Possible Profanity Warning – Justified Though...

As I wrote the other day, I pulled the nasty, white(ish) indoor-outdoor carpeting out of our dining room the other day – saving us from old stains and even older odors. Still have the trim to do (that's a next week job), but its out and its gone – happily disposed of and out of our lives. And I might have mentioned the nastiness continued upstairs in our bedroom.

I couldn't leave the job half done, now could I?

With the dining room finished and freshened, the master bedroom began to wear on my nerves even more. Toss in yet ANOTHER moment of rudeness by one of our cats directly next to the head of the bed and I was forced to act. (Waiting until the Prime Geek had safely left the premises so I didn't have to work around him asking awkward questions. Like – What are you doing, why are you carrying a steak knife, what's that smell, are your feet bleeding? Things like that just get in the way.) A quick pull of the carpet by the door confirmed the existence of tile and I even attempted to be adult about this whole deal by double checking a corner over on the opposite side of the room in case the “new” addition hadn't been treated the same way. A little tug, and I'd know enough to plan my assault over the next few days.

Well, I planned to plan it that way anyway. Instead of a little tug, it required two knives, a flathead screwdriver, several bitten back words of profanity, and two more broken nails. The &%*#^$ had GLUED it down in places. Result? Not a small portion of carpet coming up discreetly... no, instead a three foot chunk of carpet dust raining down on my head as I fell onto my ass from the sudden release. I'll confess, at this point the profanity wasn't so bitten back. More... hissed out. Carpet may also have been thrown against a wall as well. Just a bit. Let's just say I temporarily lost some of my “being mature” points.

With that, my day took on a whole new look. No more “looking”, no more “future planning”. That crap was coming out and it was coming out NOW.

I knew it would be bad. I knew what the cats had been doing. I knew it was old... what I didn't know was I would develop an overwhelming and burning hatred for whoever installed the damn stuff in the first place. Any guesses as to why the cats might have been marking their territory?

Some mother-loving jackass NAILED, GLUED, and STAPLED 1/8 inch open cell foam onto the tiles underneath.... ON TOP OF FRAKKING DOG CRAP!!!!!!!!!

Old, dessicated dog crap, but dog crap nonetheless. Yeah. No wonder my cats had become neurotics constantly feeling the need to mark their territory. If every moment you smelled a big invisible dog in your home, you might get a bit tetchy yourself*

Toss in a leaning towards Jackson Pollack when it came to staples (at least 100 in random swirls by the door as a start – not through the carpet mind you.. no no. Just through the foam-esque material.) hundreds of unfinished nails somehow sticking pointy side up – my feet look like someone took a meat tenderizer to them – an odd fondness for glue in haphazard patches, and more then 30 years of filth, grime, piss, and God know's what that had seeped through the padding AND what had been sealed UNDER the padding and you have one shudder inducing afternoon.

Five trashbags**, four scrubbings with everything from a green floor cleaner to bleach, seven showers, and unnumbered applications of medicinal rum to keep me from thinking too hard about what the PG and I have been breathing for the last year and a half, and its done. It's not pretty – the floor will be refinished in the spring and until then its just new floor strips and some soon-to-be knitted rugs tossed over the worse spots. Its ugly, its old....

and I love it more then kittens in springtime because for the first time ever – my house feels cleared and clean.

Where'd Smelly Dog Go?

Now... if I can just get a few moments with the souless doghearted imbossed carbunkle*** who put it in, I'd be happy. I may need a baseball bat and a few moments alone.



*I'm going with big due to size issues under the padding. The other option is too horrific to contemplate.
**I confess to failing my green leanings with this stuff. So nasty when the underneath was exposed, it simply got taken to a dumpster and left. I know I should have looked for the "proper" disposal place, but by that point I was cut, bleeding from hundreds of little stabs to the feet, nose and eyes running and burning from the dust and filth, and more concerned about the nosebleed running down my throat -which I still have -to really care all that much about Mother Earth. Just this once, she can be a big girl and deal!
***Shakespearian insulted substituted because my first three tries would have gotten me kicked out of a navy bar. That... and my mom reads this sometimes.