Painting The Addition

On the last day of 2012 I spent the bulk of the day painting. I expected that it would go fast and it did--there are no floors in yet, or trim, or even switches, electrical outlets or lights.

I blew-through five gallons of primer in 6 hours of continuous work and then I was done, not with the job, but at least with the day since I was out of paint.

As I was progressing I had a couple of thoughts:

1. I am glad I ignored the advice of the paint clerk at the hardware store. He thought I should need only two gallons of paint, reasoning that each will do 400 square feet and the addition is about 800. I reasoned that the 400 figure was wall area not floor area and that is about the coverage I got.

2. I nearly got one gallon of paint onto the walls per hour of effort and so wondered what kind of benchmark "real" painters achieve? On further reflection, I doubt painters measure their work that way. Most are probably paid by the hour, not by how much paint they use-up. Even if you paid by some measure of how much work was completed, you probably would not want it to be by paint volume since that might just encourage wasteful application of product.

I have never hired a painter since it seems like the quintessential do-it-yourself kind of thing. But I may look into how they quote for jobs. Do they just come in and do everything? Or do you buy the paint and they just apply it?

At the end of the last day of 2012, I was exhausted. I don't know how I managed to find the energy to go out after that and pick-up more paint, but somehow I did. Yet the next day I (with Wife's help) finished the primering and the amount of time on the job was similar to what I had spent on painting on the day before. But I felt fine. I suppose that one's body adapts to whatever kind of work is demanded of it.