On Monday, July 30, 2018 at 9:51:23 AM UTC-4, wrote:
On Monday, July 30, 2018 at 7:00:15 AM UTC-4, DerbyDad03 wrote:
On Monday, July 30, 2018 at 2:19:34 AM UTC-4, Puckdropper wrote:
DerbyDad03 wrote in
:

On Sunday, July 29, 2018 at 11:08:23 AM UTC-4, dpb wrote:
On 7/28/2018 6:08 PM, DerbyDad03 wrote:
On Saturday, July 28, 2018 at 10:38:14 AM UTC-4, dpb wrote:
On 7/27/2018 7:25 PM, DerbyDad03 wrote:
...

At roughly 6:30 SWMBO and I had just sat down for dinner when the
doorbell rang.

"Hi, my name is Dave and I'm working on the house next door."

"Yes, Chris had told me that he was going to have some work done.
What's up?"

"Well, I got started a couple of days late and Chris wants to
move in this weekend, so would it be OK with you if I worked a
little late tonight? I'm really trying to get back on schedule
but if the noise is going to keep you up or bother your family,
I'll stop."
...


So what did "a little late" turn into...2 AM? vbg

--

Actually, yes! Sort of.

I don't really know what time the construction noise stopped. With
our windows closed (AC) we didn't really hear too much anyway. We
went to bed around 11 and it was fine.

However, I got up to use the john at around 2AM and when I looked
over the lights were still on and at least two guys were in the
house. No noise that I heard, but they were still there.

They are still at it. They worked until at least 9 or 10 every day
this week and all day today. I was doing some work on my deck so we
had dueling...
...

Having the initiative to try to push and "catch up" is probably even
more rare ime...

I've spent the last few days repairing the oak flooring in dining
room/hallway that folks had covered with carpet in the major remodel
almost 40(!) yr ago, now...I've packed up at about 9 PM, though, each
day altho there's still the farm chores to get to as well so it's an
inbetween task.

There was one large cut out area about 3x5 ft in the SW corner in
front of the door to the living room I've no idea what that was
about--there's nothing under there that I can tell and doesn't look
as though the subflooring was cut thru anyway...Dad had filled it in
with oak flooring before so just had to fix up a few strips that he
had face-nailed with 8d commons and one strip where was an 1/8" gap I
made a wide piece to fill in...if you know it's there you can spot
it, but it's far less noticeable than the gap was before!

In SE corner there was a patch where HVAC contractor had cut in (as
always, _very_ crudely w/ Sawzall) for a floor vent that wasn't put
in as is in middle of final floor--I'm presuming perhaps that was
done before they decided to open up the whole east wall into the
entryway they created out of the old porch and was still against the
existing wall when was done. It was just patched in with a piece of
ply and some water putty to level...I managed to find some 1-1/2" oak
flooring remnants in town left in the warehouse (he was surprised to
find anything that narrow too, let me have the lot to get rid of it)
but while they worked to fill in the SW corner, apparently they
switched lots somewhere in the middle of the original because the
east end is 13/16" thick instead of 3/4" and the groove/bead end up
1/16" low try ing to patch in with the new stuff. So, I had to make
some to fill in that patch...turns out I didn't have a 1/4" bead
cutter so I just chamfered the square corners a little with block
plane for short run...worked out pretty well...

Now it's on to patch in the holes from the piping of the old original
steam radiators and then see what will take to
refinish...unfortunately, the drywall and painters took "carpet" to
heart and spattered mud and paint everywhere liberally. It was
stained really, really dark originally altho the wear areas are down
to a reasonably nice color...I'm hoping to be able to keep some of
the appearance rather than sand back to all bare wood...

I'm now on a mission to find the replacement dust corners that were
on the stairs; the nail holes and outlines are there; to my surprise
I have not found a bag full of them when they were removed to carpet
the stairs...dad saved most everything else.

I've found one style of replacements with the nail hole in the
center; these were nailed at each corner...any leads on alternatives
to what seems to be the ubiquitous version would be welcome.

I don't want to full carpet the stairs again; probably will put down
tread pads, though, on the steps...

--

Sounds like a lot of work, but fun. Making new stuff look old, bad
jobs look good, etc.

The guys next store have been at it all day. Apparently Chris has to
be out of his former place on Tuesday, so the rush to finish is on.
9PM and they are still shooting nails.

I just finished the deck work (for today). Because of the slope of my
lot, the deck that we get to from the first floor at the back of the
house is about 7' off the ground. It's enclosed in lattice and we
store some stuff under it. Years ago I had some spare pieces of
corrugated fiberglass panels so I put them under the deck to keep the
"important" stuff somewhat dry. I only had enough to do less than half
and I finally decided to do it all with white Tuftex panels, including
a gutter behind the front beam to collect the water and send it where
I want.

SWMBO helped me put the panels up and decided they look so nice that
the under-deck deserved a floor. So I spent most of today trying to
level the area so I can put down landscaping timbers (LT) to support
the PT plywood floor. Will it last forever? No, but if it stays dry
under there, I'll be gone before it needs to be replaced. I had a few
LT lying around from another SWMBO project, but I needed 6 more, plus
the plywood. Off to Home Depot I go. 10 minutes away. Uh, yeah, right.
Not this time.

The plywood is at one end of the store and the LT are at the other end
in Lawn & Garden. Unbeknownst to me, this store now has this screwed
up system where you have to pay for the LT first, then they let you in
the secret gate and help you load them in. You can't just go out in
the yard, load them on a cart and pay at a register. Unfortunately, I
asked the wrong question: "Are you sure you have 6 out there?" "Oh
yeah, we've got a couple of dozen."

So I walk all the way back to the other end of the store, where the
plywood (and my van) is, pay for everything, load the plywood and
drive over to lawn and garden. They open the secret gate and direct me
to a pile of the most twisted, warped and split LT that I've ever
seen. The "couple of dozen" had obviously already been pick through
and rejected. The whole pile was one big mess. I guess I should have
asked if they had 6 *usable* LT.

I told the guy to forget it. I want my money back. "OK, take your
receipt over to Returns and they'll refund your money."

"Will they? What am I 'returning'?"

"Just show them your receipt."

"Why would they give me my money back? I have no product to return."

"Oh...yeah. OK, I'll walk over with you."

So I stand in the Return line fuming and wait for 2 people who
actually had product to return get their money back. It's not like I
could leave and "return" them later cuz I had nothing to return.

OK, over to Lowe's. The only things that made Lowe's better is that
1 - I could actually look at the product before paying for it and 2 -
They had fewer POS LT to sort through before I walked out.

Out in the parking lot I called the next closest HD. I told them I
needed 6 LT and I wanted to see them before I paid for them. "No
problem. They are outside in Lawn & Garden, Aisle 5." Next I asked
him if he knew if they had 6 ("That's all, just 6.") "We have over
200. I just brought down a new stack." Hallelujah!

2 hours wasted. Did I finish the floor? No. I've got about 2 hours of
work left. Gee, what a coincidence.

Now I get to get all sweaty and dirty (again) after I come home from
work tomorrow.


Menards gives you a yard ticket and receipt. When you enter and exit,
you show the guard your yard ticket and receipt, which he scans to create
a record. If you decide to return the items without picking them up yet,
you can tell the nice and sometimes quite pretty lady at the returns desk
that and it's not a problem.

If HD isn't doing that, they'll hopefully figure it out soon.

Puckdropper
--

Maybe they'll start figuring it out after I send my email to their customer service dept today.

My biggest issue is the inability to actually look at you want to buy before you buy it,
especially when it comes to lumber and especially at home centers where everyone
knows that you have to factor "sort time" into your shopping schedule because of the
low quality. I don't mind yard tickets at real lumber yards where I'm more confident that I'll
find decent boards, but home centers are notorious for having so much crap.

Regardless of whether customers can "return" the item now or later, they shouldn't have to
wait in line twice, once to pay and then again if the product on the shelf sucks. Obviously
the root cause is the low quality product but they just make it worse with their "pay first"
process. If I was a conspiracy theorist, I might think they hope that people will settle for
the crap since they have already paid.

When you get the Menard's yard ticket, are you trapped in your vehicle while everyone in
front of you sorts through whichever pile of crap they are picking from?

In HS I worked summers in a "real" lumber yard (1970's). Customers were not permitted to sort thru the bunks of lumber. Take from the top, or be charged a "Pick Premium". Lumber damaged by forklift handling was the exception.

What was their return policy?

If I needed 20, I'd pay for 30, pick my boards and return 10 before they
even made it to my vehicle.

Wash, rinse, repeat until I had 20 good boards.