Okay, so I've had a week off from painting and now, I'm all feeling ready to hump a paint can again. What's up with that? I told Mike that and while he promised not to laugh, I don't think I've seen a look of that large dose of disdain in some time. It bordered on the "just how fucking crazy are you, woman?" look.

I have all but the kids' bathroom and the kitchen done. I have this idea in my head to paint the kids' bathroom white and sponge bright yellow over it, which would actually be kind of neat. It'll bright and cheery in a room with no window.

We bought a pool this week and I kept telling Mike that it needed to be on a flat surface and it's slopping heavily to one side, and we found what appears to be a nail trying to poke through the bottom of it. So we're watering the garden with it and then we'll relevel things. Mike wants desperately to put everything on cement. Cement is expensive, I've tried to explain, but then we're both in do-it-yourself mode and have delusions of gradeur about figuring it out and having this wonderful cement surface which would surround the pool and allow for sunning and make the sand elsewhere. But of course, he thought if we didn't use chlorine that the filter would take care of things. Today he saw all the clouding and realized the error of his ways and so we're watering.

Often, lately, in the course of watering, I've been finding lizards. And usually I think lizards are pretty cute and stuff, but these are pretty good sized and they give me the willies a little. I try not to let on about that to Russell because if I gave him the faintest reason to suspect that they freak me out, he'd be more freaky-deaky about things that crawl and bite and squirm than usual. I swear -- today we were floundering about in the pool and Russell said something about a snake. I playfully slid a styrofoam noodle by his shoulder and told him to watch out for the snake and he jumped three feet into the air.

I don't like snakes, but I just back away and that's that. He actively worries about coming across his next snake. *sigh*