So Close...Yet So Far...

Or should I have titled it So Far So Gone? Of course after the sickest performer right now. Shopping Bag Drizzy. So now I am about three weeks into this new line of work [slavery]. We closed April 7th and today is the last day of April, so about three weeks. I have learned a lot. I have learned that people in the contractor business are usually really good salesmen, never on time, always rescheduling and the list goes on. I have used 3 different people/companies and have had the same experience with two thirds of them. No big deal, I guess that is how the industry works.

Onto the home, I spent a second complete day on The Lamsion today. Met J at 8, headed to Lowe's and looked at lights for our stairs. We were about to buy these:

We got to the register and realized, if we were to ghetto rig these onto the stair case it would look wack. So we put them back and headed to the competition: The Home Depot. What do I love about THD? There is a sign outside that reads "We Will Not Be Undersold" and then a Lowe's logo crossed out. That makes me smile every time. Walk in and look at lights again and realize, all of these lights are for bitches and none will make The Lamsion stand out. We went back to what we know best...Recessed Lightning. I purchased a bunch of 6" housings last week but they are too big for the stair case. So we looked at smaller ones and found  sweet looking 4" housings and they were on CLEARANCE! For 20.24...what the fck? A 6" housing costs 8.66, why does something 1/3 smaller cost three times as much? Whatever, major bullshit. We had to buy them. Then we had to buy a 4" bit for our drill to cut perfect circles, cause you know our shit be right. After all of these purchase, we spend about a buck fifty to light the staircase. What is sad about this? 150 to light an area that is used twice a day for less than 1 minute. 100 dollars to light the kitchen which will be used 100x more, I don't understand how my mind works. We should just be green and carry rechargeable flashlights. 

Got home and we started fishing the wire from the attic to the switch for the living room, about an hour passed and J had to go meet his ex-coworkers for lunch in RWC. This is where I am going to go on a RANT. I fcking hate running wire behind the wall. Once I get good at sheet rock I am just going to rip a hole in every wall so the wire runs perfectly. I can't explain to you how big of a fcking frustrating ordeal it is. Argh, ok anyways. After 2 hours I get the wire behind the wall, then I hook up the wires for 6 cans in the living, no power. What the fck. I hate life at this point. I wanted to just throw a hammer at the window [since it was getting replaced, which btw Lowe's is pretty sick about. They have an automated thing that calls you and sounds like a god damn robot to tell you your special order has arrived.] Long story short, they are in now, I only got electrocuted twice today and screamed in the attic on the top of my lungs reciting one of the best scenes from The Wire twice.

It feels good to finish something. Played some basketball with Peter tonight and he mentioned that I should do my own prep [sheet rock and puttying] for the texturing next week. So I guess I am giving it a shot? I am going to pick up the tools tomorrow. I got a guy [Jenn's neighbor, who comes HIGHLY recommended] coming by tomorrow to give me some quotes on some of the stuff in the upcoming weeks. If is he is who he is said to be, I will for sure pass on the good savings and craftsmanship. Which reminds me, I need to write an Yelp review for Ron The Garage Door Guys. Fck it, he was late. I will do it when I feel like it.

Hopefully tomorrow is the last day of lighting [stairs and two hallways] and this weekend we can start masking EVERYTHING and getting ready for Texture and Paint. Quick Go Sharks and Durant [Thunder too, but as long as KD plays well I am Happy]!

Peace out.

Beamer Benz or Bentley | My Jeans Are Never Empty.

Since I praised others yesterday, I will go back to natural selfish self today.

Look at this problem I came across:

How do you fix this?

With that.

Back in the middle. Yeah I know. I am a G. Yeah that is a CFL. I am fcking green.

Speaking of green, I will start to compile a list of reused products in our house and when you come visit, see if you can spot it. This will come later...

I am chatting with an old high school friend, Johnny [http://www.apple.com/ipad/ click that], and he mentioned that he has done a lot of the same things and informed me that he has a machine that sprays texture...I swear to god my life is good. I am going to bring him some virginia slims and an 8 ball [he asked for smokes and coke]. I will be taping/masking off the house this weekend to prepare the texture and PAINT [read: PAINT PARTY!] next week. This is the tool I will be using: Wagner Spray Tech 520000 Power Tex Texture Sprayer [Yep, still on that Amazon Associates program.]

Before

After

Yep, you don't got to tell me. I am a recessed lighting king. Those are #11, #12, #13, #14, #15 and #16 and this kid ain't done yet. [Ok, J helped me with these, he gets 49% of the credit]

Anyone? Can you help me deciper this mess. I want to tap the middle for power to light the living room. Can I do it? This is a fcking mess. Peter?

In case you all didn't know:

Shout Out Post.

Please forgive me. I have been super MIA these past weeks. I have missed Birthdays and more. =X So I will dedicate this post to everyone BUT me.

First off, today was one of the most productive days so far. This angel came from heaven, Jeremiah [or JMAC as his tool box had it] single handedly removed 1 window, 1 door and parts of the wall and put in my most beautiful possession I own to date: The Sliding Door.

So without further ado, here are the progress shots:

Before [Interior]

Before [Exterior]

During

During [If you look closely, you can see JMAC's boxers. NO HOMO.]

After [Exterior, yes I know it is missing Stucco, being done tomorrow.]

After [Interior, tell me that makes you all tingly inside.]

Thank you Jeremiah for the wonderful work. Thank you Kirch [from Craigslist!] for the wonderful door at an affordable price. And, without Mr. Anderson I would have never been able to bring this door home. Thank you all.

My brother from another mother, if you didn't know.

While my savior was slaving away at the patio door, I was gingerly working on my beloved lights, my room is completely wired and done and the living room is 50% there. I want to thank Peter & Jackie Tong & Jimmy Tran for all of the advice and pointers.

Before [Yeah...that cant be to code?]

After [tell me that ain't clean.]

After [This is the after of the 1st pic.] DONE.

Living Room [Wires are fish taped. Just need to hook them up. Bye bye Mr. Ceiling Fan in 12 hours.] Btw, Jeremiah measured the lights and said I was only off by 3/4" throughout. I should become pro?

I want to wish a Belated Happy Birthday to Allison Johnson. I am 100% sorry for missing all 4 of your Birthday Parties. Official Apology. Sorry. I owe you Boba & Shaved Ice. [please notice the pronouns]

Happy Birthday! [2 weeks ago =X]

The big up is a little creepy. Cause this mother fcker doesn't know I refer to him by his first name. But if you are EVER at Lowe's on Ridder Park/Brokaw, please find Mr. Jordan, REAL TALK. He knows EVERYTHING. He helped me purchase every big ticket item so far. He walked me through windows and helped me with my tax refund, followed me through 4 aisles today to make sure my walls were patched correctly, walked me through the difference between exterior doors, bath tubs, recessed lighting, toilets and the list goes on. If they allowed me to tip people at Lowe's, this mother fcker would get 25%. I do not have a photo of him, but you cannot miss him he is like a 6 foot 4 version of Marcus Camby. He even helped me carry the wrong 80 pound bag of Quikcrete to the register. Which I had to carry back myself, but I digress. 

Next up, Jason Fanoe. Quick thanks for his help. He has no fcking idea how to do anything but is always willing to help. That is what I love about him, with the two of us together we just pretend we know what we are doing and we just reassure the other that it is correct. Thanks.

Yes, this guy is wearing snowboarding goggles while drilling out holes. I love it.

Mr. Tang for doing a great job on the copper re-pipe, doors, gas line and windows [in 2 weeks]

Sorry, I did not have a better picture, he doesn't even know I have this one.

This post is going to be continued, but I wanted to share my gratitude with those who have helped get The Lamsion to what it is today. Another 6 cans tomorrow and my first attempt at adding a switch. Have a great night.

Need Advice.

What kind of lights on stair cases are boss?

Here are some ideas:

I need sleep. Nite.

I Done Fck'd Up.

So we are a couple weeks into the renovation and things have been going pretty smoothly, some things do take a lot longer than expected, but still results are visible. Until today. I knew there was a beam running through the ceiling so I decided to cut a hole next to it to install one of my famous recessed lighting housings. Stud finders cannot locate HVAC equipment.

Failed:

That pink thing is some sort of piping for some sort of heating. Sigh. I will have to relocate this light somewhere else and...uh...patch that little six inch hole.

Mr Handy[man] better call me tomorrow, if he does not show up to install the sliding door, I will be shopping on Craigslist again.

Here is a picture of Tumas being a slave:

We are trying to get the red to come out of the fireplace again. Will post before and after once we are done scrubbing it.

Measured out 6 lights for the living room and found out that the two in the middle run against a beam. So we are going to either have an uneven lighting set up or go down to four. I will make that executive decision tomorrow and post photos. This lighting thing is harder than it looks. 

Going to bed before midnight, this is a first. Just too worn out. Got a Kirkwood season pass for 299. Please come.

Goodnight.

Quick Early AM Update.

Mr. Handy[man] had to reschedule yesterday due to car problems. So we have to look at this for another day:

Going to miss you, door + half window. I am going to miss the fact that you all shake when the door attempts to get closed.

Removed ALL of the popcorn ceiling yesterday

Biggest accomplishment yet. Peter came over for a bit and explained the wiring plan and guess what? I executed to a T. I got WORKING lights in my room now! I just need to figure out how to run the god damn wire to the switch. =(

I will leave you with this to remind you, I am still International.

Heading over to The Lamsion. Will have a lot of updates tonight! 

My Face Hurts...

It seems that I never wear sunblock at snowboarding unless a girl has it, I guess I will never learn. Just woke up from my nap after Kirkwood. I am going back to sleep as I have to meet Joseph Handy[man] at the house at 9am to get this done:

That beautiful sliding door will no longer be sitting in our garage, but instead in our WALL!

No progress today, but on a nice note, a nice neighbor brought our garbage can to the fence. That is really sweet.

Tomorrow is going to be a long and PROGRESSIVE day! Goodnight.

Taco Thursdays...

Sort of. Keeping with the tradition of going to Lowe's with J [he is the white guy who wore Oakley's as eye protection in the previous post.] on Thursday and grabbing Tacos, we went to THREE god damn Lowe's today. We needed to buy the following:

15 CFL Dimmable Flood Lights
4 CFL Regular Flood Lights
16 Recessed Lighting Housing
20 Recessed Lighting Trim
3 Dimmer Switches
and some minor stuff for the Sliding Door Install [yep, I capitalized it. Shit is real. Stuff: 2x4 4x6 flashing etc]

Anyways, went to the Lowe's on Brokaw [love that one by the way, big up to Jordan he is the MAN there]. They only had 12 Dimmable Flood Lights. Is Dimmable a real word? I keep on getting the red squiggly line, oh well. So I had them check the system, and then we had to make a decision. 15 lights at the one on Coleman or 44 at the one in Sunnyvale [don't act like you don't know where this is, next to CHEETAH's. All Nude. All Day. yep. honestly? Don't go there at lunch.] So we figured Coleman has to have it, yeah...no. They had 9, they were 1 case short. FML. Went to Sunnyvale and boom, they had 20 or so on the floor, gobbled them up. Then it came to the lights, which was a easy pick. 8 bucks a pop for a 6 pack. Bought 2 extra but it was cheaper than buying the individually. Then true leadership came through, we had to make a decision. Save a dollar on trim [times 20] and get a trim that was "off-white" or be a boss and just splurge the extra dollar. You know how we do. We got the Halo brand and balled out at 7.98 a piece. Once it was all said and done, we wasted 3 hours to pick up 500 bucks worth of stuff. Useless. Yes, get back to the house and realize we can't work on anything. The copper re-pipe was finished and they just finished putting in the gas line in the kitchen. Yep, we will have some fire coming out, so you know that real Chinese food will be cook in a wok, by who? Who knows. So we figure we will just cut the holes for the lights and hopefully they will be done and we can wire it up. But, we have not learned anything yet,  nothing goes to plan. The two lights we try to install on the stair case has a beam running through the middle. No idea what to do. The living room has all of their stuff in it, so I do not want to get their stuff dirty and cut holes. So we say fck it and I treat J to Chalateco.

After Alambre Special [which is tacos with pastor, carne, bacon, b pepper, onions AND cheese], melted queso with pastor and 4 papusas and 2 large agua frescas we are done. Go back to the house, don't even walk in and just go home. Heading to Kirkwood in 6 hours. I will leave you with some pics and wish you a Happy Friday.

Everything is wired up for my room. I just got to put the power in. Yep, I hung out there for a couple of hours. No rat friends. =(

A weekend project in the future, gutted the carpet and realized we got real wood underneath. Stain? Paint? We will see!

Not fcking around with the Alambre Special con Queso. 

I Am Useful.

Short post today, so tired.

Got 4 recessed lighting housings in, I ran the wire for all 4 but have not connected a live wire to it yet. Will do that tomorrow. I will be going to Lowe's at 8 am with J to pick up a ton of stuff [doing 10 more recessed lights tomorrow, wish me luck]. By the way, those 10% off things from the post office are becoming more scarce, got conserve them. Haha.

Got some pics:

Thanks for the help J.

First hole cut, I see the light!

I don't like this trim. Returning this tomorrow.

Much better!

Oven pulled out? Can only mean that the gas line is being ran to it. Bye bye electric range.

Will have a much better update tomorrow. Sorry.

Goodnight.

Timeline to Keep Me On Task

Ron, Ron, Ron. Found out our garage is tore up after Ron came by and attempted to install our brand new Whisper Drive. Sigh, I guess this is where I will tell everyone that things are never what you expect so give yourself a good cushion when budgeting and making renovations/decisions. I guess it is good to know after Ron is done, I will have a brand new garage [funcionality wise] for the fraction of the price. Another lesson here, don't install things unless you know what you are doing [I know...I have no clue what I am doing, but at least I watch 10 YouTube videos and ask a bunch of people before I try =X], the original owner installed the tracks too close to each other, resulting in the motor exploding due to its repeated attempt on closing the door. 

On a lighter note, before:

After [well not 100% after, I still got some scraping, ok a LOT of scraping to do]:

I have no clue what on earth these people were thinking, I guess if this room was used for a retro porno shoot, that wall would be cool. But then I would need a handlebar mustache and sideburns. Wait I got both... I ripped off the wood today and started peeling away at the glue/paint underneath. It is a pain, but it should be done by the end of the week. I am going to put this aside because I will be spending my day up here tomorrow:

First of all, yes that is the attic, but that is not the importance of this photo. That is called: FIRE HAZARD. Sigh, I will clean that up tomorrow and start the installation of my first 4 recessed lighting fixtures. I am not going to lie to you, if I had to take odds, I'd say I am a 1:3 long shot at making this perfect, but that is why we are using my room as an experiment before I get to the kitchen and living room. After borrowing 100 things from Peter this evening and asking hundreds of last minute questions. I am fully prepared. However, if I get electrocuted and die, anyone who is a follower of this blog at the time of death will be entitled to $1,000 each.  How are you going to get that money? Who knows, just follow me. Thanks.

Finally, some real work! Tomorrow should be a big step as no longer am I just performing monkey tasks, but actually going to be working on something useful. 

Quick timeline [this also helps keep me on track]:

Recessed Lighting 4/24

Sliding Door Install 4/24

Texture/House Ready For Paint 5/1

Interior Painted [yep, this is when YOU are going to get a text] 5/8

Tiled and Floored 5/15 [fck, forgot baseboards, whatever]

Bathrooms/Windows fit somewhere in between there.

Move In: When my toilet flushes and soda flows out of my sink [hint of future addition].

Yep, copper piping to the upstairs bathroom. Done.

Goodnight, pray for me that 110V isn't lethal. 

Your Trash, My Treasure.

Those might look like Domino's to you, but to me they are the blueprint for my "bright" future. Yep, recessed lighting in the bedroom, yep,  connected to a dimmer, yep, we sure can make a Plies music video [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fSUOQ2VA7w]. After visiting the Tong's and getting reassured that these lights are easily doable, I am going to take the plunge tomorrow. Well, no cutting yet, just going to put up some construction paper lights and work on spacing and make a visit to the space above my room and under the roof and see if I can run the wiring. Wish me luck or at least wish that I don't get electrocuted.

So Ron from Garage Guys had to drop his kid off at the doctor this AM, so we rescheduled for noon tomorrow, no biggie. Would be nice to have a garage door that we do not manually lock and lift up, at least I'm getting in my shoulder presses.

Copper re-pipe is getting there. Should be done in a couple of days.

In with the new:

Out with the old:

Popcorn ceiling removal status update:

My Bedroom [cute drapes,eh?] check:

My Office, check:

Tum's Office, check:

Tum's Bedroom, check:

Just got the hallway/stair case and downstairs living room left. Almost done!

Just got a reply from Joseph Handyman [I don't think that is his real name, but that is how it shows up in Gmail] and he gave me a list of things to buy for the sliding door install. I do not know how I am going to fit a 4x6, not to mention 4 2x4's in my little car. Anyone want free lunch?

Before, I go get my much needed rest, I just got an idea: I am making my own TV Stand. Will post blue prints when the time comes. This should be awesome...I hope.

Publish Post

Goodnight.