I was ready to spread out the voluminous plastic sheet that would protect the wood floors from the paint. I taped that in place, too, before I started painting.
I climbed the rickety ladder to paint along the ceiling before clambering down to move the ladder and paint the bottom of the wall, and so I continued all the way around the room.
The room before was a dark golden wheat color.

I've lived with it for nine years now and thought I like it, but as I painted over it with this pale blue gray, I grew to detest the golden wheat color. I couldn't wait to cover it. Unfortunately, that same color is now in the dining room and kitchen, waiting to be painted.
Still have this blue gray paint on my fingernails this morning.
I think it is turning out quite well.

The main color is the pale blue gray, and the wall that juts out over the fireplace is this darker blue gray.

I'll probably use that darker color on the far wall in the kitchen too since the entire house is open from the living room, dining room to kitchen -- open plan, as they call it on the real estate shows.
We haven't painted the trim yet and will probably do the trim for all of the rooms at the same time. I'm hoping to lure my children into painting parties so that I don't have to do it alone.
Exhausted, I went to bed around 10:30 and then couldn't fall asleep until after 1. Perhaps I was too physically tired.
Anyway, I'm rewarding myself this morning. I started reading The Enemies of Versailles last night when I couldn't sleep, and one of the characters was eating a luscious cream puff. It made me crave an eclair, so I ran (literally ran) to La Chatelaine, a French restaurant in Columbus, about three miles away, and bought an eclair. Once I got home, I made a latte and sat down with the book and my breakfast. 

Oh la la! What a reward.
Now back to real life, grading papers and figuring out how to move a piano in the dining room so I can paint behind it.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh, we must meet when you move here.
Isn't it too bad that we fix things up when we want to get rid of them, instead of doing it for ourselves? When we bought our vacation rental apartments and were starting the renovations, oh, the years of dirt we uncovered! And this was a very bourgeois lady who had somebody come to clean (but apparently not move the furniture). I thought--I do not want to be so ossified. I do not need so much stuff. I want to downsize already!
In a way, you are lucky to be on your feet all day. I have a FitBit and see that I did not even 3K steps today, like yesterday. I am at the computer all day, writing. Sometimes I wish I had gone for a different métier.
Your book looks interesting. I just finished "Last House" by M.F.K. Fisher (numerous ponderings about her time spent in France) and have moved on to "King Leopold's Ghost," which I bought the minute it came out, because I was living in Belgium then. And my French tutor was quite upset to see that I had it! Yet I never got around to reading it. Very interesting and relevant to today, when it seems we are still fighting the Civil War.

our life in france said...

Paulita, I am loving the new colour on the wall, it has really brightened it up, it isnt a colour I would have chocen but seeing yours I really like it, I think you have deserved the eclair as you worked non stop and then ran to the cake shop, I would have had two, here in our part of France we can get eclairs but they are filled with either chocolate or coffee flavoured synthetic cream which is a bit overpowering, I like the ones like we could get in UK which had lovely fresh whipped cream...x

Paulita said...

Francetaste, Yes. We definitely have an affinity for each other. I've had MFK Fisher books in hand before, but don't think I've read them before. I'll have to give them a go.
Roz, Say it isn't so. Why are you getting synthetic cream in France? Aren't there French rules about the kind of cream that can go in French eclairs?

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