I have to admit, I am a little disgruntled. I had expected a lot of excitement this week revolving around the building next door being torn down. Not only having the view, and the neighborhood substantially improved, but I was hoping to get the big scooper to take away some of my concrete chunks and also to salvage some of the landscaping rocks from the front yard. A little patience - I can't get used to EVERYTHING GOING MY WAY ALL THE TIME can I? That's just not the nature of life.
So I shall focus on what did get done. I'll start with the work that the AC guys are doing. One of the main things that had to be done to improve the system in the house was to run duct work to the upstairs bedrooms. Really, how can you have an air conditioning system for just the first floor of the house? After analyzing the layout of the whole house, it seemed that right next to the chimney was the best place to run duct work to the second floor.
This photo shows the holes in the bottom of the little bench to the left of the fireplace. Below you can see the basement and the side of the chimney where the no-longer-existing ash pit would have been emptied out.
Here's a shot through the ceiling right over the holes I just mentioned. You can see Greg's hands as he explains something to his helper, and above that the hole that will carry the ducting in to the ceiling of the second bedroom.
Here you see the completed ducting in the living room. The one on the left is the 'return' which will suck air through a vent in the stairwell wall, vastly improving the circulation upstairs. The duct on the right is the one that will carry cool air up through the attic and down into each bedroom and the hallway.
Here's the aforementioned duct work as it appears right now upstairs in the bedroom. The cut out in the wall is where the 'return' register will be - you can see the staircase balusters on the other side. Have no fear - both these ducts and the ones in the living room are going to get framed in and finished nicely, you'll never even know there are there. Except the fact that you will have comfortable cool or warm air in the bedrooms depending on the season. Kind of important, I thought.
And lastly, the cutout in the stairwell from the other side, with my comic relief doing his part for your viewing pleasure.
The AC guys will be back on Friday to finish up. I hope.
Meanwhile, I carried on with various projects. The ceiling fan in the living room is finally up off the floor. The lamps are cleaned and the thing actually works. The drywall will be mudded in when I do the drywall finishing in the kitchen - no point in doing that one little piece right now. I'm not sure if I'm going to reinstall that decorative medallion again - there were some issues that I'm going to try to address, but it may stay just like that.
Here is the peek-a-boo breezeway in the stairwell before I started ...
And here it is after I installed the paneling. You have to imagine the finish molding on there, and it all painted nicely... but I like the fact that you can stand in front of the hole and feel a breeze blowing right through, as planned. I suppose if I ever have a cat it could get up on the kitchen counter through there, but I don't think there's much of a chance of that, do you?
I've spent three days there already this week and back on Friday. The fence looks beautiful and is so close to finished... Don and another guy will be back on Saturday to finish that AND to replace the one garage door with a "man door". What are the odds that I can be patient and wait to see that on Monday? Don't bet on it.
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