Still haven't emailed anyone - my apologies - been doing a MAJOR renovation on my home since August prior to putting the house on the market (target date 01/16/06).

Originally thought it would just be a cosmetic update - yea sure - so here I am six months later and about $40k poorer finally seeing the bottom of the money pit almost reaching ground level.

Originally my parents house - my Dad loved to paint - unfortunately after 60 years of him changing color schemes it became necessary to remove all the previous layers before we could put a smooth coat on - In one room I was able to distinguish 13 separate colors that room had been painted over the years, even found a layer of Chartreuse in my brothers old bedroom - As a teen a million years ago he wanted to paint his bedroom walls Chartreuse and the ceiling black - I don't think I was even a teen yet but I remember him getting indignant when Dad agreed to the Chartreuse walls but absolutely ruled out the black ceiling!

Dad also would in his latter years retile the kitchen and bathrooms - and usually did so by just adding another layer of tile - One of the last was a ceramic tile floor in the kitchen and looked nice for about 2 days then all the tiles started cracking - felt really bad for him (now I know the cause at the time I didn't) well didn't get pop down he said the hell with it and went back to his self adhesive 12 x 12 vinyl tile and just covered it up with a floor that wouldn't crack!

Well when remodeling the kitchen and getting ready for a New Ceramic Tile Floor - (hoping that the plywood sub floor was still in reasonable condition) we started removing layers of floor - first 1 layer of vinyl 12x12 tiles then the layer of cracked ceramic tiles had to come up then we had another layer of vinyl tiles and removed them and below that another of 12 x 12 vinyl tiles which we removed then wow below that there was the plywood but it was water damaged and had rot so we removed that and what did we find? Yet another layer of vinyl tiles and below that was the ORIGINAL kitchen floor of "asbestos tiles" circa 1944! Well shrugged my shoulders put on a face mask and removed that layer to find another rotted out plywood sub floor which we removed and thinking FINALLY now were ready to start with the new floor - one minute after that thought my foot went through the original wood plank flooring as it too was water damaged and rotted - went under the house in the crawl space (YUCK - I was always sure as a kid that all kinds of mysterious critters and huge spiders lived down there) and did an inspection and fortunately the only place that the plank flooring was damaged was in the kitchen so we removed them and laid down new planks (hey this time GOOD NEWS the joists being the main beams that the floor bds attach to and that hold the house up (we are on a foundation) were in good shape. So what I thought would be a couple of days to lay down a new ceramic tile floor for the kitchen turned into a two week rather expensive labor intensive detour and similar type situations have occurred over and over again as we've gone from one area to another.

Fortunately I have had the time to dedicate to this project as rather then hire a contractor I just hired a couple of qualified all around handy men and between the 3 of us we've been able to tackle whatever came our way! If I had gone the contractor route I'd be living on the streets -

Every month for the past 3 or 4 months I've been saying well another two weeks and we will have it done yep I was saying 2 weeks more, 14 weeks ago.  NOW I have set the date for 1/16/06 to put the for sale sign up which means I best drag my ass outside and try to install the new front door jam that I cut last night - normally 2 sides and a top and a door stop nailed on to it this one is a jigsaw puzzle as nothing is standard as to the measurements or even square in this house due to prior remodeling jobs - Dad was a jack of all trades and loved to work on the house and had a level of energy even at 80 yo in tackling such things that I never had at any age.  Unfortunately thought while he had some knowledge in all areas he was an expert in none of them - hence some of the problems I've encountered.  If you are tuned in POP it's kewl the place always "looked good" and that was good enough for us - unfortunately I have to take it a step further so that it will pass inspection and for what I expect it go be going for the buyers are most definitely entitled to be reassured that all improvements have been made correctly.  As for the front door pop don't sweat it if my pieces don't fit the jig saw puzzle and all else fails I'll just look for a bigger hammer!

On the plus side though is that for every dollar invested in the renovation we will see 4 to 5 returned in he increase in value.

For the past week or so been doing all this with a nasty cold/flu
- and though it has slowed me down tremendously hasn't knocked me out of the game yet - (coughs a couple of times and feels like some invisible critters are poking ice picks into his muscles - but being the stupid duck that he is drags his ass outside to make sure the others are doing what needs to be done - breaths a little more of the sanded drywall and sawdust into his lungs - looks at some of the stuff he knows he should do today and who knows probably goes back to bed - FUCK THIS - DID I SAY TWO MORE WEEKS - yea sure!!

poor sick duckey aka / Ed