Bathroom Chronicles, Part Four: Fairly done.

Welcome to the new bathroom.



We no longer have to swing the door open, and squeeze by the sink to get to the toilet. Cool. (Also going to build a wall cabinet to go beside the medicine cabinet here.)



Nor must I stand sideways to take a shower.



The Hansgrohe fixtures gleam crisp and clean, whilst ebay brought down the prices lower than any ole bathroom center or lowes or what have you.



I'd say the nicest part of the bathroom would be the tile and the frameless glass shower enclosure with it's chromey hardware. I'd also say the worst is the contractor's workmanship on the details... say, when you put our toilet back in the house from being outside for months, maybe spray out the leaves in the tank first. I could go on, but I won't.



Oh, we've got some lighting up in thar.



Currently working on this little wall rack made out of sweet gum. Looking pretty alright. Still lots of work to do/issues to fix in this bathroom, but I can shower... and very occasionally shave.

mirrah mirrah...

To distract my mind from being swallowed by the bathroom and our contractor woes, I bought this here mirror off craigslist for 15 bucks. It was made in 1974, and was covered in a walnutish laminate that was in pretty good condition, but not that cool overall, except for its rad shape. After a little primer and a can of red spray paint, it turned into this doooozy. We'll see if this "big mirrors make the room look bigger" talk is all a farce or not. I ain't crossed into any alternate universe on the other side of it yet, but I'd like to think I have a huge afro on that side.

Bathroom Chronicles, Part Three: Shower Tiling Complete

Yo's, sorry for the delay... you see, tiling takes years sometimes. See that hole? 2.5 hours of drilling to get that. No lie. That's 30 minutes of straight drilling, til the drill battery dies, then repeat another 4 times. INSANE.



Luckily, Pa is a master measurer, and the hole lined up with the shower head pipe perfectly. If it didn't, I was going to sell the house As Is, and move as far away from that Tile Hole as possible. Who needs a shower handle and shower head on the same wall? Not this tiler.



Done grouted, caulked and ready for the EFFIN CONTRACTOR TO SHOW BACK UP TO FINISH HIS PART OF THE DEAL! Seen the bro for 2 hours the past three weeks. Said he'd send his son over this morning to do some work. It's almost 2pm, so he must have been in a bad car accident, I'm guessing. I'm currently boxing up a horse's head, and having it hand delivered to a certain good-for-nothin wasterofmytime.



30 dollar tile saws bought off craigslist do the trick... Especially if the trick is to go from clean to covered head to toe in tile dust within 5 minutes.





The upside to the contractor downside is South By Southwest rolled through town. We saw some rock. Julie and I ended it with Thee Oh Sees, who played within 12 inches of our barstool at beerland. Luckily, we kept all arm movements to a minimum, so we don't have broken hands from wailing drumsticks- I guess stages ain't their bag. This was shot a few days before the show we were at. It was similar, except this show has people dancing on the ceiling.

Razor Blades- Revealed/Concealed

I saw Lisa's comment on the last post, and thought I'd share what I got to see down inside my wall... My razor blade dreams have all come true! Now for the house of slots! As a side note, all razors found inside the wall behind our old medicine cabinet were preserved in the exact place they were found. Drywall has been cut and pasted over the hole where the cabinet used to be, so come another 60 years I can only hope that someone knows what the hay is going on when they run across this dangerously sharp time capsule.



In related razor blade news, there's this awesome etsy shop run by a lady here in Austin called Fetosoap. Check out these soaps. I should have donated our wall treasures to her!

Bathroom Chronicles, Part Two : Floor Tiling

Oh bathroom... how I love and hate you. Sometimes you let in the cold, and contractors neglect you, but someday, you'll be a star. New walls are up, and the shower pan poured.



Two baldies at work. Pa came down to Austin to help lay some of this wickedly large 12x24 inch tile. You'd think a kind son would be down on his knees instead of letting the old man oldman do it, but...



look at the thinset that guy lays! Julie said, "textbook." She would know... Mine always looked really gloopy and bad. In a few years, when tiles start cracking, we'll know which few I had a hand in.



We rented a tile saw, and went to town. This tile was our Piece de Resistance.



Like a friggin glove.



This tile is NOT the daltile Fabrique, but it's a knock off brand called Strands. Can't find anything about Strands on the internet, but the old Tile Guy is always in the know... Made by the same company and cost 1/4 as much per tile. With saw skills peaking, it's like this tile just grew up and over the shower curb. Baldy's getting a little toot tooty up in har.



Still have the walls of the shower to do... and some grouting, but it's looking pretty sexy.



Oh, and BOOOOOOOOOOOOYAHHHH!

Bathroom Chronicles, Part One

Observe the master bath. It's this here 5ish by 5ish square foot zone. It's hard to take pictures of because there ain't no room. I take a shower in that tiny area behind that door there. Picture that, ladies.



Welcome.



Please enjoy your dank cavern shower.



It's easier to take pictures of the area when big boys knock out a wall. Unfortunately, the toilet was the newest feature of the bathroom, and it took a sledge to the face.



This area is about 5 feet from where we sleep at night. Julie's freaked out about what is going to crawl into the house and cozy up beside her.



I feel like the morning light is going to look a little nicer when it shines in the bathroom window in a few weeks from now. To be continued...

It's gittin grilly in here..

I've been toolin around with this here lamp the past couple o days. Well, it started last week, which began with me divin willie nillie into electricity city without doing my homework, and sparks and smoke arose from my outlets. After some proper learning, I built this lamp! I could have kept it like this here, but I had these curved up bamboo pieces that I wanted to incorporate.



I slapped em on.



First I thought I'd use some rice paper for the innards, but that seemed more blando than this stuff up at Breed and Co. It's a radiator grill cover piece, though I wonder how many homes in Austin have old radiators that need covering.

Luckily, I had a lamp that could use some covering, and this stuff worked out well. It also casts cool shadows that can soothe a wailing baby, when singing Yankee Doodle just doesn't cut it any more.

Maybe I'll sell this gem. It has it's prototype qualities, which could be smooved out, but if someone has their wits about them, they'll pay top dollar for the prototype that changed the face of lighting... or if they are sick of being in the dark when the sun sets.