More progress

I started today by running down to the permit office to make sure the plumbing calculations checked out and to find out how to get the correction to the pipe size signed off. I checked with both the head plumbing inspector and with the original inspector we were working with and both said we are fine. Yay!

Later in the morning, I called the roofer because we have some daylight coming through the roof around one of the vents. This means that water can get in. He's a really good roofer, and came out later in the morning and sealed up the problem area. For the rest of the morning, I worked with one of the contractor's guys putting together the Ikea cabinets. He ended up doing more than me because I had to leave to go to the dentist in the middle of the day. I even helped move some of the big, heavy ones. Nice to know I'm still able to move heavy stuff!

Here is the kitchen, where we've begun to store some of the upper cabinets.


Here are some of the tall cabinets stored temporarily in the living room.


Here are some of the lower cabinets stored in the "staging" area.

As we don't have a dumpster right now, we're storing trash in the back yard. Looks awful! I would have never thought of this, but dumpsters must be carefully managed! They cost money, so you want to make sure you can fill each one, but you only get 7 days to fill it before it starts costing more for each extra day. We want to wait until closer to the end of the project and then get one more dumpster. The delivery also has to be scheduled around street cleaning so they can put it in the driveway. For a while, I paid for street permits to have them out front in the street. Now that the wall surrounding the front lawn is mostly down, the dumpster can go in the driveway and save money. But, because the driveway is so narrow (it's only 2-3 inches wider than the dumpster) they need to deliver it almost straight in which means it has to come on a day when no cars are parked across the street and the driver can do multiple backups to get the dumpster pointed directly into the driveway. The only day I can be pretty sure of this is street cleaning day.


Here is the new bathroom window during installation. The waterproof membrane is up and the opening is ready for the window.


And here is our new window viewed from inside. Not that impressive yet, but wait until you see how it fits the design!



Finally, I ended the day with yet another trip to Ikea to return a damaged cabinet and two that came in the wrong color. I had to deal with a frustrated drone on a power trip who wouldn't take back the damaged one because he insisted "you assembled it, how do I know the damage didn't happen during assembly." Mr. "CSI-Ikea" concluded this because there were pegs in two pieces. What happened was that the contractor's assistant was assembling it and after a while, it becomes obvious which pegs go in which holes. So as he pulled the first two pieces out, he put all the pegs in before he saw the damage. I immediately told him to put it back in the box and that I would return it. We did not assemble it, and in fact, most of the pieces did not even come out of the box. So, had I said take the pegs out and then put it back we would have been fine. I was seriously pissed at Mr. CSI-Ikea. I purchased a huge quantity of cabinets, and he was sure I was trying to put one over on him. I pointed out all the other pieces, which had no evidence of having been screwed together and that the bag of fasteners had no wood shavings, tool marks or other evidence of having been used. I was trying to reach him in his CSI mode. He finally said that he couldn't accept it but that he had already called the manager down. Ugh! Why didn't he just say that in the first place and I would have just waited for the manager!

As soon as the manager arrived, he immediately lied to the manager and said "she wants to exchange this but she already assembled it" to which I butted in with "I DID NOT assemble it." The manager took a split second look at it and okayed the exchange. If only Mr. CSI-Ikea had been a little less confrontational, it would have been a lot easier.