Day One

Hola, amigos. I know it's been a long time since I rapped at ya, but things have been pretty tough on the home front, what with all the professoring I have to do most of the time. anyway, we have another set of big projects that we're working on this summer, and the biggest of them all is the planned renovation of the ground floor bathroom. Check it out (this is about the most flattering picture I can take of it):

You'll notice that this is photographed from kind of a wonky angle, and the iPhone's wide-angle lens is distorting things perhaps more than usual. Well, here's an over head shot that may help understanding why -- it's a photograph of the entire bathroom:

The bathroom is very small: 36" x 45" (3 feet by 3' 9" for those of you who do metric). Very, very small -- indeed so small that people of even moderate height can't -- pardon my French, but since this whole blog is going to be about bathroom stuff, better get used to it -- sit on the toilet straight. The bathroom is original to the house, not a converted closet or anything, but just very very small. So job #1 will be reclaiming some leg room in and around the toilet. Naturally, this isn't as easy as just swapping out a smaller toilet: toilets used to be much bigger, with much larger tanks, and so old houses like ours have a different "rough in" -- the distance from the wall to the opening of the sewer pipe. The newest toilet often have a 10" rough in, but the standard is 12" and older houses have 13", 14" or 15". I think ours is 13", but we'll have to get the old toilet off before I know for sure and can't start making more plans. But the real motivator for starting this project is actually the dismal state of the tile:

As you can see, the original tile is a gorgeous swirled pink monstrosity, but painting over tile doesn't make it white tile. It just makes it ugly pink tile that's peeling and looking extra nasty, especially near the toilet. So, the tiles need to all come off so they be replaced by something new and nice. And while I'm at it, the molding between the wall and the floor is some super cheap, institutional-looking rubber crap, and that has to go. And obviously the linoleum floor is a non-starter. But hey, while you're tearing down tile and removing the flooring, you pretty much have to take out the old plaster walls (no insulation, because 1930) and replace those with modern wallboard and insulation. That in turn means fun with sledgehammers!

There are a few other things I'll be looking into fixing along the way. The door is in pretty sad shape, as you can see below: I'd like to strip it completely, stain it back to its original dark brown, natural wood, like the untouched doors on the second floor, because this paint also just cracks.

The second issue with the door -- no lock. Or rather, as you can see, an old mortise lock with a missing key. One of my fun excursions will be into seeing if I can get keys made for the door -- all the doors in our house actually have lockable deadbolts, and most look like they're in working shape, so having a few keys would be great. The temporary solution was to get a hook and eye latch, but it doesn't say "classy boho professor" as much as it says "welcome to Roberto's beachside taqueria." 

There is a light switch, but if possible, I'd like to run an unused power line from the basement into the bathroom, or get a new line added while the walls are down and this stuff is much easier, so that we also have an outlet (that was not allowed in 1930, but is permitted now, especially when there's no bathtub). Also, the area around the switch is just super grotty, as you can see.

This AC/heating register is in terrible shape and will obviously get replaced. It also has no seal and can't properly close, meaning that a good portion of the HVAC that should go to Sasha's room upstairs is being lost in transit. 

The old medicine cabinet will go. There's nothing wrong with it, but it's old, old-fashioned, and needs an update. IKEA stuff (bookshelves and wardrobe for upstairs, sink and pedestal for bathroom, also mirror and organizer) will arrive on Monday. 

And lastly, the window is going to change. I'll be talking to our handy person, Amy, about what exactly will happen, but I have some ideas. That will, incidentally, be the last downstairs window that is an original (and very environmentally unfriendly) to get replaced. Then we start on the upstairs. 

I will actually be getting to work immediately after posting this, so there will be an update soon. Adios, amigos.