House Repair the First

The Funny Farm needs a long series of small fix-ups, most of which I’ve put off for lack of anyone to do them. Recently, though, I found a handyman through Angie’s List who seems to be an experienced craftsman and is a very nice gentleman, to boot.

Abigail’s recent post on the endless costs of damfool things you can’t do yourself (or know better than to try) spoke to me as all this was coming to fruition.

So he came over on Saturday morning to attend to the most urgent matter: A previous owner replaced the doors on one of the bedroom closets with a set of flimsy, cheaply made louvered things. They were great, but a few years ago they began to fall apart. I’ve limped along with them, though, sorta fixing them but mostly putting off the inevitable. Finally they reached the point where they threatened to fall on my head or Luz’s if they were dusted one more time.

The developer equipped the closets with ordinary flat, no-panel, paintable composite bifold doors that slide back and forth on an overhead track. They’re certainly nothing fancy — the place is just a little tract house, after all — but they’re sturdy and unobtrusive. Why on earth anyone would replace them with cheesy louvers escapes me. But there they were.

So on Saturday our guy went by the Depot and bought a pair of replacement doors. By some sort of miracle, they were still being made in a size that fit the door opening in a 44-year-old shack. Earlier I’d bought a can of Dunn Edwards’s finest in the desired gaudy color, and so he went right to work. In short order, he had the things installed. And I think they look just fine:

Still have to get a pair of knobs to go with the fake-pewter knobs that hold forth throughout the manse. Amazingly, Amazon has a style very much like the ones I got years ago at the now-defunct Great Indoors. If I don’t find anything at HD or Lowe’s when I’m up in that direction tomorrow, I may just order those.

That room essentially functions as a hallway to the doggy-door and as storage. Off-season clothing goes in the closet, and the armoire that no longer holds a television set is full of bed linens.

So it was kind of annoying to have to spend $333 to upgrade it. Still, with that cheap little area rug I picked up at Pier One, the room now looks better than any of the other rooms in the house!

Surely would love to have area rugs down in the living room and family room. But a) they’re more trouble to clean than they’re worth and b) with dogs, area rugs are powerfully contraindicated. Because…where does a dog invariably go when it feels moved to barf, pee, or dump? To the softest spot it can find!

At that would be, yea invariably, the nicest area rug in the house.

So we have tile. Acres and acres of tile.

Other handyman chores remain for our guy to take on:

• Replace the kitchen faucet
• Replace the bathroom faucet (if I get rich in the porn novelette biz, make that “replace the bathroom  countertop, sink, and faucet”)
• Install new weatherstripping around all the exterior doors
• Replace the cracked tiles on the kitchen countertop
• Replace the cracked tiles in the living room
• Replace the laundry room faucet
• Repair the cracks around the fireplace hearth and touch up paint
• Repair popped drywall nails and cracks in three rooms

And I’m sure I can dream up all sorts of other things to keep him amused.

All of these will have to wait until I have more money. But the door was a major annoyance, and it was becoming unsafe.