Monday - October 06, 2008

Ultimate Squeegee Project, Day 4

I still live.

Bear witness all ye fellow sgueegee men and strip washer wielders. Today I am one with the best of you. I have faced the mighty Skylight of Doom upon the Roof of Small Traction. At least 4, nearly 5 full stories off the ground. Upon the treacherous Rickety Stairs I did ascend, through the guardian Bilko Door I passed, and into the ethereal heights did I emerge. Falling not, failing not, fearing not (Ok, quite a bit, but I did it anyway), I have breathed the rarified air where few pigeons dare to fly, looked down upon the chimney pots, walked unsupported across the open peaks and scrubbed away generations of dirt and dead stink bugs. I have left cleanliness in my wake. And no streaks or smudges either.

Friday I was able to stick my head out the roof hatch and look around, but that’s as far as I got. Today I just went up there, out there, and got the job done. Granted, I didn’t waste any time turning cartwheels up on the roof, and I did keep my center of gravity as low as possible the whole time. But I did it, and it really did feel like some kind of rite of passage. And it was a loooooong way down with no railing, no safety harness, no nothing. Thankfully, it was also no wind, so that made it much easier mentally.

I also did the skylights in the bathrooms, which are interesting, in that they are secondary skylights. They are in wells in the attic floor, and get light from the main skylight in the attic roof 2 stories above. I’ve never seen anything like that. So I had to remove the safety screens in the floor, lean down below the floorboards, and give things a good scrub. I could have gone up through the bathroom ceilings, but that part of the house was closed off to me today. Funny, these sheets of frosted glass are not mounted. They just sit there, lose in the wood framing. I guess that lets excess steam out. But it also lets bugs and dust and stuff in. Odd.

So the attic is finished. I got all the removable storm windows off the lower floor, except one, got the inside surfaces clean, and got them back on. One left, and there is a small stained glass window to scrub underneath that. I would have got it done, but some whizzo who was painting the sills came along some time ago and filled all the screw holes with putty. I just didn’t have the energy left to deal with that, so I went down into the basement and scrubbed a few of those little windows. The basement windows can’t be cleaned from the outside, since there are iron bars across them. And the basement is very very large, and not always very well lit. So I was down there with a ladder and a flashlight, doing my best to scrub away more filth than you can imagine. I don’t think those windows haven’t been washed in 30 or 40 years. Triple washing on both sides, even with a scrubbie pad, and the dirt was still coming off in chunks. Yikes. Fortunately, the building manager thinks that this is beyond the call, so I did only 4 of the ... maybe 18? ... before she had me call it a night. Sun up to sun down. Another day’s work for the window guy.

Tomorrow I will do the rest of the downstairs inside. It’s about 1/4 done already. After that I have a few (10) hanging lamps to clean, and I’ll be done. 6 days, max. Hopefully 5.

Time for dinner. Shower first, and start more laundry. I am filthy. And I smell like Easy-Glide. Soapalicious!

Posted by Drew458     on 10/06/2008 at 06:40 PM   
Filed Under: • work and the workplace •  
• Comments (2) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

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