French apartment renovations, Day 130: Rock breaking and guilt trips

Today was a GREAT day, not because of anythig remarkable, but because of all of the things I got done. First thing in the morning, Zari and I did PE With Joe together.

Then, full of post-exercise endorphins and freshly showered, I headed downstairs to get dirty again.

I cut more holes for electrical boxes. I am done with the entire back apartment, except for the holes for the light fixtures in the upper ceiling. We have to figure out where to put them and then I can drill the holes.

The most challenging part of the morning was chiseling out two ovals in the exposed stone wall. They had to be the right size to fit double outlet boxes and also the same height. Not an easy feat with all of these large stones in the way. After lots of drilling and chiseling, the recesses are ready! And I also was able to create spaces for the electrical cables, which will go between the rocks and be hidden once I tuckpoint the joints with lime.

I also took off the entire plaster ceiling in the hallway. It was quick and satisfying. I like those kind of jobs. Now we have a ceiling of rough-sawn wood. I'm glad I took off the plaster because a) it was mostly loose anyway and b) about 1/4 of the wood has insect damage and needs to be treated.

I might sandblast the ceiling and see how it looks once it's cleaned up. But we will likely end up putting drywall over it; it was never intended to be exposed (unlike the beautiful wood ceiling in the front half).

I came upstairs around 2 pm, looking like an "octogenarian" (Eric's words) from all of the dust. I really didn't want to wash my hair so I did the next-best thing: I vaccumed it! Good to go! Then I hopped in the shower to rinse all the dust off the rest of me.

The next few hours I worked on lots of breech things, then picked up the girls from school. We dropped off school things, had a quick snack, and then headed to the coulée verte. I refilled our water bottles with sparkly water and joked with a woman doing the same thing, "C'est dur la vie ici avec l'eau pétillante gratuite."

Dio is having a tiny birthday party tomororw with 2 friends at a park. We're making cupcakes and of cousre right when I was starting to make them, I realized it was 6:56 pm and I had no flour and all of the stores were closed for 7 pm curfew. I ran to 2 different grocery stores but no luck.

Then I phoned a friend who lives just down the street, "Please, can I borrow some flour?" She said no problem, so I ran over to her apartment (only about 50 meters away from us) and picked up a mostly-full container of flour. Phew. Cupcakes are now baked. We'll make frosting in the morning.

This evening Eric was cleaning up and Zari and Dio were just watching him...despite him having asked them for help. So he started monologuing and guilt-tripping the kids as he was cleaning. This went on for a good 10 minutes and finally Zari got off the couch and washed the table. Dio? He got out the phone and started filming.