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Friday, April 20, 2012

Slapping On Paint



“The guestroom needs to be painted,” Mrs. C. said to me one day.

“Why?”

“We agreed to change the color when we bought this house.”

I shrugged. “That was a year ago and we haven’t had a single guest. So what’s the point?”

“We’ll do it together. It’ll be fun.”

That’s what she said about Lamaze classes thirty years ago and I still hadn’t gotten over them.
“Painting is harder than you think.”

She let out a tiny snort. “How hard can slapping around a little paint be?”

“Okay. If you’re willing to help, how can I say no?”

She told me what color she wanted and I drove to the paint store for supplies. I could tell when I opened the can that she wasn’t happy with the color. “It’ll change when it’s dry,” I promised.

“What’s all this stuff?” she asked, pointing to the supplies I’d lugged upstairs.

“This is the stuff we need to do a good job.”

She rolled her eyes while I unfolded drop cloths and covered the bed and hardwood floors.

“Hand me a brush,” she ordered.

“We aren’t ready for brushes.”

A little kid must have lived in this room because there were crayon marks everywhere. “Wax and acrylic paint don’t mix,” I explained. “The paint will peel off if we don’t remove the crayon marks. Then we need to pull out nails, spackle over the holes and sand them smooth. Then we need to tape off the moldings so we don’t get paint on them, along with the ceiling to keep a straight edge where the ceiling meets the walls.”

“How long will all of this take?”

“An hour. Maybe an hour and a half.”

There was that little snort again. “They make it look so quick and easy on the home improvement shows.”

An hour later I trudged downstairs and found her in the living room with her nose buried in her Oprah magazine. “I thought you were going to help me?”

“Are you ready to let me slap some paint around?”

“Almost. The prep work takes up the most time.”

“Call me when it’s time for some serious painting.”

I called for her a half hour later. She climbed the stairs, grabbed one of the brushes I’d laid out and began slapping paint on the wall facing the street. This wall had a large window and the least surface to cover. “You might start with applying paint to the corners where a roller can’t reach,” I said.

She slapped paint into the corners for a few minutes while I finished taping and sanding the dried spackle covering the nail holes. When I grabbed a roller and started applying paint she said, “That looks like more fun.”

“You said you wanted to slap on paint. You can’t slap it on with a roller.”

She was beginning to look like she wanted to slap something other than paint. I handed her the roller.

Her arm got tired before she’d gotten far. “I think you bought the wrong paint. I can see the old color through it. Did you buy single coat paint?”

“Like the chupacabra, single coat paint is a myth. You always need two coats, especially if you’re covering a dark color with a light, which is what we’re doing.”

Five minutes later she was back downstairs with her nose buried in her Oprah. Two hours later I finished the second coat and carried the ladder downstairs, along with the paint, brushes, rollers and drop clothes. When everything was put away, Mrs. Chatterbox looked up from her magazine and asked, “Are we all finished?”

“Yes, we’re all finished,” I said, my tone dripping with snarkiness.

That night, our guest room received its first guest—me. She never told me to spend the night there, but for some reason it seemed like a good idea.

35 comments:

  1. Have you had any other guests in that room yet? Of course it looks so easy on TV because they have editing and use those fast-forward montages. If only we could do that for real.

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  2. You, my friend, were snookered! Surely you know the old gimmick, usually attributed to husbands, who offer to do something, then do it so badly they're never asked to do it again? You had it done to YOU. Haha! :)

    S

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  3. Over the years we have developed a system that works exceedingly well: either HE does it or I do it -- and never the twain shall meet -- except, of course, when I need him for something!;-)

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  4. She's a smart one, she is! A friend of mine wanted to paint her front door while her husband was out of town. She is impulsive, and decided to do it alone, even though she's never painted before. Her husband was indeed surprised to find she'd not only painted over dirt on the door, but cobwebs and a small bee, as well.

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  5. Hehehe the fumes must have given you a headache

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  6. You have my utmost respect, Chatterbox. I am a real stickler for painting being done right. As a Realtor, I can't tell you how awful some of the paint jobs are. I love that you prepped the room and took the time to get it right. Yes, painting is hard work esp. the cut in part. Kudos to you.

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  7. I used to do a lot of painting and decorating. Now I avoid it by claiming that the fumes trigger my allergy. The tactic seems to work.

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  8. Lowandslow called this one right on the money.

    Cranky Old Man

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  9. Your Mrs. sounds like a woman after my own heart :oops:

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  10. Like the surprise ending! Sounds like a Tom Sawyer trick your wife pulled.

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  11. Mrs. Chatterbox, I salute thee.

    Love,
    Janie von Junebug

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  12. You sound just like my husband. Must you all be so meticulous? It takes too long and is SO boring. But the end result is always beautiful.

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  13. Usually she's got everything right and this time you had everything right. There's hope for you yet. Bwahahahahahahaha. Excellent post.

    Have a terrific day and weekend. :)

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  14. When you have a few minutess, I have some painting that could stand getting done!

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  15. My hubby taught me to paint the careful way, and we've managed to complete a lot of painting projects together in our married life. Wallpaper, however, almost killed us.

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  16. Great story, and in this house, it would be me up there on the ladder with the brush. Trust me, i didn't marry him for his handyman skills.

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  17. But it must be done correctly! Totally on your side! And it IS a lot of work. ;)

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  18. Hahaha! Mrs. Chatterbox is cool! Got all the work done from u... and i like the Oprah part the best! LOL!

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  19. I learned 2 things about painting from my husband. 1) you need to prep to make it look nice. 2) Painting the outside of a house that has T-111 siding with a brush, is a completely specialized ring of hell...

    Cat

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  20. The next time we need to paint, we will only pick up ONE thing: the yellow pages.

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  21. Is that really the color -- the paint in the photo? It's a wonder you got to sleep!

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  22. i love to paint a room, but it's true that the prep work takes longer than anything & one coat coverage is a myth. but such satisfaction when it's done right. and without the help of a complainer.

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  23. My husband owned a remodeling company for 30 years and he had the best and expensive painters. Most people are like your wife and just think they will have to pay for an hour or 2. But if they saw a 1 hour job they would be very disappointed.

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  24. Wait! Was there something wrong with that painting scenario? Because it seemed perfectly logical to me...

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  25. I haven't bit yet. I've been paintless for about fifteen years. Good article.

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  26. Haha... now I understand why my husband gives me the weird look when I ask him if we could do some improvement in the house. Those home improvement TV shows really got me fooled. I guess I'm just like Mrs C.

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  27. Well darn, I thought there would be some snuggling after you both finished getting the room painted, no matter who did most of the painting. At least did you get a good night's sleep?

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  28. lolzzz!!! Mrs. Chatterbox is clever ;)

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  29. Art is acceptable and it's sounds our eyes.Paint is one kind of art.

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  30. You are too funny, but I LOVE Mrs. C - my kind of woman!!! Laurel

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  31. oh the joys of household chores in a marriage!! the good part here is I have everyone trained to do the work and not expect any of it from me.

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  32. Okay, now I am going to look up "chupacabra"!

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  33. Snort... you might as well have painted the doghouse. ;)

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  34. I've tried painting in the past, I ended up getting more paint on myself and the floor then I did the wall.

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