The homeowner

Funny thing happened today. After work, I stopped by the house to help out. My parents had been there all day working on the wiring and soforth. Anyway, I was cleaning out the basement of all the excess drywall and debris and hauling each peice to the driveway when I stopped. I stood there for a minute, looked around at all the work that still had to be done, and gave a sigh. The look on my face must have been priceless because as I stood there, I heard laughing from over my shoulder.

My dad was laughing at me?!

"What?" I asked.

"You're a homeowner." Replied my dad.

Paint

What do you think about this wall color for our livingroom / kitchen? We'd only paint one or two walls. Our aim is to complement the hardwood and brick fireplace.


And maybe this color for the hall bathroom.

Spagetti

Yesterday Daddy Francisco took off the ceiling (badly installed plywood) of the basement to expose the wiring in the house. They were driving back to San Carlos to have dinner with my folks so I didn't drive to SJ today. But anyway, he described the whole mess as spagetti. We think he had trouble sleeping just thinking about what he'd have to do to it to make it orderly. He said the original work is neat and pretty but whatever the previous owner "added" would need to be replaced. This guy used extension cords for any new electrical needs. Sounded like he used a lot of them too.

So Daddy F said he'd replace the extension cords and fraying portions but thought the good existing stuff was adequite and could be left alone. I vaguely remember hearing someone say that the old knob and tube stuff was obsolete and not to code. I'm sure we won't get inspected but it'd be nice if it had a fresh start. Pending funds, I suppose.

Here's a sample of how our house is wired with knob and tube stuff.


The day was full of rain and wind so Mommy F couldn't work in the garden like she had hoped. So she took out the rest of the carpet foam and nails left in the hardwood. I think there's some water stains in the hardwood and we'll need to replace some of the boards. Anyone got any advice on that? My friend's boyfriend volunteered to help us out with the hardwood. Apparently he's installed it before so he knows all about sanding and finishing and stuff.

Predinner conversation was full of conduit talk and discussions of stranded wire vs. solid wire and a lot of other things that would make any passerby confused and uninterested. After eating way too much chinese food with my parents, they departed and we went to our new favorite store... Home Depot. The shoping list consisted of Romex wiring, junction boxes, and other stuff for the electrical work.

Slowly but surely we're making progress.

Mom and Dad Francisco are here...

for a visit and to help fix up the house. They got a good look at it today. Not sure if they like the thing, but that's probably because they're used to paying just a little bit for a big big house. Too bad that in the bay area there's no such thing. Deal with it.

But they're willing to help out and we're willing to let them. Today mom and I started pulling up carpet foam and pulling staples out of the hardwood. Dad started chopping up bushes and pulling up weeds in front of the house. "Making it presentable..." Tomorrow he starts on the electric. Oh joy.

Oh yes. I almost forgot. Butch is still alive. That thar is one tough fish.

Knobs

comments? questions? concerns? opinions?

OSH pays the taxes day

Ze keechen has no gharbaaazge disposal. So we bought one :) And we bought all the face plates and stuff for the light switches. All the other stuff on our list was still more expensive than other places even with the tax sale. So.....

We bought our fire extinguishers and smoke detectors from CostCo. :)

butch and the fumigators

I got a phonecall today from the fumigator company...

"We were told that your pond was empty. But there's a fish in there! The pond is pretty close to the structure. If he's there while we fumigate he'll die."

"Yeah. I know he's there. He wants to die."

"Excuse me?"

"I've tried to catch him already. He keeps running away. I explained to him what would happen to him if he didn't come with me. But he decided that he wants to stay. So I said okay. Go ahead and die!"

*Laughter from other end* Okay sir. Just wanted to make sure!

"Thanks for checking! Enjoy killing off the little buggers!"

"Thank you sir."

fishing

be vewwwy vewwwy quiet..



*takes the asian squat position at the edge of the koi pond*

so the fumigators are coming tomorrow and since it was too dark the other day, i have to catch the renegade koi that the previous owners left in the reely reeeely green pond. so green, i can't see 2 inches under the surface.

it's about 4:30 and i've come straight from work hoping that i can catch this sucker and still make it to outrigger practice at 6:00 pm in redwood city.

there he is! *takes a swipe with a fish net with a handle much too short to reach the other end of the pond* missed.

*resume the squat position*

gosh this thing thing stinks. there are mosquito larva on the surface of the water. great. west nile. i hope fumigating kills mosquitos.

*pulls out reminants of water lillies and resumes the squat position*

i grumble about how dirty the thing is and repeat the swipe technique each time butch (that's what i've been calling the fish) shows his face.

elapsed time: about 30 minutes
attempted captures: at least 10

neighbor and son come by to watch me. (melissa's brother and nephew.) i know they want to laugh. while baby points at the pond yelling fish, and i not seeing what he's seeing, i look around for something to lure butch to the surface. fish food doesn't work fast enough. fresh water from a hose seems to work very good.

*resume asian squat with hose in left hand and fish net in right*

daddy and baby leave when it's time for his nap. i've managed to fill the pond further. no dilution. still green.

*turn off hose and resume asian squat*

"where are you you little ...."

elapsed time: about 60 minutes
attempted captures: uncountable

this isn't working and it's getting hot. forget paddle practice.

"where are you, fish?"

beetles and bees about the size of small plums are working at our lemon tree nearby and keep coming dangerously close to my ears. FREAKY.

"get into the net you little!@#$%"

i resume the asian squat and every so often take off running around the back yard and patio cursing to myself waving my hands and arms franticly in the air after being narrowly missed by the kamikaze bugs pent on plundering my ear canal of nectar for their crazy human ear honey.

*resume asian squat* "!@##$%"

maybe i need a bigger net? i walk around the yard looking for what the previous owners must have used. nothing. but.... *lightbulb* i find that our bathroom screen door is small enough to fit in the pond.

"yeah... try and escape this big honkin net!!!"

i'm successful only in making our bathroom screen door disgusting. too big. no handle. too slow. i rinse off the screen door while butch watches me from the other end of the pond. i bet if i understood fish, i'd hear laughing.

"you can't hide forever..."

*the wife calls* "yes. yes dear. no i haven't caught him yet. if i can't catch him soon, i'm just going home. there's no point. yes dear. i'll see you later on...."

*resume asian squat*

*dredges bottom with a stick*

"forget it. you don't wanna come out? you can just die here. don't tell me i didn't try!!! enjoy the fumes butch."

i'm no fisherman.

elapsed time: between 90 and 120 minutes
attempted captures: uncountable

The house

Escrow closed on April 13, 2005. Its a quaint little bungalow in northern San Jose. Its a 2 bedroom, 2 bath house with a full basement, hot tub, koi pond, a little cottage thing in the back and a pseudo garage. It needs a lot of work but we're up for the challenge. Its next door to my brother and his family. They have a 15 month old son. We'll be swapping babysitting for power tools.

The guy we bought the house from has Alezheimers and his daughters put him in a home and sold us the house. The neighbor says the guy thought of himself as a handyman, although his "improvements" are more like hindrances. We're taking most of them out.

The first order of business is the termite fumigation. That's happening this Friday thru Sunday. So we decided to go to the house yesterday to do some preparation. We are planning to refinish the hardwood that's hiding under the carpet, so we ripped out all the carpet in the whole house. For some reason we thought there might still be chemicals in the carpet if we waited until after the fumigation to take them out. Since we didn't want to inhale any chemicals, we pulled up the carpet first.

The one koi left in the pond was also a concern. We brought a little 5 gallon tank to put the koi into so he won't get gassed either. But we waited a little too long and it was getting dark when we attempted to catch the fish. We gave up. Chris will get it today after work or something.

Some things on our to do list (random order)....

~Rewire the electrical in the whole house (Chris' dad volunteered to tackle that one)
~Paint everything
~Refinish the hardwood
~Replace all light switches and recepticals
~Install a garbage disposal in the kitchen sink
~Tile the kitchen and bathroom floors
~Install smoke detectors
~Install 2nd strap to the water heater
~Repair the chimney
~Change out the blue toilet for a white one
~Install closet rods (it has that wire shelving that's falling apart)
~New kitchen cabinets (4 doors don't match the rest of the cabinets)
~Update the lighting in all rooms
......

And the list goes on.

Starting not from the beginning but close to it...

Well, we've bought a house. We've already gone through the pain that is bidding, signing, and escrow. There's a story about it, but we'll probably tell it another time.