oh crap, nine days since my last entry!!!

Ok, I've been a very bad little blogger. I'd love to tell you it's because I've been SO busy renovatin' and stuff, but that'd only be partially true. I HAVE made some nice progress, but I also must admit that the appearance of Netflix on my laptop+three seasons of Breaking Bad have dented my motivation. Also been out seeing bands (that I'll hopefully work with soon), buying a warm jacket, replacing broken MacBook power thingee, etc. etc. blah. Anyhow...

The concrete floors are done, finally. Took them about two weeks, and though it's not 100% perfect, it's pretty cool. The problems aren't the fault of the guys who did it, they're the fault of previous owners- the house had carpet in the living room and halls at some point, so the tack strips (the things that hold the carpet in place at the edges of the floor) made some nasty divits in the concrete, and though they could fill them, they couldn't really polish them, so there are scads of little light gray marks. That said, it's still pretty neat, mostly super smooth and has lots of nifty patina. The foyer must have had tile, because those marks are a result of oxygen escaping through grout differently than the tile itself, but they don't bother me. It's really cold (and I don't own fuzzy slippers... make that any slippers), but I'm guessing that's gonna be a plus come summertime. Bonus points if you can spot Lester twice.

In the meantime, I've been hammering away (while, screwing really, but that kind of gives the wrong idea) at the wall framing for the studio soundbooth. This went relatively smooth, and I couldn't have done it without the help of my friend John who was there to tell me when I was being stupid. He also helped me set it in place, which is certainly not a one-man job. My original plan was to built it such that the top 2x4 would snugly rest against the ceiling tile, but I realized this was a bad plan, because the acoustic ceiling tiles are about 3/4" thick, and probably not very soundproof, so this would've likely defeated the purpose of trying to build a (relatively) soundproof booth. Instead, I drew thick pencil lines across the tiles with a straight edge, cut them with a utility knife and removed a "channel"  of the tiles about six inches wide so that the frame could press up against the ceiling drywall instead. I had to make it wider than a 2x4 because the idea was to stand the semi-built frame up from the back, so we needed some clearance for the top to swing into place (hope that made sense). However, I cut the "extra" in the back side, so from the front, the drywall will butt up against the ceiling tiles and look nice. In reality we could've built the entire frame on the ground prior to swinging it up into place, but I was paranoid about getting the dimensions just right, so we just put together the top, bottom and sides then stood it up and screwed it into place. Luckily it went in just right and I built the rest with it standing up. The double-framed rectangle on the right will hold two panes of 1/4" glass (so angry female singers can flip me off when I'm riding them to do the 46th take because a note was out of tune even though I'm gonna fix it in the computer anyway). The pre-hung door will be immediately to the left of the window. It's only going to be 24" wide, but I'm still waiting for it to arrive, and I'd rather build the framing around it (so I don't mess up dimensions), thus all the door framing is currently missing. I'm also going to have to sawzall out the bottom 2x4 for the door, but we left it in because I wasn't exactly sure of the dimensions and we figured it'd be a lot harder to wrestle the frame in place with a big chunk missing. Shouldn't really matter too much if I nick the floorboards when I cut because the laminate wood floor will hide any damage. Hard to tell from the pic, but there's another three feet or so on the right side, so this is going to be a big vocal booth- really bigger than I need. But I intentionally put the door in the middle so that I could use the area on the left for storing guitar cases and stuff- irregular shaped objects are actually a plus because they act as random sound diffusers in a small space, theoretically, anyway (this is why you always see those weird wood panels with squares of differing heights on the back walls of audio mastering rooms). Anyway, the door should arrive pretty soon, then I have to do some insulation in the walls and hang the drywall, which should be relatively easy because it'll be all big new pieces (unlike the swiss-cheese patchwork nightmare of the kitchen), then it's paint 'n' flooring time. This should come together pretty easy- can't wait to get my studio out of the little bedroom and up where it belongs (that's a song pun there).