UPDATE: I have recieved word that the Exterior of the house is done! wooohooooo, the pavers are in the lights are hung now I just need to add the shutters, but that isn’t holding up putting the house back up for sale….
So what is going on in Donviti’s life you are all wondering right? As delaware hottests blogger the past few weeks have been chaotic as hell. I have had a surge of activity at my house which I’m trying to get back on the market before the summer selling season ends.
What started out as a little home improvement project has quickly blossomed into a multi thousand dollar job with no end in sight. Originally I was going to put in a bay window where these 2 small windows are to the right (see picture below). Well my dad, the genius that he is said, “Instead of that, why don’t you just move the door there instead? It will cost the same and may actually be less.”
That was all I needed to here “Less”
Well ges what? LESS IS MORE! WAY FUCKING MORE! WAY, WAY, WAY FUCKING MORE! (ironically the electrician is named Les….he ain’t no less!)
The door did cost less it was only $1000 (snark) compared to $1400, butttttttttttt, guess what, do you see where those bushes are under the 2 porthole windows? Yep, I need a walkway, well I have 3 Mexicans feverishly installing pavers for $700 as I type this, the wall to cut through took 3 days labor ($1500) because this F’ING house was built by a mental midget so nothing is a simple cut and go. Everything had to be reframed and braced which in turn takes more time.
Well where the front door was; that had to be torn out and walled off, another days labor. Then inside the house had to be redone because the old entrance needed to be converted from the foyer to pass through with a closet. That was another days labor. I had to rip out the 2 small closets and build new ones. That was another days labor, I had to put new flooring in the old foyer area to match up with my kitchen and dining area which with material and labor was another $1200.
So my dad, who is retired and goes out to eat 15 times a week said, and money is no object too also said, “Why don’t you move the service wire too (over the door) It won’t cost that much and it will make the front look like a front now.”
(Cost of moving wire = 2thousandfuckingdollars, yes fucking dollars, not the good fucking dollars either! the bad ones!)
So I got this contractor guy that worked on my kitchen and I was really happy with to do 75% of the work. He came out and gave me an estimate and said he would need a couple days pay before he would come out so he could pay his guy and get the materials and such. I said sure, usually I wouldn’t pay someone for work they haven’t done, but like I said the guy had worked for me before and I trusted him
Well I was supposed to be done the 2nd week of June at the latest.
I’m not done and with any luck I will be 99% done by Friday. Last week I thought I was really going to be done. The contractor guy who by now I’m pretty sure has shorted me a days labor at least, (b/c he has come and go a few times without me being around) $750, said he would give me a full day on Sunday, last Sunday. He said he had to leave early Saturday b/c he had a “thing” to go to but he would give me a full day Sunday. He never showed up. Never called. Nothing. This isn’t the first time either. The guy never calls me back, but I’m stuck with the guy so I try to be real patient. If I piss him off them I’m stuck with a half way finished job and no contractor. So I go all week without the guy calling me. Finally, I called him this past Friday to see if he was coming out. He said he had to talk to me first. He never showed up this weekend. He never called.
My dad who has some experience said he wasn’t coming back. I was hoping he wasn’t right. Well, the douchebag called me last night and tried to say after he “looked” at his paperwork he realized we were “even” and that he didn’t owe me a day, if anything he was actually in the hole a half day because of all the running around for materials he did “for me”. WTF, oh man I couldn’t believe it or actually didn’t want to believe it I guess.
I am sooooo close to being done, but now the detail stuff is what is left. And I am not a detail guy if I was I wouldn’t have to hire someone to do this sort of work. I am about as handy as a 6 year old. I’m good enough to tear shit apart, but when it comes too putting it together I break more than it is worth and usually end up so stressed out I can’t sleep. I curse like a sailor and get so irritated that I want to burn the house down.
My house is sooooooo close to being done, but the little stuff like trim work, dry walling the closet and the closet doors are left and I can’t do that stuff half as fast as my guy could do it. I have a little bit of tile work to do too with no wet saw! aaaaaahhhhhh I could kill
so here I am on the phone yestereday. I begged the guy I mean begged the guy to just do the closet doors. I said, listen man I can’t pay you anymore (meanwhile I’m thinking “you fuckstick you have $1000 of my fucking money and I know you fucked me over at least 3 times you piece of shit lying scumbag). I pleaded with him to just install the closet doors and I will do the rest. Me knowing full well I don’t know how to do the rest.
The guy “said” he would call me Tuesday night to set up a time to come Wednesday. I can’t believe this shit, all the final stuff that I have no idea has to be done and this fucking guy has totally screwed me!!!!!! And I don’t believe for one second this guy is coming out to finish the doors for me….sigh, what a kick in the nuts this has been.
I got 3 hours sleep Friday and Saturday worrying about this guy coming and what I need to do to get the house ready. (by the way comedy central says the f-bomb at 2 am…and they play the “girls gone wild commercial every break) Last weekend was the same thing, though without the girls gone wild commercials…..
Oh and to top it all off my craftsman 19.6 volt drill got stolen by one his workers, though I can’t prove it. So now I have to either buy a new 19/6 volt drill b/c I had a kit of tools that all used the same battery or I screw myself out of a saw, a sawzall and a light. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH or I buy a cheap drill that I can get buy on and just use the one battery I have for the other 3 things and just stop my project for the hour it takes my one battery to recharge.
In the end I am so close and i have to suck it up and learn how to do it myself. I lay spackle like a 3 year glues ziti to construction paper. I screw the damn dry wall screws all the threw the sheet rock or into oblivion. I can’t cut a 45 angle to save my life.
Here is what my house looked like as of May…tomorrow the outside will be 100% done, the lights will be installed and I will show you a picture of that. Hopefully you will say it looks good, b/c if not I’m going to scream!
