I just created a blog through this website all about my experiences remodeling my kitchen. I painted my counter tops to look like galaxy granite and talk about some of the troubles I ran into while doing it, which might be of benefit to you. I'm not sure if my blog is working correctly or if anybody has taken a look at it, but I'd love it if they did.
Like grammakin suggested, I used TSP to clean my counters and in my blog I talk about some of the other steps involved.
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