IM IN UR OCEAN. EATIN UR CARDZ.
After a long softball tournament weekend in Duluth, we wrapped up Labor Day Weekend by going to the fair one last time. Nick made it a point to eat things he hadn’t tried before, which really impressed me. I had a great time this year, but I missed doing a full day with just Nick and me. There’s always next year.
Once again, I am late at posting my fair blog. Which, really, should come as no surprise at this point.
This time I went with Nick, Whitney, and Jake from the gym. Rob met up with us later that night. New foods we tried included:
Nick, the Murderses, and I ventured out to the Great Minnesota Get Together on opening day this year. Our normal parking lot had been converted into the new West End Market, so we parked in the old bus lot, which felt pretty weird actually.
Nick kicked off the evening with an About a Foot Long hot dog as tradition goes. I had a corn dog. It was everything I’ve been dreaming of for the past year. Whitney and I did a wine flight again. I was not impressed. It was better than last year’s, but not by much. This may be the last time I have wine at the fair.
For new fair foods, we tried the pretzel curds from O’Gara’s, which were excellent but not in a get-these-every-year way, and the SnoRibbons from Blue Moon. I liked the SnoRibbons, but I wish I’d waited for a better flavor, as my choices were churro or mango, neither of which I’m a fan of. I’d like to try them again, but there are so many other ice creamy type things on my list that I don’t know if I will this year. I guess it depends on which flavors they have when we return.
I have a long list of favorite foods to eat as well as new foods to try. Time will only tell what’s next!
The walls are all painted and they look amazing. The color turned out to be exactly what I wanted. The cat was kind enough to help me. Or… maybe she was just excited about an open window? I’d like to think she was offering moral support, at the very least.
We aren’t getting carpet for a couple of weeks, but to keep things moving along, we went to Ikea on Sunday. Originally I only intended on getting the three pieces that will make up my vanity, but the trip seemed so tedious and Nick hates Ikea so much that we decided to get everything. Unfortunately the desk I wanted was out of stock so we’ll have to go back, but Nick made up for it by getting two shelving units for himself.
Summer probably wasn’t the best time to tackle a project like this, but even so, it’s going much faster than I thought it would. Not an incredible lot has happened since my last post, but I’m at the painting stage, so at least it won’t look as disastrous by the end of the week.
The corner patches needed second coats, but I had to do one side at a time and I glopped it on there pretty thick so it took a couple days to dry. Dust. Dust everywhere. For a few days there was a permanent haze in the room. I’ve been living out of a laundry basket in the bedroom because I didn’t want to deal with going in there and opening the closet and stirring up more dust than necessary while we were still sanding.
Eventually I finished the corners, but not after sanding off the pads of my thumbs while cleaning the sanding sponges. I didn’t notice it happened at first. I cleaned them in the morning, and that evening the turned bright red and started burning like they’d been… well, burned. At first I assumed it happened when I took meatloaf out of the oven, but I thought it was strange because 1) I probably would have noticed when it happened; and 2) it didn’t make sense that’d I’d burn my thumb pads and nothing else. It dawned on me sometime the next day.
It was ridiculously painful. I couldn’t touch anything. That set me back for the rest of the week. That weekend I was out of town for 4 days, and when I got back I lost all motivation for another week.
Nick did a good job at patching the holes near the floor, though there is a piece of carpet fiber embedded in the mud that looks like a fuzzy caterpillar. I found a giant crack that had to be patched while taping the windows, and another small hole when I was sanding it. But I think everything’s as good as it’s going to get at this point.
On Sunday I bought paint! I primed and painted one wall to make sure the color would be even. It looks pretty good!
My plan is to finish painting the room tonight. Then all that’s left is ceiling repair, light fixture installation, new carpet, baseboards, light switches, and a trip to Ikea! And then a day’s worth of work to assemble everything. But after that I’ll be good to go!