Not Cut Out For Contracting...

During the summer preceding my senior year in high school, my grandmother got me a job with this guy installing refrigerated units in gas stations down in Charlotte. Besides actually working on the units, this guy also had me run errands for snacks/drinks, or to places like Lowe's for materials. He had an old truck, that should have gone into all five gears, but, being a young driver, I could only find 2 of them...so each excursion was painfully slow, as I could only drive that truck about 20 miles an hour.

Besides the heat and driving conditions, the physical labor I endured taught me very quickly that I'm better as a thinker, rather than a laborer. I thought of myself as more of a supervisor, but over the course of the time that I worked that summer, I downgraded myself to chief complainer. It dawned on me then that working this way was not for me.

Fast forward 15 years, and here I am again. I started hanging the super simple, easy-to-install, forever durable, ClosetMaid closet components yesterday, wondering out loud why I was participating in such physical torment. All of us are tired, aching, and fitfully exhausted, yet we keep getting up and going over to the new house, and opening up new cans of worms.

Today, just so you know, is finish the closet day, touch-up paint day, and hopefully by this evening: clean up the mess day. The carpet is finally coming tomorrow, and I just thank the heavens above that I'm not having to install it! There aren't enough complaints in my head to get that job done in a day, were I to be in charge of it.

People keep saying Rome wasn't built in a day. They say all good things take time. I suspect these people also appreciate posters of a kitten dangling from the end of rope with a tagline that says something like, "When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on." I'd like to take that rope, and, well you probably get the picture.

I'm ready to be done with all this house stuff, for two reasons: A) I'm tired and want to get our stuff moved in and be done with it, and B) we're almost out of Ben-Gay. This time next week, though, things should be relatively settled, and maybe the complaints will dwindle to just a slightly audible, only somewhat negative babble.