TBT - Knocking Down a Flag Pole!

Another vintage post for your reading pleasure! Doesn't everything sound better when you call it vintage?? Happy throwback Thursday!

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Flag Pole Down
This weekend has been a great success with regards to the yard. Jon was out of town so that helped a bunch. Jon was out of town so that helped a bunch.  He typically hurts this (although there have been times when he has done a lot of work when I was working my two jobs and I couldn't help. So, I don't want to be accued of not giving credit where credit is due!) because he works a lot and never wants to do it and I am a wonderful wife and watn to spend time with him.  He was out of town helping with some familial obligations so I decided to go out and get some work done.  One of my favorite things is to work on something when he's not around so when he arrives it's a surprise.  I think I like doing this because I LOVE surprises so I enjoy making them happen for others, no matter how small. However, this weekend was not small (albeit not THAT exciting).

As luck would have it, my mother called me on Saturday morning to ask me about coming to a Labor Day party on Monday.  We got to talking about how Jon was out of town and how my yard is a horrible fricking disaster that I'm sure making my neighbors secretly hate me.  She said well, I was planning on working on Rebecca's house today (my sister-in-law still owns a house from her former single life that my mom has been helping to fix up because she is the in-house maintenance lady ha) but I think I'm going to come help you.  She stated that under the guise that it would be more fun but I think she just feels embarrassed that people she knows from church live by me and know we're related.  Regardless, she headed over with her tools and we were underway ripping out the weed garden section of my yard around the flag pole.  Yes, you read that right, the flag pole.  The previous owner was in the military so I imagine he found it very important to proudly display the American flag.  I, on the other hand, am lazy and don't have any motivation to do so.  Therefore, it is a gigantic, rusty eyesore.  Anywho, we worked on it for about 5 hours together less a lunch break and then she headed home.

The following morning I received another early morning call from my mom.  Her ambitious self was on the phone asking me what I was doing that day.  She said, want to take out the flag pole? Let me provide some additional details about this thing.  The pole is screwed into a brace taht is cemented into the ground and with rusted screws it has been extra protected from movement.  Jon and I have been dreading this task as we figured we would have to jack hammer it out and somehow keep it from falling on our house. Also, the pole is about 40 ft. tall and seemingly made of very heavy plumbing pipe.  I begrudgingly said ok thinking that this was heading for disaster.  A 65+ year old woman and a weak, lazy 27 year old are going to end up in the hospital and a hole in the roof of the house.  However, I had apparently underestimated the magic materials that my mother would bring with her.  Wetried to unscrew the screws but very quickly confirmed that the rust made it impossible.  So, my mom whipped out this spray and voila, the screws twisted out.  Soon, we found ourselves on the last one.  As it loosened I began pushing on the pole and it began to fall... AND in the opposite direction of my house! Success! Until... it hit the tree limb and got stuck.  Because I live in a town very similar to Mayberry, a neighbor man who lets us borrow his tools all of the time just happened to be walking by.  He insisted on helping us and after a few short minutes the pole was safely on the ground... sans any personal injuries!  This was a big win when it comes to my morale.  Now I'm on the real mission to finish tearing out the flipping yard so that next year we can begin planting and no longer look like we live in an abandoned drug house.  I really only have two more secionts left and I think I can get them done in the next week or so.  Hopefully, I will have a fantastic update soon!

Oh, and btw Jon was surprised.  He kept asking how we did it and I think is not-so-secretly happy that he didn't have to be a part of it. :)

Me pretending to hit the pole as it was stuck in the tree (great art direction by mom).

Wall-Done

One of my most favorite projects thus far would have to be the hole we put into our wall. This is likely due in part to the fact that I didn't have to do anything, it was handled completely by professionals (Jon's amazing uncles). I also love it because it made a huge difference in our house.  We have a "cozy" (my favorite word for very, very small) 1100 square foot home, so needless to say there isn't a lot of room for entertaining.  From the day I bought this house I had the idea that I needed to open it up to help with the flow when entertaining. And isn't opening things up all the rage these days?

El problemo with my plan was that I wanted to open the space up between the family room and kitchen, and that my friends, is a load bearing wall. Not to be discouraged, because I have the motto you can do whatever the eff you want as long as you're willing to pay for it, I forged on with the plan. Well sort of. Jon and I are what you might call indecisive procrastinators.  Real projects terrify us and even though we have been together for something like 10-15 years (I mean it's somewhere in there who keeps count at this point anyway?) we are afraid of commitment. Lucky for us, we had someone nudging us... aka saying, "Are you going to do this stupid project or what??"

Because I was smart enough to know that I shouldn't touch a load bearing wall lest the house should collapse, I think the project really started when I asked Jon's uncle at a family party how much it could cost to brace a load bearing wall for a pass-through.  He didn't really give me a direct answer and I thought that the question had sort of died. However, I think that either at another party or via a phone call the project was brought up again and the next thing I know his uncle is at our house assessing it. He gave us a quote and Jon and I, the procrastinators and non-committers that we are, didn't call him back. That's when we finally got the call essentially saying are you doing this or not? So we said... ok, completely terrified of what we were starting.

One thing about this plan was that it had originally begun as a fairly simple rectangular opening, I had no grand plans. I'm a pretty simple, modern style-ish person so I was cool with that.  Then one day my mother threw this giant wrench in the plan.  She said, "Why don't you consider doing something fun like columns?" I was thinking that's kind of gaudy for my taste. I'm not really into a Grecian style (I mean who is under the age of 75 or really rich people with poor taste?). I said no way. The subject came up again at a later time and I said, "Mom, do you really think a Greek column would go in my little 1960s house?" She said, "I was not talking about Greek columns! Google some photos of Crafstman style home columns." Oh goodness, did I fall in love. I loved the column style and the built-ins that typically accompanied them. How in the hell do moms always know everything? It's not cool.

The process began, and moved along pretty quickly. Although, this was not without a major fight where I got mad at Jon for not communicating the measurements correctly.  The pillars were supposed to be sitting on top of the built-ins but I could tell partially through the project that this was not going to happen. However, it all worked out in the end and I am really happy with the result.

Some photos for your enjoyment...

This is what I came home to the first day they began the work. I was soooo excited and scared.



The same day I went down to the creepy room in the basement where we were keeping our sweet little Lola. I think she was a little stressed and took it out on Jon's parents' old couch...



In-progress, sorry it's a tad blurry but you get to see Jon's uncles in action!



Ok, the official before photo... (ignore the really messy coffee table)



Annnnnnd the after!!!!

Way to Handle It Like a Man

This is a whiny post today.

I was so excited when we got our electrical completed in the bathroom that I was feeling motivated to get this baby moving.  So I decided to call some other contractors.  I had a plumbing company come the week prior to evaluate the work and give me a quote.  They came and evaluated it (after rescheduling 23 times in one day) and told me I would get my estimate the following day.  It never came.  I honestly didn't follow-up with the guy because he told me that I needed to have a heat run moved to move the toilet.  That is fine but I figured I might as well call a plumbing and HVAC company.  Therefore I never followed-up.

When the day came for me to be motivated I decided to call a dual plumbing/HVAC company, that which I will call Dionysus (know your Greek mythology? I don't, I googled it to be funny but I think it will end up only being funny to me).  I talked to a man who refused to listen to me.  He kpet telling me that they could do the plumbing but couldn't move the heat run because they would have to rip out all the dry wall.  I repeatedly told him it was in a gutted bathroom and an unfinished basement so the entire run was exposed.  He kept telling me they couldn't do it.  Finally, I stopped him and said so you're telling me that a completely exposed run cannot be moved?  There is no dry wall anywhere near it.  He said, oh it's exposed? We can do that.  You ever see a comic when a character has a fizzle above his head?  That was me.  He then proceeded to tell me that it would cost me $80 for a plumbing estimate and another $80 for the HVAC. I am not spending $160 on estimates so I hung up in annoyance.

I had not lost faith yet though and thought well if a plumbing/HVAC company is going to charge me separate estimates I might as well try to get the original estimate from the guy who had looked at the work previously.  I called him and left a message.  He called me back a few minutes later and said, "Oh, I remember you.  I hadn't forgotten.  We've just been really busy."  I basically told him no problem.  He then proceeded to continue telling me how busy they were and then followed-up with something condescending like, you know, because we're really busy we really won't be able to get there for a while. And I mean it really looked like you needed a plumber two weeks ago so I'm sure you don't want to wait.  He then proceeded to tell me how busy they were again.  And then told me he would get the estimate next week.  I didn't say anything until I just said "Ok, bye." He could tell I was angry.

Here's the thing, I get it that companies get busy.  I really am a very understanding person.  However, if they were so busy he never should have wasted my time coming to evaluate my work (but I'm sure he determined once he did that the job was too piddly for him).  The other thing is that he didn't need to talk to me like I was an idiot.  I know that I really need a plumber in there, but thanks for telling me in case I had forgotten.  I was so angry I couldn't help but wonder if he was being so condescending because I am female.  I am not a person who questions that with men very often.  I have worked on many house projects with many men who were nothing but professional.  When this guy was at my house looking at my bathroom he kept calling me on of those pet names like honey or sweetie.  It originally didn't really bother me because I feel like he didn't mean anything by it, you know it's just what old men say (even though he wasn't THAT old).  But after this phone call it infuriated me.  Dont' refer to me as someone less than you and don't ever talk to me that way.  He totally ruined my motivation buzz.

I began crying totally irrationally.  Way to handle it like a man, Annie. I'm not sure if I'm being overdramatic about it which is part of what drives me crazy about the situation.  Do I have a right to feel angry and upset?  Maybe this guy would have said the same thing to my husband.  I'll never know.  What I do know is that I'm finished dealing with contractors.  I immediately called my husband and told him he was handling the rest of them on this project.