Drunken Decorating
Decorating is something best done sober. However, once I have a few drinks, I start feeling “creative.” I have had good results with drunken creativity in the past. In Okinawa, I went through a period where I would arrive home after drinking at the O-club and spend a few hours covering items in washi paper or folding origami cranes. My projects turned out well. Now, however, the stakes are a bit higher. My creativity extends to making permanent changes to the house. If you see me drunk and looking to be crafty, please hide the drill and hammer.
Drunken decorating should be a crime. If it’s late at night, you know your neighbor has been drinking, and then you hear the sound of hammering, please call the police. Your neighbor is better off in protective custody than causing wanton destruction. Perhaps they’ll be handed some origami paper while in the drunk tank.
It isn’t the making of holes in the wall that is a problem. I can hit a nail and hold a drill while intoxicated. The problem is numbers. I can’t seem to measure or perform basic math while under the influence.
My first experience with drunken decorating was when I tried, after two beers*, to hang a mirror. This project only required driving two nails in the wall, but thanks to my impaired measurement and observation skills, I had to hammer one of those nails in three different spots. While ripping it out of one spot, I took a large chunk of wall out with it. The mirror looked great when I finished, if you overlooked the gaping hole in the wall next to it.
A few weeks later, I decided, with the help of a couple glasses of wine, that it was time to install an embroidered hanging on the living room wall. This time, I wrote my measurements down to avoid any mistakes. Still, I couldn’t add and concluded that 45 plus 35 equals 70, not 80. I didn’t realize my hole was in the wrong place until I had drilled it and nearly finished pounding in a hollow wall anchor. Thankfully, Mike was there to pull it out, once I realized my error. I suppose my accuracy had improved since my last project; I made only three holes, where two were needed.
The moral of the story: drinking and decorating don’t mix, especially if your screw-ups are going to leave a mark. Friends don’t let friends decorate drunk!
*yeah – I’m a lightweight
posted by Kasmira at 11.1.05
2 Comments:
Oh, I don't know. The year I spent in Monterey, I had a roommate with whom I shared a 10'x15' room. We both made $314 a paycheck and had been generously provided by the N.A.V.Y. (stands for Never Again Volunteer Yourself), with two single beds, two wall lockers, one desk and one chair. Most of our decorating decisions involved pizza, beer, and duct tape. Cardboard, tape, and alcohol and only one chair can give rise to an amazing array of home decorating ideas. We even built a floor to ceiling partition that could be put up and taken down between Friday morning inspections. I was especially proud of my Adirondack style chair fashioned from pizza boxes, beer case, tape, and some purloined PVC. It was very comfortable and could be stowed under the bed, behind the under-bed drawers and away from prying khaki eyes (no hard feelings).
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