Today was the first day of demolition, which consisted of taking down the wall between the kitchen and the hall closet, which will give us just another foot or so of space. All along, there have been dark forewarnings of something bad that we might find in the wall--something that would add unspecified amounts of dollars to our contract. The bad thing was never specified; apparently there are endless possibilities of disaster looming in an old-house remodel. When Jim went down to look at the remains, he was cheered. "It looks like you didn't find anything unexpected," he said. "Well," said Sue, our carpenter, "except for the stack...." (The stack, I gather, is the main plumbing conduit in the house).
Here is the exposed stack:
The problem is that all the plans were premised on a perfectly straight stack. Ours, however, has a little jut that comes out about 1/2 inch. "Oh well," Sue said, "plumbers can sometimes work miracles." I fear that this oddly shaped stack will end up costing a lot of extra money. Suddenly I fear that everything is going to end up costing a lot of extra money. My mother used to complain that her children were going to send her to the Poor House. I had visions of the entire family being swept up and carted off to the Poor House. (I didn't know exactly what it was, but I had a pretty Dickensian imagination as a child). Apparently this worry has never quite left me because I am suddenly thinking about the Poor House again.
When the carpenters started tearing things up, they uncovered some of the old vinyl flooring that we covered up with the temporary laminate I talked about yesterday.
This reminds me of why I really wanted a different floor.
6 comments:
We did a big remodel a couple of years ago of our bath and half bath. Ugh, about a month without a real working bath (with a 18 month-old, and a husband who could shower at work) I still get a little twitchy thinking about it (twitch). Then we tackled our kitchen ourselves for what we called just a "freshening up". It went from just a little botox around the eyes, to a full on facelift with dermabrasion, collagen injections and chin implants. Good luck to you and Jim, and don't worry about the budget or project calendar. They both always go over! Poor dears. Send me your address, and I'll send you some bread. Have you got a good toaster oven and mini loaf pans or a mini pizza stone? THE BAKING MUST CONTINUE!! You'll love the kitchen when it's done, and the process will soon be just a memory (twitch)
Chris in RI
Chris,
Yes, I could see how those memories could cause a few twitches. I hope you were happy with your face lift--but don't they have to be repeated every ten years.
Paddyscake,
The optimistic time without a kitchen is six weeks. We already know it will be longer than six weeks. The new optimistic projection is two months.
Marie, you have your hands full, don't you?
A lot of work to be done, but I think it'll be amazing.
Patricia,
Everyone, including our contractor, warned us that it would be awful. I believe they were telling the truth.
Interesting to know.
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