Stucco ceilings suck.

[c9]

The entire condo has stucco ceilings. And for the most part it's OK, the stucco is the typical fairly-easy-to-paint variety. But in the kitchen there's a different type, which crumbles as soon as you touch it. So painting takes forever, since the roller gets covered in stucco almost instantly. I was getting about four square feet per hour painted. And that's just the bad first coat.

How to make a big mess: decide the loose stucco's gotta go, and scrape the entire ceiling with a putty knife. Goodness what a mess. The ceiling is better (I hope), but so much for the nice clean anything. :)