13 trips with a busted bottom wheelbarrow back and forth to my two least favorite tools: rake and shovel.

LUNE –

Hanger hammering, glue gun destroying, wall destroying, minor stucco fragging.

First acorns this season dropped by the oak across the street dot the pavement, new green against hard gray.

Luis, the new carpenter (new, meaning this is his second week on this job, but hardly new to the tasks) and Marco’s neighbor is fiercely competent and quiet, except at the lunch break when he and Super Hombre discourse at length.  In Spanish and so I feel excluded.  But not really.  The onus is upon me to learn their language.

Luis, whenever I ask him a question, such as “why did you double frame that, or what is that and how does this footer brace work” is forthcoming and generous with his explanation.

He looks upon me as an idiot Anglo, but maybe one who can be helped.

I hope so.

MARDI –

Shank of the day dancing with my two most hated tools: rake and shovel removing the rubble pile adjacent to the new foundation for the house extension.  Good upper body workout, though.

MEIRCOLES –

Trim removal, the rest of the day removing wall paper.

The roller with spikes in front of the steamer has an utterly unknown purpose.

Thanks to Hodge’s Rental, the workman has at his command a steamer.  This apparatus by which one removes wallpaper is essentially a coffee maker without the bean pan.  In place of dripping the condensate onto beans, the steam is directed through a hose (not well insulated) to a sort of upside down griddle pierced with holes out which the vapor emanates.  Applied to the wallpaper, this ‘griddle’ is intended to saturate the wallpaper with moisture thereby releasing the eternal grip betwixt glue and wallboard substrate.

This, depending upon the duration of steam application, does occur; although the process is akin to ironing shirts, but without the necessity of creasing the sleeves.

And just as boring.  With the development of the appropriate je ne sais qoui, the workman can peal off notebook sized hunks; when this acumen is lost, it’s postage stamp size by postage stamp.

It’s the reason why people paper over paper.

DAY 24 –

Of the morning onset, I ask Marcos how is his back.  He ascends up out of his pain to lie about how good is feels.  Unfortunately, he’s under the spell of a chiropractor; I ask him what the X-ray shows and he knows its scoliosis, but without the picture, I can’t tell if there’s any cartilage degradation (as if).

Jerry, our new ramrod chimes in that he’s got HIS X-ray’s in the truck.  He’s had both hips replaced.  The scan through of his pelvis reveals two unequal sized appliances.  It is beautiful.

Most of the day with the steamer.  Tedium.  But right up OCD Street.

DAY 25 –

On this, the end of the fifth week at 3605 Eastfield, longer than Shop Rat has been employed in the Hometek shop, I think of what the actress Jean Simmons said about the filming of the 1960 epic, Spartacus, “Who do I have to screw to get off this film?”

Super Hombre chipping off even more stucco atop an unsafe perch.

More wall board removal, this time in the former laundry room, then demo (vamanos) the utility closet door and jam.

While Super Hombre chips out a double door sized hunk of stucco, Chihuahua Man is busy doing something low impact: policing the area, in general.

Tom and the client in most of the mid-day.  Later morning flooring is delivered.

After lunche, we take out the beam that once supported the northwest corner of the house.

Clean up the trimmed foliage, and stand around and try to be helpful when the new kitchen floor goes in.

Team Super Hombre and Luis the Magnificent

Watching (and occasionally handing in a tool or hoisting a beam) Super Hombre and Luis is like admiring a well-practiced Mexican carpenter opera.  Since it’s in Spanish and the music is written  mostly for guitar, accordion, and tuba, I don’t get much of the plot except for a length of a board or two; both have obviously framed and floored dozens of times, feeding each other dimensions and call-outs.  And while not racing, clearly expediency is secondary only to tight tolerances.  I also admire their instantaneous ability to switch from Spanish to English when there’s something I can help with…. or to tell me to get the hell out of the way.

Ruined my right knee tumbling off Jerry’s truck bumper unloading ply.

Set a bad tone for the weekend.

SABADO –

Notable only for a dream within a dream.  During a well-deserved mid-afternoon snooze, dreamt I took a nap in the gutted Singing Hills house.  Now barn-sized, deck removed, footer for a north wing and the only installation upstairs is a glass framed hallway running athwart the skeleton that will separate the living from the sleeping quarters.  And joining me in my slumber nest is the amalgam of several dear, departed doggies.

DOMINGO –

Started on yet Another Display Table.  This one intended to be something of a medium size and akin to that which you might browse in the dry goods store during the Cleveland Administration.

It is also intended to be formed entirely of salvage from the Eastfield renovation: an oak mantle and glass from the kitchen.

Job One was to coax the glass out of the four cabinet doors from the former kitchen.  The glass isn’t but glued into the open-back cabinet doors with silicone, but broke two of the four.  Still the extant two will form the top and front of the display case, the remnants of the other two the two sides.  The back will be some sliding opaque something.

In laying out the cut plan, it became clear that the mantle wouldn’t provide enough wood, so fell back on oak on hand, which I resawed, then cut to the four rough shapes for the front and back, up and down case sides.

Meanwhile, across the philosophical divide known at 9^th Street, the Papist’s are parading about worshiping an idol.

Clearly they are held to old traditions and refuse to bow down to America’s One True God: Mammon.