Burn, Baby, Burn!

It's official. We've given over our house to the local fire department and the big day is this Saturday.

The morning starts with volunteers fighting several pre-set fires upstairs, then they fight pre-set fires downstairs.

Eventually they get to the really good stuff: the structural fire that brings the whole house down.

A couple dozen volunteers will take part, and some of their family members will gather to watch.

The neighbors have all been informed, including the neighbor whose house is immediately adjacent to the leaping flames. They've been extremely receptive to having fire fighters clambor over their roof to station a live hose. Wouldn't you be?

We plan to camp out on the river side of the house, reading books and watching the fun. There should be a couple of great photo ops - like Brian with his back to the flames, smoking a cigarette. We'll see if I can sneak that in. He hates having his picture taken.

Today we finally resolved our issue with surveyors and surveying. The first surveyor did initial work, then "forgot to mention" the need for an additional $1500 worth of work they'd need to do. Duh oh! Game over.

The new surveyors had a good price and solid recommendations, but their contract was waaaay sketchy. Like, there's a retainer fee up front AND the work is C.O.D.? Why pay a retainer before they do the work if they have complete control over their work product? They basically have the power to withhold their results until I pay them. Seems like that should be enough.

Oh yes - and the big signs on the doors saying their lease is up and the space is for rent also made me reluctant to write them a big ol' check before they do any work.

Fortunately, we had a good, reasonable chat and hopefully things will get underway now.

There's a great deal going on these days. We should have house plans posted to an FTP site so you can see them soon. We're wrestling with all kinds of insulation, sound proofing and siding decisions, and I keep looking at the lot and wondering where on earth the house is going to go. It just doesn't seem like we can get the garage built on a slab-on-grade without bringing the house back toward the (very loud) road and away from the river.

But first things first. Let's burn this baby down!