PORCH PROJECT - two pillars restored

Today I got two of the pillars put together. Since I am putting 7.5 inch square pillars around a 3.5 inch post I have to cobble together one inch spacers to go inside. Of course nothing is actually one inch - it's all 3/4 for some reason. Somebody knows why but I don't. I happened to have some 1/4 inch flat molding that I could put together with 3/4 inch wood to make an actual inch. Pretty crappy looking but all they have to do is be there.

Here is what they are doing. The pillar boards are nailed to each other and to the spacers placed at the top and bottom of the post. There is a lot of fiddly work and adjusting to do, and nothing is really square or straight, but I am holding my own, so to speak.

Two pillars built, in need of some touchup and paint, but from a distance they look okay. They are certainly not much worse than what was there before. I am working at the limit of my skill and the ability of my tools and as long as you don't look too closely it's alright.

The bummer of the day was, just when I was about to start doing this, Donna told me there was water on the floor of the back room in the basement, near where she keeps some of her books for sale. I wisely had everything up off the floor on an old wooden futon frame for just such an event. It seems an ancient iron water pipe has sprung a slow pinhole leak, and it is very fortunately in a place that it will be relatively easy to replace it with copper. I keep hoping the 80+ year old parts of the plumbing will just wait until I am dead to fail because some of it will be a real pain to replace. So I got to start my work angry and frustrated at having been suddenly jolted out of my focus by another problem. It's been pretty rough the past few weeks with environmental issues - too hot, too sunny, too many people out doing things and raising a ruckus, and I have been generally anxious and depressed over that and my zillions of internal demons I never discuss with anyone. I really have no person or thing I can turn to for relief. Now I have to think of this new thing too.