I live with my Grandmother in the house I grew up in (fourteen rooms). My younger sister is here with us as well, sort of, she sleeps here, runs up the electric bill, the phone bill, etc.
My grandmother wanted the sills around the windows and doors outside on the first floor porch to be painted. The porches doesn't go all the way around the house so the windows in back never get painted any more (everyone is afraid of heights so even if we had a ladder long enough, unless the house is on fire and we're escaping down it, no one would get on the ladder).
Now paint gives me a massive headache (I am prone to migraines) but I figured it's outside and only the sills. I grabbed the brushes and paint and went to work this morning at about 9 am so as to beat the heat (it was already 80).
The paint looked like vanilla pudding. My granfather Cappy must have bought that stuff a decade before he died seven years ago (he's the only one who would paint around the windows that need a ladder). I'm kind of amazed it didn't have a set of pre-eyes floating in it, or maybe the early stages of the spaghetti god thing.
I was able to get most of the work done without any damage, except for the cellar door. Left a streak of white on the rust door.
Oops.
How is this about Gram?
Gram is a stickler. When she wants something done, she just doesn't want it done, she wants it done her way.
"This is the way you hold the brush. This is how the paint can should be set up near the sil. No, don't pull the brush up and down, go left to right. No, don't do the left side of the window first, it will dry faster if you do the right because it's facing up the driveway."
So on and so forth until I say:
"Isn't it time for your arsenic and old lady tea, Gram?"
Today, not once did she come out side to "inspect" the work. Not a word. She didn't come out until I had only her door sill left and then it was only to ask if I wanted to go out to eat before I took her to her shopping. Then she went back inside (80 degrees is a lot for someone with a bad heart and dizzy spells, she's 88 years of dust in clothing old). She didn't even care about the white on the cellar door, just said she'd check to see if there was any of the rust paint left and if not she'd pick up something close.
Early tomorrow morning I will get the sills on the second front porch windows.
Okay, I did get a spot of paint on my jeans but Gram thinks she can get it out.
August 25, 2007
August 25, 2007
