The joys of home ownership are unending...

Every time something breaks in our building, my landlord (for the next 6 days) likes to say that "the joys of home ownership are unending". And since the building is over 100 years old and has 18 rooms, that's pretty frequently.

But I'm finding the same to be true with my new townhouse, even though it's only 28 years old and has 6 rooms.

I spent a good chunk of this weekend painting. A more accurate description would probably be that I spent the weekend trying to paint, and then having my friend bsom point out how wrong I had done it.

Painting - like assembling furniture, picking out cars that don't break down regularly, or convincing girls to go out with me - is one of those things I'm not good at. I tend to miss spots, to drip, to tape stuff that shouldn't be taped and not tape stuff that should be. I'm also am a bit of a klutz and tend to do things like fall into the wall that's just been painted. I also made the mistake of trying to paint the brick fireplace in my family room, which had been painted beige by the previous owners. I thought a fireplace should be red, and painted it thusly. Unfortunatly, painting brick a dark color is a pain in the arse - it took me longer to paint the fireplace than for BSOM to paint the rest of the room, and there are still spots that aren't perfect.

And if you are curious, I did the bedroom blue, the living room and office a light green called Summer Rapture (so I'll be ready if the end times come to Nottingham), and the family room a color called Badlands Taupe, which looks a little more pink than I thought it would.

Besides the paint stains I need to clean off the trim and ceiling, there is one other much more serious problem with the new Casa De Mad Anthony. My heat pump/air conditer is, to use a technical term, effed. It's leaking. When I bought the house, the carpet seemed really nasty, which is why I was able to get a carpet allowance, and why I'm having new carpeting installed tomorrow. But it looks like the reason for the nasty carpet was in part the fact that the air conditioner leakes. I first noticed a puddle on the floor of the bathroom that's next to my laundry/storage/HVAC room on Sunday, the first day of painting, at night. It didn't seem to be near the toilet or sink, and since I hadn't been drinking I was pretty sure I hadn't pee'd on the floor. So I figured it was something else. Turns out that the A/C is leaking not only in the bathroom but also on the floor in the hallway outside. It seems that the coils in the heat pump are freezing, and when they defrost they dump a bunch of water in the bottom of the unit, where it really isn't supposed to go, and that it then seeps out. There was a ton of water when I came in this morning, and there wasn't much when I left tonight, so I think what happens is that when I turn the AC off before I leave, it gets warm, the ice melts, and it dumps on the floor.

So I've already emailed my boss and told him I'm not coming in tomorrow. I'm going to have to meet the carpet installers and tell them not to install carpet in the hallway, since it's just going to get leaked on - I'll have to do that at a later date. I'm also hoping I can get someone out to look at it. And I'm hoping that it's something cheap to fix. And I'm wishing I had opted for the home warranty.

Or kept renting.