Exterior

The exterior of the house was left in an unbelievable mess by the concrete pourers. I've been working at cleaning up the screed, scarping plastic out of the concrete and other kinds of tape that was actually concreted in. Cleaning the screed has meant hours on my knees turned almost upside down, using a screwdriver and a hammer to scrape out the concrete and the stucco, jammed into it. It takes about an hour to do 4 or five feet. So far, I've spent about 60 - 70 hours on the job. Now I have a technique and I've found a paint that works pretty well to give a clean look to the house bottom. After the rains this week, I'll be able to finish up the job and by the end of the month we can have everything sealed.

We take our little fights one day at a time. Yesterday, Richard battled with Pacific Sales. We have one wine refrigerator left to be delivered and they want to deliver between 4 and 8. We can't take delivery at that time at the rancho as it's too dark for big trucks to negotiate the driveway. 4 times, maybe 5 Richard has scheduled the delivery only to find out they want to bring it at 6 or 8 or sometime. Very frustrating. He's also having trouble getting the plumber to come for the fire inspection. Manny the tiler seems to have dropped out again. This time I've had it with him and will look for someone else to complete the job.

As of this moment we are thinking we will be finished in March or April. I'm thinking Easter.