It’s been a blur of a week and the holiday weekend has started out in a similar fashion. After about 2 hours of sleep, I woke at 3:15 AM to head off for Michigan via a 6 AM flight at LaGuardia. I feel like I’ve taken every form of transport besides a boat today, but I've arrive safely after flying on Northwest (of Northworst as I like to call it). Scrambling for a few hours, I submitted what I need to for work and completed the always fun trip to Home Depot to begin the painting of the trim tomorrow.
That's right, I've come all the way home to Michigan to paint trim with my Dad on a holiday weekend. We saved a few thousand dollars by having it replicated in Michigan. Although it’s a bit of an expense to fly out, there is a luxury here that I’ve forgotten: room to work!
I saw the trim for the first time tonight and it looks fabulous. The milling is spot on and my Dad has kept it inside all winter making sure it’s nice and dry, minimizing any chance for warping and splitting since it has been in a controlled environment.
Tomorrow is going to be a long day, so it's off to bed for now.
Friday, May 23, 2008
Monday, May 19, 2008
Traveling and forgetting plaster
I've been gone for 10 days now on a crazy trip to London, UK and Athens, Greece for work. Long story short, I've forgotten what it's like to live in a construction site. I came home yesterday a bit jet lagged to the pleasant reminder of plaster dust on the floor, surpise pieces of wall fallen and my clothes fallen to the ground as my makeshift closet (a shower rod) fell in my abscence. Swank hotels and friends homes with clear areas to sit down on and clothing in closets has been the norm for the past week. It's been nice traveling without any plaster.
Now reality has reminded me how much work I have to go. After a good night's sleep and a day of work, I'm back into my routine of hauling out bags of plaster in the Radio Flyer cart. I took it easy tonight, just 6 bags to our building's pile, just so the trash guys don't get ticked off that I'm back. I'm sure they had a nice week and half off without having to haul away my plaster. Luckily the pile has greatly dwindled and there are only a handful of pickups left for it to be all gone.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Moving in Paralell
While there is a heap of trash in my bedroom, that doesn't mean there aren't things to be done. There are many little things. For instance, I put all the twist ties on the trash bags this weekend, removed more nails that I couldn't reach before, pulled out some baseboards, vaccumed, removed nails from wood and budled it, etc. Small questions still loom like how do I want to wire for cable and loudspeakers, but these answers should come fairly easily.
There is a lot to do on the design side, an area where I haven't made many concrete decisions. This is why I hired my good friend Bryant Keller to think about these things for me. Bryant's got skills I don't have and for a small sum of money he's helping me along the way with all of the interior design.
After weeks of ON/OFF work, we finally nailed down the kitchen design. Take a look and see what you think. I think it is pretty sweet. Traditional but classy and calming.
I've now started to price it out and this is where I feel that things may fall apart. Again, this is where my contact may come into play. My other friend has an uncle who makes cabinets as his hobby. He's into doing other people's kitchens and has agreed to work with me on mine.
I've emailed him these drawings last week and we're going to price them up hopefully this week. Fingers crossed it won't kill me.
There is a lot to do on the design side, an area where I haven't made many concrete decisions. This is why I hired my good friend Bryant Keller to think about these things for me. Bryant's got skills I don't have and for a small sum of money he's helping me along the way with all of the interior design.
After weeks of ON/OFF work, we finally nailed down the kitchen design. Take a look and see what you think. I think it is pretty sweet. Traditional but classy and calming.
I've now started to price it out and this is where I feel that things may fall apart. Again, this is where my contact may come into play. My other friend has an uncle who makes cabinets as his hobby. He's into doing other people's kitchens and has agreed to work with me on mine.
I've emailed him these drawings last week and we're going to price them up hopefully this week. Fingers crossed it won't kill me.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
5 Hrs. of Shuffling Trash
Anu came over today and we dug into the trash again. Tying up all the bags was a big help as was vacumming the mess underneath them all. The worst part was the darn nails in the lathe, but they came out with ease and patience. I'm feeling better about this mess and confident a few more weeks of patience will help it all dissapear.
After a fresh mop, the floors are gleaming again and I'm more optimistic about this project then I was yesterday. Time to relax with a movie...
After a fresh mop, the floors are gleaming again and I'm more optimistic about this project then I was yesterday. Time to relax with a movie...
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Trash Setback
I started getting a bit cocky this week as the city has been picking up everything I've been putting out...at three trash piles on the street.
Granted, I believe it is totally illegal to put out trash at other spots that are not my property, but I've been doing it to try and speed up the process. So after getting home at about 2:45 AM last night, I went to work and took out twelve bags of plaster, 1one bundle of trim and two bags of lath. I spread the plaster out between the trash piles at my building and the one across the street. The wood I took down the street to another small neighboring building.
When I woke up this morning, all the trash was there as I peered out the window. This is the usual thing as they don't come until 11ish to pick it up. I had a meeting with a neighbor and when I came out of it, the trash was gone...except for the twelve bags of plaster. Damn!
To top it off, either the garbage men or the building across the street hauled the plaster I had placed over there back to our side of the street. Busted!
I freaked out for a bit, as I don't like getting in trouble or dealing with people yelling at me. I started to wonder if I should leave it or call 311 and report it. I called 311 only to find out I had to wait until the end of the day to report it. Still freaking out, I finally called our weekend handyman and just asked him if I could move it into our courtyard next to the other bags of trash. He said sure, no problem.
On the bright side, I won't have to haul down plaster all the way from the apartment on Monday night. The downer is that I better back off for a bit and just put out six bags Monday and Wednesday night. I'll try to put some wood up the street too. The Great Trash Race continues.
Granted, I believe it is totally illegal to put out trash at other spots that are not my property, but I've been doing it to try and speed up the process. So after getting home at about 2:45 AM last night, I went to work and took out twelve bags of plaster, 1one bundle of trim and two bags of lath. I spread the plaster out between the trash piles at my building and the one across the street. The wood I took down the street to another small neighboring building.
When I woke up this morning, all the trash was there as I peered out the window. This is the usual thing as they don't come until 11ish to pick it up. I had a meeting with a neighbor and when I came out of it, the trash was gone...except for the twelve bags of plaster. Damn!
To top it off, either the garbage men or the building across the street hauled the plaster I had placed over there back to our side of the street. Busted!
I freaked out for a bit, as I don't like getting in trouble or dealing with people yelling at me. I started to wonder if I should leave it or call 311 and report it. I called 311 only to find out I had to wait until the end of the day to report it. Still freaking out, I finally called our weekend handyman and just asked him if I could move it into our courtyard next to the other bags of trash. He said sure, no problem.
On the bright side, I won't have to haul down plaster all the way from the apartment on Monday night. The downer is that I better back off for a bit and just put out six bags Monday and Wednesday night. I'll try to put some wood up the street too. The Great Trash Race continues.
Monday, April 21, 2008
The Great Trash Race
At the same time my project is happening, the building is clearing out basement spaces in preparation for storage. Years of junk is being removed by tenants who illegally used the space for their own personal 'rat pack' habits (as my Dad would say).
Unfortunately, I'm afraid this may soon effect my amazing no cost construction debris disposal plan. As soon as the tenants move their stuff out, the building will clear out the rest and put it to the curb to be picked up on trash days. There goes my 6 bulk items.
So now I've got to step it up and take out more then usual. Where am I going to put it you ask? Across the street and up the street of course. Their trash days coincide with ours.
So tonight I disposed of eight bags of plaster and two bundles of wood. I feel criminal about all this, but I've got to win the Great Trash Race against my own building. I still believe I won't have to spend a dime on trash disposal of all this.
Yet, there is another glimmer of construction debris disposal hope. The building across the street that has a retail space which is being renovated. I'm hoping that dumpster will appear sometime soon this week. I promise, I'll only throw a little bit in it...
Unfortunately, I'm afraid this may soon effect my amazing no cost construction debris disposal plan. As soon as the tenants move their stuff out, the building will clear out the rest and put it to the curb to be picked up on trash days. There goes my 6 bulk items.
So now I've got to step it up and take out more then usual. Where am I going to put it you ask? Across the street and up the street of course. Their trash days coincide with ours.
So tonight I disposed of eight bags of plaster and two bundles of wood. I feel criminal about all this, but I've got to win the Great Trash Race against my own building. I still believe I won't have to spend a dime on trash disposal of all this.
Yet, there is another glimmer of construction debris disposal hope. The building across the street that has a retail space which is being renovated. I'm hoping that dumpster will appear sometime soon this week. I promise, I'll only throw a little bit in it...
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Organizing Trash
After waking up at 7 AM and working for 5 hours straight, I have organized my mountain of bagged plaster. It was driving me nuts. I couldn't use the bedroom to put anything in there (specifically laundry to dry). After twist tying bags of plaster vacuuming the floor and then doing a final mop, it's starting to feel a bit normal again...if you ignore the open ceiling and walls, but hey, I can dream. The trash load ups should go much quicker now, which will be well appreciated since I've been doing them at 11:30 PM recently. The little Radio Cart can only handle three bags of plaster at a time, so its always 2 trips at least, which takes me 15 - 25 minutes depending on elevator traffic.
Besides organizing the trash, I made little bits of progress today. Most of the closet floor tiles were scraped up. I removed all the nails from the moldings, cut them up and bundled them to be placed on the curb.
I also made headway on taking the plaster off the brick. It took me a good 20 minutes to figure out the best technique. The secret was to make sure the edge of the plaster is scraped so that it is perpendicular to the face of the brick. A mini sledge and a flat bar are the other key elements. Put the flat bar wedge on the plaster/brick and pound away, watching the chunks easily come off. The downside is that the noise of the flat bar/brick interaction reverberates in the whole hallway....not such a good idea on a Sunday, so I didn't take it all off.
I didn't tackle the lath today and I'm hoping to do that with a friend. It's not fun on your own removing all those nails.
Tomorrow is trash day...again.
Besides organizing the trash, I made little bits of progress today. Most of the closet floor tiles were scraped up. I removed all the nails from the moldings, cut them up and bundled them to be placed on the curb.
I also made headway on taking the plaster off the brick. It took me a good 20 minutes to figure out the best technique. The secret was to make sure the edge of the plaster is scraped so that it is perpendicular to the face of the brick. A mini sledge and a flat bar are the other key elements. Put the flat bar wedge on the plaster/brick and pound away, watching the chunks easily come off. The downside is that the noise of the flat bar/brick interaction reverberates in the whole hallway....not such a good idea on a Sunday, so I didn't take it all off.
I didn't tackle the lath today and I'm hoping to do that with a friend. It's not fun on your own removing all those nails.
Tomorrow is trash day...again.
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