biodork

:lol:

Not exactly, LOL. Cliff's Notes version: after a period of steeply declining fertility and birth rates, the US gov. is replaced by a strict theocratic (and almost caste) society where fertile women (The Handmaids) are rounded up and forced to have children for the Commanders.

Welcome back, NS!

:lol: and thanks!

That's incredible stuff, PA. (I can't do that bike ride as a healthy person!) Hope your friend is able to find another drug trial.

Copy/paste fail on my part (d'oh). :lol:

Not really one for fishing... I just like going and enjoying the scenery (and exercise). You should take up flyfishing. :D

I love apline lakes. :wub: Almost 10 miles hiked each Saturday and Sunday, with around 4100 ft of elevation gain. Much as I love snowboarding, summer in the mountains is pretty awesome, too.

Agreed. It was still fun, but nowhere near as good as the original. Oh well, kinda to be expected.

Good point on the asbestos!

Just make a concerted effort to drink lots of water inbetween beers and you should be okay; dehydration will make the effects of altitude worse. Some of my friends have found that taking ibuprofen before hiking helps with the headaches caused by mild brain swelling, too.

That's good about the doorways, at least! I'll never understand why people choose to install new floors right on top of old ones... So lazy.

Have fun, man! It's freaking hot out here right now, but it'll be much more comfortable in the mountains.

???? Wow, that's some vintage stuff under there! Aren't you worried about your doors being too short if you remove two layers of flooring?

Any chance you can install radiant floor heating so at least it's good in the winter?

Oof... at least you have central A/C, though! My place does not, and although you really only need it for maybe 3 months of the year out here, it's easily in the mid to upper 80s upstairs without it. Was looking into a whole house attic fan since it's a lot less expensive ($2k vs $5k), but it sounded like I'd need to add more ventilation in the attic to the roof, and the roof / exterior is managed by the HOA, so now I'm stuck waiting 3 weeks for them to have a meeting and decide whether they'll consider letting me do it. Ugh.

Had to wait a week to respond to this, lol. Hammocks are the best. The spare bed is a neat idea! My stepmom is really liking the new job so far, even though it's definitely an adjustment schedule-wise. Really proud of her for making this happen and being positive about the situation; I'm not sure I could work 11pm-7am at 57 years old!! That's a bummer about your wife's lab... hopefully they have better luck on the next grant cycle! Bonus fantastic Friday: starting tomorrow, I am on vacation for an entire week. My best friend from back east is coming to visit from Sat-Friday and then the bf if coming Fri-Sun. :)

I think everyone forgot about this thread with the holiday week! My complaint: crappy contractors. The guy I hired to re-tile my bathroom floor did the tile removal himself, but he sub-contracted another guy to lay and grout the new tile. Not a problem by itself, but the guy he hired was much less conscientious (uncovered the sink I I had purposefully taped off to protect everything and used it to prepare grout, got grout everywhere, left stains on my carpet in the hallway, etc.). Was willing to let it slide at first because they seemed to do a really nice job laying the tile, and from standing height everything looked great. The original handyman wanted to come back and seal the grout something like 14 or 15 hours after it had been done, which should've been a red flag after I noticed the grout box said to wait 16 h before stepping on the floor and 3 days before sealing. Still had an overall positive impression of the main handyman (in spite of his obnoxious and repeated overtures to me), asked if we should wait, and he ended up coming back a day later to do it. Still overall happy at this point. When I finally started trying to clean up the floor and get the room put back together, I realize that not only is there an awful amount of grout haze on the tile that the guy had no intention of addressing, but the grout lines were way too low and already cracking in a few places. BOO. Talked to the handyman about redoing some of the grout, and he was surprisingly amenable, offering to do it that same day. So we scrape out the worst sections, he re-does the grout after I head off to work, hoping it's all fixed. Except later that same day the new grout is already cracking again -- UGH!!! I texted to let him know that he'd left some tools behind and that I appreciated his help but it was already cracking, and he tells me he can come back and re-do it and has an idea of how to prevent the problem. I told him I was on the fence about whether to have him come back a 3rd time but sent pics of some of the new problem areas. Asked what he had in mind as a fix... and didn't hear back. WTF? So I resign myself to again scraping out the grout he'd done and redoing it, this time using sanded instead of unsanded grout (which it seems like he should've used in the first place). Looks much better, and 3 days later, no cracking. Annoying, but done. This guy has the nerve to text me yesterday like nothing is wrong saying he'd been out of town and wanting to know when he can come get his tools? I told him I'd leave them in a bag on my porch that he could pick up during the day and not to contact me again. He literally has no clue and says he doesn't know why I'm upset, so I screenshot the earlier texts where he'd offered to come back out and fix it and tell him how I'm upset because I had to redo part of the job I'd already paid him for. Suddenly he's all "what can I do to make it right", and I'm ignoring him because it's done and he was creepy and made me uncomfortable anyhow, and I think he tried to come to my house last night because someone rang my doorbell once around 8:30-8:45pm. I updated my (formerly positive) review of him on HomeAdvisor, and this SOB sent me a text this morning that said "Shame on you for leaving me a bad review after I tried to do everything to keep you happy karma will back on you" :wallbash: :censored:

My stepmom finally got an entry level job in the field she's being trying to break into since she finished her degree a few years ago. The hours suck, but it's a foot in the door and I hope she enjoys the work. Also, I now have a hammock for my balcony. I'm pretty sure we could de-escalate things with North Korea if someone just sent Kim Jong Un one of those things.

:lol: Well played, Miro. So jealous... it's on my list.

D'oh, by my own fault it won't be finished until tomorrow... he was planning on coming back at 8am, but I saw last night that the grout box says to wait 16 hours before stepping on the floor and 3 days before sealing it. Much as I'd like to be done with the guy, I want to make sure the install is good so the new floor lasts as long as possible. (Am I crazy for considering having him do other projects around the house? He does good work and his prices are fair, but I'm not sure if he'd just get even more forward if I asked him to do more work down the line.)

I need to start using this in my daily life.

????????

Well he's planning on sealing the grout and putting the toilet back tomorrow morning, so if all goes well that should be the end of the project! ????

:lol: To be fair, mine is only working on a 43 ft2 bathroom, so that really shouldn't take long... just worried he's going to use the cure time between grouting and sealing as an excuse to keep coming back every few days. I might just offer to do the sealing myself so that's not an issue, but I need him to at least put the toilet back in place since I can't do that on my own, so I have to keep being nice to him at least until that part is done.