Day 14

They painted the trim and walls today!

The basement is really starting to look like a living space now. We choose to have the same color as we have in our kitchen and up the stairs, because it was a warm, subtle color. Additionally, we knew that although it was a light color on the main level/stairs, it would seem a lot darker in a basement. The pictures don't do the color justice (lighting), but in person it looks really nice. The window sills look great too. We like them so much that we'll probably add sills to the rest of the house at a later time. I pretty sure I can cut and nail a board and a piece of trim to the wall and paint it!

Broncos vs Saints

Stacey and I went the the Broncos game today while Julia cheered loudly with Grandpa and Grandma at home. The game was entertaining, and it was good to get out together. All in all though, this will be something we do once every 10 years. We paid a lot of money for the tickets (and parking, gas, and 2 drinks). My supervisor has season tickets, and he sells a lot of them to his coworkers when he can't make the game.

Unfortunately, we spent most of the game sitting next to explicative shouting drunks. Although we were in the 6th row, most of the game was played 100 yards away on the other side of the field. Considering we had to squint because of the sun, I doubt we would have seen much anyway. The game came down to a final field goal, which New Orleans missed handing Denver the win. The problem with our seats in the 6th row is that they looked right down the goal line. The deciding kick of the game went up and through...or maybe not through...the field goal posts. I couldn't tell. Everyone behind the end zone cheered, so I cheered too. I guess he missed the kick.

In case anyone is wondering, going to the game took about 8 hours total. Counting only game time, it cost us $3.84 a minute to watch the game in person from "good" seats. I heard somewhere that in a 60 minute football game there are about only about 15 minutes of actual playing time. So, better make it $15.33 per minute of playing time. Anyway, the point to this story is that we had a good time, but if you're interested in watching the game, save the time and money. You get a much better seat at home and if you don't like what you hear or see, you can push the mute button or change the channel.

Probably the best part about the day are the pictures below. We were able to get a few good family and individual shots!

Like A Kid Again

A few weeks ago I heard a noise outside. I peeked out of the kitchen window and saw one of the boys (7 years old) from next door on his front porch. I had to watch him for awhile because I couldn't figure out what he was doing. He would grab something, stick it into something that made a grinding noise, and then would neatly place it in a box next to other "somethings". After about a minute or so I made the connection that school was starting in a few days and he was excitedly and proudly preparing his school supplies (sharpening pencils) for the upcoming school year.

Tonight I felt like a kid again. I had forgotten how much fun it is to draw on cement. Although I didn't have any colored chalk, an old pencil and pencil sharpener did just fine. I happily sketched out my masterpiece, using half of a pencil in the process. It was also fun to manually sharpen a pencil once again and watch the shavings fall to the floor. Tomorrow I am going to proudly show the drawing to my Mom. I guess some things never change.

Google Trends

I thought some of you might find this interesting. A few months back I stubled upon "Google Trends". It's basically a page where Google tracks the most searched for words, people, or phrases each day. It's a surprisingly interesting way to keep up with what's going on in the news and/or popular culture.

For example, did you know that today (Sept 19th) is International Talk Like a Pirate Day? I didn't think so! Yarrrrr! Ye better learn t’ talk like a seafarin’ hearty today or else ye`ll look like a fool!

Day 12

Over the past few days a fair amount of progress has been made. The drywall was hung, the corners rounded, and after all the mud was completed it was textured to match the rest of the house.

At this point, we've moved past what I would call the construction phase and moved into the finishing phase. Matt and Chris did some trim work today and hung the bathroom door. Additionally, they trimmed and built/hung the window ledges. By the end of next week, the walls will be painted and the carpet/flooring laid. We're getting very close!

Samsung 50 Inch Plasma

Every good basement needs one. For the past few years I've had my "pulse" on the television market. I knew that at some point in the near future I'd have the opportunity to setup our family room...aka our own movie theater...aka O'Slicky's Sports Bar and Grill.

Sunday was that day. I checked out Best Buy and saw this television on sale, 25% off the listed price. A few days after we bought it Best Buy increased the price $300. Very nice. Anyway, it's full 1080p, and has an astonishing 1 million to 1 contrast ratio. After looking around for awhile it was very clear that you get much more size for the money with plasma versus a LCD. In my personal opinion, the picture on a plasma is just as good if not better then an LCD anyway. HD television and my Playstation 3 (games and Blu-Ray) look amazing...and that's an understatement.

I realize it may seem weird to pose for a picture with your television, but the reason was so that you could see the proper scale. I know all the guys will appreciate this post. Once we've got the basement finished we'll have to have everyone over for a movie night or for the Superbowl.

As a funny side note, check out the picture with the white Toyota truck in it. I've never seen another white Toyota pickup with the same Toyota emblem in the center of the tailgate. Considering I added mine 12 years ago, I think this guy copied me. Amazing coincidence it was on the television at the same time we were taking these pictures.

Thank You...

...Colorado DOT - but probably more appropriately, Wilson Co.

This evening I drove home on Powers - my usual route. As usual, they were doing construction on the the Powers Woodmen overpass. When I got home I realized that something had gone terribly wrong. The sides of my truck had been covered in a hard, thick layer of tar (or sealant). It looks like someone has taken black paint and sprayed it all over the side of my truck. For those of you who have ever tried to clean off even the smallest speck of tar, you know how hard and how messy this is. I'm about to figure out how hard it will be to clean an entire vehicle covered in it.

In case this happened to anyone else, I found the following web page on the DOT website:

www.dot.state.co.us/powerswoodmen

There are contact names, phone numbers and an email address listed. I sent Wilson Co. an email with these pictures. I don't expect to hear from them, but at the very least they need to know what happened. Obviously, something was not done correctly. At the very minimum I hope they will fix whatever happened so that it doesn't happen again. I wonder how many people will be spending this Saturday scrubbing tar? 100? 500?

Aston Villa 2 -1 Tottenham

Arrrrrrrgh...I'm getting so sick of watching Spurs play. It's getting so bad that I'm seriously thinking about canceling Directv and going back to the old rabbit ears. In case you're wondering, after 4 games this season we are the only team to not yet win a game. We're dead last in the standings too. I know this is going to be a rebuilding year, and it will take time for our recently overhauled squad to get used to playing with each other. But, that doesn't make it any easier to watch.

The other reason why it's no fun to watch anymore is because the games are blurry. A few weeks ago I didn't know the difference. Then, I discovered that the local stations are now broadcasting their signals in high definition...for free...over rabbit ears! Maybe I'm the only one who didn't know that. Anyway, I pulled out an old set of rabbit ears from Radio Shack and hooked it up to my digital tv (i.e. flat screen). I was blown away by some of the HD NFL and college football games that have been on. In a weird way I feel like I have discovered a previously untapped gold mine and extracting the gold is free. Actually, it feels like I'm stealing something since cable and satellite companies charge you extra for HD on top of their basic package.

Back to Spurs. Anyway, as I was saying, it was so bad tonight that during the game I seriously considered switching over to whatever cheesy, bad sitcom was on. At least in HD it would have been prettier to watch then the garbage I had subjected myself to. There's something wrong with that.

Little Punkin'

On Saturday we headed down to Happy Apple Farm. Although all of the happy apples had already been picked, there were still a few "punkin's" left.

Day 8

The drywall was hung in one day! The next day, Friday, they finished the corners and put on the first coat of mud. We now have walls.