There is a God, and he likes to watch me fume.
First things first. The linoleum guy came today. We went by after work to see the handiwork. And we are confused. Why?
Because it looks like this:
I find that it looks distinctly DISSIMILAR to what we picked out, which was this:
THESE DO NOT LOOK THE SAME TO ME.
Do they look the same to you?
I called the guy and he was like "huh. Well, I had 45 written down, and what you are describing on your floor definitely sounds like number 45" and I was like "I don't care what number it is, it's not what I pointed at. I HAVE PICTURES. SHALL I SEND THEM?"
He was actually quite polite and asked if I would like the floors replaced. YES PLEASE.
I'm going to come in tomorrow and discover a lovely shade of aqua installed instead, aren't I?
Thankfully, this latest debacle did not push me over the edge because the edge came on Monday, and it was sharp and precipitous.
We spent an exhausting, sweaty, and completely overwhelming weekend painting our place, with much MUCH help from many friends and it's still not done. There is still a lot of trim and touch ups to be done, but the major part of it is finished. And it does look much MUCH better. The entire interior was painted a sort of concentration-camp bluish-white-grey, which seemed to be specially designed to make the entire place seem as personal and welcoming as Alcatraz. Clearly the landlords were trying to communicate to their tenants: "This place is not yours and you are not to feel at home here."
Sample wall:
This will some day be a baby's room, so we didn't bother to paint it this weekend. For now, it remains as a testament to the extreme ugliness of the house before it became Our House.
The rest of the house has now been converted, and went from looking like a Place and looking like Home.
So, while trimming and edging and touch-ups are still coming, it at least looks good now. On the walls. The floors? Not so much. We lifted up the drop cloths and found spot after spot of splatted latex paint covering our carpets. Now, downstairs doesn't matter. So little did it matter that Melissa took great pleasure in putting big brown hand prints on the carpet, and we didn't even USE drop cloths. But we meant to keep the upstairs carpets. That now had paint ALL OVER THEM.
So, of course, being me, I took this calmly and in-stride.
AHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA. I crack me up.
Naturally, I freaked out. Actually, so did Benn. He went around, whipping each drop cloth off the floor and swearing increasingly loudly as he found more paint under each one. He scrubbed at the stairs for nearly half an hour with no result. I just wept. Now we would have to replace the upstairs carpet, and we were moving in on Saturday so somehow we had to get DOWN to the showroom, pick a new carpet, and get them to install in BEFORE SATURDAY. Or call and ask them to extend the laminate up the stairs, which made me worry about slipperiness when little people run downstairs in sock feet in future years. It just felt like too much. I couldn't handle it. I wanted my mommy.
But it turns out that acetone will take the paint out without damaging the berber (I discovered this at 10:30 at night last night, having left Benn to pack at home because I could NOT sleep until I knew we could get that paint out) so the crisis was averted. We have yet to actually remove all those stains. I have a feeling it'll be a long, drawn out process over the next couple weeks. But it CAN BE DONE.
After the paint fiasco, the wrong linoleum seems like only a minor blip.
I think I'm gaining Home Owner XP very quickly at this rate, don't you?
Because it looks like this:
I find that it looks distinctly DISSIMILAR to what we picked out, which was this:
THESE DO NOT LOOK THE SAME TO ME.
Do they look the same to you?
I called the guy and he was like "huh. Well, I had 45 written down, and what you are describing on your floor definitely sounds like number 45" and I was like "I don't care what number it is, it's not what I pointed at. I HAVE PICTURES. SHALL I SEND THEM?"
He was actually quite polite and asked if I would like the floors replaced. YES PLEASE.
I'm going to come in tomorrow and discover a lovely shade of aqua installed instead, aren't I?
Thankfully, this latest debacle did not push me over the edge because the edge came on Monday, and it was sharp and precipitous.
We spent an exhausting, sweaty, and completely overwhelming weekend painting our place, with much MUCH help from many friends and it's still not done. There is still a lot of trim and touch ups to be done, but the major part of it is finished. And it does look much MUCH better. The entire interior was painted a sort of concentration-camp bluish-white-grey, which seemed to be specially designed to make the entire place seem as personal and welcoming as Alcatraz. Clearly the landlords were trying to communicate to their tenants: "This place is not yours and you are not to feel at home here."
Sample wall:
This will some day be a baby's room, so we didn't bother to paint it this weekend. For now, it remains as a testament to the extreme ugliness of the house before it became Our House.
The rest of the house has now been converted, and went from looking like a Place and looking like Home.
So, while trimming and edging and touch-ups are still coming, it at least looks good now. On the walls. The floors? Not so much. We lifted up the drop cloths and found spot after spot of splatted latex paint covering our carpets. Now, downstairs doesn't matter. So little did it matter that Melissa took great pleasure in putting big brown hand prints on the carpet, and we didn't even USE drop cloths. But we meant to keep the upstairs carpets. That now had paint ALL OVER THEM.
So, of course, being me, I took this calmly and in-stride.
AHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA. I crack me up.
Naturally, I freaked out. Actually, so did Benn. He went around, whipping each drop cloth off the floor and swearing increasingly loudly as he found more paint under each one. He scrubbed at the stairs for nearly half an hour with no result. I just wept. Now we would have to replace the upstairs carpet, and we were moving in on Saturday so somehow we had to get DOWN to the showroom, pick a new carpet, and get them to install in BEFORE SATURDAY. Or call and ask them to extend the laminate up the stairs, which made me worry about slipperiness when little people run downstairs in sock feet in future years. It just felt like too much. I couldn't handle it. I wanted my mommy.
But it turns out that acetone will take the paint out without damaging the berber (I discovered this at 10:30 at night last night, having left Benn to pack at home because I could NOT sleep until I knew we could get that paint out) so the crisis was averted. We have yet to actually remove all those stains. I have a feeling it'll be a long, drawn out process over the next couple weeks. But it CAN BE DONE.
After the paint fiasco, the wrong linoleum seems like only a minor blip.
I think I'm gaining Home Owner XP very quickly at this rate, don't you?