Sunday, May 27, 2007

Saturday work, May 26, 2007


"Avoid silica dust" says the warning sticker on the cementatious backer board. Who needs instructions?

Sandy visited with us today, she helped apply primer to our walls. We are grateful for her trip here (Sandy is a bandit, flatlander from New York) and we are glad the visa paperwork cleared at the border to our republic. Sandy's singing voice is on par with the Brooklyn Barrister's (between a screeching air horn and a braying donkey). Hopefully one day we will have some help from somebody who can sing. Until then we will limit singing from helpers.


Also, Lauren is here, you can see she is doing an important job, we are EXTRA grateful for her childcare help; E and A love her a lot.






Here Sandy applies primer to the hallway, she has completed the primer in the first floor bathroom. This picture is taken from the first floor bath.










Billn installed the cementatious backer board on the floor of the laundry room, before applying a second coat of drywall compound. The backer board will be below ceramic tiles soon.


Here is the first floor bathroom, after billn removed the old 9"x9" tiles. For those that are "in the know" likely the tiles and the mastic are ACM. For those of you who do not know what ACM is, don't worry. For those of you that do, billn bagged up the waste and it is ready to go. Billn installed a new self-adhesive floor in the first-floor bath today (along with mowing the entire property, second coat of drywall).












Here is the completed floor. It came out OK, not billn's best work, but when he was finishing at just before midnight, he realized he didn't mis-cut any pieces and had no avoidable waste. This floor is temporary, a new bathroom is scheduled here in 2008.










The previous owner was not a clean freak, this brown spot is on the tile behind the water closet. The WC is a newish 1.6 gallon per flush unit, so that means the previous owner had a chance in approximately the last 10 years. He chose to replace the WC but not clean the wall.


Overall, today Jenm and Sandy completed a good piece of priming and painting in the first floor bath. Billn applied a second coat of compound in the laundry room. Billn is a lousy applicator of drywall compound. Billn removed the old floor and installed a new one in the first floor bathroom. Billn also mowed the grass, front and back. Since today is (was) Saturday, we also visited the farmer's market; coffee from Capitol Grounds, we saw some people we know, including our current apartment neighbor with her 5 day old baby. We love Vermont.


Tomorrow, more painting and more drywall compound.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

wow, even your masking tape is green.
i've heard the maple syrup based adhesive it uses requires a sickening amount of pre-licking to really get it to stick. the crusty residue it leaves behind does scrape off nicely as a flavorful sundae topping though.

from the pictures, that scaffold looks insanely dangerous. i can't believe that its only corner support is a spindly 2x4 + c-clamp rig. i am imagining you must have a pile of anvils and bowling balls acting as a counter balance on the ends of the planks outside the picture. very interested in how that thing is held together. very nice work regardless.

please send sandy home. i don't want her to miss the lighting of the car battery bonfire. it makes for some pretty far-out vision-inducing s'mores.

keep up the good work. i look forward to the day I can make a full inspection. Make the best of the generous "grace-period" you have been granted. The Sandy is not as forgiving as I am.

memoriously,
cabbagePANTS

btw, what you (very humorously) refer to as donkey braying, I call the "cherub's flute symphony".

Anonymous said...

that should have been "i am not as forgiving as the Sandy"...

threats unfortunately lose a good deal of gravity when they need to be corrected. enjoy your moment in the sun.