Blog by E

This has been an exciting/exhausting last few weeks. Everything we are doing now makes a huge difference in the appearance and is quite gratifying.

Painting continues... here's a rare picture of my lovely wife painting the closet doors.

This picture might be a bit out of chronological sequence with respect to the other blog posts, but since the painting never seems to stop it works.

The master bathroom is finished! I installed the towel bars, the vanity, the toilet, and the shower fixtures over the course of several days. Unlike the apartment plumbing, which I did about a year ago... everything went smoothly and I haven't detected any leaks so far.

Here's a picture of the installed vanity.

And then a closeup of the plumbing underneath.

Notice the little angle brackets that secure the vanity to the wall for when the next big earthquake hits. My dad helped me cut and glue the wood base for under the marble countertop, and then our friendly neighbor helped set it down on the cabinet. I'm sure K will put up a picture of the completed bathroom in an upcoming post, but I'll mention now that the consensus between the contractor, the neighbors, and the family is the bathroom is a timeless beauty.

What to do after finishing the bathroom? Throw in the kitchen cabinets! Our contractor kept his word and offered up 2 of his guys (for free!) on a Saturday to help me get started. While I'd say putting in cabinets isn't rocket science, having a few experienced hands helping certainly cut out most of the learning curve.

This is a picture of all the cabinets in place. I still need to do the island but that will happen after we have a floor. Again, smooth sailing and I'd say that overall, this project took about 1/2 the time I though it would.

Here's 1 of 6 under-cabinet LED light fixtures.


The microwave...

The dog...

Finally, no post would be complete without a solar or heating system update... The solar water collector is increasing in efficiency as the solar elevation angle aligns more closely with my near vertical mounting, and the system is overheating. Water temperatures in the tank are over 180-deg and with very little hot water usage, the pump is shutting off, causing stagnation in the collector. I need to finish my heat-dump loop and add the underground circuit to dissipate this excessive heat.