grow old with someone who can make me smile and laugh

It is but a tiny step across a vast chasm to go from here to eternity…

In some ways we are still the same people, Harmonygirl and I. And yet, different.

When you make that leap from POSSLQ to spouse you go from a shared bond to a publicly and legally recognized shared bond.

And with that step you go from a shell to all the weight and authority of thousands of years of Tradition.

It makes a difference.

We talked about that over dinner last night.

I’m still the same man I was yesterday…

I’m not sure how to behave…

The same as you did the day before. Please be sure to call me out when I am being an idiot. If you don’t who will?

It is a hard thing to go from POSSLQ to Husband.

Like most promotions… you fulfill the role for a long time before the title becomes formalized.

I like having my name of the door.

I like being the Master of My House.

Because I have been honored by the Mistress of the House…

And like the land, we are a part of history and the warp and weft of life.

Smell the flowers I have planted and share them in our bower.

We are one with each other and the universe.

There has been some progress. Still waiting for the morter to set before grouting in the morning. But at least the tile work is done….

There was a question regarding whether the sink actually fits or not.

I can honestly say it does.

_{Even the cats agree}

For anyone who has been following, I can cheerfully report that the sink now fits as it was intended.

The new item is the trial arrangement of tiles on a kitchen counter.

Now the textbook answer is tiles should be evenly arranged with whole tiles and a minimum of cut tile.

One counter came out perfectly…

The other (the one with the sink to be); not so much.

The Classic Old Cabinets with the Classic Old Counter and the (now gone to the scrap yard) not so stainless, Stainless Steel Sink are not even.

That is to say, the existing sink is plumbed (WAS plumbed) to be in he center of the window. The issue is that the Classic Old Counter was made before niceties such as dishwashers and French Door Refrigerators. As in circa 1970, a home handyman CUT the cabinet up, removing one half of the drawers and a cabinet to make room for a dishwasher and a larger than 1950 standard Kelvinator.

This resulted in a sink centered on the window, with the left side 32 inches and change from the sink edge and the right side 28 inches and change to the now sheer drop off and the 1970 created dishwasher opening in lieu of cabinet and drawers upgrade.

It is impossible to evenly place tile under these circumstances. So I do what I must, fit the tile as best I can, knowing that the tile will not be perfectly even on either side. So…. fitted tile at the back and at the edges is a necessity.

Welcome to the world of the test fit.

I am attaching a picture of a test layout that DID come out evenly….

More to follow….

In this case it is the innocent task of “making our kitchen nicer.”

This involves three tasks…

We decided that it would be nice to have an upgrade to the old laminate counter kitchen with the heavily aged stainless steel sink. (they MAY be steel, but they certainly are NOT stainless!).

Then there is a window seat that has been teethed upon by a certain Border Collie…

So it begins…

So many, many decisions.

What kind of sink?

What kind of counter?

What to do with the chewed up window seat?

Granite?

A different kind of laminate?

Quartz?

Discovering that some of these options end up being in the same league as a medium sized battleship relative to the state treasury of HOME…

We look again.

Marble or Quartz tile?

Laminate… OUT!

Stone tile pretty.

Stone tile expensive but less so than solid surfaces….

Stone counter would be out of keeping with the rest of the local building standards (think crafts-many cottages).

Tile…

Ceramic or Porcelain?

Hummm…

Porcelain. Doable by me.

Ok.

Now a sink…

Colors and materials galore…

Something other than stainless which ain’t.

Cast iron?

Acrylic?

Granite?

Granite Composite?

Here we go again!

Cast iron is durable… but drop anything and it will go smash.

It will also chip.

And did I mention that it weighs like a battleship?

Acrylic?

Pretty colors.

Lightweight.

It cracks and scratches easily….

Uh…. NO!

Granite composite?

Weighs more than acrylic.

Solid through and through, if you chip, it is the same throughout.

costs less than many similar options.

Add one granite sink.

The window seat….

solid wood.

With teeth marks.

Resurface?

chomp. chomp.

Steel overlay? (Might crack dog teeth….).

Tile? TILE!

Oh boy.

There is a lot to prep.

Tear out the old surfaces…

Get supplies.

Get materials.

Did I mention I didn’t have a lot of tools for working with ceramic tile?

Eeeep!

Got the old surfaces stripped and prepped.

The sink didn’t arrive, so get a back-up sink and return the ordered sink when it gets here (originally supposed to be here last Thursday… now it will be a week from today LOL).

Get the old sink out.

It fights tooth and nail.

It wanted to stay.

I win.

The old sink is out.

Test fit the new sink to check opening is ok.

It doesn’t fit.

Not because of the opening…

But because it is an Old Cabinet and a classic (we like it.)

Just below the correctly sized opening the old cabinet displays that it has internal partitions that are eighteen inches across.

The new sink needs 22 inches.

Rebuild inside of cabinet.

Test fit again.

The sink doesn’t fit.

This time it is because the new sink has a 10 inch deep side sink and an 8 inch prep sink. The old plumbing used a six inch deep sink. And NOW I know why. There was literally two and a half feet of solid copper supply line feeding into the old cabinet.

The new sink needed two inches less pipe, or pipe that was 1/2 inch further toward the back.

Stop everything.

Become a plumber.

This involved removing two control valves, shortening the pipe, configuring a new supply line for the dishwasher while keeping the supply line for the ice maker.

Did I mention copper pipe.

Panic.

Research.

Thank G_d for compression valves and copper pipe cutters.

I have completed the plumbing.

Bought tile.

Bought backer board.

Bought tools.

Tomorrow…. I start to tile.

To be continued….

This is a goal that requires care and nurturing every single day…

Or you may wake up

and

find…

that what you held most dear

may be at risk…

you have no one to blame but yourself.

All you can do…

is keep being…

yourself.

And evolve into the person that you would want to be wanted…

And witness the trips and tribulations of life…

while sharing all you can

each and every day.

and extend your hand…

and try…

to share with your other…

the day G_d made.

It starts with knowing the same lyrics to tunes that haven’t played in years…

And memories of times spent in a movie house yelling Great Scott and throwing the toilet paper rolls….

It is the little things that are the glue that binds.

And I wouldn’t have it…

any other way.

But also like many things in this world, the devil is in the details...

In this case I am spending the morning cleaning and setting straight. The daily grind of feeding animals, straightening things out, putting up dishes, cleaning windows, dusting surfaces and generally setting what right I may…

all the way being quiet. This is to allow the relief of slumber to strike where it needs to.

Am I an altruest?

Hardly.

It all starts when you get to the conclusion that I am up and in this I am alone.

So you decide not to be a bother and to instead do something useful…

So thus I am engaged.

Being useful…

When deep down, I really would rather…

that I was…

not.

_{part of growing old with someone who can make you smile and laugh is to make as much lemonaid as possible from the lemons you find in your path. The another key part is to have faith that sometimes love manifests in a lack of dust bunnies… LOL}

I was grousing. No fine way to put a spin on that

I…

was…

grumpy!

It was one of those days where if you had anywhere else to go, you would just walk...

A pause…

I don’t know… it’s time for something different

A new job or something else to eat?

I laughed.

Something else to eat of course!

Part of growing old is having an accurate translation table…

Is an essential component in any attempts to grow old by yourself, let alone in the company of another.

It is important to establish boundaries…

Marquess of Queensberry Rules for domestic discussions requires that there are places you don’t go, or blows you choose to make (the verbal variety, never, a thousand timesnever the physical variety)...

Whatever you do…

Fight Fair!