Monday, March 30, 2009

Finally some motivation....

So many of you may be wondering what I’ve been up to since my last entry. Well to be honest. Really nothing….. I guess I should clarify. What I really mean is that, I have been doing things around the house, but nothing that would constitute a new entry. Unless you’re interesting in knowing that I have been cleaning my apartment. Even that isn’t truly exciting… But the serious issue is that my motivation level of fixing things around this house had met an all time low. My activities for the month of March consisted of video games and sleep…Oh, that’s right I can not forget the Holyoke’s St Patrick’s Weekend festivities… Here are some pictures from the Holyoke Road Race...
The staff setting up the finish line...
Here is a picture showing the leaders at the start of the race.
I was told that over 4000 people ran in the race... As you can see, I stood by and enjoyed the race...
Here is City Hall looking over all of us... By the way, the beer was cold and the weather was nice..
Here is picture of people everywhere after the race...

More people after the race.. I'm standing behind Brennan's Irish Pub....

With the birds starting to chirp a little louder and the potential of actually finishing this place, something has sparked in me... I’m really starting to gain interest of completing this place, again…

So with the new flicker of enthusiasm, I finally contacted the plumber so that he can install the radiator upstairs. The reason for having him install the radiator doesn’t have anything to do with my recent iron man competition… I contacted him because when I was installing the new hardwood floors in the living room, I didn’t consider the radiator... When I installed the new hardwood floor; the floor height increased by a 1/2 inch, but the radiator pipe did not budge. So I had the plumber install a new pipe to fix my bonehead mistake, which seems to be working well. The floor looks a little damage from the steam but I’ll chalk that up to giving it character. Anyway, here are some photos of the new radiator fixes.

Here is a picture showing the new pipe and fitting for the radiator in the living room... Plus my sneakers... I also had him replace a threaded fitting in one of the bedrooms. When installing the radiator in the bedroom, it turn out that the treads were damaged. The threads were stripped, so the radiator wasn’t engaging properly.

As stated in my last entry, I was able to install the window trim. However, I wasn’t in the mood to cut custom trimming for each window. So with that said, I installed the window trim with gaps between the wall and trim. The gaps were about ½ inches in thickness around several of the windows. To be honest, it was because I was lazy and decided to quicken the processes by just buying 1” x 4”s. The gaps were excessive, so I used meshed tape and joint compound to fix the issue. It worked well. Except after sanding everything, the apartment is dusty again. Anyway, after sanding the windows, I was able to start priming the window trim and main entrance hallway. The next thing is to finish painting… I’ll post pictures when I’m completed.

Here is a picture showing the gaps around the window
Here is a picture showing the new joint compound

So with the realization that the second floor apartment is almost completed, I started to consider what to renovate in my apartment. Well in my kitchen, hallway and my weight room, I’ve been looking at drop ceiling that looks pretty beat-up. It’s the type of drop ceiling that you would find in an office. Anyway, I was looking at several tiles and wondering how they were being held up. Plus I was curious to see the quality of the ceiling behind the drop ceiling. I was initially thinking of removing them completely. So after removing a tile, I found a second ornate looking ceiling. The second ceiling looks to be painted a pale vanilla color and looks to be pealing. I scrapped some of the flake of paint off and to my surprise found what looks to be copper or tin ceiling. The three rooms mentioned have the metallic ceiling. Here is a picture of what I found...

Here you can see the paint pealing off.

Now I don’t know what to do. What I mean is, I could remove the drop ceiling and then later realize that that metallic ceiling is damaged be-on repair. If it is not damage, I could repaint it to a nicer color… I’m thinking a dark bronze color…But, I’m really not sure yet... I guess I really don’t have to make that decision today... But my options are open. I guess we'll find out together... Anyway, the things that are left for the second floor apartment are to install an electric heater, replace some plugs, replace the screen door, paint the window trim and clean… After that, I should be completed. I‘m in hopes to place an ad within the coming month… I hope to have a tenant by May, but we’ll see what happens… Anyways, until next time…

Sunday, March 8, 2009

Home Improvement...

For the last couple of weeks I’ve been pretty busy with things outside of working in the apartment. About two weekends ago, I took a trip with my father down to New Jersey to visit some family. The trip was filled with both sadness and happiness. But the depressing part of the trip is for another time and place… But one of many stories that I could possibly tell from my trip, is of one story that is more relevant to the house journal.

My loving uncle, who I know is proud of my success and learning experience through life, has been sharing this wonderful story with one of his co-workers. My uncle tells me that every time that a new journal entry has been entered, he would print out a copy and share it. Apparently there was one day, after my surgery, that my uncle’s co-worker asked, “Any new entries from the Puerto Rican Tim Allen?”

I actually loved that show and Tim Allen’s character, Tim “The Tool Man” Taylor. I certainly love the reference. Thanks for the laughs… Thought you would like that story...


Ok, back to my home improvement. The apartment upstairs is almost there. This weekend I was able to remove the trash and start cleaning some of the rooms. I also had help from my mother, who cleaned the kitchen. It is starting to smell clean.

I was also able to place some decretive trim down at areas where the floors do not evenly meet.


I was also able to get the cracked radiator repaired. The crack was welded and hopefully it will work ok...I have not installed it yet… I have to admit,. I’m still a little scared to move anything especially after my surgery and all… But I can say that it looks fixed and is ready to be installed.

There are only a few things left to finish the upstairs like remove all of the tools, paint the hallway and window trim, install the radiators, switch out a couple of damaged plugs and clean. Then it’s just creating the required administrator stuff, like application, lease agreement and so on. Anyway, until next time…

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