Absolutely this trip there were to be no building projects undertaken in the Tucson house. This trip was strictly to be for golfing, playing and getting into shape for retirement. So this year, no tools were loaded into the Rendezvous.
That was before four floor tiles cracked and heaved upward in the mud room hallway.
Examination revealed that the bond between the thinset and the floor had failed and the pressure forced the tiles to pop up. We have five spare tiles in the garage, so mixing up some cement and grouting in four replacements should be a simple matter. Getting a workman to bid on such a small job would result in a high bid and the usual frustrations of working on Arizona time.
No, if we only had tools, we could get this little project done ourselves.Good fortune came last night at a neighborhood salad and pizza party. Meet Tom from Long Island, New York, now living three doors down with his wife. He's a retired firefighter, who has accumulated a lifetime of miscellaneous expertise and the hand tools to go with it.
This morning he dropped by with the requisite floats, trowels, sponges, chisel (freshly sharpened), hammer and enough advice to get the job done.
Kathleen, who loves Manhattan, drew him into a nice conversation about all things New York. He understands that Midwesterners have trouble following the brisk, pushy speech patterns of New Yorkers, so we think he took it down a notch for us. Nice guy. His history is Brooklyn and Long Island more than Manhattan. He enjoys the famous street vendor "dirty water hot dogs" that get their unique flavor by being boiled all week in the same oily water. (We really didn't want to know why we enjoyed those hot dogs so much.)
We're grateful to have neighbors like this. Makes a nasty job on old knees a lot easier.
