Carpets, revision and other boring things

[selenay]

Things I have learnt today:

- The company that built our house 35+ years ago were corner-cutting louses
- There is, in fact, a broken riser that was fixed by stuffing carpet down the hole and hoping no one would notice. Amazingly it worked because we only found it when taking up the stair carpets.
- Who needs solid flooring? Use small off-cuts of chip-board rather than planks and nobody will know until later.
- There are several two inch holes in the chip-board off-cuts on the upper floor.
- The patch upstairs where your foot sinks and we've learnt to automatically avoid? That would be because the teeny patch of chip-board is held to a rafter with one nail and a lot of hope. It sinks because the non-rafter end is attached to thin air. Whoo.
- I don't want to walk upstairs ever again.
- It is obviously a good idea to use carpet tape, nails and staples to be really sure the carpet stays attached to the stairs. Who cares if nobody can take it up again?
- Carpets should not be left for more than 30 years because the rubber backing will disintegrate into a fine black power. Or just weld itself to the wonky chip-boards.
- When tiling the ground floor prior to putting the carpets down, don't worry if you don't have enough tiles. Just leave a few bare patches.

The cat is completely confused and tracking little black footprints through the clean carpets that we're keeping. Just wait until the carpet-fitters arrive...

I ask this every autumn, but...why do I take exams? Would it really be so bad to flunk my degree? And why is revision so much duller than learning this stuff six months ago?

I want to read fanfic. Or code up recs. Or write. Instead I'm avoiding revision by LJ-ing pointlessly. And developing miner's lung from the black dust in the air *sigh*

Comments

[riverfox.livejournal.com]

First, take the exam. Get it over with. ;-) And yes, very bad to flunk a degree because there's the annoying little voice later on that keeps whispering, "you should have...you should have..." Damn thing.

Second, I sympathize sugar. :-)
It's SO aggravating (and scary) to find that your home is the result of slipshod construction and half-assed finishing. Grrrrrrr. I hate it when they get cheap and don't stick to the codes, especially when you've found that they've put the wall studs (noooooooo, not *those* studs ;-p) wider apart than they are supposed to be (and yes, the mind is a smutfarm this morning *gg*).

One wonders just how these people get away with this crap. Obviously, the answer is that there are way too many cheap, lazy people in the world, owners as well as builders. It's a wonder our large buildings in our major cities don't fall down, and only later does one get a pretty good picture of how well they're built when an earthquake strikes or a plane runs into them. ::smirk::


Cats. Cats are our reminders to lighten up. I miss having them, though I don't miss the fleas which *always* found my cats no matter what. When I lived elsewhere, and had the room to oil paint, my cats would endeavor to find my palette on the art table (i.e. kitchen table half the time) and walk across it, then make a trail of yellow or white (which dries slower than the darker colors) paw prints to let me know where they've been while I was out. That was an interesting bit of detective work. ::big grin:: They weren't very amused when they had to have their paws cleaned. You'd think they'd have learned, but nope. It's always more fun to track up mommie's stuff and take a risk that they won't get cleaned. Never worked, but they always seemed to live for hearing the tonal quality behind, "Goddamn it! Just what the hell have you been up to?" then scatter to the four winds. *bfg* Stupid cats. LOL.

[selenay]

First, lovely icon :-))

First, take the exam.

:p~~~~~~~~~~~
Terry has the same exam time and exam hall for one of her exams. I need to show how her to find it (new town, new exam hall) so she'll be doing the annual "Frog-march Sel into the exam hall" trick. Guh.

the mind is a smutfarm this morning *gg*

*snigger* Just this morning?

It's SO aggravating (and scary) to find that your home is the result of slipshod construction and half-assed finishing. Grrrrrrr.

Grrrr. Yeah. We've been doing a lot of work on the house over the past few years and our opinions of the construction goes down every time. Although these carpets have been the worst. We're all tip-toeing around the upper floor now that we know what we're walking on. We've been automatically stepping over certain particularly loud creaks and the sinky patch for years - looks like we'll need to learn a few more points to step over.

when an earthquake strikes

Heh, not exactly a worry here :-) Although I am at the nexus of a number of RAF bases and Allied Strike Command, so the good news is that I'll be one of the first to be vapourised in World War Three. Comforting, huh?

Cats are our reminders to lighten up.

Too true :-)) The cat is feeling a little worried by all the unusual noises and the fact that there are now floors with surfaces that make his claws click. He's taking defensive action - sleeping behind the TV. He snores. Loudly. It's slightly disturbing when the TV appears to be snoring...

[sazandra.livejournal.com]

The company that built our house 35+ years ago were corner-cutting louses

They'd obviously got it down to a fine art by then. The company that built this place 40 years ago skimped on a few things, cocked a few things up and we're still finding these out all these years later - and my parents have lived here since it was built.

It is obviously a good idea to use carpet tape, nails and staples to be really sure the carpet stays attached to the stairs. Who cares if nobody can take it up again?

That will be the 'it will never fall down' school of workmanship!
My dad did a good one twenty odd years ago, he wanted a tropical fish tank and because water is very heavy he made sure the unit the tank would stand on was very secure. It was so secure that after the fish were long since gone and he wanted to take the unit apart it took many hours to get the mega strong, totally bolted to the wall, iron bracket off the wall.

rubber backing will disintegrate into a fine black power. Or just weld itself to the wonky chip-boards.
We've had both scenarios. Here somebody had this bright idea of vanishing the fairly okay floorboards, problem was the vanish didn't dry. Newspapers were put down on the wet varnish, varnish soaks through newspaper and sections of it are still there to this day.

[selenay]

my parents have lived here since it was built

We've had the house for...shit...twenty-three years. Between the builders and the former owners (there are some big holes in the walls where they ripped out wall-mounted lamps and we've never worked out how to fill them in, covering them with paintings instead), this house has had some issues. It's the way that we keep finding new things.

it will never fall down'

Ah. That's a...er...helpful(?) concept.

We've had both scenarios.

Ain't they fun? We've found a patch of carpet on one stair that will not come up. We've used a paint scraper, a shovel and Da's taken all the skin off his knuckles. It's still there. Pah. Tomorrow we may have to go at it with sis's welding torch...

[destina.livejournal.com]

Who needs solid flooring? Use small off-cuts of chip-board rather than planks and nobody will know until later.

It's amazing what you find when you start doing maintenance/upkeep to a house, isn't it? And then you start to wonder what other damage/problems are lurking behind the walls. Or at least, I did. But I try not to think about it. *g*

[selenay]

We're planning to sell the house in a few years when the parents emigrate so we've been doing lots of things to the house over the past couple of years. It's been *scary*. There was this thing in the kitchen that we always assumed was a box to cover pipes. Nope, it was a lump of wood stuck to the wall to 'cover' a botch job on a dividing wall. Lovely :-)

My room was part of an extension we did twelve years ago - I watch it being built so I'm fairly confident that the flooring is safe. Of course, the plaster is so good you can't get nails into it, but...

We aren't doing the room with the creakiest floors and three sinking patches. It will have to be done before we sell up, but we're a little afraid of what we'll find now. It was my room when I was a kid *shudder*