We had our garage floor re-cemented. It’s always been kind of a mess and we’ve had it repaired at least twice but it keeps cracking, filling with pot holes, etc. so we finally bit the bullet and just had a new floor poured. We had to keep the cars out of it for a week but its been pretty nice out so no problem. Next, we’re having the driveway itself recoated with asphalt. We did this two or three years after buying the house and it’s time to do it again.
Time flies when home repairs are expensive.
But it will be nice to drive on and add tremendously to the home’s curb appeal.
One of our favorite games is ‘what would we do to this place if money were no object?’, just like everyone else. Back during the housing boom, we were able to refinance every three years and pour money into the place. I’m happy to say that everything we’ve done has added to the value of the house and to the pleasure in living in it and that even after the bust, we were never underwater. We haven’t refinanced in six or seven (could it really be eight?) years so we haven’t done anything major in quite a while. I’d love a front porch, even a small one. We’d also love to remove the front fence and integrate the side yard with the front. More to mow but right now it’s just wasted space. For years we had raised vegetable beds back there but they’re gone. It’s just a big, square, mud box at the moment when it could be grass, gardens, etc. It should be something. Besides hard to access, I mean.
Inside the house, I’d love to replace the non-energy-efficient sliding door in the TV room as well as the hideously ugly brick wall with the fireplace. I love the stove and the hearth but the wall around it is uneven, white brick: a decorating statement that screams “I’m the late seventies and I have no taste!” We’d love to remove all the brick, put a handsome stacked stone above the hearth and floor to ceiling book shelves up both sides.
After doing all that, it would be nice to turn the little bedroom off the kitchen into more useful space. For years, it was our second guest room but we don’t need it anymore, so the bed’s gone. Now, it’s just extra storage for linens, out of season clothes and the grand kids toys. I keep the ironing board in there. I’d love to rip out the built in cupboards and replace them with a system that uses the space more efficiently. We could turn it into a butler’s pantry/ walk in closet pretty easily, I think.
We’d love to rip it and the main floor bathroom out and redo a bigger, better bathroom but that gets pricey. Still, it might be worth it.
On Monday, I picked up Josie from school. Can’t believe she’s done with her junior year! She’s still killing it, grades-wise. She hasn’t gotten the grades on her finals yet but I’m not worried. She said “I might have gotten As in everything…but I might have gotten Bs.”
That’s her worst case scenario: Bs.
She’s taking nearly all science courses.
That’s my smart, over achieving girl!
For only the second time in three years, I hit no traffic and no construction and actually made it to her apartment in under five hours. We cooked a pizza while loading up my car and ate before we hit the road.
We pulled away from her place and she immediately said “let’s listen to Hamilton!”
“Uh, I left it in the other car.” I said sheepishly. “I didn’t realize that until I was on the road. I have a lot of other good stuff.”
“All I want to listen to, ever is Hamilton!” she said, with that note of hysteria common to all who have heard the soundtrack to the greatest musical ever written.
“Would you like me to sing it to you?” I asked, half joking.
“YES.”
“How does a bastard, orphan, son of a whore and a scotsman, dropped in the middle of a forgotten spot in the Caribbean by providence, impoverished and squalor, grow up to be a hero and a scholar…” I began.
“…the ten dollar, founding father without a father got a lot farther…” She joined in and we sang the entire first song before we got to the gas station where we planned to fill up before hopping on the interstate.
“…and I’m the damned fool that shot him!!” we were basically shouting by the time we pulled up to the pump.
“That’s soo good!” I yelled as I stopped the car.
“I’ve got it on my phone.” She said. “I’ll hook it up to the blue tooth.”
So, the first three hours of the trip home were accounted for by listening and singing along and trying not to cry. It’s a tragedy.
Then we listened to Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first Broadway hit, In the Heights. It finished as we pulled up the driveway at home.
Perfect timing.
No sooner had Josie unpacked than Jay decided he and I needed to get away for a few days. He’s got a few weeks off between spring and summer semesters and most years we go to Florida. He considered that but a friend has a great little cabin on a lake in Wisconsin and driving is a lot easier and cheaper than flying and the weather is perfect and Jay loves to fish and I don’t care where we go as long as its far from my drawing board and the sun in WI doesn’t try to kill me like the sun in FL does so here we are, kickin’ it in the Big Woods.
I don’t know where Joni Mitchell wrote Big Yellow Taxi but it sure as shootin’ wasn’t Wisconsin.
I’m sitting on the back deck of a lovely log cabin. Its built on top of a hill that drops down to a very pretty little lake. Jay is out on the water, pulling in the biggest sunfish he’s ever caught. The cabin has a walkout basement and the deck upon which I’m sitting is literally in the tree tops of the trees down the hill. There’s actually a series of decks and stairs leading down to the water, at least one of which is big enough to put a table and chairs on so as to have numerous entertainment areas during the summer holidays. The trees are so thick that I can’t see most of the lake but I’m up so high that I have an unobstructed view of tree tops and sky as far as the eye can see. I love it!
It’s still too early in the season so the dock isn’t in the water. Jay’s been fishing out of a canoe he can launch from shore. There are some other people up here but they live on the far side of the lake. It’s so quiet that I can actually hear the flapping of wings as birds pass my tree top deck.
Right now, this is my favorite place on earth.
Last night for dinner, Jay grilled up two of the steaks we brought with us. We also had a bottle of wine, Harry Connick Jr. on the IPod and a sky full of stars. We danced on the deck beneath the stars after dinner. The moon rose not quite full but so bright it seemed like a spot light. It’ll be full before we leave the cabin.
It was sunny and hot during the day but cooled way down at night. When we got too cold to stay out on the deck, looking for satellites among the stars, we watched TV. I’d brought several shows on DVD that I thought Jay would enjoy. He picked The Shield. We watched three episodes and finally went to bed well after 1:00 a.m.
Vacation!
I didn’t get up until well after 9:00.
We’d packed bacon and eggs to cook for breakfast but the coffee we found in the place wasn’t to our taste so we decided to go out for breakfast and hit the grocery store on the way home.
An hour and fifty miles later we’d found no place that served breakfast (but four or five bars) and not so much a grocery store as a convenience store. We bought coffee, cookies and ice for $75.00.
Vacation!
I had planned on getting some ice cream but I couldn’t bring myself to fork over $7.99 for a half gallon of Kemps.
Aldi has really spoiled us.
We were starving by the time we got back to the cabin. Jay cooked up the bacon and eggs and we ate them for lunch. Delicious!
Tonight, we’ll either have the fish he caught or the other steak we cooked last night. Either way, we’ll be well fed.
Well, he caught a huge mess of fish and spent the early evening cleaning them. I put two thirds of them in freezer bags and Jay fried the rest up for dinner. They were fabulous. Fresh fish is one of our favorite meals.
Before dinner, however, we went down the road to the Crystal Lake Tavern for a drink. The place looks like an old fashioned out of the way inn. I don’t know if they rent rooms or just live above the bar. The building looks like it was put together one room at a time, just adding on or building up as the room was needed. There’s a deck overlooking the lake. We sat out there and watched the sunset before coming back home here. Jay cooked the fish while I built a campfire. We had s’mores for dessert. Then we cleaned everything up and watched a couple more episodes of the Shield before bed.
It’s wonderful how well you sleep when you spend the whole day outside.
Friday dawned as clear and warm as the day before. I finished one book and started another while Jay fished. We had a late breakfast, then went down the road past the Crystal Lake Tavern to the View Point Lodge, where we’d been told we could get the best burgers in the neighborhood. No kidding: it was one of the best California burgers I’ve had in forty years.
Then back to the cabin for more fishing and reading. Vacation!
We built a bonfire in the fire pit behind the cabin. I made s’mores and Jay smoked a cigar as the moon rose from behind the trees east of the house. The full moon didn’t get quite as high in the sky as the night before but was still as bright as a search light, obliterating most of the stars.
We slept really well again.