Drying Day.

The sun returned and so did the wind (a cold wind today). First thing in the morning the sea was almost flat but then as the wind picked up whitecaps appeared as far as the eye could see. 

It was a perfect drying day. I have nothing left to wash but I had painting to do. Conditions were so good I got three coats of white on the garage door frame and one coat of blue gloss on the garage door. I chose oil based gloss which although less convenient to use is more robust  and should last longer. 

I did make one mistake which was to not decant some of the gloss paint into a smaller container. Standing on a stepladder clutching a very full tin of paint was not the best idea and resulted in a minor spillage and extra drips and splashes.

Lesson learned I'll use a paint kettle (if I can can my one or an ice-cream tub if not) when I give the garage door its second coat and go over the side door/gate which got flecks of white when the builders sprayed the house walls with the permanent (hopefully) coating.

 

Whilst waiting for each coat of white to dry I got on with some other jobs which were all interlinked. First I smashed the glass shower door which I'd been keeping hoping somebody could make use of it. I nearly found a new home for it but the person who might have had it was inundated with shower doors.

It was surprisingly hard to break even with a 4lb club hammer. I'd sandwiched the door between old dust sheets and the first few thwacks did nothing more than make a loud noise. Then I remembered that to break a car windscreen you need to hit it in the corner. One tap in the corner and the glass door disintegrated into a million small chunks. I now have two buckets of glass fragments to put in the glass skip at the dump.

Having the shower door lurking in one corner had been holding up my garage sorting plans (unlike Peter I'm very good at organising spaces and as he seems to have come to a halt where the garage is concerned I'm stepping in).

Behind the shower door were the last of the mirrors we'd saved from the house. I like mirrors and we've managed to re-use most of the original mirrors, as well as put up our own mirrors but these ones were still left over.

Three tall mirrors are now behind the trellis that screens the oil tank. The photo doesn't show it but instead of seeing the oil tank (since I cut back the honeysuckle) you now get glimpses of acers and clematis as you walk past. Of course it wasn't a matter of just leaning the mirrors against the trellis. I needed to make wooden frames for the mirrors to sit in so that the wind wouldn't blow them back and forth and eventually smash.

With the door and mirrors out of the way I'm already starting to move things around and work out the most efficient way to store all our bikes, tools, materials and everything else we store in the garage.

The poor tomato plants have struggled with the hot weather especially as I didn't water them enough at the beginning but I'm already picking them and will have a couple in a salad tonight.