Carpenter Cabbit?
Nov. 14th, 2005 12:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cabbitzilla... no, not really, but it seems I can fake it effectively. But I'm gonna explain, and given how totally exhausted and battered I am right now, most folks might want to skip this
Mom's been making some changes to the trailer, rearranging it to suit her rather than the long-standing compromise that living with grandma had been. Part of that was new flooring in the kitchen, living room, and sunporch (an addon done seven years ago to the front of the trailer). Friday morning, the contractor from Home Depot (no link, I am SO pissed at HD right now it's not even funny) arrived, started pulling up the old linoleum and carpet, and discovered that the floor along the back of the kitchen was badly water damaged... and that the flooring of the sunporch was completely rotted through in a dozen spots. The floorings didn't get laid down, put on hold until the damage could be repaired.
By friday night, Tommy Joe (brother-in-law, Leah's hubby, die-hard redneck) and I had been drafted to try and do the repairs. We met at the trailer Saturday morning and set to assessing the extent of the damaged areas. The results were mostly unpleasant; a one foot wide and seven foot long strip in the kitchen was going to have to be cut out and replaced, and the entire floor and subfloor in the sunporch was going to need to be replaced. Hard work, but none of it excessively difficult and all of it apparently well within what we could do.
The kitchen floor was tackled first, given that it was a much higher traffic area than the sunporch. We unloaded the tools from Tommy's truck, uncased the power saws, and set to work.... and were suddenly engulfed in a cloud of mold spores. Major coughing attack later, the fans were unpacked (it is November, not August, after all) and that particular problem was minimized as best as we could manage. Between mold complications, rerouting wiring that was in the way, two trips to HD, and the inevitable 'ellie fell in the hole' mishap, the day was spent doing the repairs in the kitchen.
Tommy and I retreated to our separate corners to lick our wounds and try and plan the attack on the sunporch, reconvening this morning just a bit after dawn. We'd been operating under the sadly mistaken assumption that since a 'professional' contractor had built the sunporch, that it wouldn't be as bad a job as the kitchen had been. *snort* Right. They'd done the framing, gotten the first inspection done, and then gone Happy Harry Homeowner kinda apeshit with the rest of it knowing they were working for two little old ladies that wouldn't spot the slipshod construction. They'd used roofing sheeting for the subfloor, nailed it down to the framing, and then BUILT THE FUCKING WALLS ON TOP OF THAT. What's that mean? It means that replacing the floor requires some innovative support engineering to raise the walls just enough to get the flooring out... or removing the walls altogether, which wasn't an option. We add-libbed, and in the process managed to toast one of the heavy duty SawzAll's that Tommy'd brought with him (I didn't know they -could- be killed o.o). The framing under the flooring wobbled and rocked; there was a complete absence of crosspieces. By the time we'd gotten all of the old subfloor out and properly laid in an edging of the 3/4" pressure treated sheeting we had, we'd already discovered that all of the internal framing was so shoddy it was going to have to be redone. Off to HD we go again, returning with a small lumber yard sticking out the back window of my Explorer and earning a couple of bonfire jokes from one of the neighbors. *mutters* Bonfire my left tit. Old crank.
Anyway, we got the last of the new main beams locked in, and Tommy and Mom headed back to HD to fetch new discs for his ... RotoZip? Something like that. Hand held rotary with cutting discs. When the SawzAll overloaded in my hands, it got dropped and shattered the two discs Tommy'd brought with him, and we were going to need them to fine-cut the flooring. Armed with a tape measure, t-square, pencil, circular saw, and the desire to actually be of some HELP on this sawdust-encrusted clusterfuck, I settled in to cut and set the crosspieces. I had about a third of them done by the time they got back, and Tommy just stared at me until I shut the saw off and rounded on him with a 'WHAT?'.
"When the hell did you learn how to use a saw?"
*blink* "I've been watching you all morning. It didn't look like rocket science, though a crash course on the finer points would've been nice. Why, am I doing it wrong?"
"No. You're doing it right."
"... then hand me that next 2x6 and quit looking at me like that. You're not my type."
He passed it in to me and headed around to where the floor boards were propped up and set to cutting them. It'd just gotten dark when the last of the screws went in, locking the new-and-vastly-improved floor into place. We sat on the floor as the echoes of the drills faded, and then he quipped something about hoping he didn't look as exhausted and cruddy as I did. My answer (which is only dimly remembered) had something to do with missing teeth, red necks, and power tools, and seemed to be the most hilarious thing he'd heard all day. When we finally managed to get back up on our feet, we did the measurements for the new panelling, cleaned up as much as we could still see, and headed for our respective homes.
... and next weekend, we get to do this again. Panelling, window casing repairs, a new doorframe, weatherstripping, two light fixtures...
... and a partridge in a fuck'n tree.
My hands resemble ground beef at the moment. I'm barely able to walk. I do believe I'm gonna put my fat, battered ass in bed.
Crys, if you've read this far, do me a favor: if I've not surfaced (however briefly) on AIM tomorrow by noon, call here and holler at the answering machine until I appear. I need to go down to the trailer tomorrow and walk to make sure all the tools got gathered up, and to get the rubble into one pile and covered with a tarp until we can load it into Tommy's truck and get it to the dump.
Mostly this post has been me venting, and to let mousie, bunny, puppy, diddle, bear, and That Cute English Lad know that I really am alive (much to my back's dismay) in spite of being almost completely absent this weekend. *smile* They all love me and they worry, poor dears. I'm erratic enough that sometimes I don't get the 'don't worry' posts up in time, and I'm trying really hard to make sure that becomes less of a problem.
My HD rant will appear later, once I've got it down to under three uses of the 'f' word per sentence. Right now, it's running about every other word.
First person that offers to get me a lace-and-ruffles toolbelt dies a very slow and painful death. Unless it's pink with white ruffles, and then Tommy might want to kill you. :p
Mom's been making some changes to the trailer, rearranging it to suit her rather than the long-standing compromise that living with grandma had been. Part of that was new flooring in the kitchen, living room, and sunporch (an addon done seven years ago to the front of the trailer). Friday morning, the contractor from Home Depot (no link, I am SO pissed at HD right now it's not even funny) arrived, started pulling up the old linoleum and carpet, and discovered that the floor along the back of the kitchen was badly water damaged... and that the flooring of the sunporch was completely rotted through in a dozen spots. The floorings didn't get laid down, put on hold until the damage could be repaired.
By friday night, Tommy Joe (brother-in-law, Leah's hubby, die-hard redneck) and I had been drafted to try and do the repairs. We met at the trailer Saturday morning and set to assessing the extent of the damaged areas. The results were mostly unpleasant; a one foot wide and seven foot long strip in the kitchen was going to have to be cut out and replaced, and the entire floor and subfloor in the sunporch was going to need to be replaced. Hard work, but none of it excessively difficult and all of it apparently well within what we could do.
The kitchen floor was tackled first, given that it was a much higher traffic area than the sunporch. We unloaded the tools from Tommy's truck, uncased the power saws, and set to work.... and were suddenly engulfed in a cloud of mold spores. Major coughing attack later, the fans were unpacked (it is November, not August, after all) and that particular problem was minimized as best as we could manage. Between mold complications, rerouting wiring that was in the way, two trips to HD, and the inevitable 'ellie fell in the hole' mishap, the day was spent doing the repairs in the kitchen.
Tommy and I retreated to our separate corners to lick our wounds and try and plan the attack on the sunporch, reconvening this morning just a bit after dawn. We'd been operating under the sadly mistaken assumption that since a 'professional' contractor had built the sunporch, that it wouldn't be as bad a job as the kitchen had been. *snort* Right. They'd done the framing, gotten the first inspection done, and then gone Happy Harry Homeowner kinda apeshit with the rest of it knowing they were working for two little old ladies that wouldn't spot the slipshod construction. They'd used roofing sheeting for the subfloor, nailed it down to the framing, and then BUILT THE FUCKING WALLS ON TOP OF THAT. What's that mean? It means that replacing the floor requires some innovative support engineering to raise the walls just enough to get the flooring out... or removing the walls altogether, which wasn't an option. We add-libbed, and in the process managed to toast one of the heavy duty SawzAll's that Tommy'd brought with him (I didn't know they -could- be killed o.o). The framing under the flooring wobbled and rocked; there was a complete absence of crosspieces. By the time we'd gotten all of the old subfloor out and properly laid in an edging of the 3/4" pressure treated sheeting we had, we'd already discovered that all of the internal framing was so shoddy it was going to have to be redone. Off to HD we go again, returning with a small lumber yard sticking out the back window of my Explorer and earning a couple of bonfire jokes from one of the neighbors. *mutters* Bonfire my left tit. Old crank.
Anyway, we got the last of the new main beams locked in, and Tommy and Mom headed back to HD to fetch new discs for his ... RotoZip? Something like that. Hand held rotary with cutting discs. When the SawzAll overloaded in my hands, it got dropped and shattered the two discs Tommy'd brought with him, and we were going to need them to fine-cut the flooring. Armed with a tape measure, t-square, pencil, circular saw, and the desire to actually be of some HELP on this sawdust-encrusted clusterfuck, I settled in to cut and set the crosspieces. I had about a third of them done by the time they got back, and Tommy just stared at me until I shut the saw off and rounded on him with a 'WHAT?'.
"When the hell did you learn how to use a saw?"
*blink* "I've been watching you all morning. It didn't look like rocket science, though a crash course on the finer points would've been nice. Why, am I doing it wrong?"
"No. You're doing it right."
"... then hand me that next 2x6 and quit looking at me like that. You're not my type."
He passed it in to me and headed around to where the floor boards were propped up and set to cutting them. It'd just gotten dark when the last of the screws went in, locking the new-and-vastly-improved floor into place. We sat on the floor as the echoes of the drills faded, and then he quipped something about hoping he didn't look as exhausted and cruddy as I did. My answer (which is only dimly remembered) had something to do with missing teeth, red necks, and power tools, and seemed to be the most hilarious thing he'd heard all day. When we finally managed to get back up on our feet, we did the measurements for the new panelling, cleaned up as much as we could still see, and headed for our respective homes.
... and next weekend, we get to do this again. Panelling, window casing repairs, a new doorframe, weatherstripping, two light fixtures...
... and a partridge in a fuck'n tree.
My hands resemble ground beef at the moment. I'm barely able to walk. I do believe I'm gonna put my fat, battered ass in bed.
Crys, if you've read this far, do me a favor: if I've not surfaced (however briefly) on AIM tomorrow by noon, call here and holler at the answering machine until I appear. I need to go down to the trailer tomorrow and walk to make sure all the tools got gathered up, and to get the rubble into one pile and covered with a tarp until we can load it into Tommy's truck and get it to the dump.
Mostly this post has been me venting, and to let mousie, bunny, puppy, diddle, bear, and That Cute English Lad know that I really am alive (much to my back's dismay) in spite of being almost completely absent this weekend. *smile* They all love me and they worry, poor dears. I'm erratic enough that sometimes I don't get the 'don't worry' posts up in time, and I'm trying really hard to make sure that becomes less of a problem.
My HD rant will appear later, once I've got it down to under three uses of the 'f' word per sentence. Right now, it's running about every other word.
First person that offers to get me a lace-and-ruffles toolbelt dies a very slow and painful death. Unless it's pink with white ruffles, and then Tommy might want to kill you. :p
