Staining a Fence: Vietnam Edition

My toes are still orange. Technically they are "Heart Redwood" because I stepped in the tray of Duckback stain while wearing open toed shoes. Just one of many transgressions and OSHA violations this weekend during a father-daughter staining marathon. My dad and I straight up stained a thousand million T-Rex square feet of wood fencing that just would. not. quit.

We recently moved and actually have to care about the premises on which we now live. From day one my dad has been warning us about the terrors of unstained wood. It grays. It rots. It's U-G-L-Y and it don't have no alibi it's ugly. Can you tell someone used to be a cheerleader? He kept telling us how he stained the fence of our last home and it looked so great, even after many years etc. 

So we finally get some nice weather, not too sunny, not too rainy, just the right Goldilocks stretch of cool days for this massive project. Only I have no idea how massive it's about to get. We "tested" the stain on what happened to be the most difficult part of the fence--the gate with all this lattice work at the top. And because we are the most impatient people on earth, the "test" turned into a full blown staining of the gate. It took 2 hours. To do about 15 square feet of gate. On one side. Two people.

I was like, "Dad, you did the entire fence of the other house? By yourself? HOW?!?! Just this gate took FOREVER. And it's about 1/100th of the amount of fence that we still have to do."

And he's all, "I didn't do the whole fence of the other house. Don't you remember? The fence was concrete blocks. I only did the gate."

Me: "????*&%@#%^#??? How did you ever think we could do this ENTIRE FENCE by ourselves then???!!!"

Not off to a good start. I immediately asked my neighbors if they knew of anyone we could hire to undertake this ridiculous job.

No one had any recommendations. I'm like, there's no way we can do this. Then I found a video on Youtube of some guy using a sprayer to stain a fence. So I immediately call my dad, "We have to get a sprayer. We can do this if we have a sprayer." He's like, "I got one for 12 bucks from Home Depot."

Buoyed but skeptical, I plunge into the job with my dad. It's a hodgepodge in our garage and backyard. We started with 5 cans of stain, three brushes ranging from 1.5 inches to 5 inches wide, the plastic pump sprayer, a 6 inch roller, one paint tray, a Simpson's mug, two random tarps, and a wooden spoon for stirring the stain.  

But this is no ordinary fence where the boards are just side by side. It's like some special fence where the boards overlap. Very pretty and tight knit so you don't have cracks in the fence that any perv can peek through. The problem is you now have 40% more surface area to cover because now you have to stain both sides of every other plank. This shit just got really real.

Turns out the best way to stain a fence is not with a sprayer. Too messy and difficult to control and coat the planks evenly. Use a roller. And small brushes to the the sides of the planks. And don't make the mistake of not realizing that rollers actually come in a 3 inch width. Which means that instead of laboriously brushing the stain onto all the narrow planks like we did for half the job, you can just roller the crap out of everything and just use the brush sparingly. 

Hello Houston. HALFWAY through the job, when we were already singing the praises of the big roller for how fast it was covering the big planks, the lightbulb went off like, "Gee, maybe we should get a small roller for the in-between planks." Ding ding ding. Suddenly we cut our worktime in half.

But it is done. I have the photos to prove it. Although some of my more discerning neighbors say they want time lapsed video proof from start to finish of me actually doing more than posing with a roller.

My dad and I know the truth. 2.5 days of father daughter huffing bonding. Yes those are shorts he's wearing and yes that is stain all over his shin. No socks with those sandals. It's a two for one safety nightmare.

But I will say, if someone grafted the elephantine skin from my father's toes and heels and cloned it, we would have a new source of body armor for the United States military. Nothing can get through that petrified epidermis. 

My father would also only wear one glove, a la Michael Jackson, until the last day. I guess the Oompa Loompa hand was starting to bother him. He also refused to put his mask back on after the first couple hours. I joined him on the last day and went mask free. I think the hallucinations from the fumes made me a better stainer. More artistic.

It is quite a sense of accomplishment though, and one that I will gladly show off with a psuedo Southern accent to everyone who visits. That thar is man's work, gall dang it. 

As The Good Doctor put it, "Aside from childbirth, this is your most impressive physical feat."

Baby Videos

Every now and then Asian Grandpa sends me a home run from YouTube. 

This video is so funny because it's like watching a Toddler Dragon Lady. "I'M 4, YOU NOT 4" at :35 seconds in is pretty priceless. And all the pointing fingers. It's so Vietnamesey. At least the boy holds his own. I'm very impressed.

And this video is simply inexplicable. The comments are brutal but I did shed some tears of laughter watching this one. I just don't know exactly what is going on, and the herky jerky quality of the video is a little Paranormal Activity-esque. And the sound effects. I don't know where to start or end my assessment. I can only say I've never seen anything like this. Disturbing and funny all at once. #distunny.  

CA Carpool Stickers

Let me count the ways I appreciate thee. And there will be a moral to my story. Bear with me.

There is no feeling quite like driving home in my Prius in the carpool lane. By myself. I experience it every night now on my new shift, which puts me squarely into the dreadful evening commute. 

Thank you Governator Schwarzenegger and the people of California and any and every single person who had anything to do with issuing carpool stickers to encourage people to buy hybrid cars like the Toyota Prius and Honda Civic. It totally worked on me.

To people who don't like the carpool stickers: Suck it.

I remember the trip to LA I took with The Good Doctor back in 2005. I thought the Prius was the ugliest troll car I'd ever seen, besides the 2 door Honda Insight with wheelcovers. Nothing is uglier than THAT car. I was living in Arizona at the time, planning to move back to California when my reporting contract at Fox ended in December of 2006. We were getting married, and I was going home, by hook or by crook, even if I had to leave TV news and work at BCBG. My closet would be so hot right now.

I kept telling my future husband, "That is such an ugly car. Why do I have to buy such an ugly car? I'm gonna end up with that fugly car." I knew I was going to be heading home to Bay Area traffic, possible commuter hours, and life on the 101. (Yes haters, I called it "the" 101. No, I am not from SoCal. I just call it "the" 101. I've actually had people call the station to say I called it "the" 101 and "how dare" I not know that up in Northern California we call it 101 or U.S. 101 or Highway 101 but NOT "the" 101. Yes. Same people who take the time to call a TV station to complain about the anchor's lipstick color. The the the 101!)

Anyway, fast forward to mid-2006. The reality of moving back to CA and commuter hell spurred me to buy a Prius, hoping that I would get back in time to apply for the yellow carpool lane stickers that allow hybrids to use that lane, even with just one person. It seemed like a no brainer. I HATE commuting and spending time in traffic. Some of you can do books on CD or you don't mind living out in the country where the air smells so clean and the people are nice. I just want to get from home to work and back again without extending my middle finger. 

I got here in January of 2007. Lucky for me, Arnold had issued 10K more stickers, starting January 1, 2007, because the original 75 thousand stickers were snatched up faster than Four Loko at a frat party. I just so happened to arrive back in California January 5, 2007.

My dad called the DMV for me to see if there were still any stickers to be had. The person who answered said "Nope, they're all gone." My dad was like, "Already?" DMV worker: "Yep. All 10 thousand are already gone."

I cried. I had a fugly car and no carpool stickers. 

My dad called the DMV again. This time, a non-imbecile answered the phone and told him there were, in fact, 1400 stickers left. Then she proceeded to tell him that in order to get one of those stickers, the BEST thing to do was to follow the DMV instructions EXACTLY. Get a Fastrak, fill out the carpool sticker application, and mail it to the P.O. Box in Sacramento with the 8.00 check. Don't UPS it. Don't FedEx it. Don't take it to the office in person or drive there because they won't take your information at the DMV. Just mail the application and check to that random P.O. Box and the carpool sticker fairy would take over.

I was so ready to drive to Sacramento and hand over hundreds of dollars. 8600 stickers had already been issued in 5 days. I had to get mine. But thanks to my dad's second call to the DMV, and that lovely, competent, helpful government worker, I followed the instructions to a T.

My stickers showed up two weeks later, on the same Friday that the Mercury News printed an article saying all the stickers were GONE.

*Making sign of the cross* I have saved hours of my life from the black hole of sitting in traffic thanks to that DMV angel.  

Moral to my post: always ask at least one more time if you don't get the answer you want to hear. You never know if you just got the idiot of the day who's giving you false information. 

Better yet, make your dad do it.

Rules

I owe my dad for all sorts of things throughout my life. Lately though, it's been a rocky road and not in the 'best flavor of ice cream ever invented' kind of way.

But for the sake of Emmy, I'm trying not to be a total douche when he comes over to visit.

In fact, I even took him and Asian Grandma to lunch this weekend at Elephant Bar. To try out their three course special lunch with $1.99 Mai Tais. As an Asian, I feel it is my duty to drink the Asian drink and to take advantage of any and all coupons and specials.

We're seated snugly in a booth. Me by the window, Emmy, asleep in her carseat, The Good Doctor, wishing he was asleep in a carseat after a long work week and very little sleep since he stayed up to wait for me Friday night and then got up super early to go to New Moon Saturday morning. Yes, dammit, I have dragged him into this. Marriage is messy business.

Anyway, we get our food and then, per usual, my dad begins his dissection of the meal. The rice is too wet. Chew chew. Actually, the rice is OK. Chew chew. I need hot sauce. Chew chew. These ribs are too tender. The meat is too soft. Like it's cooked for people with no teeth. I have teeth. I like to chew. Chew chew.

The Good Doctor looks up from his macademia nut crusted chicken and says all matter of fact, "So many rules." And Asian Grandma looks up to the heavens like "Don't I know it," because this is the man she's been living with for the past 33 years and she is SO over his food drama. I start laughing. And my dad is like, "No. I'm just saying the way things should be done." And The Good Doctor's like, "Yeah, kinda like rules. Rules tell you the way things should be done."

Asian Grandma is just shaking her head and concentrating on getting her coconut shrimp off the skewer. And The Good Doctor's like, "Huy's Rules." And he sits back from his meal, and starts listing them out loud. In a subtle accent that's a toned down version of my dad's.

"Rule #1: Must have rice everyday."

"Rule #2: Rice must not be too dry. Rice must not be too wet."

"Rule #3: Must have hot sauce with every meal."

"Rule #4: No salty with sweet." Because my dad's ribs came with a side of cinnamon apples on the same plate, next to the cole slaw. And he was like, "Oh no no," as he separated the sweet from the salty. "I NEVER eat something sweet with my food like this tsk tsk."

"Rule #5: Hot. Hot food has to be hot. If it's not the right tempoorature, it's not good."

"Rule #6: No water with the meal. It die-loots the food tastes." (Plural. My dad adds 's' to everything.)

And by now we're all laughing. But I'm roaring. Because The Good Doctor is on a roll. After 15 years together, and countless meals with my dad giving the play by play about every aspect of his food, The Good Doctor is Letting It Go.

So many rules. Including, "Rule #7: Don't talk too much. We don't talk a lot when we're eating, though. When it's time to eat, eat!" (My dad throws "though" into sentences all the time. Makes you wonder what he's referring to, what subordinate clause you missed from a previous conversation.)

So next time you're over for dinner, listen. You'll pick up a rule or two, I'm sure.