very simple

I spent over 12 hours today unpacking and cleaning my new apartment. And I’m not done yet.

It was apparently over 100 degrees today in the city, which would explain why I wanted to cry when I had to walk all of two blocks to the Radio Shack to pick up some adaptors. At one point, I thought I had (in my delirium) accidentally stood on top of one of those steam grates, that blows hot air on you. And then I realized that, no, it was just the air.

Tomorrow I’ll head back over for another round of cleaning – now that I’ve gotten rid of a ton of boxes (other than a few miscellaneous things, I’ve unpacked just about everything but books) I can maneuver. I did save the "best" for last though – tomorrow I get to clean the bathroom…

And the cable got hooked up today, which was great – the service guy was actually awesome – it turned out that the wire running from the hallway into my apartment was completely frayed, and instead of making me wait for a "construction" rep, he just fixed it himself. Which took quite a bit of effort, thanks to the fact that the hole through the wall was bizarrely dug – the hole in the hallway was actually about six inches above the one inside my apartment, meaning that we spent almost two hours trying to snake various objects through what was essentially an "s" curve (for some bizarre reason the "canal" dipped down first before it snaked back up) in order to pull the cable through (i’d need Board permission to do anything else). And when I say "we", I actually mean "we". Both of us on stepladders, on either side of the doorway, with wire coathangers, kitchen knives, screwdrivers and various other miscellaney. The coathanger was the thing that worked.

Anyway, I’m now completely wiped out. I just took the longest shower in history and I can still barely walk. I keep thinking that this was easier when I moved to the city six years ago, and then I remember that…

…I was six years younger then…
…I didn’t renovate anything…
…I was renting a shoebox…
…oh yeah, and the bulk of my worldly possessions consisted of a mattress, a tv, a futon couch and a beanbag chair.

I suppose I deserve this for deciding to buy "real" furniture rather than crap from Ikea when I decided to upgrade…

and I have too many books.

Pictures soon – I swear!!

And by "done", I mean "livable". not actually "done" done. The plumber was supposed to come today to hook up the bathroom sink and shower, thereby making it habitable. When i stopped by tonight after work, the bathroom sink was sitting in the middle of the bedroom, and only part of the shower fixture had been installed.

So i call the plumber to find out what happened, and he’s all…"the tile wasn’t glued in, grouted, blah blah blah and I can’t install anything until it is". I ask if he spoke to the painting contractors, and he’s all "the only people there were the "kitchen guys". And i say, "[plumber], the "kitchen guys" are the painting contractors – you’re telling me you were both in the same apartment for hours and you didn’t say one word to them?"

So I call giuliano to find out what happened, and giuliano says that the "plumber is a jackass", that he didn’t actually show up until 3:30 in the afternoon (mind you, all work must stop by 5 p.m. according to condo rules), and giuliano was waiting for the plumber to get his shit together before he regrouted, so that he could regrout around the new fixtures.

So the result of all of this? I have two contractors who are more interested in passing blame at the moment than actually getting the apartment done (I’m right now leaning towards placing more blame on the plumber myself, because…3:30? really? It’s just not physically possible to get the work done in that amount of time in the best of circumstances). And I get to sleep on an air mattress in my parent’s spare room for at least another week, since I also can’t clean all of the dust and debris out of the new place, being that there’s still no freaking water!!! (not to mention that they’re still working, so cleaning a bunch of stuff that’s just going to get covered in new contractor grime on Monday is not exactly at the top of my list). My favorite part was where the plumber’s all "the toilet works!". And I’m all, (a) the toilet is the only piece of equipment that wasn’t replaced, so it damn well should work, and (b) I can’t exactly get ready for work monday morning with just a toilet and no other water fixtures.

But the best part? my brother comes home on monday. Which I’m actually quite excited about, because this is the month he’ll be home before going into the Peace Corps for the next two years, but it’s going to get really old really fast if there’s now a fourth person trying to share the one shower in my parents’ apartment in the morning. I think he’s planning on going up to the country first, so that may ease the overcrowding. 

Rick posted in comments the other day that my moving/renovation saga was better than a soap opera. heh. he spoke too soon. After my PC Richards episode on Tuesday, I continued to pack for my move on Wednesday afternoon. Let’s just say that it didn’t go too well. I sent an e-mail to my stepmother later that night, and I think it captures better what went on than I can recall at this particular point, so I’ll just copy the relevant portions here:

Oy…today was pretty much a mess. The movers showed up late and didn’t have the insurance information that I told the company about at least 5 or 6 times (including calling the other day to check that it was done). And the crew supervisor was a complete asshole (to both his crew and to me), and refused to move my second TV, even though it was on the inventory list. [not only that, he was a jerk in a way that bled time all over the place – thereby aggravating me further – every five minutes he would stop what he was doing to tell all the guys on the crew what they were doing wrong, then he would undo their work and redo it]. So the Company has to send another crew to my [old] apartment in the morning at 8am (because I refuse to allow this supervisor within 100 feet of me) to pick up all of the stuff this guy just decided he was too good to move, then move me in in the morning. Meanwhile, most of my stuff is sitting on a truck somewhere. So I actually haven’t moved in yet – I actually had to go out and buy clothes at the gap, since they packed my overnight bag, which wouldn’t have been a big deal if they, you know, had moved me in today.

This was after, of course, PC Richards totally screwed up their delivery yesterday, showing up two hours late, after Giuliano had to make an executive decision to paint the floors so they would be dry by today for the move (heh). So they’re coming tomorrow again.

So of course, the morning crew didn’t show up until 8:30, even though I dragged myself down there from the upper west side to meet them at 8. Conveniently, PC Richard showed up at the new place about five minutes after I did, so the appliances got moved in before all of my stuff. not so conveniently, my entire apartment is filled to the rafters with furniture and boxes, because the contractors were still tearing up the kitchen floor that morning as well.

Anyway, the PC Richard guys get there, and I look at the invoice, which says "refrigerator–white". so they have to open the box before I’ll let them take it off the truck to show me that it’s actually titanium. So they drop off the appliances, walk out the door, and I notice that the side of my range box says "black". So I go running downstairs to literally run across 72nd street, to chase the now-moving truck, because they’re not going anywhere until they can confirm that it’s actually a stainless steel range sitting inside the box (of course it turns out to be fine). The only problem PCR seems to have is with their labeling system.

At this point, all of my stuff is in the apartment, but I can’t unpack anything because there’s nowhere to put anything. Giuliano stopped by today to help me move the appliances into the kitchen, but then we realized that the boxes took up as much space as the appliances themselves, and they can’t be thrown out until Monday (we need freight elevator access). But one of the maintenance guys in the building managed to snag me a bunch of subway tile from an upstairs apartment that’s being gutted, so my bathroom will be able to get done by mid-next week, which means that I may be able to start actually living there by the end of next week. I’m currently staying at my parent’s new place, which isn’t exactly a hardship, other than the fact that I’m living out of a suitcase.

I took a bunch of pictures, but just realized that the cord I need to download them to my computer is packed somewhere.

On Monday morning, I tried to postpone my move, but the moving company was having none of it, being that it’s the end of the month, in the summertime, when, apparently, everyone in the city is trying to move at the same time. So my contractors have been totally busting their asses trying to get my floors sanded, painted and varnished (and dry!) in time for tomorrow afternoon, because, really, if the floors are done it’ll make moving so much easier.

On top of everything else, my appliances are supposed to be delivered today. and the store is one of those places where you have to call in the morning and get your estimated delivery time. So I call this morning and get a time of 10:45 to 2:45 today. Okay, fine. I call my contractor, who says that’s fine – they’ll hold off on painting the living room floor until 3pm, let that dry, and then varnish it in the morning – the varnish takes about 2 hours to dry, and since my movers aren’t coming until the afternoon, it works out perfectly.

Except for one thing. 2:45 rolls around and the delivery guy is nowhere to be found. I call the store, and am told that "I’m the next stop and he’s on his way". Finally, 4:00 rolls around, my contractor (Giuliano) calls to tell me that they had to go ahead and paint the floors even though no one has shown up, and they were leaving since they couldn’t walk around the apartment anymore (obviously). (You have to also understand the tone of these conversations – Giuliano is Italian, and speaks with an incredibly thick accent – I can’t understand half of what he says, and I’m pretty sure that he can’t understand me half of the time. So most of our conversations involve us shouting at each other, not because we’re arguing, but because we’ve become so consumed with over-enunciating everything that we turn into caricatures – I’ll just speak louder and that’ll make it easier for him to understand me. Oh, and we’re both on cellphones, so the ugly *loud* cellphone talking voice doesn’t help things along either. The flip side? he does such beautiful work that I actually started crying with joy the first time I saw the bedroom painted.)

So I call the store, where they claim that the guy showed up at, like, a minute after 4. Where he was turned away by the doorman because (surprise!) my floors were wet. I, of course, immediately launch into argumentative lawyer mode, blame the whole thing on the store (it was because they showed up so late that my guys had to paint the floor ahead of them, blah blah blah). In the end, not only did they agree to redeliver for free on Thursday morning, including getting me first priority on the 9am truck, they’re refunding my delivery fee for today. Given that Thursday’s probably a better day for everyone anyway, that turned out well.

In the meantime, I actually had to go this morning and buy more boxes. And that’s with throwing out about 10 big black reinforced Hefty bags full of trash in the last two days. I swear, one of these days I’m going to turn into the Collyer Brothers. 

Ok. So everything is set for me to move on wednesday, except…the apartment.

So I have to call tomorrow morning and see about possibly moving my moving date back a day or two. Just so the guys can get the floors done. I have no expectation that the kitchen will be anywhere near complete by Friday either (luckily, my parents gave me keys to their place). If I have to move on wednesday, either due to moving company or freight elevator issues, we’ll figure it out, but in the meantime…here’s where it stands…

The kitchen has actually been sheetrocked, including the drop ceiling (I’m putting in recessed lighting). The sheetrock, of course, is a lovely shade of fluorescent blue.

The bathroom is waiting for new tile, so that they can install the sink and the new shower fixtures….and yeah, I originally wasn’t going to replace the shower fixtures, but it turned out that I needed some sort of regulator in the wall, which wasn’t compatible with the old fixtures (said regulator, of course, to prevent the water from scalding me intermittently, so, good idea!). It also turns out that separate hot and cold taps in the shower are actually now illegal in NYC. So I had to get a single integrated handle. you can see the beginnings of that installation.

They got the bedroom floor sanded last week, but not the living room (hence my attempt at a delay – they still need to be painted and varnished (I’m pickling them because they’re not in great shape).

The living room has been painted in this light brown shade that I found at Restoration Hardware, which I love. I needed something neutral, because my artwork and furniture is fairly bold colors, but I didn’t want white or beige.

New electrical outlets in the foyer, where there previously had been none (there are also new outlets in the kitchen, and they replaced a bunch more wiring than originally planned because it was in pretty bad shape – but there was conduit, which made it a relatively simple job.

And finally, the kitchen cabinets that I spent this weekend putting together so that they could get hung this week.

Here are pictures of everything…

Other than that, I’ve been packing up a storm, Housing Works came yesterday to pick up the furniture I wasn’t taking with me, and I’m writing this entry as procrastination (I needed something to do after finishing Harry Potter, but that’ll be the next entry).

I’ve pretty much resigned myself to the fact that the kitchen won’t be done before I move in. Among other things, my plumber found out today that his father died, necessitating him traveling to Poland(?) next week. Which sucks. for him certainly more than me. And of course I can’t really complain about it because, really. His dad died. I managed to keep my moment of selfishness about the whole thing between my dad and myself. My dad who keeps trying to get me to postpone for a few weeks, apparently not realizing that…

• …I’ve already shut off my phone, electricity, mail, newspaper, etc. in anticipation of the move
• …I’ve signed a contract with the moving company
• …I scheduled the week off of work months ago, because summertime vacations are at a premium. And everyone else in my group scheduled their vacations around me, just so I could move
• …oh yeah, and my lease is up. I’ve already given notice, and they’ve already hired their own contractors to renovate this place as soon as I move out so that they can rent it as soon as possible. Nevermind that I don’t exactly have another month of rent and mortgage in my budget.
• …I really really want to move already.

Given that I don’t actually cook, I think not having a kitchen for a week or two is not exactly the end of the world. Pretty much everything else is on track to be done, or close to done. Tomorrow the building plumbers are actually changing out the old building pipes, so that’s one more thing done. Oh, and I was up there tonight, so…more pictures:

I went up to the new place on Monday night to check on progress and take a few more pictures. I’ve pretty much resigned myself to the fact that everything won’t be done when I move in two weeks (two weeks!!), largely because they won’t be able to come in and measure for countertops until just a few days before the move. And installing the kitchen sink (which I ordered on Sunday) requires the countertops to be there. But almost everything else should be able to get done in time.

So, on Monday, I took these photos (which have already been overshadowed by the fact that they painted the bedroom and the bathroom today):

Oh, and did I mention that I kind of have outdoor space? The apartment actually overlooks the roof of the building lobby, so while I don’t technically have a patio (and I do technically have to climb out the window for access), I have this lovely patio-type area right outside my living room window that only I and the guy in the apartment on the other side have access to:

So this afternoon I left work early because I wasn’t feeling well, but did manage to stop off at PC Richard on my way home, because my plumber needed more information on my stove. So here’s a picture of the back of the stove, which apparently does have some room for the gas line to be hidden behind while the stove is still flush with the wall:

And now for the real prize. On my way home I saw what was quite possibly the ugliest car I have ever seen in my life parked in an outdoor lot on 23rd Street. I had to stop and take a picture. And when I did that, another person stopped and copied me because it was just. so. hideously tacky:

That’s right – it’s a Gucci emblazoned Cadillac Escalade.

So I did actually make it to Ikea on Saturday, and it was all absolutely fine. They have helpers specifically located to help put together kitchens, and all of the stuff I wanted was in stock. Of course, "in stock" for kitchen stuff doesn’t necessarily mean in the store, but just not on backorder. Which means that it will be two weeks for delivery. Again, that’s a really good time frame in real-world numbers, but seems really far away from right now. But I figure that it’ll probably work out well, because they should show up right around the time all of the plumbing and electrical is finishing up and new drywall is put up. Hanging the actual cabinets should take very little time once they’re put together, which is my job (it’s the typical ikea-allen-wrench project).

Other than the incredible crowds at the store, it was all very easy to get done. The bus was standing room only (I managed to get a seat), and it was like every person in the New York area who didn’t go away for the weekend decided to buy some furniture. At the same time.

Four weeks!! I need to start throwing things out.

The renovations are finally moving ahead, starting next Tuesday morning. It took forever to get the contractors to send me the correct insurance information, and then another two weeks to get the condo board approval (which, in real time is actually quite fast, but given my schedule, felt like forever). That finally came the other day, so there’ll be actual progress shortly. which means more pictures at some point.

So, in light of all of this, I make plans to take the bus to Ikea tomorrow (free shuttle!) to finally purchase my kitchen cabinets. But when I get online to check availability, every item I want to purchase is marked as not available. So I call customer service. And the first guy I speak to is completely unable to help me (kitchens are "beyond" him – you know, the guy who is the customer service representative at the Ikea shop by phone line). Apparently, even though the kitchen items appear in the catalog, with model and order numbers, they are not actually orderable anywhere but in the store. And if they’re not in the store, well, nobody knows what happens then.

The third person I spoke to was actually able to help me. Apparently the items are available in the store, they just get marked as not because the fronts are custom (sort of), so they have to be put together before the base cabinet with the birch door is actually considered in stock. And apparently they can order them for me if need be. Now how hard is it to actually get the first guy who answers the phone to know that?

I can never understand when stores seem to go out of their way to not let me spend money in them. It’s not like I was trying to buy a $20 lamp either. Anyway, buses start running at 10 tomorrow, so I’ll be visiting lovely Elizabeth, N.J. in the morning…

The cable guy just left, after replacing my modem and running a bunch of tests. He also reconfigured my splitters so that the line was split differently (rather than having all three lines – 2 TVs and 1 cable modem – split off of the one trunk line, it’s now got one split off the trunk line that goes to the modem and a second line, which is then split between the two TVs). Plus the new modem is much smaller and actually has a power button. It’s apparently also got better internal software, which I guess happens after 5 years.

But the main problem is the line coming from the hallway into my apartment. Which means another visit from an entire crew that will have to remove hallway moldings and whatnot next saturday. I’m pretty sure I can just leave keys with my doorman for that one though – they only need access to the end of the line that enters my apartment. I’m apparently losing massive amounts of signal strength between the junction box and where the line enters my apartment. Which means one of two things – the line is degrading (and it’s pretty old – it was here when I moved in) or that someone has split my line and is stealing cable. Which would be totally possible because the molding hiding the cable is open at various points (where it runs underneath the recessed hallway lighting). So I guess we’ll find out next week.

For now I’m just happy to be able to order groceries again.

Update: The new modem is, like, 1000 times faster than the old one. It’s awesome. I just ftp’d a bunch of files to my website and it took a fraction of the time it used to take.