telephone niche

So today was one of those days. I was a little frustrated. I was assigned to trash duty in the back yard...why trash duty? Leo cut the front yard last week. But since no one sees the backyard and we have so many other things to do, we put off the back yard. But the time has come. So, my dad sent me to the backyard to pick up trash. We don't want Leo to cut himself while cutting the yard--a trip to the emergency room is not what we want right now!

But, this is a time where I really wish I possessed more valuable skills...such as drywall mudding. Never thought I would say that.

So trash hunting I went. I found old wooden shingles, asphalt shingles, little green BB gun pellets, nails, bolts longer than a foot in length, more nails, more little green pellets, triangular pieces of gutter material, broken beer glass, and these big metal pieces which I still have no clue what they are. But there were at least 10 randomly stuck in the dirt. That would have hurt. So I guess it was an important job. But I wasn't so convinced when I picked up an old Big K Cola can and brown gook came spilling out. That smelled like death. Then I was pretty much done. So I looked for about 5 more minutes and then called it quits, went inside, and asked for another job.

I was assigned to trim the bedrooms with the oil-based primer. Finally, a job that actually felt like I was contributing to progress! I was about 5 minutes into it and my hand was killing me and the paint looked awful. I called my Dad in to look (probably the 10th time I called for him in 5 minutes. Poor guy) and he decided it was too humid and the paint was too thick. So I stopped that job. He then reassigned me to organizing his tools. Oh, the glamour.

But I did it. I started organizing the nail boxes, screwdrivers, drywall tapes, duct tape, rope--a sundry of things. I was on my probably 20th trip down the stairs and my Dad stopped and asked me, you want to do something else for me?? I was a little wary, not going to lie! It hadn't turned out so great for me as of yet. But he asked if I wanted to try to crack open the little box underneath the old telephone niche that had been painted shut.

Are you kidding me? I had been begging to do this for weeks. It may not seem like much to you all, especially if you aren't an old house fanatic, but curiosity had been killing me. What would I find in there? What have people been sticking in there the last few decades? I needed to know. I also needed to know how the contraption worked. My engineer friend would be proud of me, I'd like to think :)

So I grabbed a paint scraper. And I scraped. I finished scraping but it still wouldn't come open. Then I realized the top underneath part had been caulked. And I had jammed the caulking in between the frame and the front, in my attempt to try to get to it quickly. So then I walked around for a few minutes trying to find a tool to pull it out. I settled on a flat-head screw driver. My Dad didn't think it would work. It did. My little victory for the day :)

Anyway, we finally popped it open and I was so excited. Like many things in the real world, it didn't quite live up to expectations...in fact it was a little gross. I don't know what I was expecting though. Maybe a date? Someone's name? A few thousand dollars to help with the reno costs? If only!

So when I said it was a little gross, I meant a little. It wasn't bad. But if dirty q-tips really bother you, I warned you! Mostly it was candy bar wrappers and kids things---a little toy, a crayon, some tiny scissors. There was a pretty old coupon for cereal and I was interested to see the expiration date. Of course the one time in my life I wanted to see an expiration date, it said in all caps "NO EXPIRATION DATE"! My friend Teresa suggested I take it to Kroger and buy some Coco Puffs and try to use the coupon. I'll get back to you all on that one :)

Then there was the old parts and the sign from the company that I suppose installed the phone. Not super exciting but kind of neat!

Right now I'm trying to decide what to put in it. I've heard sometimes they had lights in them so at night you could see to reach the phone. I think that would be neat and a decent night light! Any one heard of something different? 

-Katie