Chips

About four or five weeks ago, as I was getting ready to go to bed, I heard a buzzing noise, not the sort of buzz which would indicate hunny, which in some worlds would be a Good Thing, though generally not inside a house, but the sort of buzzing noise that indicates an electrically-related malfunction somewhere, the sort of buzzing noise likely to prevent sleep.

Turned out it was the doorbell, the part that sits on the wall and notifies me of visitors, not the part that's outside waiting to be pressed.

Keen to get some sleep, my philips screwdriver and I set about making the buzzing stop. Together we undid three wires and two fasteners, and when I examined the doorbell I decided that it was broken, and needed to be replaced.

The wall in the hallway had three old wires poking out of a square of nasty pink floral wallpaper just smaller than the old doorbell. I had high hopes.

Then I went to bed, happy, with a plan.

The next day I went and bought a replacement doorbell and eagerly opened the instructions to find out how my three wires would be attached, only to find, to my horror, the following:

"When removing your old doorbell, carefully note which wire is which..."

Not helpful at all, after the fact.

Time passed.

I bought a brass knocker, and after a few false starts, had it securely mounted on my door. At least the blue sticky note on the front door could be removed, and no one need bruise their knuckles.

I bought stuff to fill holes made in doors.

I looked at the three wires and the nasty pink wallpaper and decided to paint the hall.

I looked at paint chips.

I bought paint and spent a weekend painting my dining room (it's really only two walls) and part of my living room. It was hard work, the taping, the painting, the standing on ridged rungs of the step-ladder. Sore feet, sore back, sore arms. Tiring work, but the wires and pink floral wallpaper still sneered at me and so, chastened, I painted the following weekend too.

The hallway looks lovely, though I haven't yet put away the three old wires. I may have some electrical work done one of these days.

This is why I have no beadwork to show, no knitting, and the only reason I had yarn pron the other day was that I had a spinning day, finishing off the last of the polypay and was thus able to ply.

This painting thing is much more time-consuming than I'd have imagined, but I rather like the results.

I may take a break from it for a while though.