All posts tagged: old houses

The interview ends with a worm.

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We’re here with Hamish the Corgi and Miss Tibbit-the-useless-little-black-dog. It’s painting season again here at the WideEyedDomicile. The Bosses are up on the scaffolding along the northwest side this season, scraping and painting yet another architectural complexity. We asked Miss Tibbit what she thinks of the house painting activity. “Well,” she looked either thoughtful or vacant, it isn’t easy to tell, “it is really pretty boring. We just sit around in the yard. There’s not much to do.” Hamish looked sideways at her. “That’s a negative attitude.” Tibbit snorted. “Look at them up there,” Hamish waved his nose upward, “they stay in one place for hours at a time and I can keep my eye on them.” “Whatever,” Miss Tibbit seemed doubtful. She sniffed the air and “Hey, there’s a worm over there!” She spun on her hind legs and took off. “What??” Hamish ran after her. Another day, more of the house painted. We’ll check back in with the WideEyedHousehold next week.

High places

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Miss Tibbit and I stood in the rain eating black raspberries off the canes in the backyard. I reached high, Miss Tibbit plucked the low ones with her front nibble teeth. Their pure, rain-washed fruitiness is soothing my stomach after a feast of lamb vindaloo and chicken xacuti, samosas and deep-fried paneer at the Taj Grill. I can hear the rain pinging on the steel frame of the scaffolding. We should be painting. Monsoon-like rains and passing lightening storms make it impossible. The scaffolding arrived a week ago on a big rig. It traveled across country for 22 days to get here. Twenty feet of bright yellow painted tubular steel and mini-girders. So cheery. So horrifyingly high. From July 2 to July 5 we spent the daylight hours perched on Level 1 (6 feet), Level 2 (12 feet), Level 3 (18 feet) scraping, washing, priming. The husband of each neighboring household came to see. From my aerie they all looked the same: wide legged stance, arms crossed over the chest, head tilted back, mouth a …

Old House | Freedom Thief

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We had freedom once. We hiked. We rode mountain bikes. We visited antique shops and flea markets, clutching take-out lattes. We read the whole Sunday paper to fill the time before brunch. But our lives seemed empty. So we bought a house and fixed up it. Then we moved. Bought another house and fixed it up. Then we moved, to the biggest, oldest house yet. It must be painted. I do understand that there are professionals who do these things for you. For buckets of ducats. But the WideEyedSpouse and I sort of want to see what is happening on the house. Get a sense of coming maintenance. And, we want to run the 35 foot boom lift and stare down at the neighborhood from our lofty position. Yesterday we started. We scraped. I washed with pre-painting detergent. No, I’m ok, it only burned a little when it dripped down my arms and off my elbows. We painted. Creamy white. Deepest blue. We painted until 12 minutes after sunset, knowing that rains were coming and hoping for the …

One year and three months in the bathroom.

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The WideEyedHousehold spent the last fifteen months without a bathroom door, shower, sink, or toilet more or less sequentially. This embarrassingly long duration of inconvenience was, of course, the fault of unadulterated laziness and winter ennui. In recent days we bootstrapped ourselves into finishing the job. More than one year ago, the WideEyedSpouse got to picking at the paint peeling off the 104 year subway tiles (see: 6 Days in the Bathroom). He peeled up the cheap sticky tiles and cleaned pink mold from the antique hexagon tiles on the floor. He stripped spray paint from the tiles around the radiator. I stripped nine to fifteen coats of paint from the woodwork, primed, and repainted. I scraped and sanded the ceilings and walls, primed and repainted. We replaced the tub faucet and shower surround. I bought a new beveled mirror for the old medicine cabinet. I broke it. I bought another one and some glass for the shelves inside because I thought that would look nice. It does. We found a 100 year old Empire …