Still Dotting The i's

It's sort of a twist on the old Monty Python line: "I'm not dead yet!"

The job's not done yet, though I see I haven't posted anything in well over a month. That'll tell you something about the pace of change.

We have hit a few milestones recently:

• Thanks to brother Craig and son Geoff, we tracked down the hidden coax cable, made the connection, and now have our shiny new plasma panel hooked up to cable TV.
• The electricians have connected the juice to our range hood, so we now have lighting above the stove as well as an exhaust fan in the kitchen
• I installed the last of the new window coverings
• The family room furniture arrived last night. Wow.

There are still a zillion little things remaining to be done. A piece of trim here, pendant lights over the kitchen bar there. Those little floor gadgets that keep the closet doors in place. Labeling of all the data cables so I know what leads where.

It's not done yet, but it's inching ever-so-slightly toward the finish line.

Pareto's Principle

Most of us call it "the 80/20 rule", the notion that in any endeavor, there's an uneven split between cause and effect. More specifically, the last 20 percent of a project seems to take 80 percent of the effort.

And that's definitely where we are now with The Big Remodel. Oh, we're eating dinner at the kitchen table (even though the vent hood still isn't hooked up). We're watching DVD's on the new plasma panel (even though the cable TV outlet still isn't connected). And we're going to move the dining room furniture in this weekend (even though the dining room lighting fixture, and many others, awaits installation).

There are a zillion nagging final details. We're really enjoying what we can use of the "new" house, but a little frustrated about the parts we can't use.

The "unfinished symphony" may be in my DNA. My dad was sort of famous for doing remodeling jobs that didn't quite get to the finish line. But he always had a great rejoinder to anyone who'd challenge him to complete the job. He'd invoke the spirit of Sarah Winchester, who kept building that house in San Jose because she believed she'd die when the construction stopped.

With that in mind, I'm OK with a few things being left undone.

Whole Lotta TV

A photo does not do this thing justice.

That is one big TV set--at least, it felt that way while Tharon and I were trying to schlep it into place.

It would have been an easier job with another helper or two, but we got antsy and decided to do it as a duet.

Things went pretty smoothly, except for the part when we:

1. hoisted it into place on the wall mount and found it was 6 inches lower than expected
2. did some hair-pulling and teeth-gnashing
3. modified the mounting brackets with a hacksaw to get a few more inches of clearance
4. decided we'll have to live with it being a little closer to the media console beneath than we'd hoped

We may need to do a little camouflage work on the electrical outlet box behind the TV panel; it's barely hidden by the top edge of the panel when the set is pushed back against the wall. Swing the panel out and the outlet box looms into view

Worse, we now realize that swinging the panel out means no room on the media console for either a center-channel speaker or an iPod dock (both of which I'd been planning to place there), so more head-scratching is in order.

On the plus side, we hooked the Blue-Ray player up and watched a movie on the beast. Here's the funny part: I'd been worried that a 58" TV would be too big.

Not even close. We could have gone even bigger.

Even The Food Tastes Better

Well, we've now had dinner twice in the "new house". Went out and got new dinnerware and cookware, stashed the groceries in the new fridge, and cooked on the new stove (after having to pull out a drawer to get to the gas valve because it had been left in the "off" position).

I have to tell you: even though there are still stickers on the windows (must remain until final inspection) and many other signs of incompletion, it feels good to start settling in.

Now, if I can only figure where we stashed everything.

There are also all those "finishing touch" issues. We placed an order for new window coverings (thank goodness for free shipping and the Labor Day sale), scoured several stores for some small rugs to place near the sink, dishwasher, stove, and patio door, and continue to debate the relative merits of different drinking glasses.

Smelling the Barn

We always joke about what happen when the horse smells the barn at the end of a long day. The pace quickens, and impatience overtakes fatigue.

That's where we are now on the big project. The stove hood is going in today, and except for the carpeting of the living room, that's about the last major item. Lots of little stuff remaining: light fixtures, bits of trim here and there, removing the stickers from the windows and skylights, etc.

But more than 4 months after the day the guys arrived with the Sawzall and wrecking bars, it's almost done. We have a big sheaf of owner's manuals to digest (there's food in the fridge and I've used the microwave, but the dishwasher and stove remain untested), and we still don't know what half of the new light switches operate.

It still seems a little unreal. You get used to living in construction mode, and it's going to take some time to adapt to the fact that we can actually live in the place we envisioned so many months ago.

Milestone

Short dispatch:

I ate breakfast in the new kitchen this morning.

Fridge, sink, dishwasher, stove, lights, and my magic coffeemaker all up and running. Still waiting on the fancy new "microwave in a drawer" to get hooked up.

Of course, the ambience was a bit lacking: a card table standing on top of the paper that protects the hardwoord floor. But darn, that cereal and coffee tasted good.

Holy Cow!

We got back from ten days of travel to find an amazing change. For months, we've watched the construction team remake half of the house: living room, dining room, kitchen, family room.

While we were gone, they moved into the bedrooms, hallways, and offices. New paint, new carpets, new baseboards--it's like a whole new house. It smells new and looks really good.

And maybe best of all: they installed the new laundry machines. We're still getting used to the Euro-style front-loader machines (they sound and operate WAY different from our aged Kenmores), but we've already broken them in. No more Laundromat for us!

The kitchen is still a few days away, though the refrigerator and dishwasher are ready for use and the pantry can now be stocked.

Our immediate task is to move all the stuff we moved out of the bedrooms and offices back into those rooms. I got started last night by setting up my computer and the WiFi network, and amazingly, everything worked right away. Got Tharon's office set up and running. And we even got the TiVo and the small TV rigged so we could watch....well, more diving from the Olympics. With all due respect to my friend Ted Robinson, HOW MANY DIVING EVENTS DO THEY HAVE?!?