Category: Home

Mom was right: I did get much faster with the rag-on technique. Well, not much faster. Just faster. I started work at 5 p.m., and covered the entire room by 8:30 p.m.

Anyway, except for the closets and the trim, the bedroom is done. But that’s not the interesting bit. When I pulled the blue painter’s tape…

You see, there’s this one odd wall in the bedroom: it’s incredibly smooth, and is obviously built out on top of the original wall. That doesn’t describe it very well, but I’m not sure how else to express it. Anyway, my agent, Angie, thought that the underlying wall was so badly cracked and damaged that some prior owner had simply put drywall on top of it rather than repair it.

But as I pulled off the blue painter’s tape along the trim at the bottom, a tiny sliver of new paint came off, too, revealing a very dark, denim-like blue underneath. At least, it was denim blue until I pulled away and examined it in close detail. Then, that tiny sliver looked like a blue eye. My blue eye. The entire wall is a mirror, and some previous owner, instead of removing this icon of the pre-AIDS era, simply painted over it.

I can only imagine how this discovery would have turned out if I had tried to drive a nail into that wall to hang a picture

The timeline is looking a little grim, but one wall in the bedroom looks beautiful.

Last night, it took me a little more than an hour and a half to lay down a second base coat on the entire bedroom. This evening, ragging on a glaze coat onto one wall took an hour and a half. That means it will take me four to five hours to finish the entire room.

I shudder to think of how long the living room will take–it’s nearly twice the size of the bedroom. I might be able to put down the necessary two coats of base color on Saturday, but I haven’t a chance of glazing the entire room on Sunday. Perhaps I’ll just do one or two walls in the living room. That should be a nice effect.

But I think I must complete the bedroom. First, the white of the base coat is terribly boring on its own. Second, I wildly overestimated how much glaze I would need to do the room. I have an entire gallon of glaze and color, and I doubt I’ve used a pint on the one wall. It would be such a waste not to use three more pints. Third, the glaze layer does a fantastic job of hiding the roughness of the walls.

Maybe I’ll do the bathroom with the same color as well.

I had my first moment of "the joys of home ownership" yesterday. I’ve been digging at some of the worst cracks in the walls of the bedroom, filling them with joint compound and sanding them smooth before painting (photo right, click to enlarge). It worked fabulously on two of the walls, but…

The last one: It was like the paint was a single sheet of plastic that had been glued on to the plaster underneath 90 years ago with Elmer’s glue. Within 30 seconds, I had a paint chip the size of my palm pop off the wall intact. After that, it was like picking at a scab. I just couldn’t stop even though I knew it wasn’t a good idea. I had one unblemished piece of paint larger than my foot come off in one piece. I’m surprised I couldn’t lift the entire 1/16-of-an-inch wide sheet of dried paint off in one piece. It was completely ridiculous.

Anyway, I think some moisture had seeped in between the paint and the plaster, loosening the bonds on that original layer of paint. I cleared off most of the wall down to the original plaster when I realized that the original builders had just painted directly on the underlying surface. Anyway, a little but a joint compound will smooth out the one sharp edge, and it will look grand.

[Photo right of the cleared out section, with some paint already on it.]

I’m loving it.

I hope to get the bedroom base coat done tonight when I get home. Then I’ll prep the living room Tuesday and Thursday, put down a first coat in the living room Friday evening and Saturday morning, rag-paint the bedroom Saturday afternoon, and put a second coat down in the living room Sunday (maybe even Saturday evening). Then I’ll put a glaze coat (probably rag) on the living room walls Monday afternoon/evening (after the packers pack) and I’ll be all ready for the movers on Tuesday. 

Perhaps working out on Friday evening was overkill. Every muscle in my body is sore, but most especially my traps and delts. Which I did a fantastic job exercising on both weight machines and while painting.

I tried an experiment today with the kitchen. I tried out a faux glaze using a sponge. Basically, I painted one solid layer (Antique Parchment) and then applied a second layer (Brecchia) using a real sea sponge. The effect was a bit more dramatic than I had planned. The examples had a very smooth transition between the two colors. Mine are quite sharp. Perhaps I should try sponging paint off rather than sponging it on.

I must say, I really hate the Manhattan Mist or whatever blue-gray color the previous residents painted the walls with. But I am worried I will not be able to complete the job before I move in. I must do the living room and bedroom before the furniture arrives.

The bedroom is all blue-taped and ready to paint. At least, it will be after I sand down all of the joint compound I applied to smooth the wall. It’s a 90-year-old building, so the walls are quite rough from use. The bedroom has some of the worst cracks and seams.

I’ll tape up the living room tomorrow, and try to put one base coat on both rooms before the end of the day. That will leave me next weekend to finish up, freshen the trim, and deal with the closets.

Today was my first real day working in my new apartment. I took the day off, and have been reveling in home improvement since 9:30 this morning.

I thought my first priority would be painting. I want to do something striking in the apartment, and the light gray/blue used throughout the apartemnt is too cool for my taste.

But looking at the place without furniture or anything, I was immediately struck by the ugly metal thresholds in both bedroom doors. Yuck. Of course, Home Depot has two-inch wide oak thresholds that I can finish however I like. One threshold is cut, and I have determined which stain I should use.

Priority two is the refrigerator. It’s horrible, so horrible I can’t believe I didn’t notice it when I looked at the place. Something tells me it was manufactured in the 1970s, and is loaded with Freon. Regardless, the icebox is caked in ice. Unfortunately, with a kitchen as small as mine, there is very little room for a refrigerator. Max size is 24 inches wide and 66 inches high. There is, of course, a very elegant model from LG that is 23 5/8" wide and 67 inches high. One bloody inch. I’d have to take out a cabinet. <sigh /> I’ll deal with that one tomorrow.

Priority three is painting. I decided to try out a bold amber/orange in the entry hall. It’s a small space, rather dark, and once I had all of the trim covered in blue masking tape, it only took me an hour or so to paint it. Or at least, get one coat on. If I don’t like it, it won’t take long to paint over it.

Tomorrow, I think I will experiment with using a sponge to add texture. There is a very small wall in the kitchen that would be perfect to start with.

Ultimately, though, it’s about the living room. I want to have some texture in the living area. Sponge or linen or rag.

The deed is done. The papers signed. The check for $56,824.14 gone.

I get the keys Thursday at 9 am

The inspection on Wednesday was fascinating: Faren West, the inspector, was incredibly thorough, right down to finding the rats in the attic. The tally:

• One broken window pane
• A tiny leak in the drain from the tub
• Broken window springs
• Broken seals on a couple of the double-paned windows
• A dishwasher hose not up to spec
• A gas line that’s pretty much ok, but not up to spec
• An electrical line under a kitchen cabinet that should be in the wall
• A hole in the floor near the bedroom radiator
• A broken knob on the radiator
• No ventilator for the gas range/stove

I requested that the broken window pane be replaced, the broken window springs be repaired, and the leak on the tub fixed. The tub was the big one–Faren warned that there’s a slim chance the entire tub would need to be replaced.

The owners agreed to repair the broken window springs and have a plumber look at the tub. They’re issuing a credit for the broken window pane. I’m worried about the credit for that: I doubt it’ll be sufficient, but I can’t prove otherwise.

As to the other stuff, I’m thinking of having the bedroom radiator removed and a theromstat-controlled electric heater installed in the wall between the bedroom and the bathroom, so I’ll need to have the floor repaired anyway. 

I’ll have the hose to the dishwasher fixed when I have a garbage disposal put in, so that’s not a big deal, either.

The good news is that someone re-wired the entire place a few years ago. There’s a home-owner’s assocation rule that one can not use bulbs greater than 60 watts. But it doesn’t apply to my new wiring!

I saw one last unit before the inspection. It was larger than the one I’m buying, and southwest leaning west, rather than southwest leaning south. It didn’t have a dishwasher, but it had lots more closet space and even a little nook for my diner booth. But I can’t live without a dishwasher, and I don’t need more space for junk. Less is better.

We’re on our way.

The sellers wanted to push back the closing date from 13-FEB-07 to 21-FEB-07. I said they could push it back even further, provided the purchase price was lowered based on my costs to lock-in a mortgage rate. In other words, the longer my rate is locked, the higher my rate. To get to the 6.125% for a 30 day lock, I would pay for points: 35 days would cost $145, 60 days $850.

I thought offering them this level of flexibility would be welcome–they haven’t found a home, and we’re only talking about a couple hundred bucks. Much to my surprise, they said thanks but no thanks.

The clock is ticking now. Inspections and appraisals next week.

The owners of my new home accepted my offer. I think they were a little taken aback by the speed of my offer, however–their place was only on the market two days, and it sounds like they haven’t even looked at any new homes.

They also insisted that the chandelier in the bedroom must come with them. If they’d claimed the leaded-glass door, I’d walk away. But the chandelier? If they DON’T take that, I’m walking away.