Nick Tingle's Blog

I appreciate Cousin Lucy having congratulated us on our perseverance re: the remodel. The process was arduous. That is an understatement. And I should not say "was" because the process is not over. Just today the "window treatments" were concluded.

Here, just for kicks the treatment is gathered in the middle.  These are black out treatments and when you close them, the place gets really dark.  This would not be necessary in other parts of the world, but for legal reasons too complicated to go into here the condo complex is way over lit.

Five weeks! And yesterday finally the carpenter/contractor left for good.  Though I am sure he will be back for something or other.

Below, our monstrous 50 inch plasma by Panasonic.  We were told that if we watched this TV eight hours a day that it would last for 22 years.  My damn TV is going to outlive me.  Though maybe, upon retirement, I will do nothing but watch TV and so kill off my TV before I drop dead.

 
The 50 inch again, giving however a slightly better sense of its vast dimensions.

 

 

Maybe three years ago we had a slab leak that flooded our living room and destroyed the carpet.  With the insurance money we got a new carpet and repainted the living area to include an "accent wall."  I had never heard of such a thing and wasn’t entirely in favor of it.  But overtime the idea has grown on me.

Below the old accent wall with the old fake fireplace:

Old accent wall, now demolished, dry wall ready for new paint.

Further prep for paint.

Paint on accent wall.

Accent wall with granite trim,

Pretty cool. We have yet to fire up the fake fire place.  We need to read the instructions.

As previously noted, we got a new phony gas powered fireplace that might served to heat the place.

Below: craftsman at work:

Fireplace framed and dry walled.

Prepped for paint.

We have been camping out in our neighbor’s condo for 11 days.

But I see progress,

Below, one room is nearing completion: painting done, window sill and trim in.  New carpet still to come.

We are 12 days now out of our little condo.  Lord knows when we will get back in.

But the counter tops were set with no problems, yesterday…let’s see, that would be Monday.

Below: the old tile previously on the counter top.  These tiles were described to us by a person who does tile as "distressed." Probably a polite way of saying "really crappy."

The new granite counter top below.
Not yet distressed.

Continue reading Remodel 3: Countertops→

The most immediate cause for the remodel was this last winter. We were cold. Not East Cold, but California cold. Bad enough. These places weren’t built for any sort of weather.

One might ask, why didn’t you turn up the heat. Well, basically, we don’t have any; just a little gas fireplace made mostly for decorative purposes.

And then in the ceiling an electrical grid of some kind, put in back in the day when the supply of electricity (1973) was supposed to be infinite according to the nuclear industry.

We never could get that grid to work; or let’s say the only way to get it to work was to turn it on full blast. Then the heat, radiating down from the ceiling was intolerable; one felt like a cupcake baking in an oven.

So that left us with the decorative gas fireplace and multiple layers of shirts and sweaters.

After that winter, we knew we had to replace the windows. They are single paned and framed with aluminum. If you put your hand on one, you could feel the cold.

So we got Milgard windows (the only kind approved by the condo association for retrofitting). We got super-duper ones, dual panes, and with a tint that cuts down on the sort of sun light that fades things. They are so energy efficient that we will qualify for a 1500 dollar tax rebate from the federal government.

They are in now. They look pretty cool. We have a number of neighbors ask, where did you get those? Turns out we were not the only ones who felt the cold this last winter.

Also we are getting the decorative heater replaced with a heater that heats. It has a fan and can you believe a remote control thermostat. So we can sit on our asses on the sofa and turn the heater up and down. Or off.

I have got to stop reading the paper. I can’t seem to do so, though. Maybe I will just have to cancel the damn thing.

I sit with my first coffee and read a huge headline to the effect: Massive Budget Cuts Proposed.

The people of the state just the other day voted down every damn one of the initiatives on a special ballot designed to produce more revenue or to redirect some revenue already on hand towards rescuing the state from its financial morass. A projected debt of about 22 billion, which might mean, if money is not found, that the state will stop paying its bills this July.

The people did pass one punitive and purely retributional measure saying that those in government cannot give themselves a raise during a time of budget crisis.

Fine. The legislators deserved it. But rage and retribution are no substitute for reason.

Also on the front page, an opinion piece making three recommendations for recovery and I agree with each one.

A) Get rid of the law that requires a two-thirds majority to pass laws having to do with taxation. This law has produced a bottled neck, allowing a minority of rabid, reactionary right-wingers to block any sensible taxes or even tax reform. These lunatics have apparently taken a blood oath to never again raise any tax, no matter what.

B) Get rid of term limits. I remember when this utterly stupid idea swept the nation back, I don’t know when, thinking: Term limits? What do we need those for. We already have "term limits;" those are called elections and that is when you vote out people you don’t want and in the people you do want. So, now because of those term limits, the legislators are constantly churned. They can’t build up the knowledge necessary to really work the machine or to build up those alliances that might actually move it in another direction. Additionally, because they are always new, they seem more prone to giving into special interests. Term limits has built idiocy and a lack of commitment to any long term vision right into the system.

C) Over turn and get rid of all remnants of Proposition 13. Hard to remember that one–Prop 13, clear back in the late 70’s; but that was the grand daddy of them all, the tax payer revolution, with California once again out in the forefront and leading the rest of the nation straight to perdition. Prop. 13 was the beginning of the wave that crested when Ronald Regan (another California idiot) came to office and claimed that believing in government and what it could do was unpatriotic.

Will any of these recommendations come into being. Not likely.

Jeez, reading those recommendations was like a trip down bad memory lane.