The Plague Diaries: A Parade of Workmen and Pavers
The condo touched off a parade of workmen. A plumber was needed to correct some bad faucets and to tell us that it would cost at least $1,100 to install a shower in the master bathroom. An electrician was needed to install a proper electric hookup for the dryer and to tell us that the circuit board hadn't been updated since 1972 and was no longer up to code, so we'd have to replace it. (He had a shockingly handsome apprentice, though, so that cushioned the blow a little.) A handyman was needed to hang the new curtain rods and deal with other sundry tasks that are outside my toolbox.
For over a week, I had to greet and supervise workmen. While I was trying to unpack and do all the other stuff required of a new place. Darwin went back to Albion for work, leaving it all to me. I don't much enjoy bringing workmen into my house. My response is usually to point them in the direction of what needs doing and go back to my writing. They're probably grateful I'm not one to loom over them while they work.
The most difficult of the workmen thing isn't actually in our condo. When we were first buying the condo, we noticed the Dreadful Awful Parking Lot. The pavement was so cracked and riddled with potholes and badly-done patching that you had to go over it slow as a tank making its way through a bomb zone. It was awful, the worst of Michigan roads--and it wasn't even a road.
But the day we moved in, the head of the HOA (who is very nice and lives directly below us) told us the entire parking lot was being repaved. Yay! But it meant that everyone would have to park in the strip mall a little ways from the condo group and walk back. The walk is about a quarter mile, all told.
"It's supposed to take about two weeks," the HOA prez said. "But you'll be able to drive on it for most of it. It'll only be a handful of days when you'll have to park far away."
It didn't work that way.
The paving company came out the Monday after we moved in and in one day tore out the entire parking lot, right down to the sand. And then they vanished. For three days. No machinery, no workers, nothing. Then, with no explanation, they returned and set to work again. More industrious digging with steam shovels and caterpillars followed. They uncovered a water retention tank, which they knew about and were ready to remove, but for whatever reason, it turned into a Major Problem, and took two full days to deal with. No parking down there, you may be sure!
Yesterday, I asked one of the workers when the actual paving was supposed to start.
"Thursday," he said. "You'll be driving on it by the weekend."
Today is Thursday, and the lot is still all torn up. Half of it is graded, but the Major Problem water tank half is all hills of sand.
Meanwhile, we're hauling ass. I mean that literally. We're hauling our asses from the strip mall all the way down here every time we want to go somewhere. Grocery shopping is a fucking nightmare. I finally hit on the idea of putting the car in the NO PARKING ZONE of the parking lot for the condo group next door long enough to unload. This is way closer than the strip mall, sure, but we have to bring anything and everything down a hill, across an uneven lawn, and through a border of bushes to get it inside. It's hell. Getting food delivered means we have to meet the delivery person a block away from the front door (again by navigating hill, lawn, and border). We don't have a washer and dryer yet (can't get them delivered because of the parking lot), so I do the laundry in Albion once a week, but that means hauling a huge basket down to the car and back.
I do know lots and lots of people live in cities where they can't park anywhere near where they live, and lots and lots of people have to park in an expensive structure, then hoof it many, many blocks home. I get that. But at least such people can usually park temporarily in a loading zone or even by a fire hydrant and drop off groceries or laundry, and they can accept deliveries at their home. We can't do those things. And after the hell of moving and with the added difficulty of doing anything at all during a pandemic, I'm very, very tired of having more obstacles added to basic life.
And more meanwhile, the sliding glass door and windows to the balcony have to be replaced. They're . . . vintage 1970s aluminum windows and are falling apart. So another set of workmen have been summoned. We got the hair-raising estimate from them today, but they said due to the pandemic, they probably won't be able to do the actual work until November. So hopefully we'll get a new sliding door and a new president at the same time.
I'm hoping that pavement goes in tomorrow. At least the parade of workmen has paused for now.
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For over a week, I had to greet and supervise workmen. While I was trying to unpack and do all the other stuff required of a new place. Darwin went back to Albion for work, leaving it all to me. I don't much enjoy bringing workmen into my house. My response is usually to point them in the direction of what needs doing and go back to my writing. They're probably grateful I'm not one to loom over them while they work.
The most difficult of the workmen thing isn't actually in our condo. When we were first buying the condo, we noticed the Dreadful Awful Parking Lot. The pavement was so cracked and riddled with potholes and badly-done patching that you had to go over it slow as a tank making its way through a bomb zone. It was awful, the worst of Michigan roads--and it wasn't even a road.
But the day we moved in, the head of the HOA (who is very nice and lives directly below us) told us the entire parking lot was being repaved. Yay! But it meant that everyone would have to park in the strip mall a little ways from the condo group and walk back. The walk is about a quarter mile, all told.
"It's supposed to take about two weeks," the HOA prez said. "But you'll be able to drive on it for most of it. It'll only be a handful of days when you'll have to park far away."
It didn't work that way.
The paving company came out the Monday after we moved in and in one day tore out the entire parking lot, right down to the sand. And then they vanished. For three days. No machinery, no workers, nothing. Then, with no explanation, they returned and set to work again. More industrious digging with steam shovels and caterpillars followed. They uncovered a water retention tank, which they knew about and were ready to remove, but for whatever reason, it turned into a Major Problem, and took two full days to deal with. No parking down there, you may be sure!
Yesterday, I asked one of the workers when the actual paving was supposed to start.
"Thursday," he said. "You'll be driving on it by the weekend."
Today is Thursday, and the lot is still all torn up. Half of it is graded, but the Major Problem water tank half is all hills of sand.
Meanwhile, we're hauling ass. I mean that literally. We're hauling our asses from the strip mall all the way down here every time we want to go somewhere. Grocery shopping is a fucking nightmare. I finally hit on the idea of putting the car in the NO PARKING ZONE of the parking lot for the condo group next door long enough to unload. This is way closer than the strip mall, sure, but we have to bring anything and everything down a hill, across an uneven lawn, and through a border of bushes to get it inside. It's hell. Getting food delivered means we have to meet the delivery person a block away from the front door (again by navigating hill, lawn, and border). We don't have a washer and dryer yet (can't get them delivered because of the parking lot), so I do the laundry in Albion once a week, but that means hauling a huge basket down to the car and back.
I do know lots and lots of people live in cities where they can't park anywhere near where they live, and lots and lots of people have to park in an expensive structure, then hoof it many, many blocks home. I get that. But at least such people can usually park temporarily in a loading zone or even by a fire hydrant and drop off groceries or laundry, and they can accept deliveries at their home. We can't do those things. And after the hell of moving and with the added difficulty of doing anything at all during a pandemic, I'm very, very tired of having more obstacles added to basic life.
And more meanwhile, the sliding glass door and windows to the balcony have to be replaced. They're . . . vintage 1970s aluminum windows and are falling apart. So another set of workmen have been summoned. We got the hair-raising estimate from them today, but they said due to the pandemic, they probably won't be able to do the actual work until November. So hopefully we'll get a new sliding door and a new president at the same time.
I'm hoping that pavement goes in tomorrow. At least the parade of workmen has paused for now.
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