WhimsyLand

I was watching the 4th Die Hard last night, whose title escapes me, but is reminiscent of a New Hampshire license plate.  I was thinking about halfway through:  "this is a perfect action film":  old guy comes back and still has the goods, the events are so unbelievable (like the VTOL attack jet scene) that they're perfect, the bad guys are bad enough, the sidekick is a geek who redeems himself, and there's even a beautiful woman.  I've been thinking about guy films, and what makes the good ones (like The Professional) so good, and the flawed ones (like almost every Star Wars after the first one) so flawed.  It got me to thinking about how little I cared about Lennon's solo work and how insipid Wings was.  Two artists that gave the world dozens of great songs were either too toneless and earnest for me, or too saccharine.  Together, though, they made great music.  Like Speilberg and Lucas with Indy Jones, for example.  Lucas, who couldn't direct real human dialogue if his life depended upon it, teams up with Spielberg who solo (though he was Executive Producer for a lot of great films) produced a lot of preachy, forgettable films.  Anyway, that's my new theory.  It will probably change tomorrow.

How's my house coming, you ask?  Well, today I was doing baseboards.  I had bought a dozen 8' fluted unfinished oak baseboards that measure about 5-6 inches high, enough to allow for my painting mistakes near the floor.  These got neutral stain and polyurethaned and looked pretty dandy.  I have one of those circular saws that you can adjust the angle on, so getting the baseboard edges to match up on corners was easy in theory.  I cut a 45 degree on one and slammed it against the wall and started hammering in 1 ½ finishing nails into the sucker.  Three problems:  the oak baseboards are really hard, so I was bending a lot of nails;  I really wasn't connecting the baseboard to the wall;  countersinking these puppies was going to be a pain.  I went back to Lowe's and asked questions, like "I guess I should be nailing the baseboards to the studs, huh?".  That required a Stanley 3-pack of various-sized countersinks, a battery-powered intelligent stud finder (no, it never even once pointed at me), heavier finishing nails and some red oak putty to take care of the indentations when I got finished pounding the finishing nails below the surface.  This was the first lesson in many long lessons that a job like this takes 4 trips to Lowe's (or Home Depot if that's closer, or God Forbid, Menard's if you're in the upper Midwest).  First off, the stud finder was complicated and no matter how many times I told it the thickness of the walls and other parameters, it found AC running underneath it (not a good thing) and randomly spotted the "edge" of a stud.  Ultimately, it was a useless waste of $15.  Next, I found that Minwax's idea of Red Oak wasn't the same as Minwax's idea of Red Oak stain, so I had to buy a couple of more putties until I found one that actually matched the baseboard.  In the end, I found that the fastest method was to a) find where the original builder put his baseboard nails, and b) drill around that area with a 2" long bit until I hit pay dirt (a stud), and c) mark it with one of the few pencils in the house that Miss Emily hasn't chewed beyond recognition, and d) line up the pre-cut baseboard piece on the wall, and e) mark on the baseboard where I found the stud, and f) pre-drill 2 one thirty-second inch holes just about there.  Next, I would slap the baseboard against the wall and pound in the new 6-penny finishing nails in the pre-drilled holes.  Voila!  Worked like a charm.  Except for the places where I had long distances to cover and had only 8-foot baseboards to do so.  That left the end of a baseboard dangling with no real attachment to the wall, and nailing into the flimsy drywall wasn't going to hold it.  This I pondered while listening to Hail to the Thief.  During my afternoon call to Sweet Junie, it dawned on me that I had a 20-foot telescoping cylindrical gadget for replacing floodlights in my cathedral ceiling.  I dragged it out and then headed to Lowe's for a 5th time, selecting a single bottle of "baseboard glue" and expediting myself through the self-checkout that always tells you that you didn't put the item in the bagging area and/or that your credit card failed to read and/or a request for the credit cards secret code, and/or if you use cash your phone number, which I don't entirely understand, but maybe the Lowe's guys figure anyone with cash nowadays is flush and they might call me to have a latte somewhere, my treat.  But, I digress.  I pulled back the baseboard whose end was dangling in the wind and drooled in some baseboard glue.  Then, I extended that 20-foot ceiling convenience apparatus and bowed it between the opposing wall and the baseboard that I wanted to squish against the wall.  It wasn't tight enough, so I used my personal copy of Many Mountains Moving Volume VII to shim it in tight, and Bob's Your Uncle, as Austin Powers always says.  I have all the rest of the baseboard pieces ready, but it takes 2 hours for the glue scheme to complete, so I'll have to move the telescoping gadget around tonight as I make my way through another classic Guy Film.

I said I would comment on Poetry, which I quite liked.  I will, but I have to call Sweet Junie now.  Back in a bit ...

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