Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Good things come to those...


The initial gut



Paranoia at its best


Finally a bit of progress


After 2.5 months I believe that my contractor is finally on track to finishing this weekend!

Picture one is the initial gutting.

Picture 2 has a bit more thought behind it. After the initial gutting the floor was removed. My house is raised, giving me a very introspective view of the ground underneath the house. The room stayed in this same state for over a month. One night while visiting the Kentwood water dispenser I heard a scuttle noise in the bathroom that made me retreat back to my bedroom. After deciding that I was being a pussy I armed myself with a tennis racket and proceeded back towards the bathroom. I stopped half way thinking there is no way I want to get as close as a tennis racket will take me to a rat – so I retreated and armed my self with a large broom.

Back on the scene I knew that there was no way that I was going to open the door to the bathroom, so I opted for the obvious choice by moving the box containing the pedestal sink bottom in front of the door. To make it even more secure I inserted placemats behind the box. You might wonder why the Kentwood water bottle is on top of the box. It was my thought at 3am that if the rat was big enough to get around the box and placemats that I needed a warning system to alert me to its entrance into the rest of the house. Luckily when I woke up in the morning to revisit, the water bottle (which was empty) was still standing erect, meaning the house had not been invaded.

My contractor, who actually, showed up the next morning, seemed really put out that I did not trust his assertion and hand over heart proclamation that he had put enough rat poison under my house to kill an elephant. I informed him that as he was not walking through my house barefoot at midnight that his feelings being hurt were not my problem.

He nicely replaced the box and placemats oh and I forgot just to fill out the space I stacked up his boxes of nails. I guess he did not want to find me dead of a stroke or heart attack should I actually see a rat. The beauty of respect by not paying the contractor until the job is done.

Picture 3 was taken about 2 weeks ago. Today when I got home, I was informed that they would have the bathroom completed by the weekend. I am not holding my breath… Next project is my second bathroom and my bedroom floor. I will post the final results for this bathroom hopefully this weekend and I did actually take “before” shots of the second bathroom to make the whole transformation process more interesting.

The progression on this project will likely be slow too. I love living in New Orleans post Katrina!!! Contractors were bastards before the storm and now they are have elevated from bastard to self proclaimed demy-gods. Oh well what can you do or say if you have absolutely no handy-skills to speak of. I am just happy that I got someone to do the job.

8 comments:

wishin said...

I would have blocked off the door too even if I was assured that a gallon of rat poison was put there. Can't be to sure that one wouldn't slip through.

Anonymous said...

did you see it?? maybe it was not a rat. there are other creatures of the dark that scurry to and fro on dark eerie nights.some of this world some of the under world. for those rat poison does no good. sweet dreams.

Raspootin said...

Thanks bwcubed,

Now I don’t only have to worry about things that can bite me, but things that can possess me too.

I will have to do a post on ghostly occurrences in my house.

It will make a good Hallo- weeny post!

Raspootin said...

Wishin'

It is good to know that I am not alone on the barricade idea. My contractor really thought I was insane.

Anonymous said...

You are truly funny. I guess I have known you too long but I also would have done exactly as you did. Not only am I deathy afraid of rodents but snakes and roaches and anything that crawls or flies and that can bite. I am soo glad things are almost finished. I am looking forward to renting out your new whirlpool tub for a relaxing soak. Keep us posted on the progress. Cant wait to see the final result.

Raspootin said...

You leave such nice comments that I really need to show you how to sign up with a blogger name.

Please remind me.

Anonymous said...

it looks worse now.

Raspootin said...

thanks for your considered opinion anonymous.