Mike and Kati vs. The House: We've totally leveled up all of our skills.

Sorry for the lack of updates. I came down with the flu...AGAIN. I got sick again Sunday night and was fighting a fever and stomach issues well into Thursday. So for a quick update. Last weekend I finished painting the risers on the stairs and caulking all the cracks and whatnot. Mike and Kevin built out the wall in the kitchen where we tore the pantry out. We also had the fun of having our dryer stop working in the middle of a few loads of laundry. We wound up calling a repairman who discovered, much to our relief that it was an issue with the 220v plug, not the actual dryer, so Mike was able to fix that...and learned a bit about our dryer. We had a party to go to on Saturday night and on the way there, Mike commented that Keven leveled up 20 skill points in drywall and shimming, he earned at least 10 points in dryer repair and I earned a few points in painting. I could tell Mike's mind was on the video game that came out this past Tuesday.

As for our work during the week, we got absolutely nothing done. Dead Space 2 came out at midnight on Monday night, so Mike was a bit preoccupied. He needed it, with all the sickness I had going on. I enjoyed his playing video games because he had himself completely scared out of his mind, so I took the opportunity to jump out and scare him by screaming like a space zombie. It bought a bit of fun to my week, fear to his. He spent most of the week looking around corners for me. The only thing that got done during the week was during my one spurt of energy and lack of nausea. I managed to strip the remainder of the ivy wallpaper in the bathroom and uninstall the gold frame that used to hold shower doors from the bathtub. My parents drove out Thursday night and of course I spent the night nursing what I hope was the last of the flu for me this year.

I had to work on Friday, but Mike and my parents were able restore electricity to the parts of the house where we lost it two weeks ago. They spent a lot of Friday out and about and came to visit me at work. Mike wanted me to post that he had to jump out of a moving vehicle to make an emergency evacuation at a gas station after eating tacos. Needless to say, I missed the action. By the time I got home from work, my dad had started mudding and taping the corners of the walls we ripped out, my mom replastered the cracked walls in the bathroom and Mike got a good start on rerouting the heating duct in the kitchen. Kevin came over and we started the kitchen demolition and tore up most of the flooring. We had dinner at Mike's mom's house and came back for some more demolition work in the kitchen.

Saturday was a busy day, after we got done at the estate sale in the morning. Leave it to my dad to find a sale so that he can find a deal. Once we finally got to work, my dad worked some more fixing the walls and ceiling in the kitchen and Mike worked on finishing the heating duct. My mom and I worked upstairs finishing the paint job in the hallway and stairs, plastering the bathroom and painting the closet, so we could finally put our clothes away. I also got the stair railings scraped, cleaned and spray painted with Rustoleum so that they would be ready to put back up. Kevin came over in the afternoon and the three guys were finally able to work together to get the chimney pipe from the wood stove we removed taken down. My mom and I were pretty nervous listening to them outside on the roof. We went out to dinner and by the time we got back it was time for another round of sanding plaster and massaging the walls, as my dad calls smoothing the walls out.

Today again was a pretty eventful day. We finally got some loose ends tied up. My dad and Mike worked on plugging and patching the hole left by the chimney pipe. My dad also worked his magic a bit more on the walls in the kitchen and my mom finished up the plaster job in the bathroom. She also got the walls in the bathroom primed and ready for paint. My mom and I reinstalled the stair railings, so the stairs are finally finished. One project done, nine million to go! I worked on moving the electrical box in the bathroom so that it wouldn't be behind the mirror we got, also because the previous owners were too lazy to sink it in the wall, so they just used an exterior mounting box. It was my first electrical job, I didn't electrocute myself and the plugs work so I'm pretty proud of myself. I also had to patch and mud the hole where the previous plug had been. I just finished sanding and priming it, so I'll be able to paint the bathroom tomorrow night.

Mike and I did a major clean up tonight and managed to get our room picked up and the mini fridge and microwave set up in the spare bedroom as a makeshift kitchen while we work on ours. The upstairs of the house is starting to feel like home. On a sad note, I made the tough decision to give Tony, my cat, up for adoption this weekend. My good friend Katie and her daughter adopted him, so I'll still be able to see him. I had to give him up because his and Mike's relationship took a turn for the worst on Friday. Mike has never liked Tony and Tony knew it and I think he finally got fed up and vindictively peed on Mike's coat and pants. I say vindictively because I saw it happen. Tony started meowing at Mike and then went and peed just a little on his coat, then ran downstairs and used his litter box. Needless to say, I wasn't happy and neither was Mike. Mike thought I was being a bit too quick to make a decision, but I'd rather not take chances on the cat destroying the house because he hates Mike. Tony will be happy in his new home with his girlfriend Trouble. Enough of that, time for some pictures!!!