The cats are mad at me because I had workers here this week, and I can't say that I blame them. I'm mad that I had to have them here too. I hired a contractor who fucked up, so now I'm having to pay to have things un-fucked up, and it's been a long, slow, expensive process.

That's ongoing.

But don't tell Jake and Jenny that. And speaking of...

Jake follows me around the house and chirps at me when he's mad. And then he hovers...

Fortunately, all I have to say is "Do you want a treat? Is it treat time?" and he forgets about being mad...

Jenny hangs around to be petted, but resents me for it...

Which is better than yesterday when she wouldn't even look at me...

Next week I am hoping that I can get a plumber here to finish up my bathroom so I can be done with it and start saving money to have the downstairs repaired.

And then? I really, really hope that I am done with home repairs for a little while.

=sigh=

The last thing I'm going to do is complain about being a homeowner. First of all, I feel grateful that I even have a home. Second of all, the cost to rent an apartment in my parts is even higher than my mortgage payment. Like a lot higher.

But holy shit have I had my share of costs when it comes to my seven-year-old home purchase (A list of the absurd amount of repairs is here).

When I bought the place, I had a hugely expensive renovation to make it safer for my mother to inhabit with her dementia. From there it's been a non-stop parade of problems. The worst of which is my shitty upstairs shower leaking downstairs. And it ain't no old shower... it was installed just six years ago and was likely leaking since Day One (but I only found out about it four years ago as it worsened). I spent thousands of dollars just to get it diagnosed, and even then they're not 100% sure that it was a leak from the drain plumbing which is what they suspected. Which means they ended up having to rip it all out so I can start over...

The demo guys noted that the shower pan was made of something spongey... the likes of which they have never seen. So fuck my old contractor for that. And fuck my old plumber for doing a shitty job that's been leaking. And of course insurance is denying my claim, because they don't cover "slow leaks," only a "sudden catastrophic leak," which fucking sucks.

This time I'm not dicking around. I'm going to find a metal shower pan myself and hire the expensive plumbers I use for everything because they aren't incompetent.

This popped up in my social media this morning, and I felt it to my core...

This is very quickly becoming me. I don't dare ponder what could go wrong next, despite my already having fixed or redone the whole place by now. I think the best I can hope for is that I at least get to complete what's currently fucked before the next thing goes wrong.

Oh what a glorious day!

The sun is out. All my clothes are washed. The kitchen has been cleaned. My groceries have been ordered. What more could I want?

OH YEAH! THE GIANT HOLE IN MY LIVING ROOM WALL HAS BEEN REPAIRED!!

So tell me honestly. Are two turbo-fans running on high speed enough to dissuade my cats from rubbing up against a freshly-painted wall... or am I coming home to two white cats where I originally had an orange one and a grey one?

Home ownership... am I right?

Today I got the worst news possible... the upstairs shower, which has started leaking again (and it's worse than ever)... will have to be entirely torn out so they can replace everything the original plumber did. The pipes. The pan. Everything. Which means I will, of course end up having to re-tile and re-paint. Lord only knows how much that's going to cost.

Let's see what this brings us to in seven years of owning a home, shall we? And this is after the complete renovation I had already paid for when I bought the place...

• Repair hardwood floors because the hugely expensive hardwood I bought was flawed.
• Tear out wall strips that were buckling.
• Rewire electrical once half my kitchen stopped working.
• Fix the kitchen plumbing, which was so poorly done that the plumber thought it was a joke.
• Tear out all the smart light switches because the company went under.
• Rip out the guest bath due to leak from above shower (ONGOING!).
• Rip out the guest bedroom changing area due to leak from above shower (ONGOING!).
• Add electrical outlet to laundry room because it didn't have one(?!?).
• Replace hot water heater.
• Replace HVAC compressor and blower with heat pump and blower.
• Rip out living room wall to access noisy HVAC return lines that were badly clamped to the studs so I could completely reinstall everything and add soundproofing (ONGOING!).
• Rip out automated sprinkler lines to reposition since they added a service box that blocks them (STILL WAITING ON A CONTRACTOR).

I am positively terrified as to how much this all cost me. A big thank you to my original contractor, who is responsible for half this mess.

Good thing I'm not going on vacations any more. I couldn't afford it.

The good news is that the massive hole in my living room wall is very close to being fixed...

Later today they skim-coat to level everything out.. Then tomorrow morning they prime it. Then tomorrow afternoon they paint.

And how happy will I be that one of four ongoing projects (soon to be five) will be checked off my list?

Very.