the fatal flaw of the forever optimist (isn't that a great title?)

at the end of august, i was bored. this can be a very dangerous thing, friends. i do things when i'm bored that i would never do in "real" life. for example, i started a blog. and then life gets busy again, and i cannot keep up with things.

so during this state of boredom, ie, i had no projects and nothing to do, i decided it was time to remodel the bathroom. bad idea.

"we can do it in one day," i told ken over the phone (as I was ripping down the bathroom tile). "i'll do all of the prep work, and you can just put it back together.

no problem? right?

wrong.

with the help of doug, our handy-dandy plumber brother-in-law (if you don't have one of these, order one soon, because they come in very useful), we took down the bathroom, and i learned that my optimism was in vain. you see, when remodeling a bathroom, there are, without fail, snags.

first snag...the tub didn't fit. i measured it, and it should have fit, but it stuck like this, hovering over the floor.


it took all morning to get that tub in place. thank goodness for strong, determined men.


i should mention another snag...the original tub was never connected to the drain, which means the water had just been draining under the tub for all these past 30 years. uck. we fully expected black mold, but to our surprise (and delight), there was nothing. there was, however, a big hole to the dirt that the water had been going to. so, with this snag, our handy-dandy brother-in-law plumber worked extra hard to redo the piping.


and then we needed to put up new drywall...which i might say i cut most of the drywall myself. i enjoy cutting things.

more snags that we had later on:

• the counter top didn't fit
• the toilet pipes rusted over

needless to say that a month later our bathroom is still not yet done.

at least i'm no longer bored, because i have a bathroom to keep me busy!