a home of one's own

so i finally had the nerve today to sit down and calculate total project cost. It came to $2440 (rounded up). Same digits as the contractor's quote ($4240) - only a better rearrangement from my pov, if you know what i mean.
and you ask - as you should - what about the efforts *i* put into this baby?

that's priceless.

i have stopped work on the bathroom for the rest of this month. i shall resume again once ramadan is over on nov 3 or 4.

forgot to mention this earlier. on debbie travis, they did a nifty little segment with 3 guys attacking three separate walls of a room with three different removal techniques (including steaming!) and the one that was fastest was: a mixture of warm water, mild soap or detergent powder and wallpaper removal gel. It does really work. But you have to be methodical. i wasn't, and so, to me, one relatively small, vaulted-ceilinged bathroom wall seemed to take forever!
anyhow, once you get the paper off, wipe down with wet sponge as many times as you can otherwise even the primer for new drywall has trouble sticking and you might end up with blotchy walls wherever primer thickens unevenly from numerous coats.
also, once you get it off - *keep it off* please people - no more wallpaper. it's absolutely the worst thing to put on your walls until a time they discover a better, faster, less yucky removal method.

he is gone. in all, i paid him for 40 hours on a project that he'd quoted at 22 hours. plus 4 for the flooring and a piss poor job at that. while leveling the floor he applied silicone to the crack between the seams of underlayment and did not smooth before laying down the vinyl. result - bumpy floor wherever silicone was applied (thankfully not too many places and hoping that people will not look too closely). he however did not admit to a single mistake he has made during this whole project. but i was able to shut his face once and for all about doing my work for cheap when i told him exactly how much a professional - bonded and insured - had quoted for the job.
on the last day he brought along a lackadaisical assistant (against my express wishes, see previous blog) who was evidently well-briefed to move at the pace of a three-toed sloth. he took two hours to drill a hole through the floor of the living room for surround speaker wires (the exit hole was already there) and another set of holes in the bedroom for a underground phone line pass-through. nothing fancy - just drill, go into crawl space, weave in wire through one hole and weave out through the other....two hours. subsequently, he just stood around holding items his mentor handed him. and, by the end of the day i paid him for five hours of work. apparently he'd *worked* for five hours. yet, i wore a stupid grin on my face when we went to dinner for lis and z's anniversary that night. i was so glad to imagine a life without the irritation and aggarvation of the past 1.5 month.
to date, i am floating on air. i don't even feel like chronicling the myriad minor dramas that ensued during that 8-hour sunday (which of course they did). suffice it to say, i am overjoyed to have a man out of my house who i suspect would go through my underwear drawer if he'd only been left unsupervised long enough.
i am afraid to do a final cost analysis though. because i fear i have not saved any money to show for all the aggravation I suffered.

he was back last evening. although originally the plan was to have him come on Sunday, he came on the pretext of taking stock of what needs to be done on sunday and then, of course, started working so now i have to pay him for two hours of work. what did he do in two hours. replaced light fixture and shower head, took the taping off the drain, installed towel bar (not level and so will have to redo) and toilet roll holder on pre drilled holes, and siliconed the backsplash behind the sink. it should have taken an hour or so.
he could not install the shower valve because he forgot to check whether it fits flush to the wall or needs to be embedded in it earlier. so now i have to go looking for one that fits cuz i don't even want to think about cutting circular niche in the tile. it will be a nightmare.
he knew very well the list of things he had to do to finish up and yet the first thing he said to me yesterday when he traipsed in empty handed was: so do you have teflon tape for the shower head? when i said: what tape (not without irritation) he made a gesture like this was common knowledge before explaining what it was. i wish i could be amused by his trying to prove that i am a loser for not having construction know-how. i have a goddamn phd!! so now i have decided to remind him of it every few minutes. and also to let him know that socially we are from two very different classes. i realised lately that it's your only protection in america: the class system.
isn't that ironic? i wonder what the founding fathers would have to say abt that.
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i got sunday to look forward to (not!). he planned to bring an assistant and i told him point blank that i am not going to pay the extra. i am sure he is going to retaliate by taking two extra hours and making me pay him even more... hahaha. i can't ever win this game.
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i also got anecdotal evidence - as always - of how good a deal i am getting. you know those stories that go: so and so did such and such and paid thi~~~s much for it? well, truth be told, the contractor's quote i got earlier had listed labor at $1250 for 5 days (and a lot better quality work no doubt as well as a lot less stress and manual effort from me). By the time we are done - I'll have paid this a-hole $1000. i did save some money on material where the contractor had high mark-ups. But still... i am left pondering the efficacy of my fateful choice.

i am overwhelmed by the amount of work that still remains... i have yet to finish painting. and to buy the vinyl. sherwin williams is not a potential source b/c they only do apartments and places with short turn over times. low quality stuff. but it looked good! anyhoo... am thinking home depot again.just need to get it over with. plans to stain the vanity a darker tone seems to be too optimistic at this point. haven't grouted or sealed seams on the shower enclosure.
on top of this i also have to mow the lawn and apply weed and feed for winterization. tomorrow the sprinkler guys coming around for the blow-out. is charging me $10 more than regular. but apparently, i can't haggle right now. their demand is higher than what my business is worth to them so they couldn't care less.
none of the above is made easy by ramadan. how can a person fasting for 12 hours do physically demanding manual labour? but i don't want to miss a single day of fasting. winter is closing in so remodel needs to be wrapped up asap. i really don't know what to do... the last time i was priming drywalls while fasting - i had nuerous dizzy spells on account of having to go up and down the ladder a million times. the space is too cramped to have the paint tray on the ladder - so every time i need to dip the rollers i had to come back down. i will need to repeat all that while painting. i can't motivate myself to do that. yesterday, sat around at friends' house for 7 hours for no reason. while all this work remained undone. i am so demoralized that i can't even visualize an end to all this. i am hoping some kind of an auto pilot will set in as handyman deadline approaches and i will get everything done. or perhaps some kind of pre-christmas miracle. either way - i need to get my ass in gear... but i am so tired.

of all the things i had to do/be involved with during the remodel, i can safely say that i hate drywalls the most. it is next to impossible for the uninitiated to match a new wall section to an old one - regardless of the amount of mud (joint compound). and then sanding the surface for smoothness - don't even get me started on that. first of all it takes forever. three or even four applications of mud may be necessary. bumps are hard to get rid of without taking all the mud off. joints are seldom level. you might think you have it just right but when you put on the primer you see all the imperfections rising up to meet you. so in remodeling rip out as little of the old drywall as you possibly can. don't go by what they show on hgtv - b/c they really don't show any of it at all (cuz it's so long and boring!).

the great folks at great floors finally sent another team of "experts" to deal with the squeakiness of my kitchen floor and finsih off trimming the toe-kicks with quarter rounds. it looks garish and odd with the rest of the wood tones in the kitchen (of course, stain did not match!) but i have given up. as for the squeakiness, the guy inspected the area and said triumphantly: "u know what? it's your heat register cover that some of the boards are scratching against." like he had nothing to do with cutting the boards too long. he was the same guy who laid the floor. he nodded his head and added: "the wood must have expanded." oh yeah??? wood does that - does it? i guess that's why "floor installers" need to cut the planks, allocating for such 'acts of god'.
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stay away from great floors (boise) when it comes to installing your floor (they have a good variety in material though). and by *all* means, stay away from randy stone as your sales guy.

this saturday and sunday lis, zu and i tiled my shower surround and base. both my friends work for the state so thank god they have today off for columbus day. i had to be at work though but that's ok.
i have been meaning to get the tiling done for the last two weeks. but lis and zu were moving houses and i was helping them so this had to wait. but unless i finished up my part, the handyman can't return to finish up his. better late than never is what i say.
it took us one day to tile the base (which you have to do first according to common wisdom but then are stuck to let it cure for 24 hours before you can stand on it to tile the walls). anyhoo, bright and late on sunday afternoon (3:30pm) we started to tile the walls. nothing was level - neither the floor or the backer boards so, of course, tiled walls aren't level either but we did tolerably well for the most part. the first wall took 3.5 hours. took a short break for tea and dumplings and then finished the other two walls in 4.5 hrs (till 11:15 pm). we got the whole things down - comparative advantages guys (i'm not an economist for nothing). zu cut the tiles to size, lis laid and leveled and i was in charge of the thinset (and some laying and leveling). here is a 'before' picture. will upload 'after' picture soon. gymnastics was a requisite b/c the space is so cramped for two people working at the same time. it was funny. we sang and danced around and had a good time in general.
next on the agenda:
* finish walls
* clean tiles and work space
* prime new drywall
* texture walls
* paint all
* white paint on door trim
* buy vinyl for floor
* buy vinyl and wall base adhesive
* buy different light fixture from lowes.
* schedule handyman
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me and lis in cramped quarters, tiling like women possessed.
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notes: 1. tiling is much worse than it looks on hgtv. so before you decide to start a project make sure you know what it involves - both in terms of money as well as the amount of muck you will have your hands in. thinset and grout are not fun things to work with. leveling tiles are time-consuming and frustrating (esp. in older houses).
2. porcelain tiles are now cheaper actually (6x6 tiles, 1 sf = $1.96 + tax) than the old style shiny ceramic and look more upscale too, so go with it.
3. a little border at shoulder level makes the whole area pop. i chose procelain tile in a color they call "florence".
4. grout and caulking is available in matching color tones.
5. get white thinset instead of gray (like i did).
6. don't worry about tiles being covered in thinset - it does not stick and you can either scratch it off when it is dry or wipe off with sponge (more effort).
7. floor tiles on mesh are convenient.
8. perhaps you can't do a circular cut with a wet saw but you can get real close so don't make any unnecessary compromises on finish. try first.
9. the $88 dollar wet saw from home depot works quite well, even in the hands of first timers but wear goggles.