Start Dropping the Ceiling!

I really didn't have any energy tonight after work, even after taking a long nap, but there are things that must be done, and it is sometimes necessary to push oneself past the limit of comfort in order to stand the sight of oneself.

Besides, I went to the trouble of buying the perimeter pieces from Home Depot today. Might as well put them up!

Due to the fact that there wasn't much time, as my nap ended some time around 7 pm (after a very tasty taco dinner, thanks to Cheryl and Mary), and Mary and I are getting up early tomorrow in order to get to Zero Hour on time for her Chemistry test, there was a little bit of a window of opportunity to get something done. So the plan was to start small. With a closet.

This is the closet next to the "suite" bedroom. It's not ridiculously small, nor tremendously huge; it's just right. About four feet deep by three feet wide. There is some 'infrastructure' above it (which is why we're installing a drop ceiling in the first place) but it should be high enough that the ceiling will still be sufficiently roomy.

First step was to mark a level line all around the top of the closet where the ceiling was to be laid. That was easily accomplished by standing on the ladder and spinning around while holding the pencil. Ha! Not really. Actually, I stood on the ladder and held up a level to each wall and traced a pencil line because I don't have one of those fancy spinning laser-levels. (Had one years go; it broke. Plastic, doncha know.) It worked. The lines came together opposite of where I started to within 1/8th inch, which was close enough for me.

Next step was to cut the perimeter piece - a long piece of angled aluminum which comes ONLY in 12-foot strips. (It had to be bent rather sharply to fit in my car, but that didn't really matter because there were going to be scraps anyway.) Two four-foot sections and two three-foot sections. That adds up to fourteen feet. Which is why I had to get two pieces of the angled aluminum.

Got those cut, then measured and stamped the places where the holes would be drilled. For most of the perimeter, the screws go right into the studs; but I realized as I was putting up the piece above the door header that there weren't enough studs in the header. So I cheated and used mollies. Which I hate. But in this case, I'm in too much of a hurry to care.

So got the perimeter set, then put two of the 4-foot T-tracks from front to back and connected the 2-foot T's perpendicular. Looked good, so I dropped a sample ceiling tile in just to see what it looked like.

It looked good!

Now to do the same thing over the rest of the basement. Or at least 800 square feet of it. About 200 tiles.