Home Improvement.

Not like the Tim Allen show. Like, literal home improvement at my house.

Ok, so recently I was chatting with an older lady at my office. [read: not an “older” lady, a woman is who is simply older than I am] How do you politely say that? Do you just say “lady” or “woman” and not “girl” – and there’s an inherent assumption about age? Ok, if there’s not rules yet, I’ll make them. “girl” means younger, “lady” means equivalent age, and “woman” means older than you. There, now you can non-offensively discuss the females you work with. No matter how young or old they are, I must warn it is never ok to call them “ol’ cooter tits”. I’m just saying.

Back on track Jay….sorry. So, I was actually chatting with her because she is about the most frugal person I know. And, as described in “I Know Poops”, I went over how I was frugal for a week of eating right when my wife was out of town, and shopped as such with a very detailed list at the grocery store. She’s like that all the time, almost too frugal and will drive to separate stores to fill her grocery needs for the week based on sales and such. I think it’s a total waste and she doesn’t end up saving because of gas money for her car, and then travel time wasted and my time is worth more than the $0.83 saved on a package of hot dog buns. Her intricate stories of successful frugal-ing have become common office conversation pieces.

Back on track Jay….sorry. Anyways, we were discussing my eating habits that week, and my part-time life in the ways of high frugalness. And the conversation changed to, essentially, “what are you doing for your wife with her out of town?”. Ummm, I’m eating right, I’m not being a total wannabe-college kid douchebag, I’m not going to strip clubs. What else is there? I’m supposed to DO something FOR her when she’s out of town? It eventually morphed into whether or not I was completing any non-maintenance activities at the house with the wife gone. [maintenance activities: yard work, dishes, laundry, vacuuming, etc. – normal stuff] Was I completing any home projects with her gone? I have since come to learn that what my co-worker meant was, “…since the wife and kid are out of town, are you taking advantage of the peace and quiet to be able to get something extra done…”, like that you normally might not be able to work on. What I heard was, “…since your wife is out of town, it’s your duty to surprise her with a home project while she’s gone…”, While-You-Were-Out-style.

Back on track Jay….sorry. The same way that her frugal-ing stories are common office conversation pieces, I guess my personal stories for the water-cooler would have to center around my hatred for my home projects’ status and completion percentage. I hate the status of many of my home improvement projects, many of them are like 90% finished. I get all spread out and distracted and start something new and never finish the last job. So I have like 10 things 90% complete, but nothing all the way done. Sooooooo, knowing this tendency on my part, what she meant in asking about my work on home improvement projects with the wife and boy out of town, was…..was I taking advantage of the empty house?

I got into the conversation with excuses why I hadn’t started anything yet, for example:
*Initiative* – Working all day, coming home, not in the mood to change clothes and get to work on a work night, let me see what Saturday brings.
*Supplies* – I didn’t have the necessary equipment (power washer I borrowed was back at the owner’s, I’m re-borrowing it soon).
*Expertise* – I don’t have the expertise to safely, in code, install the breaker in my attic for the second master bathroom fan, so I am at the mercy of my electrically oriented friend’s schedule. I’ll need his help to do the electricking to code, ya hear.
*Other Plans* – One work night was already lost to other plans. I drive a truck. I help friends move furniture. It’s a character flaw.
*Dragons* – Unfortunately, as you remember from my spacebarfail post, I only know about spacebarfail in computer form because of World of Warcrack. Look, there’s dragons to kill and gold to collect. (see inset picture of heroin addict)

Back on track Jay….sorry. So one final job that came up, that my coworker agreed would be a good one to complete with the wife out of town, was the kitchen remodeling. See, that one is like 99% complete. The wallpaper is down. The walls are painted. The countertops are redone. The trim is painted. The windows are done. The cabinet hardware is changed out. The only left to do, outside of tiling the floor, which financially is put off until a later date, is to finish caulking the trim, windows, and cabinetry. For this one, the excuse used was basically the *Initiative* excuse. I didn’t feel like working all day at work, getting home, changing clothes, and then working in the kitchen – taping up walls/trim and caulking for a night.

In hopes to up my initiative, and talk me into working on the kitchen, my coworker yelled from her office to mine, “well why don’t you just have some of your boys over, get some pizza and beers, and have a caulk party”.




Say it out loud to yourself.

Yeah. Why don’t I?