Renovate Your Bathroom; Wreck Your Life

My world thickens in daily layers of dust.

Saw, sheetrock, saw, joint compound, ceramic tile, saw.

I’m an archeological dig in reverse.

Indiana, where are you? Be not afraid, Dr. Jones -- the only snake here is easily charmed by my plumber. At $45 an hour.

So if you plan to renovate a bathroom, here are some important things to know beforehand:

• It costs how much?!
• For every one room you renovate, expect at least two other rooms to be adversely affected for the duration of the construction period. Generally, these will be the rooms you spend most of your waking or sleeping hours in. In my case, both.
• Temporary walls of plastic sheeting do not a bedroom make.

• If you are renovating a second-floor bathroom, repeat after with me: Acrylic, in-laid tub – good; cast-iron standalone tub – holy hernias!
• If your desk is on the floor directly below that cast-iron tub, up your life insurance. Just in case.
• Vanilla yogurt stains on your shorts send the wrong message to construction personnel.
• That message is not as bad the one you send them when you have fresh vanilla yogurt dribbling down your chin.
• Stop telling me to think about the future resale value. At these prices, I plan to be entombed in this flippin’ bathroom.
• Can you tell the difference between a new toilet and the old toilet with a new seat and lid. I thought not.
• Avoid backing into your subcontractors’ cars.

• If you do back into one of your subcontractors’ cars, pray it’s the guy doing the drywalling. Even I have hung, taped and mudded drywall, so how badly can he screw you over to exact revenge?
• Say, where are my car keys? And the dog?
• The air conditioner guy is not a plumber no matter how convincing he sounds telling you about needing a second hot water tank to meet your new showerhead’s output.
• But just to be safe, double check the gallons per minute rating on the manufacturer’s spec sheet. Boo-yah!
• The difference in color between ivory and isabelline grout is nearly impossible to distinguish with the naked eye in daylight. However, your  spouse will.
• Heated towel racks are a nice luxury. Placing them across the room from the shower is pointless. Trying to even out the error with radiant heated floor tiles – yeah, nice try.
• Are you serious? How FRICKIN’ much?
• In the end, time waits for no man -- especially the repairman. Get what you pay for the first time.

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