Many years ago I went on a date with a nice man.  He had phoned me up and asked if I would like to join him for a game of tennis.  Sure, sounds fun.  After our game of tennis we went out for ‘wings and a beer’ and shared a bunch of laughs.  The evening was going well so after dinner I asked if he would like to see my house.  I had just bought my first home and I was a little proud.  The home was a ‘starter home’ complete with yellow shag carpet and yellow-flowered wallpaper.  I had removed the wallpaper and painted but the yellow shag carpet still remained.  After having the tour of the house my date stated “you know there is hardwood under this [butt ugly, decades old] carpet” and then proceeded to persuade me to rip that carpet up right there and then.  That was a Thursday night and garbage pick-up was the next day so out went that yellow shag carpet!  But then I started to panic as I looked at the hardwood floor and realized OMG the floor needs repair and refinishing.  I had three tenants in the house that had no intention of becoming renovators.  This was the ‘80’s and my mortgage was at 13 ¾ % and I had no money to hire someone to refinish the floors. So I looked at my date and said “you better stick around to help me refinish these floors!”  Well my date stuck around and helped me refinish the floors, add new baseboard, repaint the room, renovate the bathroom, repair a fence etc., etc., etc.  My date (who sketched me a picture of my first house – see below) certainly did stick around, in fact we have been married for 20 years and we have never stopped renovating.    My love of ripping, refinishing and renovating began on a Thursday evening after a game of tennis, wings and beer because the next day was garbage day.  Or did my date have an ulterior motive??!!