Sunday, May 18, 2008

Reclaiming the Porch, With Casualties

I hurt all over, I think my pinky toe is broken and I'm pretty sure I sprained my baby maker, but by gawd my Appalachian documentary nightmare of a front porch is presentable once again. I'd show ya'll a picture of the whole, beautiful thing, but I still need to clean a few things, fill some hanging baskets with flowers, etc.

I hauled chit to the dump that I'd forgotten we had. I think I sacrificed my toe when the Amazon and I were wallerin' on old, wooden queen size headboard in to the truck.

That's right. A headboard. One that I didn't realize was still here. It was that bad.

When I got to the dump, the old dump guard.. guy.. thingie.. was there to tell me which of the five dumpsters each and every piece of garbage had to go in. I think he kept the old refrigerator, I have a feeling it will end up at the flea market. Oh and before you start thinking I'm like.. Shee-Ra, Mistress of the Universe, it was the little room sized fridge the Amazon took to college the first two years. I didn't load a full size kitchen appliance by myself.

We didn't have a place to store it, so it sat on the leaky porch, out in the weather. I think some possums were born up in there.

He wouldn't let me leave the four pieces of scrap panelling, left over from the bathroom project of several years ago or the bathroom door Ma had removed about two hours after we moved in here. He said they wouldn't take wood. He was cool with the old wooden chair that was duct taped together, the wooden headboard and the old end table with the wooden legs, just not the paneling or door. He informed me I'd have to haul that stuff to the landfill, about ten dollars worth of gas from here.

Um no.

So now I'm riding around with an old door and some paneling in the back of the truck, until I figure out what I'm going to do with it. I think there's a bonfire in my near future.

I'm pretty sure my baby toe will heal.. eventually. It's a nice Welch's Grape Jelly shade of purple and swollen to twice it's normal size. As for the sprained baby maker, let's be honest, it's not in high demand right now anyway. There was, however, a casualty that won't heal on it's own:


Broken Mirror


That's Jolene's passenger side mirror. Notice that it's on the ground and cracked in a bajillion pieces. Yes.. that's right. I broke my truck. It seems I parked a little too close to the porch. So now, I'm not only riding around hauling wood scraps, but I'm missing a mirror.

You might be a redneck...

Do ya'll ever buy concrete mix for projects around the house? Well, if you do, you'd better not procrastinate or leave two 60lb bags of Quikrete on your leaky porch, where they can get wet:


Solidified


If you do, someday you'll decide to declutter your porch and you'll discover that those two bags no longer weigh 60lbs. You'll find that what you have are two, very solid, very heavy blocks of concrete. I'm still trying to figure out how I'm going to get rid of these. Maybe I can break them up with a hammer.. I sure as hell can't lift them. I think when I had the bright idea to slide the crate to the corner of the porch, is when the baby maker took a hit.

The really sad part? I have NO idea why we bought them to begin with.

This next picture really has nothing whatsoever to do with cleaning off the porch. I took a break and poked around in the driveway a little and found these:


Pot Shards


To the untrained eye, they look like plain rocks, but they're actually pottery pieces. I've found rocks that have been formed in to tools, pieces used for cleaning hides, etc. A couple of years ago I took one of the pieces over to the reservation and asked one of the dealers there, who assured me I was probably sitting on a gold mine of artifacts. I'll take some pictures of all my findings one day and bore the bejeebus out of you all with pictures and explanations.

There was a time when "archaeologist" was on the list of things I wanted to be when I grew up. In a way, I chalk it up to one of those things that happen for a reason, that I live here where I can walk out my front door with a garden trowel and dig up all sorts of cool chit.

Anywho, Mahala needs to go find some Ben Gay.. and some ibuprofen. Now if I could only get Craig Ferguson to come rub it on for me.....

Ya'll enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Later Taters!

15 comments:

poopie said...

Lawd gal...I do so know that feeling. I've been hauling chit off from THIS old place since I moved here 20 years ago, and I'm still not done!!!

Mahala said...

Do you ever get suspicious that someone's coming by when you're asleep and adding to the pile?

We3Katz said...

When I have something I don't want to haul off like the door...I leave it on the side walk with a "Free to a good home" sign on it. It disappears in 48 hours.

Anonymous said...

I hope your babymaker's all fixed by tomorrow. LOL

Anonymous said...

Spring cleaning is such a pain - literally! Sorry about your pains and cement and all...
It certainly does seem like I am always getting rid of stuff, and yet there is always more. I'm gonna try to take a day off later this week to do a thorough cleaning before my teen and preteen get out of school for the summer!!!

AB

Jeni said...

OUCH! Boy, don't know which would hurt more -the pinky toe or the pulled baby-maker! I had to chuckle though over the bags of cement. Had kind of the same thing happen with stuff my Mom had accumulated over the years in our old garage. Not a full bag on concrete mix though -thank goodness! Maybe a sign on the porch that the bags are free and they actually contain a new type of concrete sculpture or something like that. Who know, you might just find a fish for them that way.

AC said...

The concrete mix photo is priceless, all nicely contained in the milk crate. Be careful that paneling doesn't blow up and out of the truck - wait, that would make a good story!

I've got one of those little fridges too, left over from J's college. And I broke off my mirror on a gate once. So many things in common!

kenju said...

I need to have a garage/estate sale and then haul othe leftovers to Goodwill and the sump. You've had a lot of experience. Won't you come and help? Our dump WILL take your wood! LOL

Mahala said...

I think it's going to be a little while before I do another major haul like that. There were too many casualties lol. Ma's bedroom is next. Be forewarned lol.

Melissa said...

I've knocked the side view mirror off my car twice. It is an expensive mistake.

Sarah said...

If your mirror is only the mirror glass portion of the mirror you should try calling a glass shop. The glass shop we use here can replace those for around 25 bucks. Most mirrors (whole mirrors) are over 100. Had to add my 2 cents in I work in a body shop and try to help people out.

Dianne said...

Holy Crackers Mahala!

a busted toe, an aching uterus and a broken Jolene - well one of her ears anyway.

When you have a fun weekend, you REALLY have a fun weekend.

If you want Craig to find ya you have to use the Gold Bond Medicated Powder - rumor has it he can smell it from miles away ;)

Take care Lady. Rome (or its porch) wasn't built in a day.

tiff said...

Dude - You've just described what I'm afraid is in my attic, only it's other people's stuff up there and I'm not sure I want to get into that much of the house's history. Still, some of it might be worth something, so....

BetteJo said...

Well you know already know I feel your pain. But I saved the baby maker for the second day!

Joy T. said...

My baby maker got taken out last year but it's having some major phantom twinges at the thought of how you strained yours. Ouch! And because I feel confident you won't tell the mean dump guy where I take my garbage to? If the mean dump guy tells me I can't throw something out and I know he's deliberately being an ass about it? I throw it out anyway. But don't tell anyone. Especially him. Cause he scares the hell out of me.