Sentenced to a weekend of hard labor

Once upon a time on my mission I had this weird illness thing that resembled a sudden onset serious arthritis.  It was weird.  My joints swelled up and every single one of them hurt.  I couldn't hold a pen or pencil to write, or put makeup on.  Climbing stairs was excruciating.  They tested me for arthritis and it came back negative (which was good obviously!) - the doctor couldn't tell me what it was, beyond probably some kind of virus, and to come back if I didn't start feeling better in a week.  Fortunately, I did.  I don't think I've ever been in as much pain since, until possibly this morning.

This weekend was crunch time - the floor guys were coming Monday morning, and everything had to be out a ready for them by then.  So around sessions of conference (I worked on some stuff as long as I could hear, but most of it was too noisy to listen/work)...

Everything out of the kitchen, into the living room.  Not real conducive to living in the living room!

Dining room floor half done.  The carpet came up reasonably easy, and the tack strip wasn't horrible.  What was horrible?  The carpet pad was glued to the floor, and had to be scraped up bit by bit.  Ugh.  And OH MY GOSH is tearing out carpet dirty!  It makes sense, I guess, but I have to admit I was surprised at how much dirt was underneath there.

Also not fun?  The last little bit of plywood subfloor with the 4th layer of old flooring resisted my efforts with everything it had.  This took nearly an hour to get up because it kept splintering.  Working in such a small space made it a lot harder to get leverage and find a safe place for various limbs - I have some ugly scrapes and bruises on legs and arms that happened to be in the spot either the hammer or pry-bar decided to go.

Dining room floor done - making progress!

The last of the trash to haul out.  My trashcans are full, so good thing they pick up tomorrow.  Way back through the doorway you can see that I still have a few tiles to pry up (that would be layers 2 and 3 of old flooring to come up; the ugly green stuff which was the original floor in the house got to stay down.)

And here it finally is!  Aubrey approves.  I still need to put in the trim, which probably won't happen till summer unless I get really motivated some weekend.

The final look.  I'm really happy with how it turned out.

Another view of the final results (minus trim, minus backsplash, with old wallpaper and minus paint - oh, and with lots of dishes to wash but no dishwasher yet!)

So maybe I'm not quite done yet...but it's another step closer and much more functional!  And now I can finally move the stove back in and cook, really cook, for the first time since early February!

This morning I was in total misery.  I have blisters all over my hands from the stupid putty knife, my knees hurt from crawling around on the floor, the muscles in my hands are sore (I wasn't even sure that was possible...), and they are chapped from all the different chemicals and dirt and washing them a million times.  I could barely get the hot water to turn on for a shower - I didn't seem to be able to grip the handle tightly enough to turn it.  I have aches and pains other places, and the hot water sure felt good - except for the various scrapes that stung like crazy.  My hands still hurt - but they've gotten better as the day progressed.  Honestly, it wasn't nearly as bad as that time I was sick on my mission - but I had to go back that far to remember a time that I hurt this bad.

I'm thrilled to have done my time and finally reached the (temporary) finish line - from this point forward, I can do everything on my own timeline.  And I'm glad I'm not the pair of pants I wore to do the work, as they have received the death penalty and are awaiting execution in the trash can.