Power Tools = Good

As I've been job-hunting this last little bit, I've drifted into a cycle of "job-hunt at night, home repair during the day".

Presently I have a stairwell under repair (repaint, strip out layers of carpet from the '70's and the '80's, pull carpet staples, replace some treads, sand, paint), a couple of trunks my father made to renovate for the nieces, a giant cat scratching post (when the cat, curled up, is 34" long and near 30lbs, the average scratching post is...inadequate), a bathroom threatening to need to be gutted and rebuilt, and sundry other projects waiting in the wings.

Spent yesterday and the day before having quality moments with the power washer - what with my illness in '06 and Dad's in '07, the whole home maintenance bit had fallen a bit behind, so much yard waste has been hauled away, and this project involved blasting mud/moss/crud off the deck & house - and then peeling maybe a 30yr accumulation of oily crud off a concrete driveway as we try and drive the house towards at least conceptual sellability.

With that much crud, took an age and a half, but managed to discover a previously unknown patio under 2" of moss (and gee, the gate DOES swing easier with clearance), that the driveway was maybe a foot wider than we thought, and various items formerly hiding under debris - as well as a dead exterior faucet that's now on the list.

I'm continuing the process of helping Mom go through Dad's things and hauling things off to various exciting new destinations and sorting through the volume of stuff that fit a 2-story 40x80 rambler just fine...but fit a WWII warbox house of perhaps half the size and w/o the outbuildings rather less well.

And knocking out about 15 job apps a week. WHEEE!