A job half done...

Hello friends and countrymen, I am sure you are all supremely curious about the goings-on up here in the Tennessee valley. You haven't missed out on anything major--the baby has yet to arrive. I spent some time doing chores on Thursday and laid low with my lady. After knocking out some more chores on Friday, I snuck out for a quick nine at the golf course. Apparently the time off from my favorite hobby has done great things for my game; I shot nine-over for the front nine, playing legitimate bogey golf. I landed six greens and had four pars. It was probably the best round of golf I have ever played at that course. It seems that papa was a rolling stone and this stone gathers no moss!! Later my favorite lady(a.k.a. Wifey) and I went out to dinner(probably the last one of those outings for a while) at the Mellow Mushroom on the Cumberland Avenue strip. We had a wonderful time and enjoyed seeing our friends again. I went back to work today sore and tired from sheer exhaustion. I know I should be taking it easier with the upcoming arrival, but I feel compelled to cram as much as possible into my days off. I have tackled refinishing the deck to pass the time and the job has been quite effective in that regard. I have to mention that the previous owner of our house, a gentleman by the name of David Seals, did me no favors with the upkeep of the deck. He decided it would be quick, easy, and cheap to slap on a layer of solid color deck stain instead of taking the time to seal it with a semi-transparent deck stain. "What's the big deal?", you ask. Once you have painted a deck with solid stain, you have basically two choices when you begin refinishing. You can pick out another doo-doo brown color to slap on over the old crappy paint, or you can remove the old paint(what little is left of it) and do the job correctly. Why strip the old paint? Reason #1--Solid color paint, while inexpensive, is only suitable for accent pieces and will not hold up to foot traffic and constant sun exposure. Reason #2--It only lasts about a year(and looks like crap) and the next season you are stuck repainting the whole shebang again. The better product is a tinted stain which lasts up to five years and allows the natural beauty of the wood grain to show through. It protects deep into the wood and prevents water and mildew damage. Reason #3--Solid color paint actually encourages mildew and water damage, as well as absorbing a lot of extra heat that burns your tootsies on hot days. So now I am in the process of stripping off all of David Seals's not-so-handiwork. This led to the descriptor "Shortcut Seals" being coined to describe any project that is done in such a way to be shoddy, cheap, and create a minimum of five times the work that it would have taken to do the job properly the first time. Thanks for nothing Shortcut Seals! Have a great evening and remember, a job half done is better not begun....especially if you are going to Shortcut Seals it!