When we bought our tile a week ago, I imagined that we would start working on the shower right away, finishing it in the evenings, a little at a time. As it turned out, the week was crazy with meetings and working late, and we opted to wait until the weekend, when we would have 3 days of uninterrupted work time.
It was 11 a.m. yesterday (Saturday) when we started. The weather man had predicted the temperature to reach nearly 100 degrees, so we set up the outdoor part of our work station first by situating the patio umbrella to knock the sun off of us, and directing a large box fan toward the table where we'd be doing the cutting.
Step 1: hang the 5' x 3' tile backer board, which would have to be cut to fit the small shower cubicle. We'd watched internet videos on how to do this. Piece of cake, they'd said. Just mark a line with a pencil, score the line with a utility knife, and snap the board in two along the cut, they'd said. We dragged the first piece of 5' x 3' backer board onto the table, marked it, and scored it. It did not just snap in two, like the video guys said it would. The problem was that we were cutting only a 1" strip off the long side of the board; there wasn't enough room to grasp it or put weight behind it for a clean break. We scored and scored and scored. We flipped the board over and scored some more. Finally, after about 45 minutes, we managed to break off the 1" strip, one ragged little piece at a time. Our backer board was dotted with big drops of our sweat.
"This scoring-and-snapping technique ain't gonna work," I said to The Husband as we raised up, our backs aching from having bent over the table for so long. "We need power tools."
Years ago at Christmas, my mother gave the family men-folk a Craftsman All-in-One cutting tool. We had never used the one she'd given to The Husband, but just last week, my nephew had commented that it was "the stuff." I fished it out of the utility room. We inserted a cutting bit, took it outside, plugged it up, and tried it. The cutting bit finally punched through the cement board, but it would not then proceed along the line we'd drawn. We switched bits. Same deal. "We need a cutting bit for masonry," The Husband said. I said I'd run to the hardware store to get one.
On the way to the store, I remembered how the video guys had cut the holes for their pipes. They'd drawn squares instead of circles. They'd drilled holes at each corner of the square and used a jigsaw to cut the lines between the holes. We'd already looked for our jigsaw but had not found it. I'd buy one at the hardware store, along with some masonry blades and, for good measure, a masonry cutting bit for the Craftsman tool.
The hardware store did not have a masonry cutting bit, but they did hook me up with a jigsaw and three masonry blades. I brought them home, and we went back to work. We cheered when we brought the first piece of board inside and discovered that the holes we'd cut actually fit over the plumbing pipes. I held the board in place while The Husband nailed it. He'd not finished nailing the top of the board when he bashed his thumb with the hammer. I sent him to put a Band-Aid on his bleeding thumb while I finished nailing that piece. We went back outside to cut another board.
The first jigsaw blade broke as we were cutting the second board. We inserted a new blade and kept working. The cutting went painfully slow. Since we were cutting such small strips from the edges of the boards, the vibration was terrible. Our marked lines were a blur, and we'd have to stop every inch or two to make sure we were actually cutting on the lines. The air under the umbrella was thick with cement dust, and we nearly suffocated inside our masks despite the breeze from the box fan. Sweat poured. A horsefly bit me on the neck, sending waves of pain-chills down my arm. Our noses were full of cement dust boogers.
Whose idea was this, anyway? When I voiced this thought aloud, The Husband cut me the "I am going to kill you" look.
We kept sawing and hammering. Broke another saw blade. Hammered the thumb and made it bleed again. Realized that if we'd hung the board on the back wall sideways instead of lengthwise, we wouldn't have to cut skinny strips to fill in. Decided to take that board down.
5:30 p.m. - "I'm going to take a short break and stir up the banana pudding," I said to The Husband as he was removing the ill-fitting board. His sister had invited us to a cookout and pool party at her house, just down the road. We were supposed to be there around 7, and I was to bring dessert.
6 p.m. - Back to work. We had to cut two more boards to finish the back wall, and then we'd be done, or so we thought.
7:30 p.m. - I gave a little squeal of triumph as we hung the last sheet: "Yay! We're done! Let's get cleaned up and go eat!" The Husband turned around to come out of the shower stall, and then he gave a little groan. We had not yet covered the "step-over" (the little ledge at the front of the shower) with backer board. That would take three more strips. Skinny strips. Pain-in-the-*ss strips. At the rate we'd been going, it'd take us another two hours to do that part.
"Tomorrow," we said in unison.
I headed for the shower in another bathroom. When the water hit my cement-dust-soaked hair and skin, I was momentarily afraid of being turned into a concrete statue. "Do yourself a favor," I told The Husband when I got out of the shower, "and shake some of the cement dust out of your hair before you wet it."
Thank goodness someone else was in charge of cooking supper.
Today, we'll saw and install the remaining strips, seal the seams, and, hopefully, begin tiling. I would not dare to venture a guess as to how long it'll take us to finish.
Come look for us if you don't hear from me soon. Since today's work will involve some bad-ass adhesive and small spaces, you'll probably find one or both of us stuck to a wall in the shower.
No comments:
Post a Comment