in order to get the tub out, he had to rip out part of the wall around the top and sides which overlapped the edges of the old tub and would give him room to get the new tub in. by hand this would be a very messy procedure involving a sledge hammer. effective but not so great if you want to preserve some of the tiles for later re-use. instead he used a little dremel type circular saw to score the tiles and wall at the level he wanted to remove it, then set his assistant to work with a mini jack hammer to remove everything from the score line down to the tub.

during this hour or so long period, you could not breathe in the house. you could not even see in the house. the air was completely full of dust. i was getting a headache from it while sitting in the front yard, it was that bad.

some of the things we discovered through this whole endeavor:

-the tub was indeed steel, and indeed rusting, as discovered by the plumber when he tried to lift it out and the crumbling, rusting, jagged edge of the tub sliced his hand.
-some genius had run the 220v electrical wiring for the stove and clothes dryer underneath the tub.
-the half of the wall on the spout side of the tub was completely termite eaten, water damaged and generally rotted out. you could see the back yard through the wall.
-the drain pipe going into the ground was run at a 45 degree angle. the plumber says this is bad and is going to require that he knock a hole in the concrete slab.
-some sort of plant tried to grow under the toilet.
-we should have called mike rowe beforehand.
-plumber is officially off my list off possible future occupations.

unfortunately the wall was so deteriorated the plumber felt that there would be nothing for him to adequately attach the tub to, so he didn't put the new tub in. we now have a completely gutted room with a couple holes in the floor, and several holes in the walls. the flooring has been removed, the vanity/sink has been removed, the tub and toilet have been removed, a large chunk of the tile and wall have been removed, there is a hole going straight through to the kitchen where the head of the tub would be, another going through to the utility room where the foot of the tub would be, and yet another under the wall to the back yard.

up until this point bryan and i maybe could possibly have lived there through the construction. now? not so much.

meanwhile, rent is due on our storage unit on friday. i do not intend to pay for another month of storage. so yesterday i bought the first bucket of real paint and started painting my sewing room. i got pretty far but the paint goes on so light that it was very tough to see where i had painted and where i hadn't. i decided to let it dry so i could come back later and see what still needed to be done. i'm going to try to get it done tonight because tomorrow night i've got some friends that are going to help me move as much as possible out of the storage unit into the house. normally i would ask eric, but he's pretty busy this week and i'm on a very tight schedule. i just can't wait for him for this.

but he did come by on saturday afternoon and lay the carpet in the three bedrooms. as he pointed out, the carpet in my sewing room and the master bedroom is the color of money. just a little darker than the green of a dollar bill. great stuff. and the carpet in the game room? gold. money, baby...

which reminds me, i gotta get my butt in gear and figure out what color i want to paint the game room. we decided to paint the bedroom green, which should be nice and soothing. i will also try to get that painted asap.