Slab and More Demo

Quite a bit of work has gone on in the past several days. Last Tuesday, the tension cables and rebar were put in place. Then on Friday the slab was poured. I tried to make it home from work to watch it happen. I think the guys started pouring at 1 p.m. and left around 7:30 p.m. And this was the crew's fourth slab of the day. I have to say that pouring a slab in 95 degree heat did not look like my kind of fun.

After the slab was poured and the concrete had dried a little/lot one of the workers got out this tool that looked like a big fan blade and went back and forth over the slab. I don't think many of the trades really like working on houses that have stained concrete floors. Even though for the homeowner its cheaper and more environmentally sensitive than carpet or other fabricated floor coverings, the plumbers, concreters, and framers have to be extremely precise because any mistake is glaringly obvious.

For those reading this that have been to our house before and are having trouble visualizing where we are and will be living, let me try to explain. We are tearing the house down in stages. Currently, we're removing the rooms closest to the street. Rich moved his computer room into where Matt's bedroom used to be. The weights and elliptical machine are in the garage where the dive equipment cabinet used to be. The dive equipment cabinet is now in the living room. The old orange love seat that was in the living room is no longer a piece of furniture. All of my "guest room" things [which was really just all the stuff (there's that word again) that I started accumulating since I left Brownsville 14 years ago] is in a storage shed that we are renting until January.

Phases 2 of demo will be a little more inconvenient and I am not sure when that will commence - probably when we are completely done with Phase 1. This phase involves tearing the actual mobile home off its chassis. Rich wants to break this down into further phases to try and limit the inconvenience we will have of living in a 700 square foot, two room, kitchenless/bathroomless space as much as possible. Typing this, I am thinking more and more of taking up my friends and family who have offered their spare rooms to me!!! Anyway, in the first part of Phase 2 (we'll call it Phase 2a) we will tear down 1/2 of the mobile home (a bedroom, bathroom, and dining area) and fashion a temporary outside wall.

In Phase 2b we will move our bedroom into the pool table room and move the "kitchen" into the garage. At this point we will probably cook everything on the grill. (Oh! an unthought of benefit...I won't have to cook for months! Yay!) We have a separate hot water heater in the garage, so we'll still be able to wash dishes. At this point we will tear down the remainder of the mobile home, except for the bathroom. Mind you, at this time, the bathroom will not be accessible from anywhere inside the house. It is at then when life gets tricky, and if Rich and I are still married by the end of it, we will be together forever. This is because at this point, it will probably be November and we will have no kitchen, 7 dogs, 4 cats, 2 people, 2 rooms, and a quasi outhouse. Rich seems to think that I will not be able to handle this, but I say he is wrong because one night when I was 16 or 17 I slept in a waterless bathtub (yes, on purpose). I look at it as an extended comfortable camping trip. But, in the back of my mind, I am thankful to have in-laws with indoor plumbing that live next door.

Oh, the dogs are doing fine. During the day, the three oldest/sleepiest stay inside. The other four stay in covered kennels (8' X 4')while we're at work. Our builder thinks that if the subcontractors came out and saw our dogs, they would turn around and our house would never get built. He's probably right. The only dog that seems to mind being in a kennel is the new dog. She has a prolonged retaliation plan in mind that seems to involve destroying every garment I own.

Here are some pictures of the most recent work.
Pre slab

Concrete truck (one of seven!)

Wet slab
Slab drying
Further demolition
New front porch
George after working hard. He will probably get mad at me for putting this picture up, but too bad!