N. MoPac much like my home renovation

What I’m about to tell you has a transportation connection, I swear.

My wife and I are about six weeks into living through a home renovation. We have a see-through kitchen ceiling and bare concrete floors in half the house, and scuzzy old insulation visible where there used to be wallboard, counters and appliances. To block dust from the bedroom part of the place, there’s a giant plastic curtain with a zippered portal spanning the living room, which also hosts the refrigerator and a huge stack of hardwood flooring for future installation. The garage is a workshop, and there’s an elephantine dumpster in the driveway.

Kristy is a veteran of this sort of thing. But I’m a renovation novice, and have been getting an education both in how things get done and how to manage emotions and expectations. Along with patience, I’m learning structural engineering, city permitting, the vagaries of construction subcontracting, what a “pony wall” is and the infinite variety of shades of gray. I’ve found that there is a profound difference between hearing about your friend’s renovation and actually going through one.

Will it take two months? Three? Five? No one is saying, and there’s no way of really knowing. Best to just let it wash over you, and enjoy each piece of progress as a gift from the universe.

Austin drivers have had a similar experience over the past four years with the North MoPac Boulevard renovation, minus the patience part. Easy