Archive for the “Building” Category

My family and I just took a trip to Florida. Which was Awesome!

I would have invited all of you readers… but, you know.

When we were about to board our flight back to salt lake city, the flight boarding personnel announced that the flight was in critical condition. Of course this scares the hell out of me, I’m thinking that our plane is about to have critical engine failure or something.

It turns out they meant that the boarding was critical, as in they booked way too many people on the flight. So, they need 10 volunteers to hang back for an extra day in Panama City.

They gave us a free hotel, food vouchers, and $900 bones toward future travel. Awesome!

The hotel though, that’s what i wanted to tell you guys about.

So the lobby of the hotel has 120 ceiling fans or so, too many to count. Seriously we tried, we counted them a half dozen times, and got a different number each time. Why would they want so many fans? Two possible reasons.

1- it’s a tourist town, and they want some flare!

2- the top of the building can detach from the foundation, and if all the fans are running full blast, the hotel can hover down Martin Luther King Blvd.

I’m leaning toward option number two.

We’ve been remodeling our house for two years now, and it’s really starting to come together. While I was working on a wall I discovered an old chimney shaft that was for a wood burning stove. The chimney was up on stilts, and Sara begged me to build a sculpture cubby in between the stilts. In the photo, you can see the cubby roughed in next to the brick wall.

After completing the cubby, we’ve had all sorts of debates about what would best fill in the space. Well, I just found the thing:

Archimedes on Display! Take that Martha Stewart!

When we first bought our old Victorian house in 2006, it was one of the dirtiest places I had ever seen.

When I say dirty, I don’t just mean cluttered, I mean filthy to the point that any child living in the house before, needed to be taken by DCSF and adopted by new parents.

The carpets were soaked in urine, there was poop smeered on the walls, there was a pile of laundry two feet thick, carpeting the entire house (also soaked in urine.)

The previous tennants had decided that taking garbage out to the cans, was too much work. They decided it would be faster to just heave the bags into the rear room. Have you ever seen a room full of 6 months of dirty diaper? Hope that you never do.

When I started cleanup, I had to buy a mask with a full face shield, so as to not allow any smell to get into my face. They were the kind of smells you can see and taste. Bleh.

Even now, two years later, I come across old smells. The other day I pulled the linoleum up from the stairs, and the whole house smelled like cigarette smoke for three days.

With the interest rates low, I’ve been manically trying to wrap up so that we can refinance the house. I’ve been burning the midnight oil working on the house. Which is a terrible idea during mid January in Salt Lake City. The inversion has been so bad that the house across the street looks blurry.

Despite all my efforts to keep it under control, when I get manic about our house, I miss sleep. Now I’m sick. I hate sickness. It’s like Mother Natures way of reminding me that I’m mortal. What a cruel world.

Last night I went out to the Maverick station, to pick up the movie Hancock, from the Redbox. After the machine ejected the movie, I notice a Whipple serviceman; wrenching at his work van’s bumper, with a crowbar. I asked what was wrong, and he said he slid on the ice and hit the bridge. He just needed to get the bumper out of his tire so he could get home.

I offered my assistance.

Since I own a Handy Man company, I have lots of tools in the back of my Van. We tried MacGyvering several tools to help our cause, ending in only bleeding knuckles. In the end, I came up with a bright idea of using a long Crowbar, a Cats Paw, and a Scissor Jack to move his bumper out enough to get him moving. He was very grateful (even though he could only make left turns) and thanked my profusely. This is his first ever Utah winter… not off to a good start.

At least I was able to bring him a little holiday spirit, and a rare view of my compassionate side.

Besides Whipple and I have history:

Last winter, almost spring, our furnace began blowing carbon monoxide all over the place. We found out when we had a Whipple serviceman out to our house to put a green sticker on our furnace. We would have just shut it down, and waited to replace it, but it was still cold outside, and we still needed the heat, so as not to die. It would have been $3,000.00 to replace the furnace, but since we we’re planning to put in A/C eventually, we decided to up the bid.

Grand total?

It cost $7,000.00, to put central air into the house. That’s an awful lot of money.

Now, on the one hand, I was upset at Whipple for finding this expensive problem (plus, how do I know the serviceman wasn’t full of balogna anyway.)  On the other hand, I don’t want to die. Besides having A/C is so nice.

So, after much thought, I decided I was just thankful that they protected my family, and loaned us the money to have Central Air.

Hopefully my hard earned money makes them happy.

Last year my little brother moved in with me. He had his girlfriend living with him. I enjoyed their company and wanted them to stay. In an effort to win them as long term guest I remodeled one of the rooms in my house and let them pick the colors.

Here are the before photos:

As you can see, the rooms started out absolutely awful. Not my fault, we were not the pigs who lived like this, that was the previous renters. You can imagine our hope for some stable renters. I cleaned the room and set to making it lovely for my brother. It took me a few weeks and vuala.

Here are the after photos:

My brother didn’t last long however, and Sara’s niece moved in with her husband and two kids. They just moved out and I cleaned the room up nice intending to keep it for my self this time. Unfortunately My cat Cinza has already claimed the room as her own, christening the room with a blood sacrifice:

Poor bastard didn’t even stand a chance.