No-Party Time, Not Particularly Excellent

So up until a couple weeks ago I've described the non-finished portion of the floor as "garage/work/storage/party" area.... but unfortunately I've come to realize that it's probably going to be more like just "garage/work/storage" area.

I talked with the head of the acoustics department at work about soundproofing it, and he basically said that if there's a garage door, the only thing I could do to keep sound from getting out would be to build a whole new wall inside the garage. This is pretty much out of the question because I want to leave room for at least two cars to park (I will have two for a small period of time, plus future owners may have two), and building a wall after that much space would leave very little room for partying anyways.

He often times is overly cautious about acoustics in general, so at first I passed his comments off as exageration.... until yesterday when I was in the back of the finished area (about 40 feet from the front) and I could hear two people standing in the street front of the garage door outside talking. Not only could I hear them, but I could hear them fairly well, and they weren't talking particularly loud. The garage door closes in a way that leaves gaps around the edges, and I would imagine is the way most garage doors function as well (this might even be a requirement to allow venting of fumes).

What this means is that the garage door will acoustically act like a screen door.

Considering that a few of my neighbors hate me, that sound will bleed out of the garage area all over, and that my upstairs would be destroyed if I had a party there............ I've pretty much come to the conclusion that parties at my house are almost definitely not going to happen. This really sucks. I like throwing parties at my house and was really looking forward to it. The plan from the start was to have the basement/garage be a party area.

I'm not saying that I won't try my hardest to find a way around this problem.... but I really don't think it's likely. My best thinking now would be large wrestling mats that I'd have to hang from the ceiling to the ground right in front of the garage door, and somehow make a seal between them and the walls. Don't ask me where I'd get these from, or where I'd store them... but ummmm.... yeah.

Anybody that read this want to offer up their house for me to throw parties at instead (couch (or bed) for me to crash on at the end of the party is required)?

Kitchens are a good thing

I really should be going to bed now, but instead I'm going to finish with the major house updates.

While working on the flooring Wednesday the appliances were delivered. After a small scare of the fridge not fitting up the stairs (!!!), they got everything into the kitchen area. We laid cardboard all over the floors to prevent scratching and it seems to have done a good job.

Slide in range with convection feature:

Slick dual drawer washer:

Fridge with bottom freezer and french doors:

The cabinets were going in at the same time, so it worked out perfectly timing wise:

The microwave got installed today as well, but I don't have a picture of that. Unfortunately there will need to be an outlet in the cabinet directly above it, but thems the breaks, as they say.

To leave a little more of my personal touch on the house I wrote a note to future owners, and along with a dollar bill I sealed them with plastic and slid it under the cork tiles in the bedroom.

(yes that's a T2 allusion, and yes I realize how dorky/lame the entire message is :P)

Spiraling out of Control

Things seem to have reached a new state of completeness now that the spiral stairs have been installed and the outside patio has been finished. Maybe it's because I'm so happy with how it turned out, or maybe it's because it's the first large section that's "done"... but it really overwhelmed me.

The spiral stairs came in Tuesday in three pieces:


Wednesday I took the day off work to get some stuff done at the garage, and that just happened to be when they installed the spiral stairs. It took a bunch of guys and seemed a bit tricky, but got done.



It still is going to need to be painted (we just got it primed to save some money). As of now I'm thinking to just paint it black... I think it looks pretty damn good as it is.

Where to begin...

Since I last dropped some of this hot blog action so much has gone on. I might break this up into a couple posts for organizational reasons, but we'll see.

The biggest thing going on has been the flooring, which I last posted about. The more I worked with it, the more I understood it and the little things you need to do to avoid problems. The most important example of this is how exact the tongue and groove needs to be to fit together correctly. If the tongue smashes at all then it lifts the cork at the edge on one or both tiles. I didn't have a good grasp on how important this was until more than halfway through the process. Although I caught big mess-ups, there were some imperfections that I definitely would've liked to avoid.

Buuut, regardless of that it looks awesome :)

As of May 5th, here's where we were:

My parents were there assembling the kitchen cabinets too:

Towards the end of the day I slammed my finger with the hammer... it didn't hurt that bad after a few minutes, but the fact that a decent section of my finger was halfway disconnected from my finger, it made me a bit uneasy at first:

After cleaning, treating and wrapping it, it felt a lot better and looked better too (and the above picture doesn't show off how bad it was.

One more update to come tonight before I sleep.

And Then There Was Cork

Last night we started laying the cork (shown above unboxed). After figuring out the dimensions with Otto, we decided there was room for 19.5 rows of cork, so we decided to put 1/4 row on each side so that the pattern I'd come up with would still work.

The first row was the real bitch. It took forever because the wall wasn't perfectly straight and each tile needed to be cut a different size. Just determining that the wall wasn't straight took close to an hour, haha.

Once we got into the groove (no pun intended) with the first row it wasn't so bad... that is until we got to the second row. Hitting the full 1'x3' tiles into the small 3" wide tiles was not so easy. You'd hit into one, and the next 3" wide one would pop off. Then you'd have to go to the end and pound those in, etc etc.

Anyways, Otto and his grandson, Josh, left after about 1.5 rows was done. I then sanded the floors and continued on. I got the feel for it and came up with some better techniques for the second row I was completing. I was feeling real good about my progress so when I got to the end I figured "hey, what the hell, I'll cut the piece for the next row with the circular saw." (I'd never used one before). I did that, it went well... nice cut, good size for the tiles. So I started laying the third row and this was a LOT easier. I got 2.5 tiles in and realized I should start checking when I'm going to need to put one of the dark pieces in.... wellllllllllll, this is when I discovered that although I'd planned on starting in the corner with a 1/2 tile, and we'd done that, what I HADN'T planned on doing with starting with a 1/4 wide row of tiles. Basically that 1/4 wide row was extra to my design, and should have been started with a full tile!

Man, I was so pissed. After all the work we did doing the first and second row, there's now way I'm going back and re-doing it. I decided to call it a night and focus on the pattern.

I came up with a variation on the other one that I'd designed, and it's pretty nice too. I'm going to take some time at lunch today to work with the pattern a little more, but I think I'm fairly decided on what I've come up with.

Here are a couple pictures of the first row and the start of the second row:

I'm a Cork Dork

Alright!

The new Night cork arrived today. I went over at lunch to check it out, and as promised, it is the same height, width and length and has the same tongue and groove!

Otto (the site supervisor that's going to help me install it) is a beast. He's gotta be over 60, and after a full day of working is going to take a quick dinner break and then come back to begin laying it.

6pm tonight is go time!

w00t.

Check back late tonight for pix of the install process at Ash's request.

Keep Hope Alive

After talking with the cork company a few times today I think it's all sorted out for me to recieve replacement Night cork that should fit with the Stone that I have. The woman at the cork company was very nice about it and said she'd personally check to make sure what they were going to send me fits with the Stone cork that I have. They also said I could keep the incorrect Night which I received. I'd like to build some boxes/shelves and scratch protectors for the floor out of some scraps, so this will be perfect.

They sent the cork out overnight to me today, so I should have it tomorrow.

I'm really happy they were nice about all this. It would've been a pain to have to deal with some people that didn't care.

I'll post an update tomorrow as to whether or not what shows up fits or not! The suspense is killing me.

Time to Wait and Other Updaits

Well, after getting to the garage this morning and looking at the cork with Otto (the site supervisor who I'd hired to help me on the side), we decided that it makes the most sense to wait until I can talk to them on Monday. Otto said he could help after work if he had a quick break, so it wouldn't mean a full week's delay. He also pointed out that not only are the two types of cork incompatible because they have different tongue and grooves, but they also are different sizes! Strangely, the boxes with the Stone cork in it say "910mm x 300mm" printed on the side, but the sticker which the company I bought it off of has on it says "900mm x 298mm" (the same dimensions listed on the Night cork)! Anyways, we'll see what the cork people have to say about it.

A few things that I haven't blogged about yet:

I showed up Monday night to paint the first floor and discovered the steel beams this "lovely" shade of red:


They were supposed to be the same red as the siding, but there was some miscommunication and they were painted this bright red instead. It turned out they were planning on doing multiple coats, so it was fixed easily. The contractors got a new red mixed together, and it looks much, much better:

(the hook is still the other red)

Finishing of the patio area was begun as well. The back area had been cleared out, dug up, and gravel was poured. This was from when just the gravel was in, but now there are paver stones covering the majority of the area.


There seems to have been a bit of a mix-up between my mom and the contractors regarding the elevation of this. My mom had meant to indicate that the part now underground which was dug out and filled with gravel be sloped towards the house, but the contractors (and me too) interpreted what she said to mean that the ground level elevation of the gravel and paver stones be sloped towards the house. This may cause a problem with drainage and water run off in the future... but hopefully it doesn't because it looks really nice and I'd hate to have to lift large concrete slabs by myself and level out the gravel!

Lots of the lights have been installed and look really good. We're going to have to do some tweaking of the track lighting because some of the, just the kitchen ones just don't give off enough light.

I'm Pissed

This cork floor's been nothing but hassle.

I was planning on doing this:

Buuuut,
I was told they should, but

Houselog Shout-Outs

After being informed by a friend tonight that he was a loyal reader of my blog, I realized I need to send out a few shout outs to the people that read and comment on this houselog:

Tony - You closet houselog reader, you.

Ash - In it to win it.

Tara - "I feel like I talk to you all the time because of your blog."

Maranda - Oh so stealth with the M-Dahtness.

Oka - The cork's going in soon... I can't wait!

Frankie - This is the cause for me not visiting this spring :P

Oh yeah, and if you're a steady reader and I forgot to mention you, make sure to leave a comment yelling at me!