What to do?

Before we got too far into today's adventure, I want to play a little game.Do you remember those puzzles in the Highlights magazines when you were a kid where they showed you two pictures and you had to pick out the differences between them?

Well, let's try one.

Take your time.

Before...

Did you guess a box of contractor bags?

We pulled down the row of hanging cabinets and it really seems to open things up.

Now, back to our horror show.

When last we left, the back bathroom looked like this...

Yeah, gross, but better than it was.

Having already ripped up some flooring in this place, I knew how this was going to go.  The linoleum was put down first and then the shower surround and cabinets were put in over that.  There is no way the sub floor under that tub isn't rotten, so it had to come out.

First, we had to deal with the water supply lines.

Note the conspicuous lack of shutoff valves.

This obviously wasn't designed to be worked on.  There was no access door and there were no shutoff valves. one way or another we were going to be without water for a while.  Seemed pretty obvious to me that I needed to run to the hardware store.

Since we are wrecking things...

Sawed off the hoses and cleaned them up with the utility knife.  Then it was time for...

That's better.  I'm going to use pex tubing up to the fixtures.

Now we could get to work tearing out that shower surround so we could rip up some floor.

Easy, right?

Yeah, right.

We got to work and pulled off all the trim around the shower. We saved it to put back on if we so choose.  Then we started pulling out the screws holding the shower in place.  It was weird because some of the screws were square drive and some were bolt head and I had to have a ratchet.  And, several of the screws were driven into the drywall alone and wouldn't back out.  I found a neat way to get those out.

The flat pry bar wouldn't just pull them out, but it gave enough pressure to use the screwdriver.

We finally got all the finishing nails and screws out and everything was nice and loose.

All we had to do was yank it out, right?

Take a look and see if you can figure out the problem.

That thing was wedged in there tight.  They must have put that in there before they even finished the walls.  The narrowest angle of the shower is two inches wider than the doorway with the door off. We might be able to get it out, presuming we could turn it sideways and get it past the vanity, if we took the door frame down, but probably not even then. The hallway is only about two feet-wide.

We thought about getting the sawzall and just carving it into small enough chunks to carry out. We thought about that a lot. I must admit, I smiled a little at that idea, but no.  I just hate destroying something that could still be useful to us or someone else if we don't have to.  There had to be a way.

What could it be?

My mom helped with this next bit.

Yeah.  The bottom of the two studs there and the sill are completely rotted through.  I'm going to have to replace them.  You know, if I'm going to have to rip out part of that wall anyway...

Sarah's spirit animal is rage.

Actually, I think Sarah was more disturbed by the mess she was creating than she was relieved by appeasing the urge for destruction.

Not bad really.

One little hitch though.  That black pipe is a sewer drain vent. To keep sewer gases out of the house, it should stay intact. I declined to cut it to pull out the tub until we have some couplings to at least hold it together while we fix everything else up.

I didn't feel like going to the hardware store again, so that was the end of that project for the day. Luckily, there are other projects. Perhaps I'll tell you more about those another day.


Oh yeah, for the record: One more opportunity to flood the house and I didn't.