Sunday, February 20, 2011

GOT KNOBS!


Yes, as my former, departed mum-in-law used to say, "I feel like a queen!"
It's nice to be able to open the drawers and doors in the kitchen and bathroom without using a putty knife. My hands don't work so well these days, what with the arthritis kicking in big time. My fingers just couldn't pry the suckers open so I inserted a putty knife and pulled. This is much better!

Seems like nowadays they want to save money so they don't install cabinet hardware. But with all we had to do during our first week at our new place, hardware installation had to wait. $120 at Lowe's and we had some nice looking knobs and pulls.
Today, Sunday, was the first day we could get to it.


The cabinets are hickory which is evidently a very hard wood. We wore down the drill battery by the time we were done!

Thursday, February 17, 2011

SURPRISE IN THE NIGHT

Water running through the attic and down the walls is not a good thing. Luckily our contractor discovered it on our first "official" day at Angelcrest after a torrential rain during the night. So because it was due to rain and snow all day and night, they set about fixing the problem. We found out that in order to use the Home Warranty that the seller provided we would have had to wait for an adjuster from Salem to appear at some point from the insurance company and he would have picked the fixer. No thanks!
Seems the problem was incorrectly installed flashing around the fireplace way back in time. We had dry rot up the gig.
What you see here is the all new siding and flashing with plenty of hockey snot applied.
Good times! You get these surprises when you buy an older home.


The good news is that we are almost all moved except for some tools and crap in the shop at Grey Eagle. The house is cleaned and polished. The garage is empty except for my Miata which we'll move this Saturday (our last day to be out).
Other surprises included 4" of mud under the previously dry house...from the improperly graded parking area in front of the house (another fix so we have good drainage AWAY from the house) and the collapse of the closet shelving held in by only one screw into sheetrock.
The cable guy refused to go under the house due to the mud, so he cabled around on the outside...nice to have phone, internet and TV again!
More later when I can lift my arms to desk height and prop myself up in my chair for a longer time.
Oh, and the big snow storm? So far it hasn't happened! WE did get a dusting because we're at 1900' here instead of 1500'.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

SMOKIN' SHREDDER, BATMAN!


The office is filled with book boxes...I've packed about 40 of them so far.

A new shredder from Costco...I managed to burn up the old one finally!


I've been doing shredder duty for several days, clearing out old files and corporation records from the previous century! We've filled 2 huge recycling cans (ours and our neighbor Cathie's) plus we foisted off two full 32 gallon garbage bags on our next door neighbor as well.
We get the keys to our new place tomorrow...it's called "early access." We can start hauling stuff over but can't sleep there until we close, which should be in about 10 days time or maybe less we hope.