Turn Ugly To Beauty
MF set the hobbyshow as February activity. Hobby? I asked myself, do I have a hobby? I enjoy working, fixing everything that is not functioning properly, solving problems, learning new skills, traveling year around: go camping and hiking in summer, go skiing in winter, fishing, as well as woodworking, house maintenance, renovation and building new house and etc. But, do those account as hobbies?
I checked the definition of hobby. In dictionary, hobby is defined as “an activity done regularly in one's leisure time for pleasure”. There are three keywords: regularly, leisure time, and pleasure. Therefore, most of my activities I did in my leisure time well fit into the frame of the definition of hobby. Among those activities, I chose to start with a project I finished 3 years ago.
March 18, Sunday,
After finished my class and lunch time, I set on a trip to a town in Ontario to renovate a rental property before putting it on market, with my SUV full of building materials and tools. The rental property is about 1500 km away from my home. My plan is: stop one night at an Airbnb then arrive at my rental property the next early afternoon, and I would return to home on March 27 to go back to work. I asked 9 days holiday time. There would be one whole week time for me to finish the renovation including painting, installing new floor and repairing everything that needs a fix. The floor materials were preordered online and would be picked up locally. The paint and other materials were already purchased and were with me in the vehicle.
March 19, Monday,
I woke up in the early morning about 5 am after 7 hours of sleeping, wishing to arrive at my destination in the afternoon to arrange the floor to be delivered on Tuesday. Once I arrived, I checked the house and listed the tasks need to be done: fix kitchen ceiling, kitchen faucet and basin drain need to be replaced and repaired, bathroom faucet and drain need a replacement and fix, bathroom medicine cabinet needs replacement. One bedroom’s door and a drywall got some big holes (these holes need to be filled, dried, and sanded before new painting), rip off old carpet, prepare floor for new laminate floor, all the light fixtures need to be either fixed or replaced, and new painting on whole house. The tasks were well beyond what I had planned. Suddenly I felt overwhelmed.
However, I only had to work hard, but no other choice. I run to the store, got the floor delivery arranged, grabbed all the additional materials I needed, then run back to my worksite.
March 20-26, Tuesday to Monday,
During these days, I woke up at 6 am, and worked till 1 or 2 am most of the time, only had time to stop at cooking time. I cook noodles for my lunch and supper. I went to a local restaurant once or two time when I felt too tired to cook. In summary, it was a crazy week. When I finished the project, the 30 yards garbage bin I rented was solidly full of garbage. In the end, what I came to is a dirty, broken, ugly property, and what I left is a neat, clean, warm house. But I would not do a second such project in such a limited time again, never!
March 27, Tuesday,
In the morning, I woke up around 7 am, and found outside a heavy snow fall last night. I packed everything left and hit the road about 8 am to go home, looking at the property, felt exhausted but pleased: the property is ready for market now. I drove about 16 hours and arrived home in the middle of night.
Everything went as planned, except the overwhelming hard work.
Following are some photos to refresh my memories.
Frozen waterfall
Old house ripped of dirty carpet
Renovated house with new floor and paint
Driving back home on a highway like fairytale world
