Small town diners, rural farms and a couple of fancy dogs in a potter’s studio.

Off to the mountains for a few days of down time.

Someplace under this pile of debris is my workbench …

The country has been clearing back trees and brush all along the Loop the last few months. As it came through the Oconee Street exit area, it exposed Tent City, a homeless encampment. The ramshackle buildings were left alone, for now.

There was a metal shed in the backyard of this house when we bought it in 2007, probably put up when the house was built in 1986. Functional, not really watertight, kind of ugly.

But it mostly worked, excepting for a wood floor that never dried out and everything getting covered in mold. So it was time for a new shed, which I over-researched for weeks and then custom ordered.

They come stained for free, or painted for an additional $200. But if you want your own colors to, say, match your house, that’s another $200.

How hard can it be to paint a shed? I’m a frugal yankee, I can paint a shed for less than $400. I’m now two days into painting this damned shed and have spent about $350 on supplies.

And it’s not done yet.

That rough timber look? Yeah, royal pain to paint.

Only the trim to finish, only the trim to finish …

A study in beige, or how to make architecturally necessary things disappear.

That’s not how this is supposed to work.

Then again, it’s our 11th familyversary today and most of what we’ve been through wasn’t how it was supposed to work, either. But it has.