Build it, Paint it, Tear it down

Build Day in Tallahassee

We started the day off in the best way possible: a 7:30 am wake up call! I still woke up at 5:45 because my body is thoroughly trained, but I could just roll over and snuggle back into my sleeping bag cocoon. Until a hidden alarm went off at 6:30. No one ever found out where the noise was coming from. Christine C, who was sleeping next to me, jumped up and started to get ready. I asked her if she was really getting up an hour early and she said yes. Five minutes later she returned and informed me that we had another hour to sleep. Just in case I was curious :) We loaded up into the shuttle vans. I was in the second round of shuttle because I spent most of the morning cleaning squished moldy fruit out of bins and finding new homes for the good fruit. Tip of the day: don't pack 4 brand new giant jars of jelly in the fruit bins. The bananas won't survive! I ended up shuttling over in the car of a Bike & Build alumni, Jen Hunt. I was the only non University of Florida person in the car and we just so happened to be in the home of Florida State University, Tallahassee. I learned a lot about the rivalry and stadiums. Arriving at the build, the first group was already hard at work. We were working with a smaller affordable housing group to revamp and existing house for a homeowner.  Originally, the plan was to have us paint the inside and outside of a house. However, when Bethel CDC (Community Development something) showed up to move the furniture out the day before they found that the job would need more than paint to make a livable house. They found dangerous amounts of mold in all of the walls, rotted floorboards and supporting beams, and a furnace that was pumping smoke into the attic instead of outside of the house. As the day progressed we also discovered that the house was infested with fleas. To think about someone living in those conditions for years really drives home the reason that our trip is necessary. In less than 6 hours we had completely repainted her house including shutters, trim, eaves and screen porch. The guys demo'ed the inside, tearing out all of the mold infested wood. I had a lot of fun at this site since I love painting. I was mocked by some of my teammates, who shall remain nameless, for having too dainty of a painting technique. I blame that on the care I take with my painting. I may not be as fast as "the gloppers" but I don't have any paint on me at the end of the day. We had some delicious pizza courtesy of our hosts for lunch. This site was very different from Jacksonville. In Jax everything was very specific and was written down. Here we were much more self directed. We could change jobs whenever we wanted or move to a different part of the house. Both styles have their benefits. I am curious to see what our other build sites will be like. 

Because of the flea situation, we were quarantined to the bike room until we had showered. Giving fleas to each of our hosts from infested bins is not part of the summer plans! I was one of the last girls to shower but I gave my bike a thorough cleaning while I was waiting. After showers we had dinner provided by an alumni's parents. They seemed very nice, but didn't stick around for very long. Our first route meeting began with highs and lows of the week. My high was the service spirit of our trip members and my low was Summer having to go home to deal with a family issue. We talked about what we could do to improve the trip and how we could make this the best route ever. We decided to wake up at 5:30 from now on, since the extra time gives us more shade and cooler temps. We finished late, after our normal 10:00 bedtime.  But it wasn't quite sleepy time yet. Just as I was drifting off, they asked everyone who was still awake to pile in the van. It was stuck in some gravel and they needed weight on the rear axel. So we scrambled outside and stuffed 7 of us in the back seat, 4 in the mid-back seat and 4 standing on the bumper. Eventually Corey managed to get us up into the secure area. I went back to sleep and dreamed about donation magic and bouncy castles :)