As I'm still having a pain day here's another old piece
Michael's Bathroom ©
by
Michael Casey
Six months previously Michael had decorated his
living room , he
had to , the white walls had turned to a nicoteen
stained yellow in places
such was the downside of having a South facing
living room . Now it was
the turn of the bathroom again . The bathroom was
very small , not even
enough room to swing a cat , it was about 7 foot by
six foot , which was
just big enough for the bath , the sink and the bog
. Why did people want
big bathrooms anyway ? You weren't going to hold
dinner parties in there ,
or go jogging , yes Michael was used to and by now
satisfied with his
small bathroom . However it always seemed to need
decorating , he just
needed to open the window more often and let the
steam out . Michael just
loved to wallow in the bath like a Hippopotamus ,
he had a radio on the
windowsill so he could listen to Heart FM while he
shaved and bathed and
watched the spiders . There were spiders galore in
his bathroom , his
mother always said spiders brought money with them
, perhaps snared in
their webs , Michael even looked under the bath
behind the panel just in
case the spiders had indeed brought gold with them
, sadly all he found
was yet more spiders and their webs .
Years ago at work the offices were tarted up , so
new carpet was
laid in the reception , so Michael had begged for
the off cuts , and
persuaded Paul Robinson to give him a lift home
with it . Once home though
it was late Michael got out some very sharp
scissors and laid the carpet in
the bathroom , he'd have a posh bathroom now , no
more cold lino for him .
Actually he did make a good job of the carpet
fitting , there was some
left over too . Now the bad thing about ordinary
carpet in the bathroom is
that it gets manky , firstly because Michael
splashed a lot in the bath ,
his mother had always told him off for splashing in
the bath since he was
a child , she was afraid the water would leak
though the ceiling into the
living room below . He did not have that problem
now in his own house ,
why , because he had a concrete floor . So the carpet
got wet , due to the
splashing in the bath . Michael was also a bad shot
, so he'd occasionally
piss on the floor , when he came rushing home dying
for a piss after
having too many shandies . Also if you spill
domestos or other bleach on
carpet it changes colour .
As for the ceiling and walls , they needed cleaning
and painting
every now and then because of all the steam and
Michael not opening the
window often enough . So Michael would go up the
road to Fads and buy
five litres of white emulsion for a fiver , then
scattering newspapers all
over the bathroom he'd attack the walls and ceiling
. He soon got high and
had a headache with all the paint fumes , even
though the window was
wide open , the radio was blaring too , he always
had music on
constantly , whether he was painting , eating ,
washing shaving or just
picking his nose . Michael's painting had more
attack than finesse to it ,
splash it here , splash it there , quantity more
than quality , his father
had always told him to use a small amount on the
brush , a tiny amount ,
but Michael always overloaded his brush , paint was
cheap after all , a
tin of paint only cost the price of a couple of
pints and a bag of chips
after all .
Once finished Michael was splattered in paint , his
grey hair now
turned white , his painting clothes , now more
paint than clothes , his
watch had a white thumb print on it , his
underpants had paint on too ,
for no matter what he did he was always hitching
his jeans and
consequently he had paint everywhere . Michael
stepped back to admire his
handiwork , but being as the bathroom was so small
he bumped into the bog
and ending up sitting on it . "It'll do "
was his usual comment , and it
would have too , he couldn't afford a real
decorator .A fiver to do his
bathroom , but a decorator would charge 100 times
that and take days , it
took Michael an hour and a half tops , he'd finish
in time for Star Trek
and that was important , he had his priorities
right . So looking at his
splattered watch , Michael gathered up the paint
splattered newspaper
which was protecting his fancy carpet . The only
trouble though was the
fact that his shoes were stuck to the newspapers ,
so Michael had to sit
on the bog and pull the newspaper off his shoes ,
invariably a spot or two
of paint stayed on the carpet . So Michael had rub
hard to clean the
carpet , and take his shoes off so that he wouldn't
leave footprints
everywhere . "Ah it'll do , " repeated
Michael as he looked back at the
bathroom from the safety of the kitchen , he'd then
strip off and put all
his painting clothes into the washing machine
,invariably the light was
fading now , so Michael had the kitchen light on ,
so his neighbours would
be treated to the dubious privilege of seeing
Michael naked and paint
spattered standing in his kitchen .
Star Trek was great as usual , Michael only
recognised the
metaphors after the show , but he really enjoyed
the show , he'd been
watching it for 30 years now , the original and
then the follow on shows .
After his dinner Michael ventured back into the
bathroom , "Who needs
decorators , the thieving bastards" . Michael
was satisfied with his
handiwork , it'd do till the next time . The next
time came , when the
carpet was manky , so Michael threw out the carpet
and searched under the
bed in the spare room , that’s where he kept the
rest of the carpet . As
luck would have it there was just enough to cover
the bathroom floor
again. So once more he got out the dangerous
scissors and cut the carpet to
shape , and yes he did do a good job of it , carpet
fitting he could do ,
it was painting he was useless at . Jackson Pollark
, the artist who threw
paint at the canvas would have been impressed by
Michael's bathroom ,
anybody else would have said , "was there an
explosion ?"
So time passed and the carpet was manky , so
Michael threw it out,
so what would he do next ? He hit upon the
brilliant idea of painting the
concrete floor . It only took half an hour and then
"hey presto" he had a
redecorated bathroom , only he hadn't thought of
one thing . What happens
when you paint a floor white ? It shows all the
dirt , and it shows up all
the spiders that are not spiders , if you know what
I mean . So Michael
improvised , he was good at improvising , 20 years
as a computer operator
and he'd leant to improvise , if nothing else . So
he painted the floor
blue , that colour wouldn't show up spiders that
weren't spiders . And he
was right . He had another problem now , because
he'd used ordinary
emulsion , when it got wet , it came off , so soon
the soles of Michael's
slippers went blue , and soon the blue was
spattered with white , as
toothpaste and soap suds stained the blue floor .
Michael persevered, he
painted the floor blue every couple of weeks or so
, blue paint was more
expensive than white , but the one tin enabled him
paint it ten times or
so .Eventually the walls needed painting again , so
Michael thought he'd
try blue on the walls , only it was too dark , he
didn't like it , and
more to the point he ran out of paint halfway
through . So he went up to
Fads again for white , though he was nearly tempted
into buying a soft
coloured paint as it was half price , but after a
bit of soul searching he
stuck with white , five litres for a fiver .
Another problem reared its head , if you try
painting over a
strong colour , the colour underneath shows through
. So on Boxing Day 98
Michael spent the day painting , or smearing as his
mother used to call it
, he spent the day smearing two coats of white over
the blue . And yes it
did look dreadful . New Years Eve came and Michael's
bathroom was covered
in copies of the Telegraph , it was a good read
with great coverage , why
just one copy was enough to cover all Michael's
floor , he'd have to write
to the editor to thank him . So Michael got drunk
on New Year's Eve and
ended up dancing with his friend Dave , Dave being
a Helmult Khol look
alike . Once home with a hangover , Michael
realised that in the morning
he'd have to give another coat or two to the
bathroom . Michael could see
the light at the end of the tunnel , or rather the
bottom of the five
litre tin of paint , once he finished the tin , the
job would be finished
whether it was finished or not , the job would be
finished . He'd had
enough , and he had a massive headache due to the
paint fumes .
"Finished , at last , thank God , "
yelled Michael , yes he
had come to the bottom of the tin , so finished or
not , it was finished.
So Michael went and watched Star Trek on the
satellite . The bathroom took
forever to dry as it was Winter and the atmosphere
was cold and wet . So
it was a couple of days before Michael could finish
the bathroom
transformation . He found some old curtains he had
in his pantry , he had
originally bought them for the kitchen , but once
he got them home and
tried hanging them he was annoyed to discover they
were too short , so
they had ended up in his pantry on a shelf next to
his iron . To his
delight the new curtains were just the right length
for his bathroom , and
they were nice and bright too . So what to dod next
? Michael pulled the
panel out from in front of the bath , as luck would
have it he had a spare
plastic shower curtain ; so he wrapped the panel in
a new shower curtain ,
a flowery pattern on it , and it would match the
shower curtain he had
already up . Finally as he had to lay the lino ,
the lino he swopped a new
pair of shoes for . His brother had some spare lino
, and Michael as usual
had a spare pair of shoes in his shoe mountain at
the bottom of his
wardrobe . So he got the lino , and his brother got
the shoes as a Xmas
present , they had both laughed as they struck the
deal during their
regular weekly telephone conversation . Their dead
mother would have
approved too , "look after each other"
was her motto . There was one snag
though , Michael couldn't find his scissors , so
how could he cut the lino?
So he improvised with the bread knife , a flash of
the knife here , a
flash of the knife there , it was hard work , he
was soon covered in sweat
but after 45 minutes he was finished . So he just
had to slip the freshly
covered bath panel back in position . So kicking it
back in position ,
Michael had finally transformed his bathroom .
Michael stepped back to
admire his handiwork , accidently knocking the
bread knife down the toilet
but he didn't hear the splash , as the radio was
blaring out a Nat King
Cole song "Let there be Love" . Michael
looked at his freshly painted
bathroom , walls and ceiling had been painted , new
bright curtains were
hanging down , and the lino was new and bright too
, he had even put a
layer of plastic and newspapers underneath to act
as insulation , and he
had a little mat too that he could step on when he
got out the bath . Yes
it was an utter transformation , the best it had
looked in the 12 years
he'd lived there . All this activity had made him
really hungry , he'd
bought a loaf from the bakery , an old fashioned
big tasty loaf , all he
had to do was cut it into big slices , now where
had he left the bread
knife ?
End
