Well, we finally got our slate from NY today. This is the slate trim for our fireplace mantel and half bath counter from Vermont Natural Stone.
I've never seen such an incompetent shipping company as SAIA. Late last week, the shipment arrived and since it weighs so much we re-routed it to go straight to the new house scheduled for this past Monday. However, the dispatcher failed to notify the trucker and it was loaded on a truck Friday. The trucker called in a huff Friday afternoon to ask what was going on and I said we had rescheduled it for Monday. I should have known better. In fact, right after I hung up I got a real bad feeling and tried calling the trucker back to just have him drop it off but was unsuccessful.
The next thing I know, Monday rolls around and SAIA tell me they have lost our freight. I don't know, it's kind of hard to lose 1,000 pounds of slate but these nimrods did it. It took 4 more days before finally "locating it", after who knows where it had been, probably rolling around all over the Bay Area rattling in the back of a truck. My hunch was that it would be a disasater delivery.
Sure enough, it showed up today and my builder Brian calls me up to say you better get out here quickly, the slate arrived. Oh crap. I race over there and its sprawled out in the back of the truck with one of the straps holding it to the pallet broken and pieces all broken and damaged. I called Vermont Stone and they said to refuse the whole thing and they would take charge from then, which I did. That did very little to comfort me knowing it took two and a half months to custom make it and get it out here in the first place. It was scheduled to be installed right now and I'm sure this will delay us, especially the half bath that needs the counter.
Vermont Stone said they are working on another batch and they assure me it will be done in a couple of weeks on rush order. They certainly could have done a better job packing it up, instead of placing it on a pallet with cardboard between the pieces. I guess I'm angry on two fronts, but I have to say...NEVER use SAIA, they are incompetent. In my 20 years of shipping stuff now, only Fedex ground (my dishwasher that got trashed earlier this year) comes close on poor handling. Absolutely pathetic.
Other than this unfortunate incident, things have been progressing well inside the house. The drywall is all plastered and sanded. The crown and trim is up throughout the house - looks fabomundo. Our painter Jason is spraying the walls with a primer coat, actually a mud like coat first to smooth it all out to a level 4 finish, almost like an auto finish. The interior doors are all in. Brian spent several days putting these in...at one point saying he forgot how many doors there were in the plan, quite sick of it! Good job!
The garden wall work continues and massive load of paver bricks arrived but the rainy weather the last couple of days made a mud pit of the back yard. Despite the mud, they are still working away. The Structural FX crew also tackled concrete along the side of the house to finish putting the level back to original grade.
We also spent a very productive hour with our interior designer Nancy Linebarier picking colors for all the rooms. We brought everything we could carry in a laundry basket - tile and granite samples, fabrics, cabinet doors etc since we have nothing at the house, to try to match things up as best as possible. It worked out quite well. We had picked up a color fan from Benjamin Moore beforehand and this allowed us to quickly narrow the choices. They cost about $10 at your local paint store.
Saturday we are picking up our granite counters from Jerong and Uni-tile with Brian's help. Next week - more painting, hopefully the solar panels go up, paver bricks for the driveway, completing of the scratch coat on the outside, leveling the back yard after the retaining walls are done, maybe some tile work will start in the bathrooms.
Any day now I expect there to be a massive outflux of finishing materials from our rental house garages. Brian is shooting for November 20th for the granite counters to be installed which means the hardwood floors and cabinets all need to be up. I'll be amazed if it all gets done by then, it seems like a lot of work still to finish on the inside. We need it to move, our furniture is arriving and stacking up in the living room!
