Thank you John Madden

Today is the best day in a long time.  John Madden has finally thrown in the towel.  I will not have to suffer through another minute of watching him stumble through his commentary talking about god knows what while his fake, makeup laden face bobbles around the television.  On behalf of fans everywhere, I want to thank you John for sparing us all.

Hardwood Floors - Done!

The floors are done!  Here are some pictures.  Everything turned out really nice, I can't wait to get some furniture in there and be back to normal.  Also Christie is going crazy without TV :)

Hardwood Floor Refinishing Day 3

Yesterday the sanding got done, and the first coat is on.  Today is the final day, with 2 more coats going down.  Oh, the last picture is a shot of our kitchen in its current state.... we are pretty excited to be able to use our house again come this weekend.

Hardwood Floor Refinishing, Day 2

Here is some shots of the floor after day of sanding.  As you can see in the middle of the room, we found a nice little easter egg left by some previous owners who didn't do the best job of patching :)  I guess its a good conversation piece.  Ironically, this is the ONLY part of the carpet I did not pull up when I attempted to do this job last year.

Below, I took a photo of the patch that was installed yesterday.  Its a little hard to see because they did such a fantastic job.  Right where that cable comes up, there used to be a 2 foot wide hole in the floor.  Hard to believe looking at it now.

Hardwood Floor Refinishing, Day 1

Today is the beginning of the final chapter in the saga of our hardwood floor refinishing project. Last May I started pulling up the carpet and found some beautiful 100+ year old maple waiting to shine again...Then I found a big hole in the floor covered with plywood from an old gravity heating system. At that point, I knew the project was out of my league, and it was time to call in the experts.

Fast forward to today, when our contractor showed up ready to cut, rip, and tear up that hideous white carpet. Fellow environmentalists, do not fret, we are recycling the carpet (and padding) and using eco-friendly water based stain and sealant.

Reclaimed maple from a home built in the same period is being used to patch the hole in the floor today and staining and sealing starts tomorrow. Stay tuned for photos!

Fun with Google News

Sometimes the automated mashup of news article headlines and images doesn't do the best job over at Google News. Here is an image I snagged today that seems like a particularly terrible scenario:

Why I have a fake christmas tree

From Christmas 2008