I can't believe it's been a week since I last posted! I have had something to do each and every day since then and it's hard to remember to blog or even find time to do it.
On Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday nights I worked with Crew B. On Saturday night I worked with Crew D covering somebody's absence.
The drywall work is finished at our house and it looks nice. Because they only applied primer and orange peel texture, you can still see the light outlines of Sharpie marker circles where the drywall guy circled his flaws for correction. We will apply our our paint colors soon enough.
We rented a 17-foot-long moving truck on Saturday, and we began loading it yesterday. We took all of the interior doors and cabinets out there yesterday. Today we loaded up everything from the garage and moved it to the storage container. We returned to Powell around 1:00 PM, ate lunch, and then began loading it with more stuff from the house. That truck is packed to the gills right now and I fear that we won't have enough room inside the storage container to hold everything. They really need to get our house done.
Gordy brought back the tile from Billings and stacked it inside the house. However, he told us he would begin working in our house "bright and early on Monday", and we didn't see anything of him. Chris Gunn was nowhere to be found either - we passed him heading to the house as we returned to Powell.
We are both very sore and tired. After dropping the load off tomorrow, we will turn the truck back in. I think we can carry the rest of this stuff out to Clark in several trips with my pick up truck. We have these computers, chairs, barstools, bar top, boxes of food, and boxes of clothes.
We will probably stop posting to this blog and Facebook for a while - at least until we can get Internet service at our house. We might try to post from computers at the public library.
Monday, November 11, 2013
Tuesday, November 05, 2013
Powell, WY
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| Water cisterns being installed. |
The plumbers were working on the pump and trying to figure out how to install the manways/filling ports onto the tanks when we arrived. The excavator arrived shortly later to begin backfilling over the tanks.
Chris Gunn drove up later and came inside to ask us what our schedule and plans were for moving in and getting the floors done. His plan is to leave the siding for last and get the interior done quickly so that we can move in. He's trying to make all of the trimming out, setting toilets, etc dependent on our getting the floors tiled. I don't think he understands how urgently we need to get into this house, and he might be surprised by how fast we get the floors finished up!
Tongue-and-groove lumber for the ceiling will begin going up on Monday, November 11, and Chris says it will only take him two or three days to finish it. He promises us he can work around the tile guy if he's there working in the house.
The electrician will return on Nov. 18 to trim out all of the receptacles and switches and place all of the cover plates.
Our 40-foot shipping/storage container was delivered to the house today. We are going to take a few things out in my pick up truck tomorrow and lock it up. It's too bad I have to work the next for nights, otherwise we would be moving fools!
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| More siding has been put on. |
The drywall should be completely finished on Friday or Saturday. We will take all of the doors and cabinets to the house first on Sunday and stack them in the middle of the living room. Then we will begin cleaning the floors so we can begin laying tile on Monday morning.
I called and spoke to Gordy Stoltz, our tile contractor and neighbor down the hill, and asked him if he could start on Monday. He can. He will come up and work for 3 or 4 hours, and then stop, take a break, and go to Cody to work on a tiling job down there. By Wednesday, his brother-in-law will be off of work and he will be able to help lay tile too! Bob and I are going to take care of the laundry room and the master bathroom. I think we will need 2 or 3 days tops to finish those.
We have been pricing materials for a dog run for Daisy, and it looks like it is going to be most practical and most affordable to simply buy a ready built enclosure for her. I am thinking we will go with the ready built run and set the panels up on rebar that we will sledgehammer into the ground. We will probably return to Billings right before we move in and get the dog run and a refrigerator.
Temps dropped down to 18°F last night, and since it is clear tonight, I expect it will be chilly again tonight.
Monday, November 04, 2013
Update
Another successful week at Cody Labs. Nights are tough, but most people seem to prefer them because there are fewer eyes around and fewer extra people with needs around during the night. The plant is 73,000 square feet - the building is an old Wal*Mart building, and at night there are only 6 of us in the entire place!
I got paid on Friday and I was able to get all of my bills caught up. On Saturday morning, when I came home I arranged to have a 40-foot-long shipping/storage container delivered to the house next week, then I gave my credit card to Bob and sent him to Rimrock Tire to get two new tires on the back wheels of the truck while I went to bed. Now it can snow and I will not be white-knuckled driving in it.
While the new tires were being put on, Bob walked over to the U-Haul rental to discuss a rental truck for our move. The truck itself is only $50-some, it's the $0.89 per mile that is going to kill us. I think I can get all of our big stuff out to Clark in two trips and that will just leave us to carry our clothes, bed, and food out of the house in the pick up on our last day here.
We are renting the truck for three days next Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. I have to work Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights, so that will make it tough for me. The supervisor tried to get me to take Monday too, but nosiree, that would be four nights on, one night off, and four more nights with no time to move.
Today we drove to Clark and found Lloyd, the excavator there. He was backfilling the trench for the electrical and getting ready to dig a pit 8-feet-wide and 30-feet-long to hold the water cisterns. The plumber and electrician were expected to be on-site to help make that happen too. Lloyd is going to dig the 18-inch-deep trench for the gas line, and he will leave it open. Later, when someone comes back with a bobcat to do grading, we will have the trench filled in.
After we left Clark we headed to Billings to visit The Home Depot and Lowe's. Here we placed an order for all of the floor tile. We were talking about Gordy, the neighbor who is helping to install the floors, when I went around the corner to look at grout, and there he was coming down the aisle! "Your name just rolled off of Bob's lips a moment ago!"
Gordy has a very large truck and he's going to come back to Billings with Bob to pick up the floor tile and tile adhesive. We took the five cases of 12x12 white tile for the bathroom, three bags of charcoal-colored grout, three bags of tan "Sahara" grout, and one bag of "Delorean Gray" grout. We also got a Rustoleum epoxy floor kit to do the laundry room floor.
$2,886.74 was spent at The Home Depot. Then we headed across the road to Lowe's to get lighting.
We needed lights for the bedroom, hallway, and laundry room. We needed vanity lights for the bathroom and half bath. We needed porch lights (3). We needed exterior flood lamps. We only spent about $360.00 at Lowe's.
We took a late lunch at Mooyah's restaurant and had hamburgers. This burger and fries place is like Five Guy's Burgers and Fries back east. But they have a couple of extra menu choices that made our visit much more pleasant. Bob was able to fore go the hamburger bun and have his burger wrapped in lettuce. They also had sweet potato fries.
On our trip back home it began to snow as the sun was going down. Visibility really dropped for a while. We stopped at the house to see what had been done today. The cisterns were in the ground, but they were not hooked up and the big hole was not back filled yet. The drywall guy has not returned yet, and he is supposed to put another coat of mud on before he starts sanding. He promised us the drywall will be completed next weekend. Also, Chris has not put one more board of siding on the house since he worked on it last weekend.
I just hope he really understands that we are moving in - soon. I also hope he understands why, when he calls for a recommendation, I end up laughing hysterically, and hanging up on him.
We will continue boxing our stuff up this week and hopefully be ready to get out of here. I transition to day shift on November 18. One good thing about days is that my sleep will be disrupted less.
I am tired.
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| Mud and taping walls in progress. |
While the new tires were being put on, Bob walked over to the U-Haul rental to discuss a rental truck for our move. The truck itself is only $50-some, it's the $0.89 per mile that is going to kill us. I think I can get all of our big stuff out to Clark in two trips and that will just leave us to carry our clothes, bed, and food out of the house in the pick up on our last day here.
We are renting the truck for three days next Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. I have to work Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights, so that will make it tough for me. The supervisor tried to get me to take Monday too, but nosiree, that would be four nights on, one night off, and four more nights with no time to move.
Today we drove to Clark and found Lloyd, the excavator there. He was backfilling the trench for the electrical and getting ready to dig a pit 8-feet-wide and 30-feet-long to hold the water cisterns. The plumber and electrician were expected to be on-site to help make that happen too. Lloyd is going to dig the 18-inch-deep trench for the gas line, and he will leave it open. Later, when someone comes back with a bobcat to do grading, we will have the trench filled in.
After we left Clark we headed to Billings to visit The Home Depot and Lowe's. Here we placed an order for all of the floor tile. We were talking about Gordy, the neighbor who is helping to install the floors, when I went around the corner to look at grout, and there he was coming down the aisle! "Your name just rolled off of Bob's lips a moment ago!"
Gordy has a very large truck and he's going to come back to Billings with Bob to pick up the floor tile and tile adhesive. We took the five cases of 12x12 white tile for the bathroom, three bags of charcoal-colored grout, three bags of tan "Sahara" grout, and one bag of "Delorean Gray" grout. We also got a Rustoleum epoxy floor kit to do the laundry room floor.
$2,886.74 was spent at The Home Depot. Then we headed across the road to Lowe's to get lighting.
We needed lights for the bedroom, hallway, and laundry room. We needed vanity lights for the bathroom and half bath. We needed porch lights (3). We needed exterior flood lamps. We only spent about $360.00 at Lowe's.
We took a late lunch at Mooyah's restaurant and had hamburgers. This burger and fries place is like Five Guy's Burgers and Fries back east. But they have a couple of extra menu choices that made our visit much more pleasant. Bob was able to fore go the hamburger bun and have his burger wrapped in lettuce. They also had sweet potato fries.
On our trip back home it began to snow as the sun was going down. Visibility really dropped for a while. We stopped at the house to see what had been done today. The cisterns were in the ground, but they were not hooked up and the big hole was not back filled yet. The drywall guy has not returned yet, and he is supposed to put another coat of mud on before he starts sanding. He promised us the drywall will be completed next weekend. Also, Chris has not put one more board of siding on the house since he worked on it last weekend.
I just hope he really understands that we are moving in - soon. I also hope he understands why, when he calls for a recommendation, I end up laughing hysterically, and hanging up on him.
We will continue boxing our stuff up this week and hopefully be ready to get out of here. I transition to day shift on November 18. One good thing about days is that my sleep will be disrupted less.
I am tired.