The end of another Phase.Follow

You misunderstand. I'm not jealous of your roads, I'm jealous of your car and gas prices.

Homes in the UK don't have basements because it's an island. Homes in Pakistan don't because... well, in this part of Pakistan there's some minor flooding and it's seaside.

I work with a girl who used to study in Illinois.


Also, Tailmon, your floors look kinda like my floors here. I guess it's a tropics thing?

Well, we're not drilling through the permafrost.

Plus, who needs a basement when storage units are cheap?

A usable basement adds square footage without expanding your house's footprint. A nice basement is not that different than a second floor. Using a basement as a storage container is just a waste.

My basement is made of wood, luckily I live in an area that let me easily do that. High hill, very sandy soil, relatively low water table. It's not that much more than a block/concrete basement. If you can lay the blocks yourself it's cheaper to go block/concrete. Concrete footings, 2x8 pressure treated lumber frame walls anchored to the footings. 1/2 pressure treated plywood. Double layer of poly wrap around the outside of the walls, buried out flat 2 foot from the wall at the bottom. 2x4 pressure treated lumber floors, 3/4 inch pressure treated plywood. Layer of poly wrap underneath the floor separating the wood from the ground. By having a wood basement, it doesn't feel like a basement. And it makes remodeling that much easier.

And won't potentially violate your local building codes by adding a third floor to your home.

A basement would be nice. However, It's not pratical do to the fact that most of Texas is located on top of limestone. Only a foot or two down you hit rock.
The home has a higher than normal roof and a large attic for storage.

My bedroom is nice and here is the set I purchased. The colors are black/silver for the room.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v619/ImGatomon/move6.jpg

Another view of the room. You can see the dresser and the curtains.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v619/ImGatomon/move7.jpg

Looking into the master bath. You can see the cabinets and the sink.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v619/ImGatomon/move8.jpg

The tiled shower. It's really pretty!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v619/ImGatomon/move9.jpg

And a womans dream! One huge closet! You can hide dead bodies in it! The shelves are a great touch.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v619/ImGatomon/move10.jpg

Your bedroom and shower look nice.

I don't really like the style of the living room and kitchen furniture, though.

Shopping for appliances is not fun. Things have jumped up so high in the past year. The budget is taking a huge hit. Not sure if the Stainless ones will be in the kitchen now.
I'm glad I didn't buy my accessories yet. The counter person will be there in Friday and the rest in the next days. I'm still hoping that next week I'll be in.

Well, finally got a deal on all the appliances for the home. All stainless. Sadly the oven is not self cleaning. Of course they won't show up till after June 6th! ARRRRRRRGH! Another week delay in moving in!

I would, literally, murder someone for a 1300 sq ft house right now. I'm lliving in a 1 bedroom, approximately 600 sq ft, condo with me and my 3 year old son and my beagle.

Spent a frustrating day at the local Toyota Dealership. I decided to bring in my truck after the rear tire went flat (Well almost flat) I had driven it and heard a funny noise and got out and found the rear tire was uber low. I babied it to the gas station and filled it up. It then would get low every couple of days. Also my high beams didn't seem to work. The radio antenna was some aftermarket rubber thing that didn't get much for stations. I ended up paying 79 dollars to have them fix the tire that had a nail in it. Apparently if the tire sat a certain way it went flat. And balance all the wheels and replace the sensor in one of the wheels. What got me pretty upset was that three of the center caps were glued on to the wheels and they had to break them to get them off to balance the wheels. I'll have to make a trip to Houston to get them to fix my truck. I called and chewed out the manager of the department that sold my truck to me. I need another rear tire now and the lights and antenna fixed now. The tire is 200+ dollars. To fix the lights would cost 200+ dollars and the radio antenna over 150. They had best fix the truck or they get it back!

Edited, Jun 2nd 2012 8:24am by Tailmon

Perhaps, but the special sensor in the wheel is another thing. That was covered by my warranty. I did pay for the best plan they had. Mainly since I can't fix newer cars without all the special tools and computer stuff.

My house has been a work in progress for the last 18 years.

I still don't have a finished floor in my living room, dining room, or kitchen... I plan on finishing that when I finish my basement. Then I'll move everything down there and use that as my living area, and be able to actually clean out and finish the floors up here.

I've lived in this house for the last 18 years with nothing but a plywood floor and a few throw rugs. (The bedrooms have finished oak floors, and so with the living room and dining room when they are done. Kitchen is going with a linoleum floor cause it's easy). Once I do all this I'm gonna get a new stove. It is broken, I just haven't bothered buying a new one cause I don't want to haul out the old one, bring in the new one, then later this year have to haul the new one back out to finish the flooring correctly and bring it back in.

The joys of moving into an unfinished home...

Your kitchen looks pretty nice. I want pictures of the front yard once you've done something with it.

If it can grow in the soil there, you should plant some gardenia. They smell wonderful.

I briefly lived in a flat with terrazzo flooring in the kitchen/bathroom. That was awesome.

The appliances are in! the plumbing is mostly done. They are blowing in the attic insulation today. I'll be spending my first night there tonight! Finally! It's been a long road.
I still have things to move and set up. Along with lots of unpacking. There are a million things to get and do but I'll get them done in the next months. I hope you don't miss me much because they still don't have the net set up at the home yet.

I've slept in the new home for 3 days now. The city still needs to reinspect it. Had a leak on one of the toilets. The crew didn't uncover the lines to the air conditioner as they promised. The electrical people forgot to fix/finish lights on the outside and in the laundry room. The dryer needs a cap on the outside vent. The home needs a street number posted on the outside. The cats are slowly adapting to the new home. Apparently the new couches and chair are now their favorite spots to sit. I was a bit concerned that my oldest cat would get sick and die but he's doing pretty well. Unpacking is a total pain and doing all the little things is more than time consuming. The phone people haven't shown up at all. Cable people are sup post to be here tomorrow. I still have washer/dryer to move from old place to new home. All of my bicycles and car heavy equipment and a bunch of clothing need to be moved. The heat and humidity have been killing me.

Work is another issue. The past months I've been working 50+ hour weeks. Not only has it disrupted my sleeping schedule. I started to hack again. It kept getting worse and worse. Finally on Saturday they stuck me with my third twelve hour shift for the week. I called in On Sunday. I was so tired and sick I could not sleep. On Monday I visited my doctor and she told me I have walking pneumonia and my Thyroid was acting strangely. It was swelled up and squishy. The coughing and hacking has my neck all spazed out and my arm has been going numb and my hands shake. I've also been having water build up in my ankles. She things I have either graves or hasnymoto's disease. Well, she took me out of work for several days. I have more heavy duty Anti-biotics to take. More meds and today I'm sitting at the hospital for my cat scan of my thyroid.

At least she gave me a note for work. I cannot work more than one twelve hour shift a week. I need to sit every few hours with my legs elevated to alieve the swelling. Apparently our shift manager is one hell of an @#%^ and he threatened to to write me up for sitting with my legs up. (Heh! He'll love this) Work is trying to kill the staff and the management will do nothing to help us. IE.. Like work the dorms and handle youth? They are scared of them and do nothing anyways. Well, after this hospital visit I'll stop at the old place and load up some more stuff to bring to the new one. Yea!

A 2 bedroom with 1300 sq ft that doesn't include a garage is plenty big enough. The house I lived in from age 1 until age 15 was a 3 bed room with 1100 sq ft not including the garage, and it was big enough for 2 adults and 2 children. When I was 15 we moved into a house that was almost twice as big (a shade over 2000 sq ft), and the house felt massive. That 2000 sq ft didn't even include our enclosed double garage which easily added another 400 sq ft.

If only everybody blogged this extensively every time they moved into a new rental home...

Things are coming to a close on the old place I lived in for the past two years. My friend came over today. She brought a shovel with her. My old cat Zippy passed away last night. He laid down in the hall and I found him dead this am. I buried him under the big oak tree behind the home. I had figured he had a few weeks left and he made it two. When he began to cough up lots of blood I knew he didn't have long to live. I'm saddened by the loss of my good friend for nearly Nineteen years. Rip Zippy. You had a good life considering I found you as a kitten crying out in the cold and rain sitting on the rear Axel of a 65 GTO I was working on so long ago.
Pix of Zippy
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v619/ImGatomon/zippy1.jpg

After burying Zippy I sat in the home for a while with my friend. She convinced me to go out and do some things for the home. I took back the toilet seat cover that didn't fit. Went to eat breakfast at Mc D's. Went back to Wally world and dumped the trash out of the back of my truck. We then visited the Hardware store and got numbers for the home. Then we went to the old place and loaded up the last of my big items from inside the trailer. One washer, (Dam it was heavy) One dryer, (Not too heavy) One small Air conditioner from the bedroom. (had to unbolt it from the board and untaped it from the window. And one Chevy 350 block wrapped in plastic. (machined and ready for rebuilding. Part of my Chev Vega project)

The only things left are my Chevy Vega wagon, engine crane, and floor jack. All of them will be brought over on a flatbed by someone in a few days or so. I plan to slowly rebuild the 350 engine and install it into the Vega with a 5-speed manual transmission. It should be one really fun car when done.

Edited, Jun 21st 2012 5:11pm by Tailmon

I finally picked up my 72 Chevy truck. They had it for over a month at the shop. The emergency brakes again work and the other issues that kept it from passing inspection are fixed. They also had it inspected for me and it passed. I don't have to worry till next year now. It's now parked in the dirt at the end of the driveway. At least now I can haul the items that damage todays cheaper made trucks easier. The only issue was that my class three hitch insert (the piece that has the hitch ball on it) was stolen off the truck as well as most of my gas being siphoned out of the tank while it sat at the repair shop. Meh, the repair bill was cheap enough to not get me upset along with the owner giving e another class three hitch and ball for my truck. I'll be shopping and get some more batteries for my camera so I can post pix of the home now. I have the appliances in place and most of the boxes gone now. The place still needs lots of things finished off. I'm sure it will get done in the next few weeks.

Kun has stopped crying all the time. He seems to like sitting in the front window watching the crickets and birds that are outside. Slowly things will change and the cats will return to eating like they used to. Right now food seems to sit and little of it gets eaten. The cats will eat sooner or later. Hunger will help that in it's way.

I can't decide if I like your office or Cassandra best. How are the cats settling in with their new living arrangements?