2 posts tagged “home repair”

My roommate finally called our apartment’s maintenance man regarding the spidery corner of the bedroom and other significant holes in the ceiling and walls.  What “Gerry” did to fix the problems was not disappointing, not discouraging, and not at all disturbing in its lack of professionalism.  Ok, maybe it was a few of those things.  But more than any of that, Gerry’s repairs were—and continue to be—one of the funniest things about this apartment.  

To solve the problem of the giant, crumbling crack in the corner of the bedroom—the spidery fissure above my poor roommate’s bed—Gerry decided to go with caulking.  Excellent choice.  It certainly solved the problem, but now there are bulging globs of pale yellow caulk in the corner, floor to ceiling and several inches thick.  It’s as if meringue or marshmallow—or something less pleasant—were bubbling out from the walls, thick and gooey, now freeze-framed in mid-ooze.

This has inspired me to rethink my decorating tactics:

1) Don’t ignore corners as possible places for color or texture accents for the room; and

2) Consider the merits of repairs as art installations, which could serve as a charming history of the apartment for guests to view.

After all, there is no question about whether or not guests will view Gerry’s little caulking adventure; there’s no ignoring it.  When we rearrange the furniture in the bedroom, we’ll have to find something to cover the spot where my roommate’s bed is, since Gerry, in a well-meaning zeal of thoroughness, applied caulk directly to the baseboard and carpet as well.  My roommate scraped it up as best as she could, but spiders beware: the caulk in the corner isn’t going anywhere.

Except that it went all over the floor, as did bits of the two ceiling tiles Gerry replaced while he was here.  Also over my roommate’s bed, the drop-ceiling tiles Gerry replaced are a different pattern than the rest now, and he sawed a rectangular chunk out of the corner tile to allow the hot water pipes to fit through.  (I guess it would be unreasonable to shut out the spiders entirely.)  My roommate vacuumed the mess under her bed and across the room under mine, where bits of tile and miscellaneous fix-it debris had scattered during the flurry of repairs. 

Gerry’s note explains things:

HI, SORRY ABOUT ANY MESS – I FILLED THE CRACK WITH A FILLER & PUT IN NEW TILES – ALSO COVERED OLD LIGHT HOLE IN LIVING ROOM JUST IN CASE –

(I think by “any mess” he actually meant to write “the large mess,” but we’ll forgive this oversight.  He was very busy with the old light hole, looking, perhaps, to preempt any subsequent requests my roommate and I may have had.)

This brings us to the highlight of my apartment: the brilliant way Gerry covered the old light hole—“just in case.”

Like his other fixes, Gerry clearly had good intentions when he used the chunk of ceiling tile from the bedroom to cover the hole in the living room ceiling.  He meant well when he caulked it to the ceiling, being careful to use enough to make it stick, even if that caused the caulk to squish out along the edges like an overloaded PB&J.  The little spatters of caulk on the ceiling were only mild side-effects to this much-needed procedure.  And he certainly had our best interest in mind when he nailed the piece of tile in on both ends, ensuring a complete graft onto the existing tile with no chance of slippage, loosening, or complete rejection by the host.

First Apartment: Recent Repairs

But, as you can see from the picture, our best interest does not include such aesthetic luxuries as replacing an entire tile if it has a hole or finding the least obtrusive solution.  Our best interest—and I mean very best interest—is more basic than that.  It is a simple and organic line of functionality upon which the apartment must tread, gingerly, lest the caulking and nails give way.

When I first saw what Gerry had done, I said, “That is not a solution.”  I probably had my hands on my hips or snapped my fingers in an “oh no you di’n’t” kind of way (for dramatic effect).  But after looking at it for a few minutes and seeing what a clever, efficient reuse of materials Gerry came up with, I began to laugh.  I looked at the protruding chunk of tile nailed to the ceiling and laughed from my gut at the brilliance of the solution.  I looked at it and saw how beautifully it fit in with the rest of the apartment, and how natural a choice it had been for Gerry to make.

Whatever else it has going for it, I have to admit the latest fix is certainly in keeping with the whole “hovel” theme.

Everyone has a nickname of some sort.  Whether it's a shortened version of your name, something you're known for among friends, or something your enemies whisper loudly as you pass, nicknames distinguish you from your peers.  For better or worse, they're part of who you are.

My apartment has a nickname; it falls pretty well under the "for worse" category.  It came about while I was talking to my mother on the phone one day about finances, telling her my rent was low, so I could afford to save for a car. 

"That's because you live in a h--" she started to say.

"A what--a hole?  I live in a hole?"

"No," she said, "I wasn't going to say 'hole.'"  She was laughing.

"A hovel?"

She didn't answer me; she just laughed, and I could hear her pull the phone away as she snorted.  I started to laugh too.

"Yes," she said, "a hovel.  You live in a hovel."  And that was that: my apartment, the hovel.

I don't blame her for the nickname, really, since I had already been referring to it as "my crappy little apartment."  It was only time before someone took it to the next level.  Her reasons for taking it there are legitimate and twofold, the two w's of where this place went wrong: the wiring and the walls.

As I understand it, usually the electrical wiring in people's homes is cleverly hidden behind the walls, and outlets tend to lie flat, blending into their surroundings.  But this aesthetic arrangement apparently wasn't interesting enough for the electrician who worked on our place, so now the outlets, switches, and wiring are all right where you can see them, encased in a delightful shiny metal tubing.  The tubing runs from one wall across the ceiling to the other, the switch and outlet boxes jutting out like a pop-up book for first-year electricians.

Perhaps this was a place of learning and practice, a teaching hospital of electric surgery.  Not only are the conduits exposed for better view, but I can tell the overhead light and smoke detector were moved in the living room, as well as various outlets throughout the apartment, as if several students were given a go at proper installation.  I can tell they were moved because of the outlines on the ceiling and walls where no dirt or sunlight could reach to fade the area where the fixtures used to be. 

That, and the gaping holes that were left behind.

None of that fancy spackle-and-repaint business for this place, no sir.  Only the transplanted bathroom light switch got that kind of treatment; the rest of the gutted electrical outlets have been left like eyeless sockets, unblinking and--forgive the pun--rather unsightly.

The wiring, as wonderful as it is, could easily be forgiven if the rest of the place were in good condition.  But we arrive now at the second w, the walls, which present an even bigger challenge when it comes to decorating and making the place home.  Not only are the walls thin and painted a depressing, dirty off-white color, they seem to have contracted some sort of disease during the electrical surgery, symptoms of which include cracking, crumbling, and, on occasion, tearing.

In the living room alone are two very long, jagged cracks we've had to cover up with wall hangings.  Pretty material or tapestries have single-handedly saved our living room from looking like it would break in half if you made too much commotion.  (Breathing, for example.)  Paintings, too, can be used to patch up the wounds.  My favorite is a spot in the bedroom that looks like Wolverine dragged his claws across the wall.  Someone attempted to repair the damage with spackle, but they forgot to take the extra step and repaint the area, so a painting now covers it like a custom-designed band-aid.

Unfortunately, not everything can be covered up.  The corner by my roommate's bed is crumbling so much that the two sides barely meet, and you can see inside to the dusty recesses of the walls.  Dusty and spidery, I should say.  She's been killing at least one big one a day, and I know she hasn't been keeping track of the little ones.  I stay out of it because it's not my side of the room, but I'm not thrilled to know our crumbling wall is an arachnid hub.  We try to vacuum it out as often as possible, but you have to be careful not to knock off any more chunks with the hose. 

I had a good laugh about the walls with my roommate this morning as she set off to buy a slipcover for our loveseat, taking a curtain tie and an arm protector from the sofa slipcover as color samples.

"That's a smart idea," I said as she untied a curtain panel.

"I could probably take some of the wall, too, since there are so many places where it's coming off," she replied, and we both cracked up.

The thing is, it's funny.  The two w's and all the other places the apartment went wrong are actually entertaining.  It's hilarious that Wolverine came in here and tore up the place.  It's hysterical that my roommate gets dive-bombed by spiders in her sleep (ok, maybe it's only funny because it's not happening to me).   Life would not be the same if this were a dream house with aesthetically-pleasing outlets and no need for tapestries.  For better or worse, in sickness and in electrical surgery, the "hovel" certainly keeps you on your toes.

I could live without the spiders, though.