I accomplish my second and third renovation projects while John leaves for the second day to work on the float. “Get ready for a surprise when you come home! I’ll have knocked down a wall and installed a water feature.”

He leaves and I jet out the door behind him to the store to make a final decision about a media hutch / console thing. We’ve been using the same, ramshackle ikea sideboards since I moved to San Francisco in 2016, and it’s time for them to go. I’ve got ~$600 in my pocket in the form of a digital Visa giftcard from a work rewards cash-out so I’m trying to do all this for essentially free. Console looks good, so I order it online while in the store for in-store pick up because this digital gift card can only be spent online. Order placed, I also order paint for pick-up from Sherwin Williams, and painting supplies from Home Depot. After running to all those places in reverse order as my phone dings that the times are ready, I make it home, clean out the living room, and dismantle the furniture.

I summon all the deep memories of painting and edge cutting from home renovations since I was 11 and bang out the wall in 45 minutes flat. While that coat sets, I assemble the hutch, make some executive decisions about what will stay in the room, and have a mild freak out over how light the paint looks. I stress for another 20 minutes before noticing that where I started is substantially darker than where I finished, and just decide to trust it. 3 hours later, the paint looks great, and I immediately undo it by painting the second coat, which while wet looks worse than before.

I reassemble the room, get things moved into their semi-final positions (read: 3 inches from where the wall is currently still drying) and hope it dries dark enough for John to be impressed. It’s the least ambitious episode of your favorite home makeover show, but when John comes home, he’s over the moon.