Memorial Day Weekend

We took Memorial Day Weekend off and went to Madison, WI for a friend's wedding. Besides the wedding, we went to the Madison farmer's market, toured the Trek bike factory, visited Frank Lloyd Wright's architecture school at Taliesin, and drove (yes, drove) by the Taliesin house. Had we arrived at the vistors' center a mere 30 minutes earlier, we would have been able to take the tour of the residence. It was most irritating to receive this news upon our arrival, and several of the more colorful words in the English language ran through Wife's head. If we had not stopped at a local coffee shop to try to use the free wi-fi internet (which, not surprisingly, would not work) to check the tour times, we would have arrived on time.

After driving for almost 10 hours without a fully functioning air conditioning unit (which is not conducive to a pleasant disposition), we picked up the Girls and the Brains of the Operation. The dogs were pooped from several days of endless barking. They collapsed on the kitchen floor and conked out. They will be back to nuclear behavior shortly.




Thanks to the miracle of global warming, the temperature at the wedding, and everywhere else for that matter, was blazing hot.

Taking A Break

We don't work all of the time while we're at the "money pit". We do occasionally take breaks to relax and enjoy a cold beverage and a nice warm sunny day.

Sunday Night Update...More Trash

We've worked a lot during the past week. All of the junk has been removed from the attic. I think the previous owner was a pack rat. There were letters and bills dating back to the 1960's along with piles and piles of junk. It took over 16 full trash bags to get it all.


We also ripped down the fiberboard wall and ceiling on the sleeping porch behind the upstairs bathroom.



The toilet, sink, tub, wall covering, and lowered ceiling were all removed from the bathroom. The tub will be refinished and used in the new master bathroom. I don't know how anyone could live with so much filth.

Tool Time

The ladder we used for the tree cutting and roof maintenance extravaganza was monstrous. We should have rented a a crane to help raise it since it seemed to weigh about as much as a steel girder.

We've bought some fun tools for the house, too. The new shop vac could probably pull nails out of the floor. That poor vacuum has been put through its paces this week - it cleaned up the unidentified crud from the kitchen floor, mountains of dust left from the removal of carpet from the stairs, a mound of dog food, and so on.

The lingering odor of the tenant and her pack of dogs is improving. We removed some stinky carpet from the stairs this weekend. That helped quite a bit. Of course, we now have a big crop of carpet staples to harvest from the stairs. Talk about tedious. But, we are certainly making a lot of progress.

Sunday Evening Update...Nora's Tree Service

We got a lot of work done this weekend.

We rented a 40 foot extension ladder and Nora's tree service went to work. We sawed and lopped off all of the tree limbs that were hanging on to the back corner of the house. While we had the ladder up on the back of the house we put down some plastic over the sleeping porch roof to stop the rain from getting in.

Tree service pictures: before


Tree service pictures: during


Tree service pictures: after


It rained both days this weekend and we did a lot of work inside the house. The carpet on the stairs was removed along with the nasty dirt and odor it was holding. Major amounts of wallpaper throughout the house and the remaing kitchen cabinents, sink, and flooring were removed. The downstairs toilet was also trashed.

Speaking of trash...we're making the local trash collectors earn their paychecks. We put out 18 bags of trash and some carpet to be picked up on Monday. So far they've picked up everything we've put out for them.

No More Ugly Awning

One of the first things we did was to remove the ugly awning from the front porch. We also removed several overgrown shrubs from in front of the porch. Here are some before and after pictures.

Before:


After:

More Photos

Dropped ceiling removal (above) and staircase (below).

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Renovation begins

This is the kitchen before. Nasty cabinets. Nasty carpet. Nasty everything. And a dropped ceiling.


This is the kitchen after removal of most of the cabinets, carpet and subfloor. You can see old newspapers from 1919 that were probably put on the floor to insulate. The dropped ceiling has been removed, although its not visible in this picture.

Our Word for Today - Filthy

Finally, we have some real news to report.

We closed on the Money Pit on Friday morning. Husband then spent part of the day installing locks.....and no, that's not a mistake, we had to install not replace locks. He also began the cleaning process and airing out the house. This house is utterly filthy. How on earth anyone could live in this mess is just beyond comprehension. Wife refuses to use either bathroom (which are presently Black Hole of Calcutta-type places) and will have to find a local establishment to frequent.

There is one room on the second floor that we had never really seen until the former owner's workman cleaned it out. It used to be filled with a big heap of junk and more filth. Now, it only has a big piece of carpet and a bucket filled with some unidentified, brownish liquid (it probably started out as rainwater since its near a leak). At some point, somone lobbed a brick into the plaster wall, and its still there. We pulled back the carpet and found a newspaper from 1948, along with more dirt.

The kitchen carpet was....filthy. The carpet looked sort of like the Astroturf you see at Myrtle Beach putt-putt courses. At least that's what it started out as. We removed it, along with untold amounts of dirt and crud, last night. On the bright side, we found some type of subfloor under the putting green and hardwood floor below.

So, we have more cleaning ahead today. It will be a while before the place is safe enough for the Girls to come with us.

She's Out!!!!!!!!!!!

The tenant is finally out. The closing is scheduled for tomorrow morning.

The Saga Continues

It's now Wednesday afternoon and the tenant still hasn't gotten completely out. She says she's pretty much out and just has one more load that she plans to get out tonight. Excuses and more excuses. Hopefully the owner won't have to go through the eviction process to get her out.

The Current Owner

Did we tell you that we're buying the house from the Keeneland bugle player? He's even got his own bobblehead doll.

Sunday Update

It's been raining all day and we haven't done much of anything. We're hoping the tenant will be out by tomorrow. If not, the current owner will have to start the eviction process.

Sorry for the short post today. The Wife is in a grumpy mood due to the tenant and her excuses.

Closing....A Quick Update

The crazy tenant has decided to stay in the house until the end of the month. This, of course, has screwed up our plans to close on the house on Thursday 4/27. We're now hoping she gets out without having to be evicted. The closing will be rescheduled once we know she's completely out and gone.

Some Fun Photos & the Sunday Afternoon Update

We want to go to Ireland again - but won't be going due to the money pit project.

Our bathing beauty at the dog swim!!!!

What's Up?
Well, we had some friends over for a cookout last night on the newly cleaned grill. We devoted a good portion of Saturday afternoon to the cleaning process. Not the most pleasant task, but even so, it was better than working on an appeal brief.

Since Wife took a much needed rest from lawyerland yesterday, some billable hours will have to be devoted to work on Sunday afternoon. Time, tide and appellate deadlines wait for no one.

Brewmaster is preparing to bottle the latest quaff. Assistant may take a break from billing to put a few caps on the bottles.

The Girls are eagerly anticipating a walk in the sunshine since they did not have their regular morning jaunt. We like to give credit where it is due, so we should point out that The Girls have a very successful record with their home security duties. They are batting 100% when it comes to getting rid of people walking by the house and UPS delivery men.

As usual, the Brains of the Operation has disappeared to a quiet corner for his umpteenth nap of the day. Or, he's hacking up a hairball that we'll find later. Ick.

Tomorrow begins the final countdown to the closing...maybe. The tenant may or may not be out. We'll see.

Husband's first post...the neighbors' house

This is a picture of our new neighbors' house. It and the "money pit" were both built by the same family during the early 1890's. It has been meticulously restored and is now a lovely bed & breakfast. We're hoping to do as good a job renovating the "money pit" as the neighbors did.


Unfortunately there's not much more to report. We're still waiting for the tenant and the owner to get their stuff out of the house. Hopefully they'll be done before the closing on 4/27.

A Kingsport Weekend

Wife got her Pal's fix this weekend. The Easter Bunny delivered: 2 Big Pal's, 2 large frenchie fries, 2 sweet teas, and 1 peanut butter milkshake. The calorie count must be enormous. Some time will be devoted at the gym this week.

The Renovators and Wife's Parents trekked around east Tennessee on Saturday. More research was conducted on Vikings, Wolfs, Five-Stars, and Dacors, and much was learned. The troupe also hit the local bike and outdoor stores in Abingdon and Damascus in southwest Virginia. Damascus is just so neat. Too bad the morons who want to pave over everything and homogenize the world are going to ruin the town. :-(

In renovation news: The tenant appears to be making progress in vacating the money pit. She was supposed to remove some things from the back yard this weekend. The Renovators conducted a reconnaissance mission to see if tenant accomplished this task. As promised, the stuff was gone. Everyone needs to cross their fingers, pray or do whatever else is needed to call on a higher power to make sure the tenant leaves in the next few days so we can close!!!!

Let's Eat

Since its Sunday night and nothing is on TV but re-runs, Wife is fooling around with this silly blog.
So what do the Renovators like to eat? Well, Wife is quite desperate for a Big Pal (with cheese, of course) from Pal's. Obviously (see the map), there is not a single Pal's remotely close to central Kentucky. Thus, no burger for Wife.

When it comes to Lexington, we are big fans of Pazzo's Pizza Pub and Brooklyn Pizza. Not surprisingly, Wife could eat an entire pizza pie right now.

We won't be able to afford sushi once we close on the money pit, so we'll just have to drive by Seki or Tomo and wave. The closest we may get to Oriental food could be ramen noodles. Ick. And the Girls just may have to eat Ol' Roy.

A Lazy Sunday

Since there is little news to report about the new house (tenant still there; appraiser taking his sweet time setting up the appointment), here's a quick rundown of the weekend:

We researched kitchen ranges on Saturday. Wife really likes Thermadors (mainly because the knobs are a nice shade of blue); while Husband seems to be quite taken with Wolf ranges. However, we will be taking a close look at FiveStar since they are of similar quality, but more economical. Wife is also pleased that they are made in Tennessee.

We watched a couple of good movies this weekend: Wallace and Gromit in The Curse of the Were Rabbit and Good Night and Good Luck.

As you can see from the photo, the girls declared war on the dog bed pillow when the cover was removed for a much needed washing. We made the mistake of letting them supervise themselves while doing some much-needed yard work. The result is almost as bad as the "great magazine and catalog shredding incident" from earlier this year.

The Brewmaster (aka Husband) spent much of his morning preparing a new pale ale while the Assistant provided moral support from a reclining position on the couch. This will probably be Brewmaster's last effort until the new house is complete. Brewmaster later replaced Assistant on the couch while Assistant went out for a spin on the old Cannondale.

Stained Glass

This is one of two stained glass windows in the money pit. It has suffered some damaged, but can probably be repaired. Hopefully we can find matching glass to replace the missing pieces.