Hickory, hickory, more hickory.

I have been having a craptastic writing week, to be honest. Usually people will say, "Don't edit, just write," and then the results are not as bad as you think they are. This time they really are that bad. No, really. I am taking hours to get mere paragraphs of prose, which would be bad enough except that it is not good prose and is derailing the stuff that was written when I was writing better.

I don't have anything like a large-scale worry about this: it is a blip, I will get through it, I will get over it, it will be fine. I am not wailing and gnashing my teeth that I will never write again oh woes or that maybe I am not a real writer oh doom. I'm just frustrated that I'm having an off week.

So I am deliberately not writing today, rather than trying to write and failing. (And yes, I do have Bea Arthur and Mel Brooks in my head: "Did you bullshit last week?" "No." "Did you try to bullshit last week?" "Yes.") It is not as though other things to do are in any way lacking at this particular time. I mean, frankly, they aren't ever, that's how it works being a Mris: full of projects. But now timprov has gotten to the point with the basement flooring where more than one person can actually be useful, so we are in floor mode for sure.

Here is the thing about floors: it is very hard to fall down from a kneeling or sitting position on the floor, and if I do, there's not that far to fall. So really this is an ideal project for a vertiginous person, as long as there is a non-vertiginous person (in this case T) to run the circular saw and stuff. So I have been hammering happily away with my bottle of Gorilla Glue by my side, so if you ever need a glue a gorilla, ask us, we know where to get the stuff. (If it's a wood gorilla, I mean. Apparently the kinds of gorilla take different glues.)

Other than that, and other than the insight I put on Facebook, that this is very much like a Girl Scout project, it is not the kind of work that lends itself much to chatter. Put in some flooring. Yep. Sure did. Oh! One of the tools we have is for hammering in things on the periphery where you can't fit the usual thing, and we have been referring to it as the shoehorn with teeth because of the They Might Be Giants song. Only in the original they sing, "People should get beat up for statin' their beliefs," and around here this year we sing, "People should get beat up for skatin' like the Leafs." So many of the teams I like are so bad this year: the Leafs, the Wild, the poor dear Oilers who are so obligingly keeping my Wild out of the basement. It's very sad. But with a perky beat and a little bit of gratuitous triangle! Thanks, They Might Be Giants! You are not the designated band to make me feel better about hockey, but hey, if it works.

My rhapsodic is all shiny because I've been waxing it so much.

What I didn't manage to say in the last post is that I am really, really happy with the wood now that we're getting it in there. We still have to put up trim, and we still have to get the stairs carpeted, so I'm not getting the full effect of what it'll be like downstairs when we're done. Still, we have all the wood at the base of the stairs in, and also significantly into the rooms adjacent, so when I open the basement door and flip on the light, I see the dusky blue walls and the warm glow of the hickory. And it's sort of like when you come up over a rise and can see the Minneapolis skyline at night, it's that kind of good. And it makes me very happy.