The Chaos Before the Storm Weekend Recap

I know it's supposed to be calm but there has been no calm.  😂

First things first, Happy Monday!  Welcome to a new week!  A week of transformation and peace...hopefully.  Wednesday and Thursday we got a bit of a jump on things with pulling off baseboards, I caulked under the current drywall to decouple and we reapplied as shrinkage happened.  When the Mr pulled off the cove molding on the stringer going upstairs, we saw some tiny gaps where we took the opportunity to squirt some acoustic caulk in there with some syringes to see if it could help with vibration.  The stringer has been our biggest concern in this whole project because there is no way for us to get behind it to put in any sound deadening and this was the closest we were going to get.  I doubt it'll do a ton but we were thankful for the opportunity to put something back there.  That was the most tedious stuff along with filling holes for nails and molly screws with the caulk as well.  All of that stuff has to be filled in or else you're essentially wasting your money by having avenues for the sound to escape.

Friday morning didn't start out well as one of the Mr's co-workers stole his chargers that were clearly wired into his desk and the guy wouldn't have known they were there unless he looked behind his computer.  When he found them on the guy's desk, he messaged him asking if he borrowed it.  He said no, it was his.  "Wow so we both have the exact same charger with the same bright red 10' cord? (from the same manufactured year that isn't even made anymore and a knot in the exact same spot.)  "Yeah that's crazy."  Wow.  It would be like you having your favorite shirt with a hole in the pocket that had a Winnie the Pooh patch covering it and the third button missing and the guy saying it's his.  People suck.  

It was also the drywall delivery day and let me tell you, that about sent the Mr and I over the edge.  First you know we live in a townhome which means rules.  One of them is no semis or a $500 fine.  Wanna know what pulled up?  This:

source

Now maybe you more experienced peeps are like "what did you think was going to deliver it?"  Honestly, I thought a large U Haul like truck with a pallet trolley and moveable tailgate like the dude that delivered our hardwoods.  Not some big effin' truck with a CRANE and STABILIZERS like a friggin' firetruck!!!  And obviously it was raining all over it too.  I went into a full on panic attack upstairs.  I couldn't even look at it.  It was only 18 sheets, I mean seriously!?  Thankfully, we're in an area with a wider road but it's like everyone and their mother saw it and I'm just waiting for the busy bodies to get in a snit over it.  The Mr talked to our contractor and said we are not allowed to have trucks that big back here and he said "we are insured and the delivery truck is insured.  If there's any issues, you send the office to us to handle."  That made him feel better and I suppose it would for me too but that doesn't apply to a-hole HOA fees.  Like my friend pointed out, they would need to allow people who paid those big moving trucks back to their place but this was just obscene and such a spectacle.  It took the Mr and I a few hours to feel like we could finally breathe again after all of that.  Did I mention they let the trolley cart to transport it into the garage whack square into the wall?  How it didn't crash through it and give us a hole into d-bag's garage is a friggin miracle.  Then we were getting two 5 gallon tubs of green glue delivered from Amazon and we had to be home to get it and give them a code.  WTH??  It was supposed to be Saturday which sucked because that meant no leaving the house but we got an update that it was being delivered Friday so that was good.  The dude had to deliver it in torrential rain and Oz like winds so it wasn't until 9pm.  They're heavy mofos and the Mr had the applicator guns delivered too.  Thank goodness because the contractor was like "oh, the supplier is all out of the applicators."  "We've got it covered dude."  Yeah, we don't like to leave anything to chance if we don't have to so that was covered but it was still a hectic, nerve wracking delivery when it shouldn't have been.  I swear the universe is trying to kill me with stress.  😐  You all have been here long enough, you see the stuff that is just beyond what normal people deal with.  I think the poor Mr is about to lose it so he can join me in la la land.

I was super bummed to see yet another no loss week because I had been SOOOO good on my water and I was more active during the day.  The Mr lost 2 though so woot for him!  🥳  He grabbed some grocery pickups and we watched Cesar Milan until it was time to grab lunch.  After that, it was time to get to work.  The Mr pulled the rails and mounts off the walls:

Then I grabbed the acoustic caulk and put them in the syringes again to fill the holes from back to front.

The door trim on the garage entry door had to be popped off because the 5/8" drywall is going to come out further than the trim.  Initially, the dude said they would caulk behind it and cut around it.  Nope.  This is where his laundry room is on the other side and I'm not having THAT be the weak link after spending $7K.  Of course there was some splitting but hopefully the almighty Titebond wood glue will do the trick.  As I've said before, you never know the "surprises" waiting for you behind your trim, baseboards and outlets.

Hello Gappy McGapperson.

I would be caulking forever on that so I grabbed some of the sound deadening mats and cut it to fit.

That fit in there well and then it was time to move on to the side gaps which were thankfully less so I could just use the caulk.

By the end of Saturday, we had the largest bulk of the stuff done.  The chairs and chest/table and lamp were moved downstairs, loveseat flipped to the back wall and table moved to the corner.  The only large furniture left to move Sunday were the armoires which would be relatively easy.  As far as everything else, removing switch/outlet covers on the wall, getting the rug rolled up (which was already damaged anyway so it needed thrown out), putting down ramboard over the hardwoods where they would be working and general cleaning.  So it was good we got a jump on things earlier in the week as it allowed our weekend to not be quite as jam packed as we thought it would be.  

I don't think I've mentioned it before but we're pretty sure the entire household of at least three people are all Jay and Silent Bob level pot smokers.  I don't give a rat's ass if you smoke pot but when it seeps into OUR basement where we workout...we've got a problem.  We've tried upgrading the insulation where we smelled it most and a negative ion air purifier- both of which failed miserably.  So the Mr went down and showed where the electric dude pointed out the shared line of gas and electric that run through our building.  Well the piece of drywall in that spot was barely covered in insulation and the foam job we did around it a few years ago that basically turned it into orange packing peanuts on the wall does nothing either.  So I grabbed a few squares of our acoustic putty pads to wrap around the gas and electric lines as well as the large piece of drywall that was missing.  The Mr noted it is strong in the middle of the basement and he said he smelled it lower more than higher.  So obviously we ordered some clear silicone caulk and will be pulling everything out from the basement walls to try to slather any obvious cracks we see.  I will tell you there were some good sized ones under the wall at the landing of the basement when I put the auto putty pads down which completely shut down the air flow in that wall.  So if we can get the positive pressure of his unit shut down on our side as much as possible, maybe we have a chance at a life that isn't constantly wrapped up in battling this jackhole.  It is literally like the pot shop from campus moved in next door.  Like I said, you want to smoke a skunk, have at it but it should not be infiltrating our home.

Sunday morning came early and I could swear I smelled pot but didn't know if it was mild PTSD from the night before and how strong it was in the basement because the heat wasn't on.  So no sleep for me after 6am.  By 8am we had confirmation that we were on the schedule for Monday morning at 9am.  We fueled up with a breakfast that wasn't the healthiest but sometimes you need banana mac nut chocolate chip pancakes when you've got a long day ahead of you.  I got to laying down ramboard upstairs to protect the hardwoods the Mr laid while he did a little cleaning.  Then we tackled the 'demon void' which is this void just above the landing ceiling that is open to the basement.  That is one big source of where d-bag's ganja seeps through.  We tried spray foam but that did nothing so off to grab the deadening mats again.  It took this many tools to get them in place and set.

I used the hooky thing to drape the putty sheet over and get it to the back of the 24" void, the long floor scraper to poke it into place long enough to pull the hook out, the pole sander to smoosh any pockets and along the top, the stand up paddle to smooth/seal the edges and the rando red stick to get any spots those others wouldn't.  

By some miracle it fit along the back and we are just praying it does it's job and keeps his skunk butt on his side.

It is not lost on me that the Mr used Too Close for Comfort DVD's to keep the hinge open into the void.  Then he put the mineral insulation back in front of it.

Then it was putting down ramboard and getting the furniture moved out of the way.

We're as ready as we can be physically.  Mentally...whole other thing.  (Especially since I started reading old posts about our 2020 kitchen reno and it brought it all back.)  I will probably be upstairs with earplugs in so I don't have to hear what they say and yell text the Mr down in the thick of it asking what's going on.  We'll just be masked and try to tell ourselves we will envy next week us...hopefully.   So we're going to try to enjoy the last night with our original drywall.  I can't help but fondly remember the little old retired couple who started out there beside us almost 28 years ago.  The only good neighbors we ever had for about 6 years then nothing but a parade of flaming assholes until we hit peak asshole with this gem that in the end will cost us about $10K for us to be able to attempt to enjoy our own home.

So say a little prayer this goes well.  It's only our sanity riding on it.

How was your weekend?

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