A Tactile Experience

We arrived bright and early to Bob and Mary’s house, where we’ve spent quite a bit of time fixing up the back bedroom. Today’s task, lay the carpet.  Donna had procured 40 24-inch carpet squares, which should be enough to do the room with not much left over.

After measuring and fitting and trimming the first row of squares we were ready to start slathering the glue on the floor.

We soon found out that this is no ordinary glue.  It is glue that sticks with a vengeance.  The first row of squares went easily enough, but by the end of it there were little dribbles of glue on the handles of the trowels (and, by extension, our hands), little dollops on the floor, and little spots that somehow managed to make it onto our clothing.  And because this, all the aforementioned items tended to stick together.  We could lift a trowel without grasping it.  Our fingers started to stick together.  Clothing stuck to the floor.  Despite our best efforts, this stuff migrated all over the place.  And the more you worked it in an attempt to pull it off, the stickier it got.

Occasionally, a little bit of glue made it onto the carpet.  The best way to get rid of it was to wipe it off with a finger.  Now the finger was sticky.  Attempting to wipe it off the finger with another finger made both fingers sticky and usually stuck them together.  Pretty soon, your whole hand was involved.  It felt like pulling dirty taffy.

We managed to make progress, one row at a time, until break time.  Three rows done and it was time to head to the SOWER room for a break.  Then the problem of cleanup presented itself.  The instructions recommended mineral spirits.  Not having any, we chose the next best thing: gasoline.  Unfortunately the only gas we could find was a nearly empty gas tank from a boat.  The little bit of gas in it was probably a couple of decades old and was a dirty brown color.  But it did take the glue off our hands.  We just smelled like the inside of an oil refinery.

We were up to the closet by noon.  Another bath in bad gas and we had lunch.

Closets are a lot of fun.  Everything needs to be cut and fit.  And there’s no place to put a sticky glue bucket. But we prevailed and when the last tile was laid, we almost gave each other a high-five.

We would have had some explaining to do...

The Hope House took us out to dinner again this week. What a treat.  This time it was Mexican food at the Cafe Ole in Boise.  Great fellowship with several former SOWERs and some of the staff from the Hope House. Again, we are treated well here.

A beautiful harvest moon was rising as we were driving back from Boise. The skies were nearly clear, so it’s going to get rather cold tonight, probably in the upper 30’s.  It’s supposed to be 57 tomorrow. I think our hot days are over.