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http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08266/914029-298.stm

Everything's in place and the dates are all set. We close on the refi Tuesday and construction is set to begin on 09/22. This remodel/addition will be a bumpy ride.

So in preparation for the Settlement on my mortgage refi, I find out yesterday that, for the 6 years I've owned my house, the county has been incorrectly assessing my taxes. They have been taxing me on 4.03 acres when I actually own 0.78. 

XKCD makes my day, again.

Damn you xkcd!

Last night it occurred to me that I had not talked to my grandfather for a long time, so I called him. This morning he was admitted to the hospital with congestive heart failure, and this afternoon moved to another so that he could see a specialist. I don't know what, if anything they can do for him(he's 94), it's not like their going to be doing any major surgery.

I'm afraid that the day has arrived that I've been both expecting and dreading for some time, especially since he moved into the nursing home. Last night could have been my last time to get to talk to him and I have to wonder what it was that made me think to call.

Last week I took the week off to clean up the yard. (Yes, it was that bad) I spent the week working my ass off in the yard, at least 10 hours/day, and pissing off the hippies. by putting a bunch of "carbon" into the air as I burned stuff all day/all week. Just burning off all the branches that the trees shed in the yard last winter kept the fire going all week. I finished up my vacation by spending all day Sunday in the woods with a chainsaw cutting up trees for firewood. I ended every day exhausted, stinky, and sweaty and yet the week felt very relaxing compared to a typical week at work. I think this may have to be an annual event, especially since I now get an extra week of vacation time. Unfortunately, even with a week, I didn't finish the yard. I probably needed a 2 or 3 more days to finish. Hopefully this weekend will be nice.

This weekend I tackled phase II of the bathroom remodel, the floor.

First I had to rip out top layer of the old subfloor, mainly because the bottom of the 5 layers of linoleum that was on it wouldn't come off and I wanted a nice waterproof surface for the tile to stick to.


Next, I had to put down a layer of latex modified thinset on the remaining subfloor, then install the Durarock over it, tape the seams and cover them with thinset. Somehow, I negelected to get a picture of that part.

Next came the tile which I discovered is a lot easier to do on the floor than on the walls.


Last, I had to install the new toilet, which went much eaiser than I expected. However, it wasn't without problem. I first seated it on the wax ring and bolted it down using the bolts and caps from the old toilet. They didn't seem to fit quite right, but it was holding the toilet down. Then, after looking at the set that came with the new toilet, I decided that they would work better, so I swapped them out. Somehow in the course of swapping them, one of the bolts came out of the flange which meant removing the toilet and reseating it which meant another trip to the store to get another wax ring. The second time around, things went without a hitch.


Phase II is now complete and we have a new toilet that does a better job flushing with less water and a lot less noise.