A two-day reprieve

Well, the Top Brass were SUPPOSED to arrive today - or, at least, that's what they TOLD us. Turns out they don't arrive until Tuesday, so we could have been working on the basement this afternoon instead of sitting around in the living room waiting for a rental car to pull into the driveway. Silly parents. At least I know where the War Department gets it from...

Anyway, it hasn't all been lying about on our bums. We've been quite busy, and so has the plumber.

Oh, before we get into it: the pictures in this post may not be up to the usual scratch; my camera is in the shop getting cleaned, and won't be done until tomorrow. So all of the pictures in this post were taken with the old piece of shit we all knew and hated.

So, we had a little extra job waiting for Leonard when he came on Thursday. The sink in the bathroom upstairs hadn't been draining properly for months, and because we had a rubber P-trap on it, we couldn't really snake it ourselves. Also, I had really no interest in doing it with that damn pedestal in the way. So we figured we might as well get the professional to do it, seeing as he was in the house anyway.

Even so, I really have no idea why we ever thought it would be a straightforward job. Nothing else in this house has been, is, or ever will be, and this was no different. He got the pedestal out of the way okay, but then noticed that the pipe in the wall was really corroded and cautioned us (well, Amy - I was at work, getting the story via a stream of increasingly hilarious emails) that it might be difficult. Then, while he was snaking the drain, his auger got stuck in the pipe and promptly broke off. ("Oh, dear," Leonard said. "That'll cost you.") So he had to break open the wall and replace the entire pipe:



I thought we were done with this drywall nonsense, I really did. Anyway, you can see how much fun making THAT patch is going to be.

Oh, and before I forget, take a wild guess what was blocking that pipe... that's right, about sixteen pounds of hair. Guess whose hair?



I haven't had hair that long since my head-banger phase in 1991...

Anyway, that little job took him most of the morning, but by the time he was done, he'd hooked up the shower and installed the toilet and vanity in the downstairs bathroom:





Man, I'd forgotten how much that camera sucks. I wanted to take a picture of the whole bathroom so you could see what a nice job Leonard (and us!) has done, but that camera couldn't take a decent picture of the inside of a lens cap. Piece of shit.

That said, it's time for another edition of everyone's favorite blog feature, infrequent though it may be,

The Injury Report

So, we've been painting the sills and trim around the windows in the office, and the combination of the plywood and the paint we bought just hasn't worked very well. I finally decided to just use the same paint we used on the walls in the laundry room for the last coat or two. Before I could start with it, though, I had to sand down some of the more egregious brush marks and whatnot. So I was sanding furiously along the top of the big window when I rammed my hand into the lip of metal on the edge of the window. It took a nice big gouge out of the back of my thumb, but it was actually the impact that hurt more than the cut.

Still looks pretty impressive, I think:



Anyway, may or may not get to the trim around the office side of the bathroom door tonight.

My money's on probably not, but don't tell Amy that.

Read more...

I should work less and post more...

At least, that's the impression I get from all the whining about the lack of updates. You'd think I didn't have a job OR a passive-aggressive, mildly incontinent cat, the way some people carry on. And that's just the War Department!

Anyway, despite the lack of updates, we have been busy. (Even if it seems to me I've posted that same sentiment on this blog at least once or twice before.) While we're waiting on Leonard to come back and install the remaining fixtures, we've been installing trim, caulking trim, painting trim, and doing unspeakable things to leftover bits of trim.

Oh, and digging, of course. Let's start with that, shall we?

When last we saw the enormous pile of crap in the back yard, we'd just taken three full loads off the top of it, and barely made a dent. Well, after another four trips to the Victoria Materials Depot on a hot and sunny Saturday (of which we've had precious few enough this summer, let me assure you), we've made more than a dent in the pile, we've made a dent in the back yard!



By the way, that's a nice little gig they got going on at the VMD. We pay them to drop it off (about $10 a load) and someone else comes in and pays them to take it away again! If we could have cut out the middle man, we might have been able to afford to pay someone else to do some of the work for us...

Anyway, once that was cleared away, it was back into the basement again, where Amy spent a great deal of time and energy installing the trim in the bathroom. I did most of the cutting, but the caulking, hole-filling, and paint preparation was all her:



I wasn't going to let her have ALL the fun, though, as I spent a good couple of days cursing and swearing at the window wells, which had to be closed in with plywood. Of course, this being our house with my framing job, none of them were square (of course) and no two sides were quite the same size:









Every single piece of plywood in those pictures was custom cut and shaped for its location. That was a lot of cutting, nibbling, testing, sanding, cursing, and - eventually - spackling. And no, those last two aren't some elaborate optical illusion. They really look like that. Of course, the trim is square -- it's the windows themselves that are totally out of level. (Since I took those pictures, I've covered over the edges with corner bead and sill trim, but I'm too lazy to go downstairs and take another picture right now. Next time.)

Anyway, we've got about a week until Leonard comes back, and we have to get the vanity installed, the trim done and painted, and a few other bits and pieces finished up in the bathroom before he gets here. And we have to prep, prime, and paint the window wells, build a casement for the workshop door, install the office door, get the office carpeted...

Uh, yeah. So... lots to do. I don't have a joke for that. It's just a lot of work.

Sigh.

Read more...