Calcimine Is Not A Parrish In Louisiana

When the Goose is up a ladder, it inevitably leads to beer.

Our Stuff

And up a ladder was how i found her when I got home from work last Saturday. She was wrapped head to toe in her working gear, splattered with paint and dust. Everything in the laundry room, from the winter clothes we had stored up high, to all the miscellaneous  hardware and trappings of a modern lifestyle that just don't fit anywhere in a Victorian house were now piled around throughout the kitchen and the rest of the house.
We don't have much in the way of storage. Evidently the Victorians really didn't have much in the way of stuff, so spare rooms and closets are in short supply in old houses. We on the other hand, have stuff and almost all of it is packed into the laundry room or utility room or service porch or whatever you want to call it, just off the kitchen. In fact, I think the room was the kitchen back in the day because there's a utility chimney in there, just right for connecting a wood or coal fired stove to.

Goose's Swabbing and Scraping

But anyway, Goose was up a ladder busy swabbing and scraping the ceiling  in preparation for paint, and it was obvious she had been hard at it all day. The laundry room is the only room here that hasn't been restored or updated. Everything has a dingy off-white paint job and the original plaster ceiling (the only one left in the house, the rest have been drywalled throughout the years) is cracked and showing signs of past water damage. But Goose had scraped and re-plastered and the ceiling was ready for a coat of paint.
"So...What's for dinner?" I inquired.
"You're going to have to find your own tonight. I really want to paint this ceiling".
"Tonight you mean?"
"Of course tonight."
"Oh."
So I found my own dinner, and Goose labored long into the night, her reward a freshly coated and radiant ceiling, the beginnings of her grand plan for restoring the laundry room.

I was at work eating lunch the next day when I learned of the disaster.
Four words, a simple text message, but it was enough to tie my stomach in knots; "THE SKY HAS FALLEN!"
"What up? R U  ok?"
"No, wait till U get home!"
So the next five hours were spent in an agony of apprehension that was almost unbearable by the time I arrived home.

Sherds

I found her downcast in the kitchen, a lone, lore, pitiful creature.
"What happened?"
She pointed into the laundry room and it was immediately apparent that the sky had fallen. Pieces of something that looked like shredded wall paper covered everything. Shreds several inches long and shards the size of coins were strewn about as if someone had thrown paper into a fan letting the chaff fall wherever it would. The ceiling above was as dingy as ever, old grayish plaster with all it's cracks and discoloration.

And Shards

"What is this stuff?" What's going on with the ceiling?"
"That's the paint and plaster I put on yesterday." replied the Goose. "there was just a little peeling when I came to check it this morning, so I went up the ladder to touch it up and suddenly every bit of paint I rolled on last night just started peeling off and now this is what I've got. All my work for nothing. And worse, it's going to take major work to fix the problem."
"Well, what actually is the problem? I mean aside from your paint job laying all over the floor."
"Calcimine."
"Calcimine?"
"That's what I said."
"Okay," I started in, "what's a place in Louisiana got to do with the paint peeling off the ceiling?"
Now it was Gooses turn to be dumbfounded. "What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about Calcimine Parrish in Louisiana. I'm pretty sure it's just west of Plaquemines Parrish and below Evangeline. It's that place where I ran over that alligator that time."
"Fish," countered Goose "I know you inhaled a lot of lead paint dust last month, do you think maybe it's  affected your brain?"
"No, me brain work good. But really, I swear I told you about that alligator. It was when I was working on the road and I had to go to Fernis LeBlanc's shop in Louisiana. It's when I found out Cajuns really do talk that way and not just on True Blood."

Alligator preparing for His Run-In

"And you ran over an alligator?"
"Well it was dark and I was just about into town when I thought I hit a log, but when I stopped it turned out to be an alligator child about four feet long. Fernis's son Marcus said it was probably four or five years old."
"What, were you two out on the town or something when this happened?"
"No, no. I showed it to him when I got to his shop"
"You took the alligator with you?"
"Well sure. Alligators makes great shoes and belts."
"So you just put it in the car and drove off?"
"In the trunk actually, but it's okay cause it was a rental."
"Then what happened to the alligator? I never saw it."
"Well, Marcus LeBlanc explained that alligators are endangered and convinced me that hauling dead ones across state lines is a federal beef. Anyway, we threw it in the bayou behind his shop, but I think he really went back and took it for himself to make gumbo or voodoo or something."
Goose just kept looking at me, exasperation or frustration or maybe keen disappointment clouding her eyes. "Fish" she finally said, "I'm afraid you really did inhale too much lead and that's something we're going to have to deal with someday. But right now I want you to listen to me and try not to let your attention wander too far.
Now first, calcimine is not a parrish in Louisiana."
Now when the Goose speaks with that kind of authority, you just have to accept what she says at face value.  But I was so certain about the alligator affair's location, you could have floored me with a bolster when she denied the whole thing. I just had to challenge her.
"Alright then wise guy, where is it and what's it got to do with the laundry room?"
"As I said my poor brain damaged Fish, first things first. Calcimine isn't a where. Calcimine is a form of paint made from a mixture of calcium hydroxide and calcium carbonate. You might know the ingredients as burnt lime and chalk. Our ancestors knew it by the name of 'whitewash'. When Tom Sawyer conned those other boys into whitewashing the fence for him, that was what he was painting with."
"So Tom Sawyer painted the laundry room?"
"No you snide and snarky Fish. Back in the 19th century when people cooked with wood or coal and lit their houses with whale oil, ceilings quickly smudged with soot from their stoves and lamps. A yearly coat of calcimine whitewash was a quick and inexpensive fix. It was also thought to have sanitary properties and in fact whitewash brushes were often referred to as sanitary brushes."
"Well, I still think that 'gator died in Calcimine Parrish and one of these days I'll Google it and find out for sure. But what's any of this got to do with peeling paint and collapsing plaster?

After a Good Rub-A-Dub Scrub

"Crystals Fish, crystals. Calcimine cures back out to calcium carbonate or chalk crystals after a time,so in effect our ceiling is covered with very fine chalk dust. Nothing will stick to it."
"Ever?"
"Not until I scrub and wash and rinse and then scrub and wash and rinse and then scrub and wash and rinse some more, ad infinitum, and then I can probably cover it with an oil based sealer, like 'Killz" and then probably we can think about painting it then."

A Bit of Whitewash

Which is what she did . And truthfully, it looks pretty good for just having a 21st century version of whitewash on it.
"So" I inquired a couple of days later " when are you going to start actually redecorating the laundry room?"
Goose just growled a little under her breath.

And Tom's Aunt Polly Would Be Proud

"Well," I continued "just so you know, I've been thinking about that alligator. I think we could get some if we pedaled over to the 'Blue Bayou'. They serve it fried with hush puppies and slaw."
"You'll be wanting a Martini with it I suppose?"
"Wanting and having are two different things my delicate young Goose. They don't have full bar service there. Only beer and wine."
"Well, you said right from the beginning this was going to lead to beer."
And so it did.


Live long and prosper,
Fish