Thursday, December 11, 2008

The tale of the amazing administrator

Once upon a time there was a little house to be in the burbs that had a nice little stockpile of tiles set aside for the summer. Then one day, the big bad tile company came and took the tiles away. The little house was devastated - "Oh no, those tiles were perfect, what am I to do now?".

The little house then had an idea! It made a wish and presto - along came the amazing administrator. The amazing administrator waved her magic wand and made those tiles reappear.

Of course, then everyone lived happily ever after (in the little house) with their perfect tiles and had nothing but happy thoughts for the magical powers of the amazing administrator.

...in other words "D" has gone above and beyond and found our missing tiles. Thanks heaps "D" you have saved the day!

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Our faith has been restored

Happy to report some good news. We have amicably resolved our staircase issue with PD, thanks to the efforts of "T" and thankfully some good, old fashioned common sense from all involved. Our staircase will proceed as planned and our SS has advised the alterations shouldn't hold up the build too much as he can work around them. Thanks for all your support and helpful hints with this issue. ..and thanks to PD for resolving the issue so professionally.

Slight prob with the tiles now unfortunately. We all know Urban Earth has been discontinued but our administrator had assured us she had some of the last stock put aside for our use. Unfortunately, now the time has come to lay the tiles, it seems someone has taken the last of the Urban Earth - no special little stockpile for the Gang! So we may now have to find a replacement tile. Our administrator is on the job trying to find exactly where National Tiles have lost our stock pile. Has anyone seen it?

That's all for now really - other than our SS has told us the internal scaffolding was put up today to finish off the plaster work in the foyer.

Will post some pics once we can get back in the house.

Sunday, December 7, 2008

A slow couple of weeks

Did Christmas start early for PD in the East? It certainly has at our place with pretty much no one on site for the last two weeks. Of course when the rat's away the mice will play and I guess it is just the fall out from our SS being away for a week.

Although we have had no tradies on site, things started moving again on Thursday when we had a site meeting with the Construction Manager to discuss the staircase issue. It was terrific that PD sent out a senior manager for us to discuss the issue with. However, we seem to have differing views on what we paid for and what we have received so far. As it stands now, "T" has taken the issues back to the office to consider and will work out where we go from here. Hopefully we will hear back from him tomorrow?

Friday saw a call from our SS with a plaster update. Unfortunately more bad news there as he is very unhappy with the standard of the stopping up. He said he spent two hours marking up all the faults. Two hours - that sounds scary. Glad he is on top of the issue and hope he can bring it up to a reasonable standard. Of course this means more delays because the painting will be at a standstill until he is happy with the plaster. On the good news front, he believes the tilers will be working over Christmas so we may make up some ground there.

We also saw someone on site yesterday and it appeared to be the plasterer? He was not due back until Tuesday - obviously wanted to make an early start.

We were able to take a couple of pics on the phone to show the painting. Ceilings are white of course and walls are Reiki....


Monday, December 1, 2008

A break in

I guess it had to happen, we have had a break in late afternoon today. As far as we can put together, it happened between 6-7pm. Someone has broken in through a back window and checked out the entire house. No damage has been done but they have ripped off protective sheets from most cupboards and have had a good look through the place. Our best guess is that it is a builder coming in for a bit of a sticky. They also broke into the house next door and did much the same thing. At least nothing has been stolen or broken but they did leave all doors unlocked.

In terms of progress, because the doors were open we were able to get in ourselves and noted
- house looks like the scene from ET when they cover the house with plastic. All windows, doors and cupboards are covered up.
- first coat of paint has been applied via spraying as opposed brushing. Is this how it is done these days?
- some architraves and skirts are still missing
- staircase posts (which of course should have been SS) have been painted
- staircase base plate has been painted when it should have been stained
- many marks have been placed on the walls where the plaster is NQR

Progress has been slow again this week as our SS has taken a much needed week off to get married. Congrats N, hope all went well.

No reply on the staircase issue as yet - expecting something back by Wednesday once our administrator has a chance to chat with N.

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