In September 2023 I finally got someone in to turn our crumbling (literally) garage into a decent workshop. I will do a big blog post about that, but this last week I finally got the walls painted.

I've been using the workshop since January, but I needed a period of dry warm weather to get the outside painted. It's been a very, very wet year so far. Any dry weather we've had I've been working, and even if a weekend was dry the walls were soaking wet from the previous week's rain. It was getting annoying.

This week though! It was going to be hot and dry all week and I had this ridiculous idea that I could get up early each morning and get some painting done. And I actually did do that.

It was surprisingly pleasant. It was already quite warm at 7:30, the roses and honeysuckle were full of perfume, it was quiet and I could just get on with it for a couple of hours.

The paint is Sandtex Brick Red Smooth Masonry Paint, so nothing special. The colour was surprisingly good though, I didn't expect it to be so responsive to the light. It's really good.

I've a few paintbrushes to do the edges, and I got this big chunky brush so I could do the bottom bit of the wall. Below the smooth wall surface there a lip of rough concrete of the original garage foundation and I wanted that thoroughly coated in paint. I noticed the brush head turning occasionally as I went along and thought it a bit odd. Then it fell off! It was a screw handle! Weird. So I screwed it back on, nice and tight and… snap. Weird and crap. I only had a metre left to do, but what a heap of shit.

The rest of it I used a roller with a telescopic handle which was very satisfying to work with.

Once the back gate is restored I'll get a bench so I can sit against the wall in the sunshine.