biggerboat's building boondoggle blog
I started this in H&F but this seems a better place for it. These are my H&F posts. A bit long-winded but hopefully entertaining. I'm sure more hilarity will ensue.
I've been debating about doing this, and I sort of thought it might qualify as health and/or fitness so I'm gonna do it.
A little background. I have a very old house that I started to remodel about 10 years ago, then ran out of money and WIM to finish it. I gutted it completely and moved walls and did a lot of interior work. But I never did anything with the exterior.
It is sort of falling apart now. The roof leaks and a lot of the wood siding is so rotten I can stick my finger through it. It needs to be completely replaced.
I just paid the house off so I can sort of afford to completely re-side and re-roof it..............if I do it myself. Another factor is I just got out of a serious relationship and now I have way too much time on my hands. I'm going a little stir crazy.
Now to the health tie-in. The last few years I just haven't been able to do things like this. I used to be able to work sunrise to sundown. But lately I'd be good for about 2 or 3 hours and my back would just tell me to stop. However, due to this forum, my back is really feeling strong again. I think I'm up for the challenge. The other health aspect is mental. I don't feel good unless I have some sort of challenge like this. It gives me something to look forward to. I'm really needing something like this about now.
So, I think I'll sort of log this activity as well as lifting. I'll have to cut back on lifting/running some. Mostly due to time considerations. I'll be working on the house on Saturday/Sunday so no lifting/running on those days.
I haven't committed to this quite yet, but I think I'm close.
On the house front. I went to the city website to see what permits I'll need. It was so confusing that I called, got an answering machine, and never got a call back. So, I went down to city hall to ask some very basic questions. Apparently the appropriate question answerers are only there MWF but a substitute question answerer was available. So, after waiting 1/2 hour the substitute question answerer informed me that he couldn't really answer my question so he told me to come back when the real question answerer was there.
I suspect this will not be healthy in any way.
I tweaked my back Wednesday doing deadlifts.
The back pain has nothing on the pain the city is inflicting on me, though.
Went back to talk to someone again. I at least got the right day. The girl was really friendly and helpful. However, she seemed to not really know what all I was supposed to do. Which, as you will see, nobody could.
The first thing she did was pull up my address.
Apparently, there were 3 expired permits associated with my house. About 10 (or more) years ago, I did a big remodel. I did it mostly myself. The first permit was for an interior remodel. I had to get electrical, plumbing, framing and probably more permits. I remember having each one signed off on. However, apparently there was a final inspection that I never got. This is just conjecture based on what she said and my hazy memory. The second was for a garage. I hired a contractor to pour the slab and I framed and finished it. Apparently the slab inspection failed but the framing inspection passed. I'm not sure how this happens. I really don't recall any of this. The third one was for a bedroom addition. I never did this. I do not recall even applying for this. But, it is there. More on this later.
So I asked a lot of questions and the girl was very polite when she had to repeatedly excuse herself to ask someone else that knew the answers. From what I gathered I can do most of the work on something they call an express permit. However, if I want add a small porch roof I will need site drawings, impervious cover documents, elevation drawings, detailed framing plans and flood plain people approval. At minimum.
Back to the old permits. The girl indicated that I could fill out a form to remove the permit for the addition since I never did it. She then sent me to someone named Tony on another floor to figure out what to do with the other ones. Tony, it seems, did not have his coffee this morning. Either that or he was just an *******. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. He told me they couldn't do anything about any of them since he had no idea if I even did any work or not. Which is problematic since I can't get any new permits with these on their computer. After much discussion he agreed to go back downstairs and talk to the friendly girl. Tony then came up and informed me that I needed a Life Safety for Expired Permit permit. He informed me that I needed to go back where I started (the line that I waited over an hour in) to start this process.
So, I go back to the window and explain to them what Tony said. They seemed a bit confused on exactly what a Life Safety for Expired Permit permit was. So, they suggested that what I really need to do is re-submit all three permits and get inspections on the work I did over 10 years ago. Even if I didn't do the work. They then put my name in the computer to talk to someone. However, the number of people waiting had swelled considerably and I had already been there 2 1/2 hours so I think I'll tackle this another day.
The latest forecast moved it just a tad to the west. Every tad matters a lot.
Yeah, I just don't know how important this book really is to me. I want to get it done but I'd rather do it at my own pace.
When I was writing, it was extremely important to me. Years later in retrospect, I realize that it was extremely important for completely different reasons than I thought at the time. So yeah, your attitude seems perfect to me.
Heard about the storm at lunchtime, thought of you guys. Good luck. Does the new setup make it easier to get the boat out of the water?
Also sorry to hear about your back, but glad it's coming around and you were able to get out.
The boat is staying on the lift.
I'm a little worried about the storm surge. Gonna get hairy.
High tide right now. Probably a foot higher than normal. Tide will be going iut as storm approaches but they are still predicting a pretty big storm surge. Fingers crossed.
Looks bad on the news. Fingers crossed ��
Move to Kansas. No water and fewer people.
glgl
Storm just moved north of us. Wind really picked up. Water rising again.
Pretty bad. Water in the house. Wife's car under water. We're safe but it sucks. Tr in a few days.
So many things to post.
The night of the storm, our neighbors had a little dinner party just because. We sat and watched the water coming up and quickly everyone realized this might be bad so we all went home.
Power went off about 9:00, but water still was ok. Then it started coming up.
It finally started seeping in so we got towels hoping we could manage it. I actually think we would have been ok but the door to the garage wasn't sealed well and it gas a cat door. It really came in fast there.
Its really disturbing just watching it rise and not knowing how high it will get.
Then stuff you dont think floats, does. Like a refrigerator. We kept hearing stuff fall over. And a constant gurgling of water seeping in places. Its really eeerie.
About 1 am the water stopped rising. When it started to fall it went down pretty quickly. Eventually the water outside got lower than in the inside. I opened the back door and water rushed out like a river. It almost took my feet out from under me.
During all of this, my wife's car started honking and the lights were going off and on. We looked out and water was over the headlights. I went out and disconnected the battery. Fortunately my truck was ok.
Spent the rest of the day squeegee water out.
More to come.
So, our next problem was trying to find a place to stay the next night. There were so many people affected that most hotels in the area were booked. Even worse though. The city shut down the wastewater plants so the hotels turned off water so many of those weren't taking reservations and people were going to Tampa.
I finally found one online but when we got there it was really really bad. One of those that people live in. There was a kid shrieking nonstop in the room next to us. Really shady people hanging out. It was too much for my wife. She sort of melted down. We had no sleep at that point and it was just too much.
So we got in the truck and drove to an area i know that has hotels. First one was booked solid. Second one same but the lady was so nice that she called around and found one that had one room left. So we went back to the first one and got our bags and moved again. Glad we did because we got a really good sleep in and it really lifted our spirits.
More to come.
So it looks like this will become another building boondoggle blog again. Pretty much gonna be a complete remodel. All cabinets need replacing. We have several pocket doors that have to cone out. Actually all doirs have to be replaced. and we have to cut the sheetrock about two feet up in the entire house. Replace all receptacles. Floors in the bedrooms. So much.
insurance?
Is it worth it if it will happen again?
You closed on the other place, right?
Things you don't think of. I'm in line at the county landfill behind about 500 other people. Crazy.
Today I started cutting the walls. We don't have sheetrock, it is cement board, which they say should be fine after a flood. The problem is that water got in between the walls so they have to be opened up. I figured I would cut it about 2 feet up. Cement board is tougher than sheetrock. My little vibrating cutting tool blade lasted about 5 seconds. So I bought a grinder tool and put in a masonry blade. Worked pretty good. Kicks up a ton of cement dust though. Got one bedroom finished.
We found out the city was coming next week to pick up debris so no more trips to the dump. I'll post a picture of our pile.
We applied for aid through fema. Fingers crossed.
We're still a little overwhelmed. Not sure how we're going to proceed.
But we're back in the house tonight. Sleeping on a mattress on the floor but we're really happy to get back.
I forgot to mention the boat.
I put it as high as it would go on the lift. Looking at it when the water is normal you could never imagine it getting high enough to float away. So I didn't tie it to anything.
When the water came up, my wife watched it. She said it started to float just a little. Another 6 inches and i think it floats away.
A neighbor's boat is sitting on the road by us. We can see it from our back window.
But ours is fine. Unfortunately all the electronics for the lift were underwater so I can't lower it until I assess it, which is really low on our priority list right now.
Apparently there's a tropical disturbance brewing in the area helene started. May or may not get here.
I say, bring it on mfer.
Is that a "While you're up," sorta thing, or a "well, ****, what else?"
Good luck on the repairs and FEMA help. At least the boat's ok?
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