Pausing for a breath in cleaning purgatory.

No fine motor skills left. I feel like I'm trying to type with boxing gloves on my hands.

But....

Amanda and I were cleaning buddies; she loaded up the stereo with her favorite CDs (a bunch of 80s songs--Morrissey, Erasure, XTC, Tears for Fears, Psychedelic Furs, Soft Cell, etc.) and we went to work. She armed herself with the EnviroSteamer, and I commandeered the vacuum extractor, bummer that it is for spot cleaning and upholstery, because I quite literally did the whole apartment on my hands and knees, stopping only to empty/refill the reservoir of the machine. Then I focused on the deck and stairs, pulling up dead vegetation and bagging it.

This reminds me of the time my dad polished one fender of my old Toyota, that oxidized blue little box of a car; lo and behold there was shiny, wedgewood blue paint under that veneer of dullness. Of course I couldn't drive around with one shiny bumper and the rest of the car looking like shit, so I spent the entire afternoon at my parents' place, rubbing and sweating and muttering profanities, because I had not planned on spending most of the day doing detail work. In the end, I was quite pleased with the results: a car that looked years newer than before.

The timing chain gear broke two days later.