au revoir

This week marked a bittersweet bon voyage to an plesant plastic compadre. They came, not unlike a thief in the night, and swiftly abducted my Jiffy John portable toilet. I guess I knew they were coming... I knew that our time together would be short... but you never think its going to be so quick... you never think that the next time time you see her might be the last.

We often laughed together when I crept out to see you after the sun went down. I would walk nervously... flashlight in hand... trying not to really touch you in any way, but eternally thankful that you were there.

And now... I have two new porcelain friends that have taken your place. They each have two button flushing depending on the amount of water necessary. Yes... I know... they flush... and you couldn't. But I never held that against you... Did I? We were just crazy kids when we first met... You were what I needed at the time. But now things are different... I'm different.

I'll miss you... blue box... plastic potty... awesome outhouse... you take care of yourself.

extra cheese, hold the cardboard

So I found myself trying to be master chef in the kitchen last night. The inaugural use of the oven commenced with my putting my gourmet frozen pizza in a crisp 425 degrees whilst watching House... overzealous and excessively hungry me forgot to take the cardboard off the bottom of the pizza.

So when I started to smell a smell that was more smoky fire, less delicious sizzling thai chicken toppings... I was alerted to the oversight.

I managed to salvage a decent pie, but was definitely a bit disheveled and diminished that the groundbreaking ceremonial meal was chemically fused to this thin circular cardboard disk.

So the lesson learned is not to let the flashy stainless steel exterior blind one to the fact that the potential for rookie moves lies around every corner.

pinch hit plumber

I need to get a working toilet like yesterday. That’s all I'm saying. I got juice, medium mild salsa, and Tostitos in the fridge, but I have to go out to the big blue box in the front yard to relieve myself.

How much sense does that make?

So I just met a new plumber over at the abode, who might be able to help me wrap that problem up. I'm not even as pressed about the shower. I can shower at the gym or run through a sprinkler or something, but the toilet... you can't fake that.

Either you can flush, or you can't.

soft steps

After 24+ hours of letting the cork flooring acclimate to the third floor environmental conditions, the installation began. So me and a few faithfuls worked tirelessly for about 5 or 6 hrs to get the floor down.

Honestly... It wasn't that bad.

It snapped the way it was supposed to snap... clicked the way it was supposed to click... There were a few areas that needed a bit more TLC, but all in all... it was a solid effort. Outside of the threshold to the bathroom, the third floor has a complete finished floor. It feels great to walk on. Its quiet, yet acrobatically inspiring... it makes you feel like walking on your hands.

The thing I loved about this process is that I ordered the cork on Tuesday and it was on the third floor chillin by Friday evening.

That’s what I'm talking about.

I like the efficiency of the process. That is what I expect from the digital age. Seamless transitions. It takes tile weeks to arrive. WHY? Come on tile man... it's 2006!!

nobody talks about fight club

I have neither documentation nor concrete proof... but I believe that there is some clandestine, underground, post-bar-closing, midnight mayhem, bare knuckle... or bare teeth, steel cage, fighting taking place beneath my second floor window. The fighters... well...not sure... but I'm going to say: Possums

either that or some rowdy southeast pigeons.

snap and click

I just got a call on my phone in which a woman informed me that she had 19 boxes of my flooring ready to be picked up. sweet.

I was following the tracking online and they said it would not be in until Monday. This means that I can get started on putting in the finished floor on the third floor this weekend.

excellent.

I decided to go with cork flooring for the third floor. Main Reasons:

Cork is a rapidly renewable resource... meaning that the ecosystem can quickly replenish the supply after it has been harvested for my floors. In fact, you can remove the cork from the tree without killing the tree. It, in turn, will regenerate the lost cork.

Cork is an excellent sound reducer. The open stair setup of the master bedroom allows for a significant amount of sound transfer between the floors. Using Cork allows for each step that is taken not to be an increasingly annoying reverberating knock that radiates through the joists as it does in older wood floor homes/apartment buildings. It's quaint... but still annoying.

This cork utilizes a snap and click process that should make the installation much easier for me since the floor will be "floating," as opposed to, being nailed in place

Doug suggested it, and he is my hero

So I am going to try and pick those up in a few hours and see what trouble I can get myself into over the weekend. There will be a significant amount of cleaning necessary before I can get started, but it is exciting nonetheless.

day two

I spent the first day after my birthday in a fashion relatively similar to day 365... waiting and worrying. Is the plumber going to show up? did he find out that Dummy ran off with his money? Should I have sent the dishwasher back and gotten the smaller one? It’s not easy to be in a heightened state of being for 7 months and then trying to calm yourself down to celebrate milestones, be they significant or otherwise. Scratch that... its damn near impossible.

I hearken back to the age old wisdom of Albert Einstein:

We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.

So with a new day, there is a new opportunity to have a new approach. I get anxious at the current state of affairs with the not-quite-so-livable-but-almost-there situation at the house. That anxiety feeds rash decision making and irritability. I could definitely see there being support for an argument that stated that I am not so fun to be around these days.

But every relationship is at any point open to be redefined... even the relationship I have with myself.

So without forsaking my hously responsibilities, I will endeavor to grab a hold of Thursday, May 4th, with a bit more passion, a bit more enthusiasm, a bit more clarity, a bit more fight, a bit more thirst, a bit more awe, and a bit more laughter.

What kind of day can I create?

of cut grass, concrete, and chickens

So I am fortunate enough to tout today as my 28th birthday.[insert pat on back here]

The past few weeks have been physical and emotional roller coasters. Demands for my time, energy and acute decision making have increased threefold and thus the poetic daily diatribe download [growahouse] that I have become accustom to has suffered.

suffer no more.

My father tracked down a local entrepreneur to cut my grass yesterday. So no longer am I the overgrown scourge of the streetscape with my dandelion forest. It was a pleasant experience to come home to an even plain of grass... a clean slate of green.

On Sunday I emerged from a 24 hour jaunt to Pittsburgh for a wedding just in time to organize a massive assembly of friends to help move the concrete countertop into place.

What countertop?

The unfortunate downside of a life transcript such as this is that when you don't have the time to write about something, you are forced to ask yourself if it really happened. In fact I feel that the concrete story deserves its own saga styled moment by moment chronological epic epistolary. So watch out for that in the immediate future.

and then there are the chickens...

I was given a birthday gift of a flock of chickens donated in my name through heifer international.

a gift as divinely inspiring as the gift giver herself.

creature comforts

Conventional wisdom (as well as Red from Shawshank Redemption) states that you need to "get busy living, or get busy dying." Through my final willingness to hear what has been whispered to me time and time again or perhaps it was simple divine intervention... I moved my television over to the house. I have no incredible attachment to my television. Though...it has served me well throughout the ages... several years of college... graduate school... countless moving from apartment to apartment to houses (shout out to Yardley Way) and now to growahouse where it will probably find a peaceful, intentional, and welcoming final resting place.

So I have slept at my house. I have watched Television at my house. I have ordered pizza... I have ordered buffalo wings... I have met the mailman at the edge of the driveway, and I have talked to neighbors over and through fences. I have watched the rain from the second floor window... and on Sunday evening... as I was packing up to head out, a local and old friend drove by to see if I was "home." We talked by the makeshift mailbox and had I a bag of brown sugar to lend him; it would have been a quintessential I am your friendly neighbor moment.

I reached a point where the readiness of moving into the house was not one based on a fictitious timeline or a self imposed mad rush to the finish.

It was a radiant skylight on Easter Sunday... it was an early morning mango.... it was leaning over a yet to be installed kitchen sink and imagining the fruits and vegetables that will find there home here atop a 2 inch concrete slab of a countertop (to be poured this weekend).

It is the recollection of the life and lives that have been on hold whilst the walls were growing.

friday is good

"Step out the front door like a ghost into the fog where no one notices the contrast of white on white."

Good Friday Greetings to one and all.

I feel a bit hazy today as I try to melt my translucent thoughts with my transparent feelings in my opaque surroundings.

It is an exercise in patience.

Growing a house is now... and has been for quite some time... the growing of a man... the growing of a partner... the growing of a son... the growing of a brother... the growing of a friend.

I leave my office desk now to pick up some wall tiles for the first floor bath... but laying the tiles will undoubtedly represent the measuring, scoring, breaking, cementing, cleaning, and polishing of new surfaces within me. I see the parallels between this project and my being more clearly each day and that makes me feel that there is an intentional and necessary method to the madness.

As with all, I am in a perpetual state of becoming.

And that is okay.

kinfolk, smoked chicken, and a wetsaw

As usual, I'm exhausted. The weekend was action packed. Stardate 0004.0007.2006 4:15pm.

The tile came into Morris Tile and I jet across town to get there before it closes at 5pm. I arrive and I am standing there at the counter.

So here is the insight into my mindset in this situation... an interior being John Malkovich... look at me.

I hope they have the tile. They said it was going to be here today, but it would just be my luck that they are going to say something happened between the last truck stop and here. I called this morning and they said the truck from Texas was in Gaithersburg and would be coming through to this location in the afternoon.... but like I said... just my luck... Okay okay... what's next...? I'm going to have to fit this tile in my car. I might as well carve out a space in the backseat. I wonder how many tiles I ordered? Is it in a crate? why am I here? Why am I trying to pick up a full order of tile in an Accord filled with shoes, a tent, a crumpled set of drawings, mail, work documents, house documents, water bottles, laser level, etc...?

Got the tile... it fit somehow and I made a move to the homefront. Flash forward 24 hours and I have convinced myself that between my current abilities and the inherent tiling abilities genetic passed on to me, I decided to forgo any 'professional" assistance for the tiling. We laid the hell out of that tile over the weekend.

Kitchen Floor... DONE First floor bath... We poured a new concrete floor and then laid in the tile last night. I'm talking wet saw tile cutters spinning, adhesive compound mixing, grout wiping, 3/16 spacer using... It was serious. It was a great collection of family/friend support spilling itself all over the house.

I'm on my way to the house now to finish cutting some tile so I can take the tile cutter back to home depot before my 24hr window is over.

keep on movin, homie

I'm not sure where I am on the 30 day countdown, but I'm pushing with everything I got. I just say to myself..."you gotta keep on movin, homie."

I try to envision myself on my bike... pushing through some uncharted terrain... tree canopy high above filtering the sunlight into piercing columns of light...helmet on, hydration system fully stocked, shoes clipped firmly into my pedals... just improvising and balancing ... counterbalancing and relying on instinct.

It's an in-between melody of instinct and ambition.

You just gotta keep on movin.

I was on the road at 5:30AM to meet the plumber at the house by 6:00AM. Of course he didn't show up until 7:30AM... but who's counting minutes?.... wait.... um... yes... yes...

ME.

I'm counting minutes. You are wasting my time and I'm counting the minutes as they go by while I sit in my car in the dark. (Thank you, Daylight Savings) But nevertheless, with a strong chin and an optimistic brow, I waited patiently and was there when he arrived. He came in and went to work. I sat in the car and caught a few zzzzzz's.

One Hour, Fifteen Minutes Later...

He's finished.....Hmmm.

I've waited two months for 75 minutes.

As discouraging as that was... the road is paved for me to close up every last wall, call my two-man Jamaican Drywall Dream Team and get ready for the arrival of the Tile.

the man inside

I took some advice and spent Friday evening enjoying a film at the local Magic Johnson Theatre Complex. The advice was not particularly to see Spike Lee's new movie Inside Man with Denzel Washington. The advice was to do something completely unrelated to the growing albatross of an unfinished house that I own and operate.

"Get him out... go to the movies... go to dinner... something."

I think the intent was well placed and it was much appreciated. I felt like a normal person for a brief 2 hrs 9 min + previews. Add that to the movie being mad entertaining and an all around good time...

I feel like it was a night well spent.

lock and load

This weekend my "calling all cars" paint cries were answered by a rag tag band of would-be pintar professionals. I had Team 145th channel their 20+ years of higher education towards putting together the kitchen cabinets. With the help of the Ikea instructional DVD and a continual process of elimination approach to finding a use for spare parts, all the cabinets were assembled and are ready to be mounted.

Check.

Simultaneously, I had Team Discovery Channel starting the base coat painting and finishing up the drywall odds and ends. I am continually indebted to them... and honestly at this point... they have given so much of their time and ability, that I will undoubtedly be in debt to them for the rest of my life.... maybe I can give them a first born or something... that might shave off a decade or two.

Check.

Sidebar... I wanted to get the Low VOC Paint to help maintain a toxin-free environment. HOWEVER... that was NOT in the budget. I was so disappointed. It costs, on average, $10 more per gallon for the paint that has less chemicals in it. Shouldn't it be less expensive? I guess change, in any way, is costly. Although... it's not as costly as not changing.

So back to the weekend... We got music playing, Mom brought over some chicken wings and lemonade, folks from my office and other chapters of my life stopped in and it was a good time... as predicted. I had one friend, hmmm... let’s call him.... Team Intensity... who drove out to meet me on Sunday morning before I headed out to Home Depot Expo Design Center to look at floor tiles. He took the house key, drove back to the house and painted for a couple hours by himself and then vanished as stealthily as he arrived. That's intense. That's dedication.

Check.

once apon a midnight dreary...

"While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,As of someone gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door."

So I had a visitor this morning. I got to the house around 8 AM and started going through my checklist of things to do and I hear this tapping sound that sounds like something is getting blown around by the wind in the courtyard or maybe someone is outside the house somewhere. Nevertheless, I became curious and proceeded to the second floor to look out onto the driveway...

Nothing... no cars... big wind gusts...no neighbors poking around...

...and then I hear the sound again, but this time it's right behind me.

Lo and behold there is a big black bird flying around the third floor, consistently banging his dome against the windows in a futile effort to escape. So, after a few tactical dive bomb dodges, I open the windows and he finds his way out.

But how the hell did he get in here?

I'm thinking, homeboy didn't have a key... there were no doors left open... no windows ajar... no ... Ahhh ha.... yes... now it makes sense. Because my roof soffit isn't finished, the bird flew in there and pushed his way past the insulation into the attic space. From there, he found his way through the hole in the third floor drywall ceiling. (The hole that had to be cut so the plumber could put a vent for the sewer line through the roof. A vent, mind you, that should have been done about six months ago. Don't ask me how that passed inspection.)

So let me take the time to thank a few people for my morning.

Thanks to Dummy for not finishing the roof and creating an inviting nesting site for local migratory fowl.

Thanks to Dummy again for hiring a sup-par sub-contractor plumber, who consistently amazes me with his incompetence.

Thanks to the plumber for waiting till after the drywall was up to get someone over to the house to finish the roof vent.

Thanks to the DC Inspection office for needing only a firm hand shake and a head nod as proof of legitimate work.

30...29...28...

They say there is a minimum 30 day countdown from the finish of drywall to a house being habitable. There are so many nooks and crannies to be addressed. There are so many finishes to install and so many installers to manage. It is rumored to be the most difficult part of the house process. I used to say that part of being an adult is doing things that are difficult. Since then I have amended that mantra to say that part of being an adult is doing multiple things that are difficult... simultaneously.

If life came at us one obstacle at a time, it would be considerably easier. Not so much the case though.

So you do the best you can with the time you are given.

The two-man Jamaican drywall ensemble are finished with the finishing of the drywall. They taped their last joint sanded their last edge. Aside from a few last minute drywall additions, we are actually ready to paint.

You hear me?... I said..."READY TO PAINT"

That’s just crazy to me. I am going to pick up my low-VOC base coat paint tomorrow... and hopefully, I will pick up my kitchen cabinets tonight. Next week, we get the tile for the kitchen and bathrooms...it is nothing short of crazy.

signs

Walking to my car yesterday morning, I should have read the signs. As I'm opening my car door, I look up and I see a cardinal and a blue jay next to one another. I have to imagine that this moment was significant. They were too vibrant to be a coincidence. It was a moment like ..."Look at me!!! Look at me!!"

But I proceeded to drive on, not appreciating the sign.... not sidestepping the gloomy 2-foot diameter rain cloud following my every step.

I was in a funk.

I did not want to not be in a funk. I was content in my funkiness. You see... in addition to my ongoing teeth pulling endeavors with my plumber to get my bathtubs set, my dummy contractor is back on the scene after 5 weeks of absence. He called on Wednesday to have a "talk." I met him by the house and asked my father to come as well to avoid any unfortunate situations.(I would describe my thought more explicitly, but my legal counsel has advised against harsh or violent characterizations of my intent.) Nevertheless, we meet.... he's babbling about his woulda coulda shouldas.... and I am keeping my cool. Like I said before... just get him to do the work.

A sidebar... while Dingbat is talking, I notice that he has a bright red lipstick kiss on the side of his dome. It made me want to laugh. I just kept thinking to myself that in addition to being a mediocre craftsman, a bad businessman, a loathsome individual, and a liar.... you are also a snuggle bunny.

Anyway, back to my rain cloud. So I hate the fact that this guy is at my house while I'm at work yesterday and I'm walking outside my office to my car when one of our resident local homeless guys stops me and said...

"You feeling alright, man. You have looked sad for the last two days. Don' let them steal you joy, man. They can take everything else... but don't let them steal your joy."

Sign number two

Sometimes you gotta take a deep breath and exhale all the negative vibes. Be easy. Sometimes you have to not let the madness of the world become the conflict within. Sometimes you have to stop worrying and appreciate the fact that there are conversations being had right now... between blue jays and cardinals...

...And those conversations have nothing to do with drywall.

what's up with your girl?

I want to take a second give a shout out to a good friend of mine. She was the very first friend I made when I went to undergrad and has been integral to my well-rounded demeanor ever since. She was in town visiting from the west coast when I had my accident with the nail. In fact, she, along with two other tireless friends, worked all day at the house with the drywall team while I endured the rigors of the emergency room. She stayed behind at the house and worked all day.

People say the measure of a man are his deeds, some say his dreams, and yet still other wiser, more learn-ed, orators say that the measure of a man(or woman...) are their friends.

I am fortunate to consider this particular four foot eleven inch individual an integral part of that small pantheon of folks who have stayed the course and I take this time now to say thank you.

rookie move

I have been relatively excited over the last 72hrs. Team Drywall started hanging boards at 7:00AM on Saturday and in a day and a half (18hrs exactly), they were finished. It was like watching a finely tuned automobile purring away at 75 mph. The house is completely different.

I cannot describe how impressed I was with the work these guys did and with the impact it has had on the space. The house is like a real house now. No longer a weekend-warrior-kinda-sorta almost a house, there are real walls and real dynamics of space and potential experiences.

BUT THAT DOES NOT MEAN THAT I CAN LET THE EXCITEMENT CLOUD MY JUDGEMENT.

I made a rookie move over the weekend that had me waiting 5 hrs in the emergency room at Providence Hospital(I will never again seek treatment there by the way... but that is another blog).

Long story, medium length... we ordered more sheets of drywall because the 190 original sheets were not enough. So I'm moving some of the green board up stairs and as I'm about to step into the house...

I step right on a nail.

A nice, long, bent, rusty, "I've been waiting in the rain for four weeks to get back at you for not using me in the house and now I have my vengeance", 3 inch nail...which if you subtract the 1-1/2 wood it was in and the 3/4 inch sole of my sneakers, some breathing room, and my sock...leaves you with somewhere in the neighborhood of 1/2 to 3/4 inches of nail that found a new home in my left heel.

That was not a good time.

And the worst part is that my construction boots were sitting next to my tool box at the top of the stairs. I was just too excited about the drywall to remember to change shoes.

Rookie move.

trabajador perdido

It just keeps getting better. I am leaving my office to go on a site visit for work and I'm cruising down in the elevator to the first floor.

ding. ding.

The doors open and who is staring me back in the eye?

My long lost contractor.

I could not have scripted it better myself. It was the quintessential... leaving Quiznos excited about your toasted sandwich and running into your ex-girlfriend in front of the Italian ice/ Twisty cone spot near the grocery store parking lot.

He was well dressed. It looked like the month plus of not working for me had been good to him. (My brother reminded me that the dummy bought those lovely clothes with my money) So I'm like...

"Hey, howyadoin?...It's been a while."

He went on about how he just finished another job and how he was ready to get started again...And how he was going to swing by on Monday.

"Interesting."

He mentioned how he had been upset about how the stucco guys didn't wait for him to fix the roof soffit before they moved their scaffolding. (They did wait, for the record) And that he was going to finish the soffit on Monday and then get ready to start the drywall.

"Hmm... I see."

So get this... Through this brief conversation, I realized that he wasn't coming up into my office to see me. He was actually coming to see a colleague of mine, who he had done some work for previously. That colleague had severed their relationship from that job I believe, because Dummy was... well... most likely being the mediocre performer that he is. He didn't even come to see me. My colleague no longer works at our office and so finding this out led to our conversation. He didn't even come to see me. He was going to waltz into MY OFFICE, speak to MY co-worker and then vanish back into the dingbat abyss that he seemingly emerged from.

"So... do you have a number at which I can reach you?"

It was all I could do to not burst out laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation. Am I supposed to be happy that you're ready to do work now? Am I supposed to feel like you are doing me a favor by finishing the job that I've paid you to do? You can't be serious. You can't possibly think that there will be no consequences to your behavior. You can't be that dense... or can you?

I kept it cool. I have nothing to gain by telling him how I feel right now. Let him come on Monday. Let him fix the soffit and the interior trim like he has been paid to do and let him work off the remaining debt. So, I took down his number and told him I would call him a bit later.

I was very proud of myself. What he deserved was a gritty whisper in his ear of..."You tryin to make a fool outta me?" But what I provided was a calm response to an unfortunate situation.

He didn't even come to see me.