What I hate most…

…about house building is the “p” word. “Lumbing” is the rest of the “p” word. I think “p” was invented by a deranged primitive while locked in a cave by his (her?) contemporaries. After fouling said cave, the deranged soul came up with a way to get rid of body waste by hollowing out a long piece of a tree, then doing the act of elimination on one end while the other end protruded past the stack of rocks that entombed the poor wretch. That simple invention served a purpose that is still done to this day.

That’s the dirty end of plumbing. The clean end is where lovely hot water comes to a Jacuzzi tub. We bought some very nice plumbing parts and provided them to our plumber to install in the wall at the end of the tub. Problem is, being a member of one of the world’s most primitive “professions,” (not the world's oldest profession, but close in kind) he made it so the on/off handle stuck out past the wall way too far for my taste. Like almost an inch (2.5 cm) too far. To remedy the situation requires tearing out the wallboard, un-mounting the valve assembly, removing the thick board to which the assembly was attached, replacing that board with a thin board, re-mounting the valves, then replacing the wallboard so it’s sturdy enough to cover with ceramic tile.

Sounds easy? Well, the thick board was mounted way before any of the wallboard went on. It was never intended to be removed. So I can’t get to the screws that hold it in place without going around to the other side of the wall and tearing out almost two feet (60 cm) of wallboard. Nice, finished, textured and painted wallboard.

So what I have to do instead is make the first hole in the wallboard much bigger so I can get my circular saw in and very carefully cut out a big chunk of the thick board without also cutting into the wallboard on the opposite side, which it touches. It will be difficult since I have almost no room to fit the saw in around the valve assembly which can’t be moved very far left or right. The thin board I need to use as replacement will have to be glued in place, onto the wallboard. Yuck. I know this is getting complicated-sounding, but hey—all this stuff was installed by a simple-minded plumber.

It’s at least a day-long project. So far half the time is spent in deep thought, trying to avoid making a stupid mistake. The other half is spent in rage, throwing things then repairing the damage. (I wish there were a greater range of cuss words; I run out so quickly. They're a good substitute for throwing things.) That doesn’t leave much time for useful work, so I should probably plan to spend another day doing p-word.