Look - you can’t even tell the house had polka dots anymore :)
go us for finding leftover paint in the garage! (and a small amount of primer).
Of course, I did very little of it, since I am still not 100% (or really, even 70%), but that’s a discussion for another post. But go Joelle!
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As I mentioned previously, we wanted to beef up some of our insulation in the house (add more to the attic, and blow insulation into the previously un-insulated walls), especially as the energy company paid for most of it.
Well, yesterday was that day, and all went smoothly. I haven’t made it up to the attic yet to check out the new stuff (I’ll wait until I feel comfortable stepping on a ladder again), but it is pretty clear that the exterior blow-in insulation was done - our house looks like it has chicken pox! (or polka dots, if you will)
These dots (seen in the picture on the left - click on the link for a full image) are where they drilled in 1 1/4 inch holes into the siding and cavity, and then blew in the new insulation. They then plugged the hole up, patched it, and left it (we knew this was going to happen). These were done around the entire house, just about entirely on two 
straight lines of siding - a lower piece and a higher one (except under windows, as you can see).
Other than looking funny, this will be easy (albeit time consuming) to finish cleaning up - the next nice day (which is supposed to be tomorrow - 80 degrees, lasting through the weekend) - we need to lightly sand all of the holes and apply some exterior primer. Once that dries, a quick paint should fix it right up (which is why it’s really nice these are all in the same level of sidings - we’ll be able to go straight across).
The true measure of all of this, of course, will have to wait until the next winter when we see the reductions in our gas bill.
I have already felt our furnace working less, though, so that part, at least incidentally, seems to be working!
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A couple key updates on things - one involving my nervous system, and one involving the nervous system of the house
- One of the projects we had in mind when we purchased the house was to update the electricity to modern standards; our home inspector had told us that we had nothing to worry about, but we were still about 20-25% knob and tube electricity (basically the old electricity used prior to 1930). Researching online, it’s actually relatively safe, but has a couple of problems:
- Insurance companies don’t love it; it has a theoretical possibility of burning down if rats, etc… eat through the wiring (or if amateurs do poor repairs). Many won’t cover houses with Knob and Tube. We were able to find a bunch of companies that did, but we ended up with a company who asked us to promise that “over time” we’d clean up the electricity. Technically we did that even prior to this work - we had some general electrical cleanup done right away (paid for by sellers inspection money), and they replaced some of wires with newer, romax, wiring. But now it’s all gone, so insurance won’t be a problem in the future.
- By code, you can’t put in new insulation on top of Knob and Tube - that’s a definite fire hazard. After seeing our gas bills for this winter, and knowing that Puget Sound Energy would cover much of the insulation work as part of their weatherization rebate program, I really wanted to beef up our attic insulation and install wall insulation on our main floor (there is none now). To do that, first though, we needed to get rid of the old wiring.
- It doesn’t have a grounding wire, which isn’t good for computers, as they discharge static electricity through the ground wire… We were fine, as we just use some of the plugs that had been updated, but now we can use any of the plugs in the house :)
- So now we are all up to date and good to go; the insulation work is scheduled to be done next week (it was supposed to be this week, but delayed due to my back issues….)
- My nervous system - that’s a different issue - I alluded to it in the previous post on dog parks - it’s impacted my ability to walk more than a couple of minutes, but should heal completely at some point. Can’t wait until this gets better!
- This all started about a month ago, with some pretty acute back pain and left leg pain. After seeing my doctor, following his advice on ibuprofen and physical therapy, then steroids and lay-on-the-floor-rest, nothing was making it better - in fact, the pain moved to my right leg pretty strongly, and my right foot went numb - I haven’t felt it in a week! I saw a few other people (chiropractor, a new general physician, taking an MRI), and finally, an orthopedic specialist.
- Turns out, I have a ruptured (or herniated) disc in my lower back, which is pinching a nerve, causing sciatica (and thus, leg and foot weakness and tingling) which has been pretty annoying to have - I miss feeling my pinky toe :)
- Next step, along with more rest and vicodin to relieve pain, is to get an epidural steroid injection (another good info sheet can be found here) on Thursday, hoping this helps… the goal is to release pressure on the back, and hope that the disc starts to heal. Often, people feel better within 3 days - praying this is true!
- Things I have learned:
- Working from home is productive and useful for a day or two. After a couple of days, it’s really hard to keep up with what’s going on in the office as so much occurs outside the scope of emails (and phone calls are hard to hold too many meetings by…)
- Everyone at work has been super great with everything. thanks all!
- I need more minutes on my cell phone plan (or else get a home phone - we are considering T-Mobile’s Talk Forever service, as we have T-Mobile’s family plan for our cell service). Given the amount of calls to work and to doctors, we’re running out of our monthly allotment!
- First time I’ve ever called into the on-call doctor over a weekend (as opposed to going into ER). They got back to us pretty quickly to get us vicodin, which was great. What was funny was that since my (new) general family doctor is part of a family clinic that serves both adults and children, they sent my request over to an adult physician and to Children’s Hospital. So we got a call back from a doctor at Children’s at first, and she stated: “I don’t know how to help you. You’re 29!”
Luckily, the adult physician also called back and was able to get me the pain-meds I needed! - There is very little good on television, no matter how many channels we get!
- I have a temporary disabled parking permit - haven’t actually used it too much yet, but it’s helpful - of course, since I can’t drive right now, it is just as easy to have Joelle drop me off at the door and park in a standard spot, but it’s a nice fallback to have in case we need to go anywhere.
- Passover seders are a lot tougher when you have to stand up the whole time! (sitting hurts…)
- Joelle is fantastic - nothing new here - but she’s taken care of everything for me (and for Molly) this past month - it has been a lot of work, I know. Thank you honey!
- Working from home is productive and useful for a day or two. After a couple of days, it’s really hard to keep up with what’s going on in the office as so much occurs outside the scope of emails (and phone calls are hard to hold too many meetings by…)