Posted by K Fri, 03 Nov 2006 01:20:00 GMT
Sooo, the latest fun has been heating, as mentioned before. We have a heat pump and could probably get through the winter on it but who can’t wait to hook up the stinky but pretty radiators and push hot water through them, making them more stinky (albeit useful and energy efficient)? Us! So we are in the get-a-new-boiler business.
Read more...Posted by K Tue, 31 Oct 2006 23:44:00 GMT
So exciting things have been going on, which I did document via Flickr a few days ago: we got the radiators back. And they look great! There is the small problem of one not fitting where it should because of a duct (the neverending Curse of the Ducts: I understand an elbow joint or two should take care of it so it isn’t the end of the world) but other than that, we can’t let the facts that we have yet to paint a thing and don’t have a boiler deter us from getting them installed. Anyway, I can’t stop looking at them and thinking that The Stripping Workshop is the best place ever. I don’t have a picture of it since I just noticed it Sunday night, but it says “ROCOCO” at the bottoms of them and I guess that was the model/style…they certainly are Rococo.
Read more...Posted by K Thu, 05 Oct 2006 02:11:00 GMT
We’ve been doing stuff, in that stop-and-start manner that I guess everyone falls into, since I have come to realize some things about remodeling and DIY:
Read more...Posted by Matthew Thu, 14 Sep 2006 20:53:00 GMT
Our land line phone hasn’t worked since Tropical depression Ernesto hit over Labor day weekend. The line was dead when we returned from vacation. It came back for a day or two then went dead again. K. called Verizon and they sent a guy yesterday. But, miraculously it started working before the repairman arrived. Then when we awoke this morning, the line was dead again. Fun!
So I decided to get with the program and buy a VoIP enabling device called PhoneGnome. It uses your broadband connection to make a VoIP call. You can choose one of their plans or a plan from a provider that supports SIP (there are many). If your broadband is down or you are calling 911, it uses your regular phone line. Hopefully it will not care much about us not having a working phone line most days. We’ll see.
Posted by Matthew Thu, 14 Sep 2006 20:38:00 GMT
Our neighbors decided it was time to upgrade their fence so we decided to hop on board that train. Now we have a fence! I spent some time this past weekend moving the concrete blocks I dug up over into the corner by the back gate. This is where the trash can and recycling go. The blocks are almost level! There is going to be a little corral back there with another gate on the south side. I dug the hole a bit deep so now there is soil along the north wall which is the start of a flower bed.
The fence really makes the backyard a more useful space. We want to put down some stone so we can put out our meager lawn furniture. We also plan on disguising the heat pump with some shrubs. The current thinking is for a Japanese maple in the front yard as the backyard won’t really accommodate even a small tree.
My folks bought us a mower:
The mower comes from the fine people at Clean air gardening. It works fairly well but, our yard is very uneven and full of concrete bits from the crumbling path that needs to be dug up. Perhaps that is this weekend’s task. But, the folks are visiting next week so I’ll probably be indoors tracking down cat hair-dust bunnies that blow around our hardwood floors like tumbleweeds.
Posted by K Wed, 23 Aug 2006 12:47:00 GMT
So we have the sink and faucet now. The dishwasher and disposal were supposed to be worked on on Saturday, when the electricians were here, but it seems they spent all their time 1- drilling things into the back of the house and 2- breaking our AC (sort of).
Read more...Posted by K Sat, 19 Aug 2006 17:06:00 GMT
Things are moving along. We have a kitchen, now, mostly. The countertops were installed Friday and the guys came out this morning to hook up the sink and everything. That wasn’t completely successful since the faucet/sink is now hooked up, but the garbage disposal isn’t, yet (it is in but not electrically hooked up) and from what the guys indicated before they left the dishwasher is live and might kill us if we touch it, so don’t use it (I think the wires are there for it but it isn’t connected yet).
The electrician is on his way to connect the wires, I believe, and hook up the garbage disposal. Next week we will get the switch for the garbage disposal installed, and also some other stuff. The windows in the back are done, the medicine cabinet is righted (sorry, Rob), and other than the kitchen stuff, tweaking a bathroom faucet, and some drywall repair, I think we are good to go (with the exception of the million-odd things we need to figure out or do ourselves, that is).
And I love the faucet but Grohe UI leaves a lot to be desired.
We also still have to figure out how to get undercounter water filtration installed and what to put in.
Today we messed around with the roses (I am back to hating them) out front and I have 294 scratches and a thorn that actually broke off in my finger. BUT all the dead canes are finally gone and we have some trellises set up that look a little less terrible than the ones that were there.
Later I hope to pick up some shelves I bought (they are at a friend’s house) so that I can finish unpacking the office and unpack/put away gardening supplies and tools.
Posted by K Mon, 14 Aug 2006 22:44:00 GMT
Here is a pretty cool site using Google Maps that tracks crime in DC. You can look up crime by general area, break it down by zip codes or streets, look at types and percentages, and even see what type of weather promotes the most crime.
Posted by K Mon, 14 Aug 2006 22:21:00 GMT
Well, the house-related excitement of the weekend consisted of scrubbing the floor and wall tile in the bathroom (with vinegar water), drying it off, and then tediously painting over all the grout lines with grout sealer. The good thing is that our grout is now sealed. The bad thing is that it took forever, was so tedious Matt opted to do dishes instead of sealing grout, and I think I ruined one of my watercolor brushes in the process. No pictures, because sealed grout is about as exciting as unsealed grout.
Read more...Posted by K Sat, 12 Aug 2006 00:41:00 GMT
Well, the Shopping Cart o’ Trash is only a hollow memory, since it is now empty (albeit still in the alley, waiting to be filled up with more trash!) but the Enormo Bin in our alley is still there, overflowing and disgusting. I guess I will make the second call to 727-1000 next week and give them my “tracking number” for the issue. The whole tracking number thing cracks me up, since the woman I talked to last time couldn’t tell me what, when, or how the problem was going to be solved. I am very glad that they are tracking the ambiguity!
Read more...