How about a house update.
The floors are mostly done. They’ve all been sanded, the upstairs floors have been polyurethaned though the downstairs floors still need finished. It’s time to move on to the next big thing. The stairs.
The current stairs are a little short and a little shallow. When they were carpeted they were treacherous. As I was taking measurements from the top to bottom landings I walked down the steps sideways and when I stopped my lower foot slipped a step. And then another and another. With each slip I was confident the next slip would be my last. After three or four slips I did a quick calculation and realized that even if I slipped all the way to the bottom landing I had the spread necessary to allow the upper foot to stay firmly planted without ripping the crotch out of my shorts.
Above you see Big D taking some measurements. The new steps will come down and out into the living room and dad is going to enlarge the door leading to the upstairs. I know what you ladies are thinking and I should probably warn you that my mom can probably kick your butt.
Big D marks a line for cutting.
My wall cutting typically consists of making small wall-plug sized holes that eventually contain Keystone jacks for network connections. This was my first experience with a reciprocating saw.
One of the reasons you never see any shots of This Old House’s Norm from the waist down is that he, like I, prefers to work in his socks. It isn’t a terribly good look on either one of us.
The interesting thing about this photo is that when it was taken I was alone in the room and the camera was set on auto. Imagine my surprise when I downloaded the photo and saw the orbs floating all around me and what appears to be an old man standing in the doorway.
Some of you might be thinking that the old guy looks like Big D. To that I say, well, don’t all old men sort of look alike? I happen to know that when this picture was taken, Big D was in a Starbucks across town ordering a Grande Latte Cappuccino with extra creme and three sugars. I am certain that this is the ghost of Buddy Ebsen. How cool to be haunted by Uncle Jed.
Some of you might be thinking that the orbs are nothing more than plaster dust kicked up by the reciprocating saw. Especially if you knew that the orbs didn’t appear until I started slicing through the plaster. But you don’t know that, do you?
Some of you might think Granny took the picture. And if she had, and if you knew that, years ago, she used to chop off heads when she took pictures (we have home movies of our first day of school one year in which you see no faces — just shirts, pants and shoes), you’d give her a big thumbs up.
Some of you might say, “Get on with it already.”
The plaster is cut away leaving the door frame. The orbs and Buddy Ebsen are taking a break.
The door frame is gone leaving only the nailers. The wider and taller doorway will allow for a kinder, gentler stairway. It will also allow for a king sized bed to be taken up the stairs.
ha ha!! i laughed out loud reading this…
“The orbs and Buddy Ebsen are taking a break…lol”
Nice post once again, Delmer.
We have some work needs doing around here if you get bored with that project … come on over!
Maybe you should let the orbs and ghost do all the work and join Big D at Starbucks. I like to do home improvement stuff in my socks too, although cotton doesn’t do much in preventing a nail from penetrating my foot.
Theresa: Buddy Ebsen is a hard worker and once in a while I give him time off. He deserves it.
Andrew: Once in a while we uncover a spider while working. Nice little ones that don’t put up too much of a struggle. Even the larger ones are sort of friendly. I’m not sure Buddy would be up to tackling the Aussie spiders.
Phoenix: The day this photo was taken I stepped on a nail. By that time I had put my shoes on. The nail was a shorty, so all it did was stick one of the lathe boards to my sneaker.