Noobies VÜ

random mutterings and musings by me, myself, and I.

5/05/2013

A YEAR! (almost)

Posted by vanashke001

This seems to happen quite frequently, well, relatively speaking anyway, I have become so lax in my posting that a year can come and go and I don't even notice. The only reason I did this time was because I was trying to show a friend a video that I knew I had posted on here. Yeah, I also learned that some of my videos no longer work. Booo for that.
So, what have I been up to, you may ask. Or not. But who cares? I'm gonna tell you anyway!
I've been doing a few projects around the house, nothing terribly earth shattering by any means but they do make the house more to my liking. Ohhh what I could do with a real budget. Or at least pay someone else to do.
I think the biggest project this year (and one that still isn't complete) is the upstairs floor. Thanks to a certain feline's propensity for peeing on the carpet in the hallway (BAD KITTY!) I found myself having to step up my timetable on replacing the carpet in the house with some wood flooring.
Of course the flooring I wanted couldn't just come off the shelf, no, that would be too easy. For some reason Lowe's and Home Depot both refuse to carry black or black toned flooring beyond the Jacobean Bamboo. That would be fine but I was advised against it as my house is too dry and the floor would likely crack in a few years unless I used a humidifier. If you've ever been in my house you'd know that was folly. har har
I did locate a lovely dark toned oak that had blue-gray graining. I really like it.
I tore the carpet out (ew, BAD KITTY) and was greeted with a sad sad subfloor. I had hoped to change it out but it would have been a huge job (of course, ALL my projects at this house go from small to huge). So, I suffered on. I do wonder if I might pull it all back up before I completely finish and try to do something about the subfloor. It is sooo uneven.

Before (with BAD KITTY) Click to embiggen

The wretched sub-floor 

You can't tell from the photo but every where there is a water stain the wood has swollen so it is uneven. I had hoped to just cut out the bad pieces and replace them but when I looked into it I realized just what that might entail and due to budgetary and transportation issues I had to forgo trying to fix it. A decision that will have ample opportunity to to cause me sorrow in the future I am sure. 
The floor looks fab though. And I ALMOST ordered the right amount. It's funny I must have measured 4 or 5 times and I swore did the math at least that many times. But with this section and the section in the entry I managed to fuck it up make a mistake and wrote down the wrong figure. I was off by the equivalent of 1 box. If I had to I could probably complete it jigsaw puzzle style with what I have, but since I've decided to face the stair risers with the same stuff I figure I'll just order a couple more boxes. 
The lovely floor :)

As you can see from the shadow under the trim there is room to try and at least put in a sheet of luan or something to try and level the floor. I might try to take up the floor and correct it using that technique, I'm just not sure that will make it much more level. I might have to get a large sander or something to knock down the high spots, then lay the luan and then the floor; love snap and click flooring. I can feel the floor flex when I walk on it and the other day I saw it when someone else was walking in front of me. It makes me worry about the longevity of the floor. Everything is cut, it's not like it wouldn't be a relatively easy process to reassemble. It's just a downer that I need to do it.
Well, thus ends today's (hopefully not this year's) entry and reviving of the ol' blog. Bear with me kiddies, I still have to finish the post I started last June about my new boat. I also have a couple of other posts planned for my bedroom redo, an ad hoc sideboard I put together, my laundry room redo, as well as a couple new things I've done to the bike and Jeep.