The last post seems so long ago, you’d think that nothing has been done in the meantime, but it has.  Finger twiddling, head scratching, procrastination, and avoidance…  These are essential abilities in constant need of maintenance and development.  There was also a trip to Regina in there, which goes a long way in explaining the pause, a garden to put in, and a swarm of aphids to contend with.

From whence I left off… I was muddling about with what I was going to do in the kitchen area as I readied it for carpet.  Smooth edge (carpet tack strip) is both glued and nailed onto concrete, so the edge tiles had to go.  They came up so easily, I ended up getting rid of them all.  It’s always better to get rid of the old, and the smell that came up once they were removed was musty and old.  Good riddance.

I was caught between carpeting the whole thing again,  or small sections of tile.  Should I go just under the fridge and stove, or 5 feet out from the cabinets, or what?  In the end, the light went on, and I decided to tile the whole shebang, and add area rugs where I wanted them.  It might be cold under foot in the winter,  but this solved the majority of the problems.

With that decided, out came the counter and cabinets.  For the additional cost of tiling where it won’t be seen, I leave the option open for any and all future configurations in the area.  It’s an awkward space, frankly, so who knows what may become of it later in life.

Snapping out a grid on that color of backdrop is not as easy as it might seem.  The lines vanished easily, and we ended up using a yellow pencil crayon to mark out the corners.  Here is the tile edge and all the cuts laid out ready for tiling.

Yeah, that’s what got done on the first day.  This is the first time I’ve done a large area of tile, and it has very different methods.  Sure, the experienced tile setter will do much of their work by eye, but I’m not good enough to take that chance yet.  I started by spreading glue for four tiles at a time until I got the hang of it…

and by the end I was doing six.  More than that was too hard to reach for me. The little hole in the glue is where my corner marks were.  Should I get much better at this, I would not bother with that.  It slowed me down considerably, and this is back breaking work.  Hats off to you setters out there.  No wonder you limp around at age 30.

With the grouting in and tiles washed, it’s coming along…

Then the cabinets, counter, and sink.  I’ll tile the toe-kick later.  I sure didn’t feel like doing it when I took the picture.  I have cut-offs I can use, and they won’t go bad…

I’ll do the baseboards later, too, but awww, ain’t that homey?   That stove I bought years ago now looks like a dinosaur.  Yes, the new emphasizes the old.  Look away!!!

Along the other wall, I’ve replaced the weight set and chin-up bar, so once again the room is a bizarre combination of elements, and thus the title of this post.  From in the living room area, where the work is still unfinished, it looks like a TV set for some as yet unnamed show. Onto the short-list in the living area, this little headache took all day.  Covering the water meter, it is the original box, taken apart, built up from the bottom, cut down for depth from the wall, then rebuilt, and given a coat of Verathane.  It’s a busy little unit on the side — LAN line, cable, and phone — now inside the wall where they should be.

Yes, that’s drywall compound under it leveling out the floor because I ran out of the floor leveling compound, and for the love of God, can I just get this finished already?!?

Next is the baseboard, which is in a bulk pack out in the garage.  I want to mill one edge of it, so it is a day or two off yet, but there are still other little knick-knacks to deal with yet as well, like a new door to cover the electrical box.

Carpeting, by rights, really ought to be the very last thing to be done, and I should be doing the spare room first, as it’s farthest from the door, but there is such a pile of stuff in there at the moment…

That’s where I’m at, chippin’ away.