What up boo?

Chairs and Stuff

The boys upstairs have been slaving away at the old casa for a few months now. Mamma Kass gave us the gift of two brand spankin' new chairs for our living room! They are beautiful and perfect for game night. The bathroom is coming along nicely too. Expect to see complete before and after photos soon but in the mean time check out the progress pending panorama image.

Time Stamp, 12:29 AM

In the famous words of Austrian journalist Karl Kraus, "A journalist is stimulated by a deadline. He writes worse when he has time." That certainly applies to our tiling efforts. Stimulated, indeed. With visitors coming for a wedding over Labor Day weekend, we had to have a proper toilet and shower. The shower in the basement, which is oh-so-very San Quentin, is not up to snuff for hosting guests. Ditto for the outhouse below. Reminds me more of Jame Gumb's split-level hell ("It puts the lotion on the skin...") than the shiny thrones at The Drake.

Thus, late nights ahead. Sawing tiles in the dark. Caulking during the Cubs post-game show in WGN radio ("This is the year!"). Post-work beers at 1 AM. The deadline was met. The trim plumbing was installed. The guests could refresh and relieve in real facilities.

Beyond Subfloor

Uncle Mark, remodeler extraordinaire, brought his tools, energy and vast knowledge to help us lay down our hexagonal tile.
The toughest part was setting a pattern. We bought one square of black and the rest was white so we could establish our own black-white pattern. Yikes. What a pain in the arse. After a long discussion worthy of a mathematics seminar we established one black dot seperated by 8 white tiles north, south, east and west. We wanted just a touch of black to bring in the black bar and the light fixtures without loooking like that Tom Petty-cum-Alice-in-Wonderland video. I think we accomplished a nice balance. We like.

Grouting was suprisingly time consuming for such a small floor area. Well, there's a boatload of grout lines so of course it makes sense in retrospect. Like all aspects of this remodel, it took at least twice as long as we thought. I scoff at our "We can knock this out in a couple of hours" fantasy speak. HA! August 1st we were so naive, and now in early September, our awareness has grown with regards to the frustrations of updating a room.

A double-shout-out to Uncle Mark. He would not let us get a picture of him to post on the blog. Something about his SAG card being out of date, so we sniped this one without his knowledge. Nice caboose, Mark! Toot-toot.

Drwall Drama

Our drywall guy, A________, was bad. Well, I suppose that's not true. He was good for someone who was doing a fairly precision job under the influence of several beers.

He showed up late, left early, took lots of breaks and what was supposed to be a 2 to 3 day job turned into 5, with happy hour starting on the 4th day at around 10:45 AM. It was stressful, frustrating and disappointing. We just wanted the dude out of our house. What's so stupid is we agreed to a flat fee and so the longer he took the less he made per hour. We thought maybe he just wanted to come over.

After he finally finished, on a Sunday morning, he had the cojones to ask for the remainder of his payment in cash. HUH? He said his check cashing place charged $5, so we gave him a fiver and said hurry up and get the heck out, fella. Or something along those lines. He said he'd come back to sand down the joints and we said when hell freezes over...

So we sanded, with the help of Treavor. And the walls were ready for painting and tile. YES.

The beauty of sanding is the dust gets carried on any air flow and settles on everything.






Naturally, Karen and the compound's new favorite toy, the wet-dry vac, went to town. Karen makes cleaning sexy!

From the Outhouse to the Penthouse

We love grilling at the Compound. Always have. Our grills, though, have not always been up to the standards we'd like in order to produce the food we really want to eat. But we've managed.

First you have the classic Li'l Smoky, which worked hard and served it's purpose. Though squatting over that grill-ette on the gangway at our previous place on a cold January evening tryint not to burn my first homemade sausage was a challenge I'm glad I'm beyond.

Next came the Aussie Walkabout (Mate!). Only $40 at home depot. You can roll it to the lake front. You see these all over the place near the beach on a summer day. Very serviceable. Definitely more room and can hold more coals (read: more heat). But the grate was too thin and had a weird cross pattern so you couldn't get those powerful grill marks. But still, not having to squat down anymore, we could hardly complain.

And now, we have reached the pinnacle of grills. Dale and Donna have facilitated a little trip to the charcoal promised land. A couple of sundays ago they brought the Weber Performer. (Cue the angel choir).

I just can't do a gas grill. You can't get that same smoky flavor. Of course the lazy detractors say, "It takes too long to get the coals started and its messy." Tasting better never takes too long. Pure gas grills are merely outdoor ovens that make men feel like they are "grillin'". Come on! The Performer's got the best of both worlds as it uses gas to light the coals, but the coals do the cooking. And look at the room on that side table for your beer, or whatever else. There's a nice bin for your coals and hooks for your tongs and spatulas. Direct heat, indirect heat, hot smoking, you can almost do it all. Plus it's called The Performer, which is cool.

Much thanks to Donna and Dale for not only getting us the grill, but bringing it over ASSEMBLED. A bonus gift.

Operation New Latrine

Progress continues. We are edging toward the finish line. Thank god, cuz look at our current facilties. Yes, the blue tape was removed, but what kind of a low-rent bum would actually enjoy making mud on that throne?!




That which does not destroy me only makes me appreciate a pristine porcelain crapper that much more! Oh sweet American Standard! Sloan, Sloan, wherefore art thou? Toto, why hast thou forsaken me? Crane, come to daddy! Poor Treavor is clearly running out of patience...

Interesting plumbing info of note: did you know that Toto makes a toilet called the Guinevere? What does that say about Arthur, or Lancelot for that matter? The best named sewage facilitator the Japanese comode concern produces is called the "Neorest". "Neorest".

Let it sink in. Calming, isn't it?

Surely a place the Dalai Lama himself could visit to see a man about a mule.


















Anyway, enjoy the progress pictures and thanks for your prayers, tea and sympathy.






For more weird outhouse info see:

http://www.terrylove.com/crtoilet.htm

Guess what drives Karen crazy?

The downside to the bathroom remodeling is all the &*#$@#!:
dust
dirt
grime
soil
clay
duff (hmmm...)
gravel
humus (with pita?)
loam (me=wordsmith)
loess (!)
marl (-thank you roget)
mud
sand
silt, etc.

Karen is chomping at the bit to clean floor one of the compound, but tomorrow is the final day of drywalling which means yet more dust, so why bother? But it's just so hard to let go!

The rest of the compound is basically wallowing in it. Daisy might even be happier in the mess, Carl hardly notices ("He continues to eat inside! Oh my God!", exclaimed Karen.), and of course Treavor "pee bucket" Doherty is anything but fazed. Michael is bugged out, but is maintaining (and left for a long weekend in NYC. lucky). Poor Karen is holding on with all her might. She is hoping to bust out Mr. Clean and the Swiffers tomorrow afternoon. Via con Dios, Karen!

Bathroom series, pt. II

It's taking shape. We've got new PVC in to replace the rotted out cast iron. Did you know that sewer gas in your vent pipe could eat through cast iron? I've seen it and smelled it kids, and it ain't pretty.

The frameout is also done along with the glass block window. The rough plumbing is almost in. This time it's copper instead of galvanized steel. Yes!

Btw, I got to watch the "sewer-cam" the other day. Wow, gross. There's white stuff all along the walls of the sewer. Steven, the plumber, told me it's fat and grease. Some of it comes from food stuff going down the drain and some it comes from people after they've showered off sweat and grease. *Gulp* Imagine caked on crisco. Eww. Anyway, there were a couple of small roots the size of grass and that was it.

I also got to see the old gavlanized steel pipes. They were extremely clogged. It looked like I imagine Dick Cheney's coronary artery did before he had surgery and was put on a strict diet of fresh vegetables, whole grains and fibrous legumes, whose side effects include regular toilet makes. Too bad he wasn't eating better back in spring of '03...

The immediate effect of new pipes is the kitchen sink has a new found water pressure. It fills up water buckets in a flash and even forces of mustard splotches off plates and dried wine out of the bottom of the glass. Yay for progress!

Bathroom series, part I

The crappy crapper is no more. Down to the bones. The above shots are the skeletal look. Notice the old lath and plaster peeking through from the other rooms. I found a newspaper stuffed in the corner and searched high and low to find a date thinking it might have some article about a Bond Drive for the Doughboys or The Humanity of the Hindenburg Disaster or James Dean Dies in Car Crash. The bathroom had clearly been done since that long ago, but I couldn't imagine that given the shoddy, slapped together look of it that they had demo'd it to the studs.

Much to my surprise and disappointment it was a Chicago Tribune from January 20, 1991. The article? the NY Giants QB controversy for the upcoming Superbowl. Would it be Phil Simms or Jeff Hofstetler to face the juggernaut of the Buffalo Bills. It mentioned that the Jim Kelly led force would no doubt be the NFL's dynasty of the 90's. Woops. Not the treasure trove I had hoped for, but kinda funny.

Then it dawned on me that this ugly bathroom with a black faux marble countertop/sink with those make-up room type of lightbulbs across the top of the mirror (there had to be at least 10...) and racing stripes on the tile was finished in 1991. That's not that long ago. I'm not sure what to say. I certainly hope our redesign doesn't look so dated so quickly.

Our plan is to have a pedestal sink with antique looking faucet, medicine cabinet, sconces and one overhead light, simple tub, subway tile with shelf rail and a layout that takes advantage of the width of the room instead of hiding it. We'll see.

Bathroom series, part II shows current progress.

On Deck iii

First and second floors look amazing.

On Deck 2

As you can see, Daisy is most appreciative of the new deck because she has a better and safer vantage point for setting up her squirrel radar and imaging systems. Fluffy tailed rodents beware, the dingus has put you on alert.

Final Deck shots at "On Deck iii"

On Deck

For those who experienced the adventure of walking, sitting and eating on the old deck, the new deck is a welcome addition to the Compound. Instead of casually resting on top of a block of concrete with posts nailed together in an amateur fashion, the new deck is hurricane-ready and country-strong. Anchored in 42" of concrete with braces, brackets, joyces and screws of all sizes and alloys holding it together, we'll happily throw barbecues and invite parents with babies, the aged and infirm without fear of it doing an I-35-esque collapse because Carl added one too many sausages on the grill or Treavor set out one too many empty wine bottles.

Special thanks to Andy of A&M Remodeling and the carpenters extrodinaire Artur and Kamil.


See Posting "On Deck 2" for more improvement shots...