But don't worry: we have a pretty good idea who the culprits are. As we anticipate gutting our decades-old bathroom for rehabbing, we've been turning our Sharpies loose.

Cheap northside bar, or the Boyds' house?

As you may know, I love to put ink on paper (or pixels on screen) whenever I can, but not since an ill-advised foray with crayons in grade school have I put so much directly on the walls. It's not just that I'm the landlord, but we'll soon be ripping out all this tile entirely, so it seemed like now or never.

It certainly has given us occasion to get in touch with our "inner graffitist." Perhaps not coincidentally, I find that I've been sleeping much better. (And by the way, yes: that really does say, "I scream, you scream, we all scream for pork loin," on the wall.)

The new walls will be painted white (or "Powdered Snow," to be precise), with white tile around the tub and a very cool "Fog Salmon" glass tile on the floor. Hopefully we won't forget to put away the permanent markers once the new stuff is up.

Notes to the contractor mix with Cupid's tags.

Ann and I have had a blast not only with the graffiti, but with putting our heads together about the rehab project. We've decided that this electricity fad doesn't seem to be going away, so we're caving in and putting in an outlet. And how about a tub drain that actually drains? We're going all out, I tell you.

Stay tuned: we'll have photos of the finished project in a month or so. And of course we hope you'll come visit and see for yourself!

first published Jul 7, 2004