Pilgrim's Progress (which was surely slow since they didn't have cars back then)

I've spent the past couple of weeks using wood putty and sandpaper to nurse the existing trim boards around the doors and cupboards in the hallway back into some semblance of non-shittiness. There were four we just HAD to remove because the tiny bit of wall space around them would have just been too difficult to work on, but I didn't want to replace more trim than absolutely necessary. So I've ever-so-slowly been re-molding the moulding.

At one point, I encountered a nail that had worked its way out. I tenderly tapped it back in with a hammer and the trim board suddenly split from the floor to about 10 inches up. After evening rumination, I decided I could fix that too. Sorry I didn't take a before pic, but the after shows that

I can build an entire perfect house from wood putty! 

I'll post another after it's painted. Hopefully the repair will be invisible.

Having completed that, and all the sanding to follow, and all the wipe-down and vacuuming following that, I spent two days applying the primer. It had to be split into two days because of all the up-and-down on the ladder. My stupid broken body just couldn't complete the job in one day but eventually it got done. Then...

Thanks to the primer, I could then see every spot that was still sub-par. Try as I might to accept mediocrity, I just can't. As it turns out, Steve admitted he did THREE coats of mud in his "little room" whereas I only had TWO coats on the hall before priming. Yesterday I mixed up a new batch of mud and went after it again.


Fall is in the air and Satan is in my car

The weather has begun to turn. After "triple digit temps" last weekend, we've had rain, overcast and chill the past few days. Naturally this means I must make applesauce cake.

Applesauce Cake

Ingredients:
1/2 cup Crisco
2 eggs
15 oz. unsweetened applesauce
1-1/2 cup sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon ground cloves
2 tablespoons powdered baking chocolate
2 tablespoons cinnamon
a veritable butt-load of raisins

Directions:
Grease and flour sugar a square cake pan (or 2 loaf pans or muffin tins or whatever else floats your boat). Mix shortening, eggs, applesauce and sugar together until well blended but still lumpy. Sift on top the remaining ingredients except raisins. Fold until well blended. Stir in raisins. Bake at 350 F for 50 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Serve naked.

My car is surely possessed

It's doing that thing where it doesn't make that clunk when I take the mechanic for a little joy-ride, so he says it's no big deal. Meanwhile, I believe I received a sign.


Uber-Goober

In spite of that, to save the cost and hassle of a rental, I loaned Lainie my car while she was in CA for a week. She came down to accompany me, Steve and Margaret to Marshall and Judy's 50th Wedding Anniversary party. I was their flower girl when they married in 1968. Don't do the math.

This photo of my late father's wives is evidence that 
my propensity for befriending exes runs in the family.

From the party, Lainie accompanied Ma and Cory back to Modesto, and then I drove down to pick her up on Monday. We had a nice lunch (unfortunately Cory was working at the time) before schlepping back to Sac. It was at the cafe that Ma tried to get a nice posed shot of us together and we pissed her off with this:

She hates it when we ham for the camera

Not a lot of obvious progress, but fun instead

The mudding, sanding, lather-rinse-repeat continues in the hallway. This ball is in Steve's court and I am unable to help or proceed with paint or flooring until he completes the work to his perfectionist standards. (Thank goddess for his perfectionist standards.)

Even after his diligent curtaining-off of the hallway, plus vacuuming and flat-surface-wiping, there is a thin layer of dust all over EVERYthing in the house. EVERYthing, I tell you. I'm trying hard not to stress out about it but it makes my OCD itch.

Debbi came to Sac over the weekend. We originally scheduled her visit so she could help me play with glue goo and put down paper flooring, but since the hall isn't ready for that yet she and I were forced to shop, chitty-chat, eat, drink and lounge. Oh, woe.

Ain't we hot for a couple of old broads