Sunkist Drive: In the beginning.. there was carpet...

Today was our first official day of home renovation. We started off the day by making the first of which I'm sure will be several stops at Home Depot. Home Depot is one of those places, much like Target, where you go in for a few items, end up getting a few more than you anticipated, and end up spending three times what you intended on spending in the first place. So, after a few cheap pairs of leather gloves, some masks, a respirator (for future possible asbestos filled projects), and a broom, we were on our way.

When we were driving up we looked out the car window and admired the beautiful view when all of the sudden *swoop*... we saw two large hawks. Hawks are amazing animals and my initial response was to be elated at the realization that we were finally going to live somewhere with more nature than the Trader Joes' Orchids we continuously nurse to death; then it dawned on me. Hawks are not so good when you have- oh let's say- a tiny black dog that more closely resembles a rabbit? KCA and I decided that Dude would not be hanging out front without supervision. We did talk about the idea that Annie would serve as a deterrent to hawks trying to prey on Dude, but then also realized that Annie would probably allow him to turn into hawk food if she was preoccupied with so much as an itch. So for now Dude stays inside.

We pulled into the car port, and soon thereafter Catman appeared. He has a mysterious way of showing up immediately after we arrive every time. Catman is a neighbor who has designated "feeding spots" for cats all over our neighborhood. He is an older gentleman, who is pretty flamboyant, small in stature, and has an affinity for short shorts. Let's not forget to mention he has an excessive amount of hair everywhere... except for his head. He knows everyone and everything that happens in our neighborhood; we still haven't figured out if that's good or bad. Today he filled us in on the "kitty situation" as he calls it. Apparently we have 5 cats currently living on our property; he informed us that he was able to trap one once, in hopes of giving it a good home, but decided to surrender it when it wouldn't settle down in the trap. So in hopes to neither displace the cats nor get on Catman's bad side we have continued to let our house function as a "feeding spot". We did make one small request that the 3 cats beds relocate to further away from the front door, where they would be less likely to result in an asthma attack.

A few minutes after we showed up so did our contractor AT, SML and Sey. AT came to do another walk through since he hadn't seen it since he first came out, which we all know was SEVERAL months before. We actually greeted him with profuse apologies. We are lucky that throughout all of this although we did at times THINK our contractors were going to walk away, that they didn't. He even joked that most contractors he knew would've been out.

KCA did the walk through and SML and I got started on the carpet. We got it down to a system and had it out in no time. In the mean time Dude was locked up in the kitchen (he's adjusting to life in a bubble well I'd say...) and Annie and Sey hung out out front where they proceeded to take turns sitting on top of the rapidly growing carpet pile.

By the end of the day we were totally exhausted but pretty much carpet free, much to SMLs hard core carpet ripping out skills. Thanks SML! And the only major road block we encountered was when Annie tried to jump out of the second-story living room window... mmhmm. (we'll be looking into screens)

Here are some pictures of the dirty lime green carpet that was EVERYWHERE!