Week ending 2/11/11

Saturday was a day from hell. We spent 6 hours prepping for the flooring. One of the parts of the flooring job is to replace a cabinet over the fridge. Our prior contractor screwed up the measuring in the kitchen so that the existing cabinet is too low for the fridge to fit under once the flooring is in. Had he installed it even 1 inch higher all would have been fine. We ended up having to buy a shorter cabinet and wasting about 10 inches of space on top of the fridge.

I bought the replacement cabinet a long time ago because Ikea changes the designs of it's kitchen cabinets fairly often and I didn't want to get shut out. We had it stored in the garage and when we went out to get it the cabinet box (not the door, which we wouldn't be able to replace) had taken some water damage. We had two periods of intense rain lasting 10 days each this winter, and we think that the garage had some water leak in at the floor level. It doesn't normally get water, but there was a lot of rain for a long period. Fortunately, the door was fine, and the cabinet box is replaceable.

We also had to buy kickplates for under the kitchen cabinets. The thing is, these pieces come in 7 1/2 foot lengths and we purchased 7 of them. Our prior contractor never installed them before we fired him for not showing up. Now, all but one of the pieces are GONE! Yes, gone, simply vanished. As much of an ass as he was, I don't think he was a thief and they weren't worth much - only $15 per piece to buy new and not of much use outside an Ikea kitchen. I have no idea how you lose 6 pieces of 7 1/5 trim lumber but he did it. One of my biggest complaints about him is that he would start something, scatter the pieces throughout the house, leave for the day and then come back the next day and start something else. So although I can't imagine how something like this could be lost, if anyone could lose it he could.

Today was all about fixing contractor screwups.

Even though we had all the part numbers and specs, we weren't able to order the parts online so it was off to Ikea for a dreadful Saturday visit. One thing about Ikea - I hate walking through the entire store when I know exactly what I want. I was there probably a dozen times when we were doing our kitchen so I know an unmarked shortcut to the kitchen department. Fortunately, when we got there they were remodeling the kitchen department which meant nobody was there! Yay! We found out they didn't have our parts, but another Ikea (about 45 minutes away) did. So off we went, only this time we had to go through the ENTIRE store to exit. Ugh. We did a lot of weaving around people out for an afternoon of recreational shopping.

After 45 minutes in traffic, we go to the next Ikea and found the kitchen department. We split up to save time, and I placed the order for the cabinet while C went to self-serve to scan for the kickplates (they told us at the first Ikea that they were in self-serve). I met up with him in self-serve, and we hadn't found them yet so we asked someone. Turns out they're NOT in self-serve, but the guy who helped us was able to order it for us. We got it ordered, stood in a long register line and paid, then waited a few minutes to pick it up before driving over an hour home in traffic.

I need a week to recover from a day like this!