Another day, another $4.62

It's cold and dark and one minute I'm roasting, the next I'm freezing. Father Time has caught up with Mother Nature. They're battling it out and I get to be the battlefield. Lovely.

It is nearly impossible to keep cool and comfortable with the windows closed and the windows need to be closed so I can almost hear the dictations through the scream of the saw tearing through wood out back. The landlady hired someone to rebuild (after he tore down) the stairs and deck to Nel's apartment and the porch out front. Luckily for me he isn't doing both at the same time. When the noise was impossibly loud and didn't sound likely to stop any time soon, I stopped working and decided to spend a few hours painting. My muscles are protesting since I painted so long I could barely raise my right arm or extend it when I did manage to raise it. At least the woodwork is looking much better and the first coat almost hid the baby crap milky brown-yellow-pink-tan that is all over the woodwork and doors right now. The second coat left a lovely faint green tint to the white woodwork and everything looks cleaner and lighter and much brighter now. I can hardly wait to start stenciling, although I am a bit nervous about spending hours on the ladder. I'll get over it, but contemplating it is almost worse than the shuddering protest my legs and body are making right now. There are worse things -- like living with this baby crap colored woodwork.

Don't get me wrong. I love my apartment, but I want things to reflect my taste and look cleaner and brighter and a little more colorful. This is the first time I've lived anywhere I could decide what colors everything should be and make it happen instead of living with whatever drunken, mentally defective, tower climbing, gun toting, color impaired and unimaginative decorating nightmare was presented. I won't even mention the bland and chalk whites that dominated the nightmares.

I don't paint or draw much any more -- don't have the time -- so this is my opportunity to be creative and daring and have some fun. And now that I have the printer synched and loaded onto the laptop I can print out a Wedgewood blue plate to take to the paint department to be matched so I can begin on the bedroom. Once the walls are done, I will be able to cover the horrid woodwork with a faintly blue tinted white that will reflect the light and the Colorado blue sky and move on to the bathroom. I'm actually thinking of doing a full stencil in there to mimic tile, and maybe even a Moroccan mosaic or possibly an ancient Greek Mediterranean theme, but I'm getting ahead of myself. For now, I'll finish what I've started and keep the music on while I stretch and work my muscles to the beat of being able to change my environs and look forward to finding just the right ceiling fan for the bedroom since the landlady said she was willing to pay for whatever I chose -- as long as it was nice. Casablanca fans, here I come.

I'll shut up now.