Checker tiling.

Song of the day: “Mongo Bongo” by The Mescaleros, Joe Strummer. Weird song, really, but big brother and I got into it after the movie Mr. & Mrs Smith, and it’s been on our iTunes ever since.

It’s been a busy couple of days, mostly involving putting in tiles in grandpa’s kitchen. Not the actual cooking area, but the dining area. In checker pattern, no less.
When I suggested doing it on Wednesday a few days ago, he was adamant that it might rain and that he’d go bonkers from the barrier that we’d need to put up to protect the new tiles from the dogs. And then, suddenly, yesterday morning he threw it on me and said he’d changed his mind and wondered if I could put the tiles in after all.

Now I am very much about spur of the moment, but you gotta understand that grandpa is not at all good at it. When he suggests something spur of the moment you can bet that stuff goes wrong. And it did. Multiple things. So much in fact that there was a point in the middle of the afternoon (when the twentieth thing wrecked my concentration while I tried to figure out with which side, tile and whatnot to start) where I just had to laugh.

Things that went wrong:
1. A bucket broke. White stuff flew all through the carport and streamed down the incline. He was not amused…I was.
2. Wrong tile glue. Grandpa made the stuff that turned hard within an hour and a half, meaning we lost two buckets of the stuff (and the buckets) within the first two hours.
3. Lost a bunch of tiles. Walked back and forth about six times before I finally found them all.
4. Twisted my ankle. Nothing too serious, but the foot started whining because of it, so I wasn’t happy about that.
5. The dogs kept making a racket, until I locked mine up.
6. Grandpa had to head back down to the carport twice for every one time, because he kept forgetting stuff.
7. I forgot something four times, and had to head back from whichever location I came. Aaargh.
8. What could have been done in six hours, was done in nine instead…but who cares. It’s looking good. Hah.

Where was I? Ah, right. I was heading down to lock my dogs up in my cabin because Sitabah was constantly attacking the fence of grandpa’s little yard (she has a thing with his dogs) and it was driving him bonkers. Hah. But anyway, I’d been “preparing” to lay tiles for three hours already, and every time I tried to get seriously into it, something would happen. So I laughed, and then with cousin Ed helping I started laying the tiles.

In the mean time big brother was dividing his attention between spray painting the damaged part of the Opel, and small repairs in the carport.

Grandpa, of course, started getting concerned around that time, making multiple suggestions for me to only do half, rather than laying it in one day (because it was already late) because he can’t stand the thought of working past seven in the afternoon. Can’t blame him, but since I knew I would have another day of finishing the edges anyway, I rather finished the majority all at once. I confidently told him that now that we’d gotten started it would only take a couple, or three hours, and did it in five to six (I feared it would take seven so six was good for as far as I was concerned. Hah).

Big brother and grandpa finished up the day by putting a wooden barrier around that section of the room, and I headed for tenant’s to sit with her for a bit by the stove and hope that my feet would carry me down to my cabin. Hah. It is normal to have a sore lower back, aching thighs, calves, feet and shoulders after tiling, so I wasn’t at all surprised that my gait was a little unstable on my way down. I relaxed with a book for about half an hour, and then headed for the computer to start on the day’s editing session.

Cousin Ed thankfully offered to make dinner of leftovers, so there was no cooking involved either. Yay.

Editing…Oh. My. Gawd!!! We are having so many rows these days. I think that at the moment our problem is a difference in style really. Where big brother likes the straightforward and simple cause and effect, I like the drama and the flair. Guess we’ll have to settle on a middle ground somewhere. I did manage to hold onto my equilibrium, and though frustrated I didn’t fight the urge to conk him on the head. Hah.

Was late getting to bed because we decided to watch an episode of Dexter. Though I still like the concept a lot, I didn’t really enjoy the episode (had to do with me, rather than the show, I think) for some reason. In the end I wished I’d opted for bed instead, but there was no helping it, I guess.

As for this morning…I slept through the night without interruption, waking up toasty warm with four dogs tight around me. Jeez, I was wrecked. You cannot turn around properly with four bony bodies pressed against you. *sigh* But anyway, I was running behind but decided to have a workout anyway. I was sore as heck from the tiling, and some exercise could only improve my condition for as far as I was concerned. Went through the entire routine at top speed, then headed down to do a massive batch of laundry, and settled for a short time into devouring breakfast. Hah.

That done, we headed down into the yard to water stuff (the winds have been increasing again, meaning that the ground is drying pretty fast), check for bugs and harvest cauliflower and broccoli. The latter would serve as today’s supper.

That done we put the new berry bushes, raspberry vines, and three plants called Hardy Kiwis. Very strange little berries, supposedly tasting like kiwis, only sweeter. I wonder how they’ll flourish in this climate. We’re going to have to find a watery spot for sure. Be that as it may, we put them all in pots, and since they’re all weak little plants from the store, we’ve decided to try to nurse these in the greenhouse (and pots) for a year or so and give them time to develop a root system.

There were dog food stores to check. Expiration dates have a knack of sneaking up on us. Hah. Found a full batch that will need to be exchanged for a new batch within the next few months, so we did that while we were at it. Carla (red cocker spaniel) discovered the pile and spent the majority of the afternoon guarding the bags and snacking from the corner he’d chewed open. Hah.

As for my Jack Vance venture…I can’t admit to liking this one more than the ones I read already. (Lyonesse: Suldrun’s garden) In fact, compared to his other stories this one is a little grittier with a sometimes even unpleasant undertone. I get that the atmosphere of the “mid-evil” kind of era has something to with it (the others were leaning toward sci-fi after all) but still; there is a darkness to this story that unsettles me at times. Though I am enjoying the experience, in particular due to Vance’s colorful and elegant writing style, I do understand why I was unable to get into this particular writer when I was a young girl. His worlds, his vocabulary and his sense of adventure is splendid, but his sense of romance, character development and dialogue leaves me somewhat hanging, I fear.

Ah well, once outside work was done, and water for spagetti was on the fire, it was time to finish the tile floor of yesterday by putting in the final edges and cleaning out the grouts. Dani did the latter while I worked on the edges and grandpa supplied whatever it was we needed. I don’t know why, but I was in a strange mood today. Off humor, and giddy snorts and chuckles were the main theme by the time I started to get tired and it became clear that there would be no time to finish the actual grouting before the evening arrived. No matter, by that time I was so cold that I didn’t care one way or other (seriously the floor was freezing). Hah.

While grandpa and Dani finished up with the floor I started on supper. Broccoli, spaghetti and the satay sauce big brother made. I had planned to ad chickpea burgers (I made them during breakfast this morning) but since the broccoli was plenty, I decided against it. It was surprised how nice the broccoli went with peanut sauce. Hah.

So now I have to call this the blog, because I really, really want to go to bed in time tonight, and the edit is still waiting. Grrr.