Washing walls, painting walls, and my mentor

Ben Benrus - 'Wash walls from the bottom up... paint walls from the top down." Truly words of wisdom though I can't say I have washed any walls in recent history.  If you have kids with dirty hands (which is all kids... especially Eric) it's a nice alternative (and almost free) to painting!  If you wash from the top down and let clean soapy water run down a dirty wall, the tracks of the water 'clean the dirty wall' below and it's hard to make those tracks go away by washing it afterward.  Try it!  Well don't try it cuz it really is hard to clean the wall so you can't see the tracks.  If you wash from the bottom up, soapy water running down a clean wall leaves no tracks!  No fuss, no muss... just wipe away the excess water with your sponge.  Man, we washed walls a lot when we were kids.  Dad really knew how to supervise. :-)

When you paint, paint the ceiling first.  Get all of your roller spatter out of the way... it's going to hit your walls... unavoidable.  Then 'cut in' on your walls with the wall color of choice using a nice angled brush... slow and steady.  Haste makes waste when cutting in... patience makes a nice straight line.  Then roll the wall top to bottom.  If paint runs, it's always below where you started so you pick it up with the roller... paint doesn't defy gravity and spatter upward on your ceiling when you roll. :-)

Dad was not a master of home care or home improvement but great leaders surround themselves with the best... and Dad was a great leader.  One of Dad's Uncles (I think this one was through marriage, not blood... whatever) was a great man named Roman Kane.  For whatever reason we knew him as 'Mr. Roman'.  That's what we called him...  'Mr. Roman'.  Mr. Roman knew how to do and fix anything and everything... including building our screened-in-porch on Candota in Mount Prospect.  He was the Handyman's Handyman.  A heavy smoking, hard working, great, great man.  He taught me so many things over the years and is the reason I have been fearless about taking on projects in life; throughout life... without 'shutting off the circuit breaker' (I do NOT recommend NOT shutting off the circuit breaker!!!  Though I am pretty certain Jim plays with live wires... he needs to stop that.  Jenni, please talk to him.). 

Thank you, Mr. Roman...  you always were and still are my courage to take on anything.  I wish you knew that.  I am still proudly and humbly working to pass on your legacy.