The Tennessee Part

There's a part of me that thinks I love manual labor. I think it might be the Tennessee part. I do like working on cars, fixing electronics, painting random people, and building tunnels. But, as I wrote that last sentence, I realized manual labor is far more taxing than what happens to be fun for me... thus, making it not so fun. I had the idea to build a bookshelf from the left over wood out of our ceiling. I gathered up Helen's son Jesse (great name), some tools from both our places, and headed off to build.

If you live in the Santa Monica area, you know it's been kinda crazy hot the past few days... today included. When I got to the building, our wood was there waiting on us... full of nails, splinters, and screws. Our first task... remove all weaponry from what would soon be our bookshelf. Four boards later, we started cutting, hammering, and sanding. Sadly, only for my own ego, it took us all day. Looking at it, you might think some of the Raspberries built it, but there's a fair amount of Jesse's (Helen's son) and my pride nailed together in there. I showed it off to anyone willing to look... yeah, that's right.

The lesson for me is that manual labor is not as glamorous as I thought. Moreover, I don't think I like it as much as I thought. I have so much more respect for the guys standing in the heat for 8 hours a day working on the playground, cutting wood, pouring sand, and ripping up asphalt. Still, now cool and in the comfort of a TV and couch, I long for another project.

On the bright side, Crys loved it. If you want, I'll show it to you.