Well the dinner honoring Our Great Leader Jim James Jimmy Berry, former ANC for the TC, this weekend was successful. A fair number of mucky-mucks, like David Catania, showed up to honor Jim. Some of us learned a lot about Jim that we didn’t know. Like, hey he got married 4 months ago and she’s quite pretty. But the main thing was Jim’s leadership, not just with the ANC but in his professional and personal life. He is a humble man who serves, and his leadership was for all, newbies, old timers, all races, everyone. He was what was right with the ANC system.
Mentioning the ANC system, I’m a little fuzzy on aspects of the history of ANCs in the District, but I gather they came in with Home Rule (I dunno) and did what the various civic and citizens associations were trying to do. I will post a “Fun with ProQuest: Truxton Circle pt II”, but while trying to figure out what was going on with the citizen’s association covering the area that can be now described as the TC, I learned a little (just enough to be dangerous) about the neighborhood associations. I knew, because of B.’s research on DC stadiums, that citizen’s associations were the white groups and the civic associations were the African-American groups. Whatever citizen or civic association held sway over the area, so far what I’ve found are really dull names, North Capitol Citizens(?), Northwest Civic, Central Civic, and Central Northwest Civic Associations. So, I’m going back to searching just Truxton Circle.
If you are just dying for me to mention something about the house, well Sunday we taped out the layout of the upper floor. It appears that I might have an extra foot that I didn’t think I had. When I was measuring I had to employ my poor math skills. So the plans I drew up were more of a guide, because I’m using that extra foot for the small bedroom. Looking at the 2nd floor with no walls made me realize how friggin small these houses are and every inch is valuable. Which is why I nixed (along with financial concerns) the contractor’s idea to make the stairs normal sized. The stairwell is less than 3 feet wide, and probably is a little over 2.5 feet. He mentioned widening the stairwell would make it easier to get furniture and other bulky things upstairs. Um, bulky stuff don’t belong upstairs, because that whole not having a whole lot of space to begin with thing.
Day: April 23, 2007
Renovation 2007: If I were a rich man, ha deedle deedle
….bubba bubba deedle deedle dum.
Got my first bill from the contractor. Yikes!! We are going with the system of labor and materials and labor was a majority of the expense. Because they kept finding crap. Crackhead crap that had to be addressed. Like the window sill whatever thing that was dry stinking rotted because it had a slight tilt that when it rained, water was led towards the house. The wood to replace the dry rotted stuff, pennies. The guy to fix it, not so cheap. The nasty hole in the wall. Bricks, got ’em all over the place, no problem. The mason to fix it… yeah. The contractor has a small crew of guys, guys who have to be paid.
So maybe the week coming up we will get to the fun part, designing and framing. I haven’t given much thought to the fun part or designing the bathrooms. All I know is I like the tiny white tile for the floor. And I really, really need to get out to the various building supply places to pick out what I want before it gets chosen for me.
This would be more fun if I had a bigger budget. Which I don’t have. I have to figure out what can be changed out later for higher quality stuff and what is more permanent, where I have to do it right the first time around.
No new pictures this week till I get batteries for the camera.