Pearl Jam – Better Man

Well, the cat is out of the bag. My parents know what I successfully hid from them for the last few months – The Project is a belated 50th birthday present from myself and my brothers to kickstart renovations on their house. The surprise is over before it was supposed to be delivered, oh well, that means I can start emptying my head out a bit.

Let’s back it up a bit. We grew up in a two bedroom home in Rimu St. When myself and my older brother were getting a little too old to be couped up in a bunk room, my parents sold up and got their current house – a three bedroom number with a sleepout, on a quarter acre section in a nice neighbourhood – the kiwi dream. They got this house with the intention of renovating it, though funding the lifestyles and apetites of four boys would get in the way of that. That was some 12 years ago now…

Now, to be fair – I got an afterschool job cleaning a butcher shop when I was 13, I got paid handsomely by 13 year old standards – $10/hr, and so I was the least financial burden for my parents as I was able to budget my own stuff. Since then I’ve been the most independant one.

So, I decided back in November before my parents both turned 50 in December that I’d be doing something for their renovations, now that three of their four sons had moved out. Slowly but surely, I drew my plans, and had to wait for a time to strike.

My mum works hard, extremely hard, and like me her holidays are far and few between, so when she does get a break she likes to do it properly. Where I’m happy to just get the hell out of Wellington for a weekend, her and dad will go to Fiji for a week. When they told me that they were going to head to Aussie for almost two weeks, I started to assemble my crew.

My older brother is a painter – he brought on board a couple of mates – Luke and Richie. So they were tasked with skimming, preparing and painting the walls.
Jim The Eagle removes asbestos for a job, and Benny used to remove asbestos with Jim. They were tasked with removing the asbestos-backed lino in the kitchen and laundry. If they had the time they could have a go with the lino in the toilet and bathroom.
Then there was myself and my younger brothers Tamati and Riki – we were tasked with doing odd jobs like stripping wallpaper, moving stuff around etc

I have to admit, my initial plans were a bit grandoise, and I believe that had we not been distracted by the head cylinder having a tantrum, we probably could have got a bit more done than we did, but still, what we have done is phenominal to say the least.

I’ll follow up with more information and photos over the coming days. I still have a few tidy up jobs to do.