Grout Vision

Have you ever had a completely obscure item demand your attention? Something you never noticed before somehow becomes un-missable all of a sudden?

I remember when my parents came out to help me paint the exterior of my new (to me) house (built the same year I was born). And yes, my parents have an odd sense of what's "fun" and how to spend their vacations... For the weeks during which I was trying to pick colors, I suddenly noticed a lot of interesting choices that my neighbors used. Prior to that I'd only really noticed the turquoise house with white trim. And maybe the Jamaican lady's bright pink house. But that also had white trim and wasn't glaring -- the only reason to notice her house was the large number of whirly rainbow kite things in her front yard. Take, for instance, the house in a cul-de-sac down the street: it was an decent mint green which contrasted nicely with the dark wood accents like the porch. The maroon trim also matched nicely with the roof and wood accents. But mint green and maroon as a pairing? Not for me. I got a lot of ideas of what not to do. In the end, I chose something super-boring: tan with forest green trim and a brilliant blue door. (Yes, that might've been the last neighborhood in the entire USA that isn't covenant controlled!)

But that sort of fixation (colors to paint with) seems sorta normal given the project I was taking on...

However, after that project was done, I suddenly focused in on caulking everywhere I saw it: public restroom sinks, the counter at a hole-in-the-wall pizza shop, the shower at an upscale hotel, etc. Caulking is everywhere! I had no idea. Had never even noticed it before. This came about because my dad had me re-caulking several areas on the exterior of my house before we started painting. While I was doing that, he was busy sanding off a water damaged spot on the north-facing wall, resealing it, priming it, etc. I definitely had the easier job. But he finished first. He came over to inspect my work. He burst out, "Tammy, it's a house, not a Picasso! It doesn't have to be a perfect masterpiece!" Apparently I am more of a perfectionist than I thought...

That was more than a decade ago, and while it's not as prevalent now, I still seem to notice other people's caulking jobs than I think most people do...

A week or so ago I got sucked into a project on the guest bathroom. There's a deadline since the guests arrive 12/20. I replaced the faucet (which the directions said would take "approximately 12 minutes" -- it took me 2 days and an additional trip to Lowe's). I mopped the ceiling to get the dirt/mold off that. I ripped out the caulking to replace it (ahem! It needed it - really, I swear! ok, maybe not). In the process I tried whitening the grout with bleach. When that didn't work, I went to Lowe's and bought tools to scrape out all the old grout and re-do that.

So, of course, I've started seeing the grout in the master bathroom and on tiled floors at restaurants. sigh. I'm wondering if I'm replacing my caulking tunnel vision with a grout one... Is that progress?