Man of action

After a suitably lethargic Saturday, I totally kicked things up a gear today.

First up, Sweatband and I had planned on doing a bike ride this morning, but because it's been raining pretty much all day she chickened out, so we decided to meet up for coffee instead. OK, I say she chickened out, but really she's actually got a bit of a lurgy-thing, and she did run the London Marathon a few weeks back, so me calling her chicken is, quite frankly, horrifically unacceptable. And deciding to meet for coffee gave me a cracking excuse to have a bit of a lie-in, which I'd like to say I haven't done in a while, but I totally have. Whatever. I yawned like a kitten, rolled over, and dozed for an extra hour.

Anyway, we met up for a coffee in Richmond at about 11:30. Well, I say 11:30, but there was rugby on at Twickenham, which resulted in stupid traffic that delayed me a bit. When I parked up I found that Sweatband had left a series of voicemails on my phone in which she became increasingly paranoid that she'd a) got the venue wrong, and b) got the time wrong (because I'm usually super-punctual, unless I'm being fashionably late). In hindsight, I really could've messed with her head big-stylee, but I really wasn't thinking about it so I just met up with her and apologised for being late. It was quite lovely catching up, because we haven't seen each other for a while and had plenty to talk about. Oh, and I introduced her to the delights of Starbucks' grande misto – I think she was sold on it.

After a couple of hours and too many mistos we went our separate ways. On the way back to the car I saw a little squirrel. It wasn't too bothered by me being close to it, so I decided to take a photo of it. The little bugger clearly thought I was going to offer it some food, though, and came close. And closer. And closer. No word of a lie, as I was taking the picture I really began to worry that the little tree-rat might lunge at me, and too be honest I can think of nothing else that would shatter my innate coolness by shrieking like Ned Flanders as a squirrel jumped on my face.

I took the pic and scurried off.

I mean, look: his tail was twitching! He was GONNA jump!

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On the way home, I did something that I've been vowing to do for well over a year now: I stopped in at Homebase and bought all the paint an' stuff I need to decorate my bathroom.

God, I can't believe it's taken me this long to sort it out. It was the only room I basically left untouched when I got Sparky Towers, because it only really needed a bit of paint slapped on the walls, and I figured I'd do it about a month after moving in. And then I was going to do it the Easter after I'd moved in. Then last summer. Then this Easter. I just. Kept. Making. Excuses. But no more! Well, actually, the thing that tipped me over the edge was that I noticed the doorframe around the front door had chipped a bit and needed tarting up, and I thought that I might as well get that sorted then just carry on with the bathroom. Understandable, huh?

So I dug out my old painter/decorator t-shirt and trackies. You can tell my painter/decorator tracky bottoms by the paint splashed on them.

And before anyone says anything untoward, that IS paint.

So I got to work, and by 'got to work' I mean that I started by daubing a small streak of paint on my face, because if there's one thing that Brush Strokes taught me, it's that painter/decorators always end up with a streak of paint on their face. Then I REALLY got to it. I sanded and washed down the porch doorframe, and gave it a first coat. Then I went up to the bathroom, and sanded all the skirting boards and the door, and anything else that needed sanding. And simply the *best* part of it all was that I finally got rid of the manky old bathroom cabinet that's been hanging on the wall since, like, forever. Seriously, it was so vile that I actually really wanted to smash it off the wall with a sledgehammer, but I figured I'd probably end up taking half the wall off with it, so I sensibly removed it like a real grown-up with a screwdriver. I also don't actually own a sledgehammer, so would've encountered problems in that respect.

I was going to post a picture of my bathroom, but it's quite small, and I really couldn't get a good angle other than one featuring the toilet and the shower curtain. I figured you already know what a toilet looks like, and don't necessarily need to see a picture of mine.

Anyway, more decorating fun shall ensue tomorrow!

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I was only disturbed once during my decorating fun, and that was when my doorbell rang. Having painty hands and a wet doorframe downstairs, I decided to answer the door by hanging out of my bedroom window.

"Hello?" I glanced down to see a middle-aged woman with a quasi-beehive hairdo and elaborate spectacles.

"Oh, hello," she said. "Is this your van?" She pointed to a white van. "It's just that it's blocking my car in."

Now, I was very close to responding by saying something along the lines of "Madame! Do I look like the sort of person who would drive a white van?" but then I realised that as I was wearing a paint-covered t-shirt and had a streak of paint daubed across my face, her answer would probably have been something along the lines of "yes," and quite frankly she would've been right. So, instead, I just said no, closed the window, and went back to my painting. Then I remembered to open the window again, because I didn't want to be overcome by paint fumes, however exciting and exotic they might smell.