Best Of

I went over today to meet with my plumber—alas, though water pressure from the city supply is fine, the shower riser is shot (dates back to at least the '50s) and they'd have to break through the dining room wall, which was just drywalled & painted, to get to it. We did without that tub & shower for almost 15 years, so we can wait till it's time to sell. Meanwhile, I found that the construction crew broke not only the sink faucet but also the toilet sear (those beefy guys actually cracked it). I had to pay for new tub spigot cartridges too, which are useless till we can get the tub & shower working again. I could have bought a faucet and had my plumber install it…for $450 plus the cost of the faucet. Nuh-uh: will tell the crew "you break it, you bought it." The fridges & stove still haven't been brought back, much less installed. (Wonder where they found my dishwasher, which they did reinstall and does work). And there's still no water line for the icemaker/water dispenser.

I spoke to the contractor/public adjuster today and he tried to weasel out by telling me all the stuff they did that was an improvement over the pre-fire conditions (new kitchen cabinets, black granite to replace the old peeling white Formica, and rehab the basement toilet & shower to bring it up to code). Not that I would make my guests descend into the grungy unfinished basement to take a shower, though the rehabbed bathroom itself is nice. (He claimed that code compliance for violations that pre-dated the fire isn't covered, but that's not what the specs said, and my policy actually has coverage for code compliance). Meanwhile, I discovered they'll have to adjust the shelves in at least two upper cabinets—they're too short to accommodate cereal boxes. It's just a matter of moving the brackets up a couple of notches, but it's still annoying. The top shelves are too high to accommodate anything we use regularly. The final list of what they allegedly did included not just blinds but even their type and materials. I brought this up over the phone but he's busy the rest of the week so can't meet with us till at least 6/30—I'm furious at State Farm for not covering our rent past then, because the house obviously won't be in move-back condition till the second week of July at best (and heaven knows when the city will even inspect & grant the Certificate of Occupancy)? State Farm says that's the contractor's problem, not theirs—and that it's up to me to get reimbursed. No way the contractor will fork over the extra month's rent—I'll be lucky to be able to hold them to what they claimed they already did.

Meanwhile, I found out that the $8500 we're paying FHS for July is not out of line for a 3BR/2.5BA house on the North Shore—2BR apts in Wilmette are going for $6K/mo., and in Winnetka $9K—those are apts., not houses. Bob still thinks we should make an offer (we wouldn't need a mortgage), but I don't need two sets of property taxes, insurance, utilities and maintenance costs. And I'm not sure the owner would want to sell his cash cow.

I was going to print out the attachments with the final tallies & specs to bring with me next week, but I think I'll just e-mail them to the contractor instead. Why should I have to expend the time, paper and ink cartridges? I can also just bring my iPad which can open the attachments.

Measured the master bedroom & first floor windows for shades & blinds. Thursday after my online shrink appt. I'll measure the rest, then touch base with the window decorator from Angi with measurements. Wish I'd taken pix of the way the treatments looked before the pack-out & demolition: the pack-out crew did, but their camera was stolen. Going over with Bob tomorrow to Abt & Hassle-Less (maybe the Dump too) to try out beds. Not gonna buy anything I haven't at least tried to nap on. But of course we can't have anything delivered till the rooms are empty. Out of desperation, I may even move the junk pile to the other side of the master BR so enough of the floor will be clear to accommodate a new bed (ideally, split king adjustable base).

Reading all of your post-construction adventures, I harbor no illusions about whether they'll clean up after themselves (despite the final tally containing charges for doing so). I will use my Ukrainian cleaning service—they're fast, thorough & reasonable and they do both move-out and move-in cleanings too. (They keep bringing me "tea bombs" too). I hope that going forward they'll be willing to come to Edgewater weekly. They're gems.

Meanwhile, the property tax appeal firm says that due to the specifics of the condition of the house, they wouldn't be a good fit for me because they're just a tech firm using an algorithm of "comparables." They suggested a law firm I had contemplated using, but also suggested I might be able save a fee by doing the appeal pro se now that the online process is more efficient than back in the day when I used to do appeals in my practice (hard-copy everything, including Polaroids).

Speaking of the heat wave, our ACs (central here, window units at the house) are handling it, though I may have to replace a couple. Not so for three hospitals in the city: Provident in "Bronzeville," Weiss in Uptown (where my late PCP practiced before decamping in disgust to St. Joseph's) and the sister hospital, West Suburban in Oak Park, where the Weiss patients were sent. What a nightmare!