There are some things that women of a certain age and size should not be doing, which is why I am here blogging at 8 a.m. on a hot, steamy Saturday instead of being where I need to be: namely, perched atop an 8-foot fiberglass ladder holding a bucket of paint while said ladder is placed precariously inside a 1930s-era cast-iron bathtub.

Yep, today is bathroom-painting day.

Now, you might say that even if you put lipstick on a pig, it's still a pig. So putting a fresh coat of paint on an 80-year-old bathroom (which is the "new" part of my little cottage built in 1901) will not make it a spiffy oasis of modernity. But it is long overdue, since I've owned the house for 13 years and never painted it. Fresh paint won't make me forget the 1930s light fixtures that were surely the height of chic in their day. They still look pretty cool but don't work. And I might not notice the noisy, rattling original fan if it was surrounded by fresh, mocha-colored paint.

But de pain, boss, de pain.

Oh well, enough procrastinating. I'm off to put some lipstick on that pig.