Day 9 of the drabble-a-day challenge. Here is today’s drabble:

The Taste of Paint

We threw ourselves into it. We were adults, we'd owned the flat for years.

How hard could it be?

We watched YouTube. We read the booklet the local DIY store produced. We even, feeling like children, asked our parents for advice.

And we started, mugs of tea in hand, laughing, radio turned up.

The first effort didn't go well. We had to strip it and start again. The second was worse: more YouTube, more Googling, more phone calls. More advice we couldn't follow.

We are three days in. Widening cracks, plaster dust in our hair and the taste of paint.

There is not much subtlety today: decorating is going on in my home. There is Grand Disarray. Furniture has been moved from its usual locations to clear space (and now it is impossible to walk along the hall without tripping over a bedside table or a curtain pole).

As with all household jobs, the work has expanded as it is examined. Unexpected tasks have revealed themselves, and minor difficulties are queueing up for attention. In other words, it is a totally normal DIY project.

So far, nothing dreadfully untoward has happened. But I fear it is only a matter of time…