10th May 2019
House renovation day 12
I started fitting the skirting boards in the living space, I used adhesive to stick them in place.
I finished the closet floor in the second bedroom and moved on to the last room in the house, the bathroom, however, first Kelli had to paint the room.
She is amazing, she will be doing one thing and thinking about ten others at the same time. In between that she was making a list of things we needed for the next phase.
When buying the flooring we over estimated the quantity, and either by cunning utilisation or good fortune I had eight boxes left over, so by returning them we could get $500 to spend on something else. So that is where Kelli’s list came in. It was written on a piece of cardboard, resembling the Dead Sea scrolls.
We arrived at Menards ready for a frantic shopping spree. First on the list was switch and outlet covers, a bloody lot of them, then on to the carpet section.
We decided that the sun lounge should have a hard wearing covering, so we chose one, and the lad prepared it for us whilst we went on to get the quarry tiles. We needed a hundred and seventy two, and the boxes came in packs of twenty eight. I asked Kelli how many boxes I would need, so she tapped the numbers into her phone “Six point one four boxes she replied.
I stifled my laugh, “ Okay I will handle the six boxes, you get the point one four pack”
By the time we worked out we needed four loose tiles, the carpet was ready for us to collect. Thoughtfully the lad had placed the carpet on a special carpet trolley, or as the Americans would say it, a “flooring transportation vehicle”.
We both set off for the checkout, me with the fully laden shopping cart and Kelli with the cruise missile. She immediately caused chaos by trying to turn into an isle blocking it, and dislodging a display of neck cushions. Eventually we managed to navigate through the network of narrow isles and reached the checkout.
On the way out and into the car park, the camber made the cart I was pushing a little difficult to handle, also I was over-egging the effect the camber was having. As I was trying to swing the front of the cart round, the front wheels hit a rut and the whole cart toppled over sending me crashing to the ground. Of course there were many people in the area, and not the occasion for me to declare “It’s okay I meant to do that”.
It served me right for messing around, but a big guy helped me to right the cart and reload the spilt boxes. When Kelli stopped laughing, she explained to the guy that I was English and couldn’t drive American shopping carts, he laughed, it should give the people checking the CCTV footage a good laugh as well.
Another Lifetime to go 