A new addiction and coming out of the closet! ;-) March 1, 2007

The Black Donnellys premiered on Monday night… I’m sure this will be a total shock, but I smell an addiction forming! Cute boys, testosterone flying, violence, loyalty, drama, unrequited love… Gods! What’s NOT to adore?! Apparently this is supposed to be the ‘Irish equivalent’ of the Sopranos (which means less than nothing to me, since I never watched The Sopranos because honestly, I can’t watch something just because other people INSTRUCT me to watch it. Call me perverse, but that’s just me)… Even the music in The Black Donnellys is frickin’ awesome – perfectly chosen for each scene! They even ended the final scene with a cop hitting a suspect (and narrator of the episode) with a telephone book! YAY!! (I actually did a cheerleader clap at that!) I have always been told by my ex-cop father that the best way to “coerce” a confession out of a suspect is to use a phone book or a sack of oranges, because they don’t leave identifiable marks. Is it bad that having a violent fact substantiated by a violent tv show makes me gleeful?

So, I was down at my cousin Shannon’s house on Saturday, where I was helping her wife (partner? They’re married, but I don’t know the terminology – I just call them both my cousins and leave it at that) paint their ‘guest room’. Their house is going to be featured in a magazine, so they’re sort of sprucing it up a bit before the photographer gets at it. The reason ‘guest room’ is in quotations is because it’s honestly about 7′ x 5′. In my opinion, it’s a walk-in closet that just has a hallway access, rather than a bedroom access. So, as you can see, while it sounds like I’ve slipped my closet-painting curse, it’s not exactly a great big stride out of the closet and into a large room – more like a lateral slide into a slightly larger room without shelves and metal rods at eye level. Ah well, one day, I WILL get out of the closet!

So, this was my Saturday. As is my luck, I woke up later than I had planned, and ended up leaving about a half hour late. Typical. I also had to get gas, and wouldn’t you know it – my tank’s damn near empty and it’s the weekend when the prices skyrocketed. So, after selling a frickin’ KIDNEY to afford a tank of gas, I was on my way… even later than before. I decided that a day of painting DEFINITELY called for an XL Tim’s coffee, and possibly a bagel.

So, I stopped in at the Tim’s on the way, where I had to wait through a painful display of late-teen/early-20s mating ritual… Some possibly 20-year-old paramedic (still in his uniform, though the truck was nowhere to be seen), was trying to flirt with the at-the-oldest-17-year-old girl behind the counter. I mean, REALLY trying. He was leaning on the counter, watching every transaction, not ordering anything, and trying to talk to her as she made up people’s orders. The only thing I clearly heard, after tuning him out, was “You wear contacts, don’t you? Your eyes can’t possibly be that beautiful, naturally.” She sort of gave me an embarassed smile (I have the suspicion that I snorted) as I was paying, and I was off… again. And thanking the Gods that I’m not in my teens or early 20s anymore… Yeesh, tell me I was never that CHEESY!

Those of you who have driven with me will know my penchant for water bottles in my car. I don’t know if I have some deep-seeded paranoia or if I died of thirst in a previous life, but there are no less than three partially filled water bottles, rolling around in various parts of my car, at any given time. Of course, this morning, two of them were on the floor in the back, and I had one of them up front with me, stuck in the door pocket. My car is from 1992, which was before car manufacturers realized the crucial importance of cupholders. Tragic, yes, but not entirely unworkable – I bought a cupholder that fits into one of the heating vents, and generally that serves me just fine.

Today, however, I suppose I was being punished for the greed of wanting both a coffee AND a bottle of water, and as I was taking a sip from said bottle, I managed to lose the cap. On the highway. Doing 120 km/h. Perfect. I tried to look for it and keep an eye on the mumblypeg in front of me, but to no avail. The damn cap had rolled somewhere inaccessible, and I now had one hand on the steering wheel, the other being occupied with keeping the bottle of water from tipping. I soon realized that there was nowhere to put a bottle without a cap, as my lonely cupholder was being used by my all-too-precious-to-risk-spilling XL Tim’s coffee. Dilemma! I’m sorry to say that I was forced to pour the water out the window, and throw the bottle in the back of my car, to be recycled at a later date.

At this point, I decided to call Joey and tell her I was running late. She listened patiently as I explained that I’d left later than I thought, had to pay with a vital organ for gas, about the horrible medic flirting at the Tim’s and even how I’d lost a frickin’ bottle cap and had to dump the whole bottle out the window. What made her laugh though, was when I was gripped with road rage, while on the phone with her. I was driving along, doing 120km/h, when I got boxed behind two people, taking up both lanes on the highway, doing FRICKIN’ 80km/h. Jesus. F*cking. CHRIST. People, if you’re afraid to drive on the highway at the speed limit (100km/h), TAKE THE BACK ROADS! Honestly! So, I started a whole rant about how I was stuck behind a bunch of Susie Speed Limits, and Joey asked if I was irritated because I didn’t typically drive at the speed limit. I told her, “NO! Man, I’m no Susie Speed Limit – I’m a Sally Speed Demon!” Apparently we’re united in this, or at least that’s what it sounded like… she was laughing too hard for me to understand much.

Finally, I made it through the downtown traffic, to Shannon & Joey’s house. As I was pulling into the driveway, Joey opened the door, in a DRESS. I got out of the car, hugged her and told her, “Sorry, my ballgown’s at the cleaners. You’ll have to make do with my second sexiest painting outfit. Just remember – you’re a married woman, so try to restrain yourself!” Apparently, the last time she’d painted, it had been in the summer and super hot, so she’d worn this tank dress. She was wearing it again, because it didn’t seem to make much sense to dirty more clothes with paint. Only Joey could pull off painting a room in a dress, I don’t care what she says.

So, we got down to painting in the smallest f*cking room known to man!! Trying to get the two of us, a roller on an extender and a dresser in there was like a human puzzle. Now, the room was originally fire engine red, ceiling included. Joey had bought the primer and had everything set up for us to get started, including the whole room, window and door, covered in plastic drop cloths. The first coat was a bit of a pain, mainly because we had to cover a stippled ceiling that had been red for years & years. But, we worked at it, and finally got the first coat of primer on. As we were downstairs, eating contraband Kraft Dinner (Shannon doesn’t let Joey make KD, so Joey never gets it – I brought some for us to have for lunch), it dawned on us that we might not have enough primer to do the room a second time. Thank the Gods for basements, because somehow, Joey went down into hers and re-emerged with 1/2 a can of primer that had been hiding there! Yay!

After we primed the room twice, it was time to start on the colour – a sort of wedgewood blue, with some green tint. But first, we had to have a discussion about whether or not we should paint the ceiling blue as well, or leave it white. The conversation kind of went like this, “Well, what do you think?”, “I don’t know, Joey, it’s your house – your decision.”, “I know, but what do you think?”… and on & on for about 20 minutes. Finally, we decided that we would tint the white ceiling paint with just a bit of the blue, so that it would sort of blend into the walls, but still be lighter. We were so intent on tinting the white that we didn’t even realize that we didn’t have enough paint to cover the room twice. Excellent. So, it was off to Rona, in our painting gear (well, Joey changed, but I didn’t bother. Who’s going to see me at 7pm in a west-end Rona, in yoga pants covered with paint?), where we wandered aisles as we waited for the paints to be mixed. There are some truly odd things on sale at Rona… but I digress.

When we got home, Shannon had just come home from a long day of work, and Joey and I were tired, so there was a fair amount of sitting around on the couch. We decided to order pizza for supper, and as we waited for the pizza to arrive, we sat and watched Dirty Jobs on tv (Mike Rowe… SO yummy, even when he’s covered in bat poop!). After all was said and done, we painted that room (closet) four times – twice with primer and twice with colour. I must say, it looks lovely, and knowing Shannon & Joey’s flair for style, the room will look amazing. Now I’m going to have to buy 18 copies of the magazine their house will be in, so I can point out, “I painted that room!”