Mistakes

I have made lots of mistakes.  Mistakes in life.  Mistakes at work.  Mistakes when driving.  Mistakes when cooking. 

Mistakes are part of life.  We learn and improve from our mistakes. Without mistakes we would not know how to be better, do better, think better. 

So often, I have found, that many of the "mistakes" I've made turn out to be blessings in disguise.  Small things like forgetting my wallet (or shoes, or keys, or phone) and having to go back, but because of that, I missed a huge traffic backup. 

Some mistakes have no magical blessings. Sometimes the magical blessing is learning "That was stupid. I'm not doing that again!"

Sometimes it takes years to find the mistake and years to find the blessing and years learn from the mistake. 

Then there are mistakes in remodeling.

These mistakes I usually find very quickly.  Usually with a thump to my head. 

I spent the day working in the bathroom at the Bungalow.  I learned from painting the kitchen that even though the walls have been painted, I needed to prime them first.  (I don't know what type of paint they used, but my paint doesn't want to stick to their paint.) Primer seems to help.

There's an old bathroom ceiling fan we plan to replace, so removing the old one before painting only seemed logical.

As I was removing the fan, I *should* have taken a knife and cut the old paint around the fan box.  {Mistake #1}

Instead, as I was removing the fan, I dropped it, and instead of the fan falling to the floor, the fan remained attached to the paint on the ceiling and dangled. Thinking that the fan was probably just barely attached to the paint, I pulled on the dangling fan. {Mistake #2}

The paint remained attached to the fan and peeled across the ceiling.  (What IS this paint made of!?!?!?)

I'll just peel a little more until it stops peeling and then sand. {Mistakes #3 through #7}

Well maybe if I paint the primer over it you won't notice it. {Mistake #8}

This situation has gone from bad to worse.  Sanding didn't even help.  It was a mess.  The only saving this is to smooth joint compound over the area to smooth it out.  *sigh*
 

It's better than it was, but set me back a day. 

The other important thing I learned about making mistakes, don't panic.  Or don't panic for long. Breathe and re-group. 


And make sure you have the situation partially under control by the time Walt Kowalski gets there. 

 

J