Not even the laundry closet is safe

A couple weeks back, I got bored.

Bored as in "I've been home from vacation for five days, and now that I have everything cleaned up and put away, I need something to do".

So I started ripping up linoleum. 

Because that's what everyone does when they get bored, isn't it?

I  would recommend unplugging everything.  I couldn't figure out how and
was too impatient to wait for Dean to get home and show me, so I made do.

I decided it was safer to start in the laundry closet than the kitchen, since we have no idea yet what exactly we are going to replace the linoleum with.  All I knew was that it was time for the yellow, 80's squares to go!

It was a simple as removing the base boards, pulling up the top layer of linoleum/vinyl (I have no idea what it really is), then pouring boiling hot water on the paper and glue to soften it for scraping off the concrete.

Okay, perhaps that is not entirely simple.  It was time consuming and required some arm muscle.  One laundry closet (3ft x 3ft) took an hour and a half to complete.

But the sight of a plain concrete floor was absolutely worth the work. I may have stood up, pumped my fist in the air and proclaimed: "We are one step closer to de-80-fying this house!!"  But if I did, I would not admit it on here. After all, who gets that excited about home renovations? I mean, come on!!

Anyhow, it was at this point that I realized that it was the opportune time to paint the closets!

I headed to True Value, picked up some mis-tint paint for $5, and started painting the next day. Painting a wall is an instant gratifying feeling!

My initial plan was to stencil on top of the green with some fun design with my leftover light blue paint (because why not have a pretty laundry area?).  However, upon cleanup, I discovered that my mis-tint paint is oil based.  Ooops! So much for gratification. I don't think I can put water based paint over that.

And I now know that I DO NOT like oil based paint. It stinks to high heaven and it takes as long to clean your brushes as it did to paint the wall. Not to mention that changing the color down the road involves using primer first.

Ah, oh well!  Lesson learned.  At least it's an improvement over the dingy, dirty white that used to be in there.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go stick my head back in the laundry closet again.  It has nothing to do with the oil-based paint fumes, I promise you. I'm simply trying to figure out what else to do in there.
Vinyl stencils? More shelving?  Framed art?
What the dickens do you do with an oil-based army green closet?!?

I guess nothing is very safe in this house when I get bored.