OT - Bob Villa Lied to Us

[Inspector-Gadget]

Off-topic babblings from the wilderness:

Babble-1

I think that Bob Villa lied to us.

My bride and I have decided to sell our home of 28 years. The last of the gadgetlings left the nest nearly two years ago. Mrs. Gadget and I seldom use the second floor of our home other than to store stuff that neither of us has the heart to throw out.

We have been looking for a much smaller, two-bedroom ranch-style home to purchase. Our next home will likely be the last we will share, and we now want (and will eventually need) a less maintenance intensive home, a home with fewer flights of stairs.

For the past several months, I have been on a binge of pre-sale home repair. To speed things along, I also hired a contractor to sheet rock over the plaster and lath ceilings and walls of the entire second floor. That contractor has been at work here for the last two weeks.

WHAT A MESS!!!!

TwistedCopper wrote recently of his newfound respect of roofers. I have recently gained a new respect of sheet rockers, wall boarders -- whatever the job title where you live. That is hard and dusty work, folks. They earn their pay. Those poor guys are covered with gypsum dust and look like snowmen at the end of their workday.

One of the younger sheet rocker contractors has a lot of piercings and a wild hairstyle. You can imagine how he looks at the end of his workday: when he is also gypsum white from head to toe, except for his dust mask protected clean lower face.

I have several times been tempted to tease him about his being the Anti-Goth. I have also toyed with the idea of asking him just what kinds of music sheet rockers prefer?

So far, I have managed to stifle my sense of humor. I admit that his always being armed with several sharp tools has factored into my silence.

I do not recall Bob Villa and Norm taking this long to complete a home renovation, and I do not recall Bob and Norm looking like snowmen at the end of their "This Old House" workdays.

Bob Villa did lie to us! He should be beaten with a Craftsman yardstick, to within a measurable inch of his LASER-leveled life.

Babble-2

(Gadget's fires up his patented Andy Rooney impression.)

[Andy Rooney voice and whiny way of speaking-ON]

Ya know folks, I have been pondering the Zen of the whole sheet-rock thing. Consider this:

(1) Guy laboriously carries a piece of sheet rock into a home -- 32 square-feet of perfect surface.

(2) Guy next punches leventy-seven screw-holes through the 32 square-feet of sheet rock perfect surface to make the sheet rock stay somewhere.

(3) Guy then spends hours taping the edges, spackling the leventy-seven holes and sanding said piece of sheet rock to end up with 32 square-feet of near perfect surface -- making alto-cumulus clouds of dust in the process.

You would think there would be a better way, wouldn't you?

I think there was a better way, and that better way is now being covered over by sheet rock on the second floor of my home.

A toast to and a tip of the hat for the craftsman lathers and plasterers of old.

[Andy Rooney voice and whiny way of speaking-OFF]

Regards,

Dusty <cough--sneeze> Gadget

 

[LGR]

ayep, bad ass group of guys. It takes skill to do those types of jobs. I hate when people say only morons do construction. feh.

Bob always was clean now that i think of it, Along with every worker on the show's jobsite. eh, tv magic.

 

[LGR]

wow, i just noticed we have a filter for foul words? I didn't use booty...

 

[TwistedCU]

I think there was a better way, and that better way is now being covered over by sheet rock on the second floor of my home.

LOL

 

[Joopin]

Everyone on TV lies! Even those cooking shows... Yeah I could cook too if everything was pre-measured and in little glass bowls... and it would take less than a half hour! My cooking show would spend the first 20 minutes looking for the wooden spoon, then another 10 before I realize I don't have any eggs...

(if anyone has heard the comedy of Brian Regan, thats where the cooking bit came from... couldn't resist!)

Sorry to get off on a tangent... what were we talking about? That's right, they like to listen to the "Damn Yankees".

Joop

 

[mud4feet]

Andy Rooney's got nothin' on you, Gadget

 

[LGR]

Brain Regan is the best, he can turn anything into a bit.

 

[Snitty]

I know all about the white clouds... i'm a contractor myself... I've done many a room of drywall... I've found the many tricks to getting that dust kept to a minimum, but no matter what, there is no dustless job of drywall

and as for plaster/lathe being superior to sheetrock??? oh wow.... no comparison... i've done plaster and lathe... sheetrock is DEFINITELY the way to go... but oh boy do i respect the guys of the past... cutting and nailing up each piece of latheboard, making sure there is sufficient spacing between them, making sure each stud is nailed to.... mixing the plaster.... applying the plaster, dealing with it falling off in clumps all over the place, hoping to get a somewhat semi-smooth surface upon application... then finishing the plaster.. and to get a smooth surface, there was 5 times as much standing as there is in sheetrock, and 10 times dirtier dust.... definitely not a BETTER way, but certainly respected...

i'm glad i live in the age of ease

 

[mingez]

Gadget, you are certainly wasting your talent with word here, not that we want you to leave. You need to consider writing professionally...really. You're too much! :lol:

Normally, I wouldn't even be interested in the subject at hand, but you make it interesting.

I have several times been tempted to tease him about his being the Anti-Goth. I have also toyed with the idea of asking him just what kinds of music sheet rockers prefer?

:lol: Now, I pride myself on finding subtletys in humor, but were you being "punny" when you asked what kind of music sheet ROCKers prefer?
waka waka waka!
:lol:

 

[Inspector-Gadget]

Mingez wrote:

Now, I pride myself on finding subtletys in humor, but were you being "punny" when you asked what kind of music sheet ROCKers prefer?
waka waka waka!

I plead guilty, Your Honor!!! :wink:

Punster Gadget

 

[Sparky-Watts]

Great way to start my morning, Gadget! Thanks for the laugh!! My wife and I have been remodeling our master bedroom for the past year or so. It used to be two small bedrooms but we took out the wall between them to make one big one. Our house was built in 1921, apparently long before the invention of rulers and right angles. Nothing in this house is square (except for me, occasionally) and not a single stud is spaced the same distance from another. We (I) tore out all the old plaster and lath over the course of about a week....ya wanna talk clouds of gypsum? How 'bout hurricanes of plaster and 80 years of accumulated dust from inside the walls and ceiling!! We're taking our time with the room and are almost finished. We've got just a few more pieces of sheetrock to put up and then I can start on the wood trim. I have a great respect for rockers. I hate finishing it out, so my wife does all the mudding and taping (thank God for that!).

Anyway, thanks for the morale boost this morning!!

 

[Inspector-Gadget]

Sparky-Watts wrote, in part:

Great way to start my morning, Gadget! Thanks for the laugh!!

You are welcome, Sparky, and …

(Bill Clinton voice on) Ahhh feel your pain!!!! (Bill Clinton voice off.)

I sheet rocked most of the first floor of my home and encountered similar construction problems. I suspect that the builders of my home were not direct descendants of the builders of the Great Pyramid. Obviously, my builders were unaware even of the operating principle of the plumb-bob, not to mention the ruler, bubble level and framing square.

Unfortunately, over the years I have become sensitive to the dust generated by that sort of work. I have been sneezing and coughing since the work started, and I am not doing the work! Hence, a contractor -- not to mention that it would be nice if the project were to be completed during my lifetime!

A sheet rock tale that might prove useful: Shortly before I retired, my work Gods decided to build a number of small offices along one wall of a computer operations room. Shutting down the computers and peripherals to prevent construction dust infiltration was not an option.

The contractor solved the dust problem simply by sanding the joint compound filled sheet rock seams and holes with large, thick damp (not wet) sponges. Worked like a charm! No dust to speak of, and you would never know the difference in the finished product.

I have since tried damp sponge sanding of newly installed sheet rock at home. That almost dust-free method works great once you get the hang of it.

Sparky, your response is why I post these seemingly pointless ramblings. I know that somewhere out there, someone is experiencing similar trials and tribulations.

In commiseration, there is comradeship, and I hope that is a desired end-result of “general” chat.

Good luck with your re-modeling project.

Sponge Bob-Gadget

 

[Sparky-Watts]

My wife uses the wet-sanding method on the sheetrock. I should use some type of wet-cutting method, though. That's where most of the dust comes from now. When I was tearing out the walls, I cut a 1' x 1' section with my sawzall and weighed it....25lbs including lath and horsehair plaster!! Just imagine how many hundreds of pounds I've had to haul out so far, and how much more I have to go. My house is 1350 sq ft of living area, not counting the upstairs. Sheesh, it's a wonder it hasn't sunk deep into the Kansas clay and gumbo dirt!

 

[jps4jeep]

I must interject!

I dis-agree with this, and am probably the most qualified to respond, not cause I am too the weekend warrior ripping my house apart room by room! More or less, I am a huge This Old House fan! and not really the Bob years but the later Steve years, I also go as far as Subscribing to the magazine and Tivo the show!

But to disagree with the "they are never dirty thing" My Wifes parents live next door to Tom Silva (the general contractor on This Old House) and Norm hangs out there often, I have had the distinct pleasure of sharing a Beer with the great Norm Abram! So... Let me inform you that when they do in fact get home from the construction site they are dirty! and most of the project homes they do go on for over a year, but through the miracle of TV production, you have been duped!

 

[Saurian]

The place I'm living in is in an in-between phase, it seems like... Built in '55, it's not lath and plaster, but it's not quite drywall either. The best description I could come up with is plasterboard. It's an inch of what looks like drywall, but embedded into a wire mesh... Try working with that! Not only can you not find anything that will fit the hole right (short of 2 1/2 inch pieces sandwiched together and sanded down, but any time you need to do some work, like electrical boxes for example, you have to chip away at the plaster, and then cut this stupid mesh. Not to mention the fact that since it is so thick, you have to really work hard to get those old construction boxes to properly mount, because they are at the very limit of their screws with the thickness of these walls...

I have gotten pretty good at drywall, but I don't particularly enjoy it... As for the crooked wall problem, both my roommates house (1955) and my parents house (1968) are here in beautiful Madison Heights, Michigan. Founded in 1955, this was originally part of Royal Oak Township (not to be confused with the City of Royal Oak, which makes up our west border. And why did Royal Oak not include this little chunk of land in their city? Because IT WAS ALL SWAMP!!! So, over the course of the last 49 years, our houses, streets, buildings and schools have all settled, to the point to crooked walls, tilted doorways, and cracked masonry. Nothing is anywhere close to a right angle, although truth be told, I have seen worse, we can't set marbles down on the floor and let them roll on their own...

So...

Who the heck puts a city in a swamp?
Why do contractors not seem to be able to measure things like squares, and right angles?
And why did Bob Vila get top billing when he did the least amount of work?

When they were working on a house, you never saw things like cement under the bathtub, wires that lead from 1 circuit breaker to another without connecting anything else, an outlet behind the toilet tank, or plumbing cut and running through the furnace ducts. Near as I can tell, there's no such thing as a perfect house... So when I look back on that show, I want to know where all these problems were? Little molding, some tile, it's all good... WRONG!!!

Went off on a tangent there, sorry

 

[Sparky-Watts]

Back in the '70s, my parent's had a local plumber install central air. He worked for weeks trying to get it all done before winter (no kidding, that's what he said). In 1990, I helped my dad prop up part of the kitchen and living room, because it was settling very badly in one corner between the two. We crawled under the house into the crawl space, and found where the plumber had cut clean through 3 floor joists to run a piece of ductwork, instead of putting in two elbow pieces to go down and under them! There was a 1 foot section missing out of all three joists!!!!!