I felt less tired than yesterday when I woke up, so did some Hill Repeats (a much shorter run workout), even though I had intended to do Speed Repeats (a much longer run workout). But I wanted to make sure I had enough battery at the end of the day to do finish some of my work work, which I ideally want to wrap up before I go on holiday.

And I would ideally like to sort out some, if not all, of the chaos before I go off.

MHH and Donut came over to do the second coat of painting – window, ceilings, walls, door, kitchen cabinets. I asked MHH how his work was going, and it sounds complicated, to say the least. So I asked him if he was looking for a new job – in hindsight I probably shouldn’t have asked him with Donut there, but oh well. He said “No. The captain doesn’t bail if the ship isn’t sinking. And the life boats haven’t been deployed yet.” He said he’s calm and even tempered at work. I was slightly sceptical, and asked Donut if what he said is true. Donut confirmed that MHH is very calm at work; if he isn’t, everyone would panic. True that. “Balls of steel then”, I commented. MHH replied, “Not quite. There’s a lot of rocking back and forth at night.” Ahh, those days. He seems to be keeping the faith that there is a way forward for now. He seems to have back-up plans otherwise, which is good. It must be a stressful time for him.

The kitchen cabinet front and shelving couldn’t be completely fixed because they need power tools, which MHH has at home. So they will come by one day when I’m away to get this sorted. MHH commented that this looks like a Hackney loft. I guess the artisanal looking paint job looks kind of quirky and offbeat. SY commented, “Very boho, made with love”. I’ve always had a creative, quirky, unconventional streak, so it kind of suits. Although I’ve literally never imagined I would be personally painting any part of my home, or be doing DIY. Like ever.

Donut asked me yesterday if I was a city girl. I was like, “Most definitely!”, and shared anecdotes of me trying to help my mum with housework as a kid, and she would shoo me off saying “越帮越忙“ (the more I help, the busier it gets), because I was often clumsy or clueless, creating more work for her. Then when I lived with my aunt, her philosophy was that our only job as children was to study hard and do well at school, not housework. So I grew up singularly useless at most practical household matters, and with the expectation that I would never have to deal with the practicalities of daily life.

Today, he asked me what I think of DIY now, if I would do it again. I was like, “Mmm, it’s kind of fun. And not as hard as it seems. But I’m not sure I would do it alone.” (In fact, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t do it alone!! 😂)

But I really think it’s super inefficient, and not very safe, for me to be doing DIY without someone knowledgeable directing or supervising me. Like MHH and Donut asked me what a bunch of random cables were for, I was like: “I don’t know? They were here when we bought the house”. MHH asked me for a pair of scissors to cut the cables, but I was like: “Is it safe? Is there a risk you get electrocuted and die? We can totally leave it lying around, no problem”. Seriously, I’d rather have a bunch of unsightly cables lying around than risk doing anything dangerous or potentially life threatening. Yes, I could google to figure it out. But seriously… I have so many other things I’d rather be doing with my life. And would it really make that much sense for me to be doing DIY, given my height, strength and skills, vs. someone else (probably most other people??)?

Having said that, I think I will go over the cabinets again with the red paint to even out the tone… The slightly artisanal look is mildly charming. But I think it’s looking a tad tooo artisanal right now. And if I really fuck it up… seriously… how bad can it look? Or I can just wash it off… because it doesn’t seem to be water proof for now. Not until I buy lacquer and spray it on. Like I didn’t even know that we could spray paint lacquer. I thought I would have to paint it on.

Song of the day “Push the Button”.