Two more things for the checklist:
I started on the bar counter this evening. I made the tricky diagonal cuts, but got stuck on a weird problem with the bottom of the counters. It is hard to explain, but I think I have a solution, so I should be able to get it fixed tomorrow. I also started working on the thresholds for the wood floor, and all of the brackets are cut to size. I just need to glue them in and snap in the thresholds.
According to the National Weather Service, Snowbowl is supposed to get like 3 inches of snow over the next couple of days. Hopefully it will stick, although it’s pretty unlikely. In any case, it is exciting to see that the beginnings of a ski season are arriving. I dunno about anybody else, but I’m pretty excited to get out and hit the slopes. I’ll have to buy the rest of my equipment one of these days.
My target for finishing stuff is November 15th, then I will throw a huge party or something for one final massive way to piss off the downstairs neighbors. Here’s what I have left:
It kind of seems like a lot. Really, I think the only actual significant work will be the vanities. Once that and the carpet are done (which just involves waiting for it to be installed), it will be in pretty good shape to move in.
I mean vanities. The bathroom vanities came in the other day, and on Sunday Mike and I got a chance to get started installing them. We started off replacing all the 6 shut-off valves on the water. Everything went off without a hitch, which was pretty awesome, because they usually leak like crazy. We got the first vanity in the small bathroom installed easily. We located two studs right away and screwed it in. Then we started on the master and the stud locations were terrible. We only located one usable stud, and it was on the first of three cabinets. We went to Home Depot and picked up some heavy duty anchors. The first cabinet was a real pain to install, because the anchor wasn’t perfectly centered. At that point we were pretty much out of time.
So, today I went by myself to work on it some more. The first thing I needed to do was install a filler piece between the first two cabinets. I set up the table saw and started to rip the filler to a half inch wide, and things started to smoke up. The blade was burning the wood hardcore. I wasn’t really sure why, so I finished up the floor in the office and headed out. After reading online, it sounds like I should be using a blade with less teeth, and the rip guide might be misaligned.
Here are a couple pictures of the cabinets going in:
People are social animals. I think it is safe to say that most people will not function properly without some form of social contact. In work, this is observable. Some people may be able/prefer to work on their own, but I would argue that they actually achieve less. I have had the opportunity to observe this phenomenon up close over the last two years. The engineering “group” of our team at work started out as me and another person doing contract work. We had one project to do, and we worked on it collaboratively. It was one of the more productive projects I’ve ever worked on. Eventually, the company liked our work and brought us on board. Our work was merged with some other contract work, so we had more projects to maintain. The other contract work was a bit lacking in terms of formal software engineering practices. We spent a lot of time getting everything up to speed, and things went ok. Eventually, the number of projects multiplied and things started getting out of control. At some point, it was decided that we assign each person to work on a different project in order to get things done quicker. I would argue that things slowed down at that point. It makes you feel like you are working alone by yourself in a dark room. If you ask other people for help, they don’t understand the context, and don’t really care about your project. The same is true when they ask you for help. A lot of times you slip into a rut where you just get stuck on something and have no motivation. With other team members, you can go to them for inspiration. When working by yourself, it takes much longer to get moving again.
So, to summarize: Always work in teams; it increases productivity and happiness.
This weekend I finished up a bunch of little random things. The bedrooms are very close to ready for carpet. The carpet people are supposed to come tomorrow afternoon, then they should be able to install Tuesday. The office is pretty much ready for the laminate floor as well, and the bathrooms are ready for the vanities, although they could use to have the shutoff valves replaced. It seems like there’s a pretty good chance I could move in next weekend, which would be nice.
I finished the laminate in under an hour after work today, then I cleaned up a bit. I cleaned up a bunch of misc junk that was around, plus the 2nd bedroom, so it can be carpeted. The moldings in that room plus the bedroom closets still needs to be touched up, so I figured I should start on that, so I sanded all of the moldings after getting some dinner. I was vacuuming before 9 and the neighbors pounded on the ceiling a bunch of times. I swear they are a bunch of whiners. Anyway, I got done around 11 and headed home. It’s getting close to being ready for the carpet. The word from Home Depot on the vanities is that it will be another week or more, which is pretty annoying. I might have to move in before those are done.
Anyway, here’s what the floor looks like:
And here are some toilet install shots:
Today the laminate floor was almost finished in the living/dining area. We could have finished, but it got a little too late to be using the table saw, so there are about 3 rows left for me to wrap up tomorrow. Should only take about a half hour. We also finished with the installation of the new toilets. They are Toto Drake toilets, with the “G-Max” flush system. My goal is to be able to not own a plunger. We’ll see. So far, the toilet shutoff valves have been the only ones to not leak. Last night, when my dad and I installed the first toilet, however, the valve started spraying water out of the handle all over the place when it was turned on all the way. We went to Home Depot and bought more shutoff valves. We were able to get the quarter-turn style, which are pretty fancy since they’re really easy to turn on and off. I’m not sure if the second toilet valve was leaking, but I figured if they were using crap parts, it probably would be soon. Both of those shutoff valves installed pretty easily and didn’t leak. Score. So, really all thats left now before I can move in is the carpet and the bathroom vanities. There is a little touchup work left on the moldings in the rooms that are getting carpet, so that needs to be done before I bring in the carpet installers. I took some pictures, but I forgot my camera at the condo, so I’ll post them tomorrow hopefully.
Last night I went to Costco with my parents and bought all of my laminate flooring. I bought 35 boxes total, plus 4 installation kits. The flatbed cart I loaded up was hard to even get moving. We started installation this morning. It was slow to start because we had a crazy triangle at the beginning, which I refer to as the Bermuda Triangle, but we got quite a bit of the living room done. I am really tired and sore now, but hopefully we can at least wrap up the main living+dining area tomorrow. Here are some pics:
A bunch of boxes of flooring (this is probably less than half of it):
The Bermuda Triangle:
The tile in the kitchen:
Yesterday, the tile was finished. The tile installers seem to have done a pretty good job and it looks nice. My new countertop for the bar came in as well, and I picked it up from Home Depot. I removed the old one, which was really hard to get off. It was attached with four big spots of glue between the two sections, and a couple nails stick up through the studs and pierce through the bottom. I used a giant crowbar which came in handy. By the time that was off, it was probably about 8:30, and I didn’t want to piss off the neighbors too much, so I held off on cutting the new countertop. I picked out a carpet sample and gave it to the tile people, who said they can do carpet as well, so we’ll see about that. I’m trying to track down some cork underlayment for the laminate so that I can start it this weekend, but I think I might need to order online, which will take about a week and a half to deliver. I’ll try to get some pictures posted of the tile job soon.
Al's Blog 