30 Days to build a bookshop: Day 5

June 5, 2021

Tonight when I took off my shoes I yelled ‘oh yeah that’s the stuff’ so weirdly my cat ran away.

Its been a big day, I got to the shop before lunch time and managed to get one of the mirrors off the dividing wall. Cloth taped the whole thing until it looked like a Victoria’s Secret Angel, put down a lot at the sides which is where I would be putting post pressure then slid putty knives behind it and gently start pulling it back, ideally I would’ve put some shims at the top but the hardware store only had doorstops and I didn’t think it would work. It makes a really satisfying sound while you’re prying it away. If you have a minute and a half to spare here’s a vid of me getting mirror 1 off the wall. It’s mainly just my butt going back and forth really quickly though so don’t say you haven’t been warned.

I tried the second mirror but it wasn’t coming off as easily so I moved onto the dividing wall. After working on more hideous screws I managed to get the plasterboard off one side which was amazing. Spatially that broke my brain a little bit, I was bagging up all the detritus and realised that you can put a wall in a bag. I remembered an excellent book called A Burglars Guide to the City that I read a few years ago, I may be misremembering it as I can’t find my copy but in it Geoff Manuagh talks about the burglars relation to architecture as a kind of spatial neurodiversity, masters of architectural origami. It’s a really good book.

Sandra who runs Minnesotta Fats, the pool & snooker club up the road popped by and gave me the most delicious strawberry tarts and a 7up because she’d found out I was doing the work on my own. She’d made them herself and they were wonderful.

I moved the big boards over to the other side of the room so I could keep taking down the plasterboard but there is some really dodgy and pointless wiring in the corner so I turned the power off, unhooked it from the wall and tidied it away until I can figure out what to to do with it.

I headed to the newly re-opened Minnesota Fats for a quick half before heading home, it’s huge and welcoming and perfect and Sandra introduced me to some very kind people. I had a grand half an hour and headed home happy.

25 Days to go

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