Tag: contractor hell

Backsplash Success

Wolsey2 Comments

Remember that disaster contractor I had back when I moved in a year ago?

To recap, I had hired this grifter to remove a floor to ceiling skinny cabinet, install my dishwasher in it’s place, lay a butcher block counter across the cabinets instead of the plastic countertops, build a cabinet box on the other side of the dishwasher, and then install a sink, a hot water dispenser, and the faucets.

I found him on Angi’s List and it was so bad, I won a judgment against him for the work he screwed up. It’s just stunning. I basically had to redo all his work, or fix his work, because it was so terrible.

One of the things that killed me was that he installed the butcher block backsplashes crooked with up to 3/8ths between the back splash and the counters, and cut all the backsplashes short from the counters.

His work as a self professed “finish carpenter.”

Every edge was like this. It’s like he didn’t take his saw blade position in account when he cut the backsplashes.
The backsplash was raised up at least 3/8″ off the counters.

Turns out the backsplashes were super easy to pop off. They were held on with white silicone sealant which scrapped off super easy.

Blobs of silicone sealant I just scraped off the backsplashes after I popped them off.

The galling thing was I had an entire new board he could have used in case he’d made mistakes and had told him to use it freely, and I didn’t care because I could not return it.

Before I cut any new boards, I dry fitted the existing boards he had across the back, with the biggest gaps, and I’ll be damned if it didn’t just sit fine? Like no gaps. He’d just installed it crooked and running upwards at an angle.

I’d asked him about the gaps when I saw it the day of the install, and he’d told me “you have to expect irregularities in wood and it would not be perfect.” He’d also told me he was a finish carpenter, so that was a fascinating bit of bullshit. I told him I needed it fixed and he said it was impossible.

I am a total amateur, but if I can fit the backsplash pieces better than a self professed finish carpenter, I think I have some issues with his credentials.

I was able to recycle most of the pieces of backsplash, use some liquid nails and finish nails, and cut them to the right length. I even filled the nail holes, and sealed it with clear silicone sealer across all the edges, especially behind the sink where water is a concern.

I guess my amateur self can cut wood to length.

I paid him a lot, and he took advantage of my wife and I because I guess I was too forthcoming with having a disability that prevented me from doing the work. He never paid us the settlement he owed from arbitration with Angi’s List, either. They eventually yanked his business from the site.

No gaps.

The side piece was a bit wonky, so I scribed it, and made it fit. It was the first time I have ever done that. It took me 20 minutes to fix it so it had no gaps.

My wife came in and said it best. We were not looking for perfection at all, but we could have done it together with just me directing and her helping and get this result the first time.

I guess I was really lucky I could afford to take the hit financially, and had the ability to fix it myself when it was clear there was a problem. I don’t know how long I have where I can work like this with my degenerative joint issues, but at least for now I can. I am grateful for that.

I am also grateful that I can now look at my kitchen counters and know it’s done. They may not be finish carpenter level, but they are good enough. That’s all I ever wanted.

The last thing I need to do, is have the electrician we have coming in this year look at his electrical install of the dishwasher and make sure it’s not a problem. Then I will be able to put this all behind me. 

Anxiety – Night Terrors

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-This was originally posted on Tumblr on 1/20/23.

I have a long history of night terrors and incredibly life-like PTSD dreams. I’d like to thank my family when I was a kid in the 80s and having to survive on my own as a teen, sometimes homeless. Nobody is on their own as a 16 year old if your family is a good one.

I am in my 50s now. The super clear nightmares are very rare these days, but when I go through stressful events, I have night terrors and I wake up screaming.

This unsettles my wife and my cat, and I am left with a hazy feeling of fear and unease. I don’t don’t remember dreams for this these days. That’s probably for the best, really.

I suspect the stress of the contractor mess, combined with my history means last night my anxiety was like, “Go get him!”

This morning, I came out and looked at my kitchen sink, which is perfectly sealed (by me), my counters sanded and oiled (by me), my dishwasher properly installed (by me), and the under sink plumbing perfectly done (By plumber Jimmy) and sighed in relief. The nightmare is over, and my house is not ruined.

It’s funny how I never thought I’d own a home. I accidentally lucked into buying this one. I feel at any minute, someone could take it all away. That overhead anxiety about the move and all this is not easy.

Adding this contractor disaster? That was just too much.

It’s causing all my minor concerns to be an anxious mess. I talked to my therapist about it. I finally have a good one, and he was reassuring me that with my background (homeless queer kid in the 80s) it’s normal to have anxieties and reactions like this to high stress.

I guess I never thought of it that way. We talked about how if you have PTSD and anxiety that it’s okay to take measures to reduce that, even if others might not understand. Like I am going to have electricity run to my shed next year (was going to be this year until I had to pay to fix the contractor’s shit) because I am unaccountably terrorized by the dark in the shed at night. I know why. It’s related to my childhood, but I am 51. I wish it still didn’t affect me, and the spector of my father didn’t still haunt me.

My therapist said you’d be gentle with others if it was them, but you have no patience for yourself. I guess we all do that. We don’t give ourselves space to exist in our own heads.

So I guess if I am 51 and can forget, here’s a reminder to others.

Contractor Disaster Conclusion & Why hiring tradespeople while trans is terrifying or why I need a lesbian contractor.

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This was originally posted on 1/14/23 on Tumblr, after I had to do some clean up work after a contractor I hired messed up my home to a shocking degree. I had hired the contractor because I have a degenerative condition and can’t really do it easily anymore due to this.

I got the sink seated on my counters and sealed with silicone despite the contractor’s assurances that nobody seals their kitchen sink anymore. Each job was one panic attack at a time. Then I realized the plumbing under the sink was insane. Like the Three Stooges image above, every time I tried to tighten something, another part leaked or fell apart.

So my wife hired Beacon Plumbing and TL/DR, $722 later, we are good.

The longer version is my wife called and set it up, and the plumber, Jimmy, was here within 1.5 hours, but I didn’t actually correct him when he assumed I was my wife. She has a masculine voice and a gender-neutral name. She is also visibly transgender and hid in the back room because she was in her PJs and had no makeup on and didn’t want to shave and look cis presentable to a stranger.

While I was happy to roll the dice with the plumber and hope he wasn’t a bigot, my wife was just not up to it after dealing with the contractor. This is what happens when you are visibly trans. You just don’t know how someone will react to you and if it’s something super important? You might opt to obscure the fact that you are trans.

Jimmy was a conservative, but “Not like those crazy bastards!” per our conversations, but my wife just didn’t want to chance it. After the contractor and the issue with him? She was exhausted. I just don’t blame her, so I put on my cis-passing mannerisms, and acted as straight as I could. I think Jimmy would have been fine, but we were exhausted.

Jimmy was a plumbing fucking hero, though. I will definitely call him for anything else. I can’t believe how great he was.

Of note, he took pictures of the plumbing and posted them to a boomer-aged FB group for plumbing fails. In the 1.5 hours he was here fixing things, it kept binging on his phone with snarky boomer-aged plumbers just taking the piss out of how bad it was. Apparently, it was quite popular.

I have a picture diagram:

Basically, it was so bad it never would have drained properly and probably fallen apart with use. Jimmy tightened everything up and fixed things so they would work. As a bonus, my drains now actually drain instead of slowly swirling forever like the contractor left them. Nice.

I paid the man $722 to fix this. I already paid the nightmare contractor $5000ish. This is so far over our budget that it’s insane. Thank god we have a VISA. Otherwise, this would have been critically fucked for our house.

Another side effect of all this is I am sore as fuck. The reason I hired someone was that I am not physically able to do this shit anymore. I have a disability. Yet, there I was, panic-fixing the sink, reinstalling the dishwasher, and sanding and fixing the counter joins as best as could be done. It’s just nuts. I think I still have to shim the counter where the sink is, so there is no flex. Like WTF?! This contractor was a moron and I can’t believe he thinks this is okay.

I can’t help but wonder if my contractor felt fucking us over was permissible becuase we are trans and queer? I mean, he’s a grifter, that is for sure, but we presented as a trans couple, and while not actively an issue, he was shocked to find out I was trans. I think he screws everyone over, but again, in this political climate? It’s hard not to wonder.

He also would not acknowledge or speak to my wife, and we could not tell if he was a sexist jackass or if it was because she was trans. Being visibly transgender means that it is always a question for her.

My wife heard of a local contractor company that was run by lesbians. First, lesbians get shit done in the world on an epic level, and second, we’d feel more comfortable working with someone from our own LGBTQ community. It would feel safer.

We will look into that in the future so my wife doesn’t feel like she will have to hide in a back room while I pretend to be her.

Still, Jimmy was a goddammed hero.

I don’t think we will ever even find this asshole to recoup losses, but since I found him on Angi’s List, I will call them and let them know what happened. I can at least put an effort into preventing him from fleecing someone else off there.