So handy

Remember in Brokeback Mountain, when Jack Twist said, "This is a g-damn b*%$h of an unsatisfactory situation"? (I forgot there was so much cursing in that line). I've been feeling that off and on lately. Sunday morning, I woke up to this view out my window:


Some riders decided to go on the ride anyway. I did not. I have boundaries over which I durst not cross.

I decided to use the rainy time to fix a few things around the house. Actually fixing/attempting to fix is quite different from deciding that I will fix them. Deciding that I will fix them is equivalent to either putting them on a list or thinking that I should put them on a list. But Sunday I tackled the cat tree project. Items needed: sisal rope (did you know that there are different kinds of rope? Also, sisal will not hold body weight, so sayeth the packaging, so no trying to hang your neighbor with it), staple gun (which I have!), replacement staples (also have). Seems easy right?
So I went about taking all the old rope off that the cats had torn to shreds, and getting ready to wind the new rope on, fastening it with the staples. Pow pow pow! First, I recommend wearing gloves when dealing with scratchy thorny rope and a gun with kick back. Second, why does all the rope in the spool fall apart so easily? Winding 30 feet of rope around a 2x4 (or what I assume is a 2x4 -- isn't that just what they call wood?) when the rest of the rope just wants to lay there and get twisted up is not fun.Then the staple gun ran out of staples. Not to worry! I have replacements. Push this here, pull that there, open this, and put in the staples. Voila! I'm so handy. No, no. Not really -- the staples went in and just sat there. No matter how many times I pulled the pow pow handle, the staples were not to be delivered to the shooting part. Try again. Reload, close, shoot.
Three phone calls, one consultation with a friend (who couldn't get it either by the way), and one trip to the hardware store later, and as I hand the gun to the guy at the hardware store who must be used to this from me by now, it dawns on me that I'm loading the dang thing backwards. Back home, more pow pow pow. More getting tangled up in sisal and cursing at the cats.
And look at this: a completed project!
Then I went and made myself some celebratory veggies and eggs. Doesn't that look good?
Maybe this next weekend I'll take on the weather stripping. The hardware store guy said there might be trimming of the replacement strip involved. Right.