I ran the disposer one night and there was a big nasty metallic clunk. I shut it off really quick to fish out what I thought was my silverware. Luckily it wasn't. One of the teeth from the disposer had broken off and there were lots of little metal fragments grinding around in there.
Jason went to the store to buy a new one, but determined that all the new ones were different sizes than our old one and he would have to redo all of the plumbing under the sink in order to make it fit. Jason hates plumbing. He didn't want to redo all the plumbing just to fix the disposer, then redo it again whenever we get around to remodeling the kitchen.
So, we're doing the kitchen NOW. Jason's really good at carpentry so we're able to do all of it ourselves.
For the past couple of weekends (including my anniversary weekend) we've been working on the stupid kitchen. We spent the first weekend sweating our asses off in 100 degree weather, cutting down plywood, inhaling our neighbor's second-hand smoke, and huffing glue for the formica. Mmmmmm.... good times.
This weekend we've been able to stay mostly indoors, but our kitchen has been turned upside down. All the pots and pans and Tupperware are in the spare bedroom and the refrigerator is blocking one of the doorways to the kitchen. There is a huge hole in the drywall under the kitchen sink (from the previous homeowner) and if we don't block it off the cat will go exploring in the space between the walls. Replacing drywall and having to rebuild one of the cabinets that rotted out have made this project a little more challenging than merely ripping out the old counters and replacing them with new ones we made.
For some reason the previous homeowner decided to "improve" the kitchen by putting floor tile on top of the old formica counter top. We have two parallel counters; one side has the oven on it, the other side has the sink. The guy used a different tile for each side and did a really crappy job at it. I think that the guy intended for them to stay there forever because those things weren't going anywhere. They were nailed in like crazy and they weighed a ton. Jason tried to get me to help him move it out to the back yard, but I physically couldn't lift it more than an inch. His friend came over to help take everything to the dump and it was so heavy that they accidentally dropped the side of the counter with the cast-iron sink.
The previous homeowner was a licensed plumber. When Jason met the guy before he bought the house from him, the guy bragged about how he was so good at plumbing that he practically had a doctorate in plumbing.
Jason doesn't know a thing about plumbing however, he does a much better job at plumbing than our friend, Doctor Plumber. Jason takes his time, reads and watches videos about each task that he needs to do, and does it correctly. Therefore, we have been able to correct some of Doctor Plumber's handiwork. For instance, the drain under the kitchen sink no longer flows UPHILL (why Doctor Plumber, why?). If Jason finds a leak, he does something to fix it instead of letting it go until it rots out all of the drywall behind the sink and the boards for the cabinet under the sink. Jason doesn't make giant gaping holes under the kitchen sink to get to the bathtub on the other side of the wall. Also, if Jason had installed the water line to the ice maker, he would have tied it into the cold water from the sink line, instead of the bathtub.
I occasionally see Doctor Plumber's trucks driving around town and I'm tempted to stop and tell the people that he's working for how much he sucks at being a plumber.
Here are some disgusting things we found in the walls behind the sink:
mold - had to replace most of the drywall behind the sink
bug shit in every crevice - on the ledge of the bottom cabinets that support the counter top, between the counter and the wall -the wall next to the dishwasher looked like sandpaper it had so much
sunflower seeds
packet of rat bait - under the dishwasher with the corner gnawed off
holes in the wall from rats
We found enough cat hair behind the refrigerator to cobble together a second Toby.
Be glad that I'm not including photos.
We already had an idea that the house had been previously infested with rodents. When the house was inspected before we bought it, there was a dead mouse near the breaker box. When we had the bathrooms redone a couple of years ago they found a dead rat curled up with a sock under one tub and a mountain of rat poop under the other tub.
I'd like to make it mandatory for homeowners to completely gut their houses every 20 years. That will give everyone a chance to clean up all the nasty bugs and rodents they've had lurking in their walls, replace all the rotten drywall, remove all 3 layers of linoleum floors in the kitchen, and get all the wiring and plumbing up to code. Sounds reasonable, right?
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