It's the Plumber. I've Come to Fix the Sink.

Inspirational song: Monkey Wash/Donkey Rinse (v. David Lindley)

I'm not that complicated of a woman. I live a relatively quiet life, and I have learned to find joy in very simple actions. As a middle aged woman, and yes, I admit that I am somewhere in the middle of my life, I have learned that there is one thing I cannot live without, and that is a toilet on the same storey of the house as my bedroom. I can live without most luxuries, but ask me to go more than a couple nights in a row of navigating stairs at 3 am or trying to ignore a full bladder at 6 am because I don't want to wake up the dogs by heading down the stairs (wasn't a problem before Murray), and you are asking too much of me. The first thing I did when I woke this morning was touch up the paint on the quarter round in the hall bath, so that we could finally install one of the two toilets that had been removed for tiling. By mid afternoon, the install was done, and the middle aged man and I celebrated. Apparently he is as easy to please as I am some days.

One of the items on my punch list was replacement of a couple of the faucets. The kitchen sink had a poorly designed faucet that made me a little annoyed every time I touched it. The downspout came out straight from the base, and combined with the tiny "produce rinsing" left sink basin, they made it impossible to rinse big pots that couldn't run through the dishwasher. In preparation for the move, I took off the water filter I had on the tap, and couldn't find the aerator anymore. It made the water shoot out in a high velocity jet with the slightest tap on the controls, and spray all over the paint that I just touched up around the window. The wedge that holds the sprayer in place broke a year ago, and to top it all off, it had a green tarnish stain on the foot plate that refused to clean up. This thing had to go. We picked out a new one, and as soon as I started opening up the box holding the brushed nickel faucet, I looked up and realized that every light fixture in the room was oiled bronze. So I turned around and went back to return it for essentially the same model, but ten dollars more expensive in the finish I needed.

I decided that it was imperative that I do the work on the installation. Not only would it make me feel accomplished to learn a new skill, but if we go forward on buying a fifty year old (give or take) house this summer, with the man spending weeks at a time up on his property to build there until the snows come, then I'm going to need to know how to do a whole lot more renovations and repairs by myself. I learned quickly how uncomfortable it is lying half inside a cabinet, working upside down over your head to fix a sink. Our cold water shut off valve is no good, and I ended up soaked before I finally called the man for assistance. Between us, we got the old faucet disconnected, and we had to trade off installing the new one as well. Mr S-P has many, many talents, but teaching his wife anything is not one of them. He uses terms that I don't know well and gets very upset when I repeat his words back at him because I didn't understand what he was telling me. I've told him often that we do not speak the same English, but he always takes offense when I insist that he is more precise in his word choices. Eventually we arrived at an accord, and thanks to our joint efforts the sink and soap dispenser are now in place. It's a huge improvement over what was there.

I intended to take a short break for a bowl of ice cream, and then go start the faucet in the hall bath before bedtime. Once I sat for a while, with a giant soft-pawed kitty boy in my lap, my enthusiasm for plumbing upgrades started to diminish. The same happened with the Mister. He opened a glass of wine and went out to sit by a fire while I stayed in to blog (and drink wine). Our time is running out quickly, but there is only so much energy to be had in a middle aged couple of DIYers. The next five days are going to be nuts. But man, is this place going to be spectacular when we are done.