Temporary (Insanity) Hiatus

Many of you might be wondering why I haven't written something about the house lately. To tell you the truth, the house has progressed significantly more than has previously been detailed. My posts were catch-ups to some of the process, because I work, and take pictures of the work, faster than I can write about it. So up until now, this has been more retrospective. Well, in the pursuit of openness and honesty, I'll give you a piece of current events. When I arrived on the job site one morning, we received a "STOP WORK" order. This surprised me, as I had received my blessing from the HDLC, gotten my permit, and started working.

So, apparently when you detail your plans to the HDLC, and then you take them to the permit office, sometimes they forget to include some things in your permit. I'm not accusing them of anything, I'm just saying that if you had this as a reference, and you reference the certificate by specific number from the HDLC in the permit, why wasn't everything included? I could not have gotten the permit if I did not have the HDLC certificate, so where's the disconnect?

I understand the necessity of such a process, as assuring that buildings are properly built, which in turn, improves public safety, is one of the primary duties of a municipal government. With the new mayoral administration, increased focus on remediation of blight and public safety is a godsend, and I commend the administration for doing so. However, as relayed to me by several contractors, architects, builders, and individuals who have had similar experiences, this little speed bump is less about the structural integrity, quality of work, and appropriateness of the building, and more about getting the right paperwork. I thought I had accomplished this task at the outset, but apparently, I need to go just a little further in order to get going again. For the structural engineers and architects that have come to see the place, they have expressed to me that the construction exceeds most of what they have seen in this locality. A short, older (80 years old) architectural draftsman said, "I can see you're doing a good job--I see a lot of shit in my line of work." I had to chuckle because he cursed. Let that be a lesson to you who intend to do such things: You can try to do everything right and still get held up or shot down. But I'm not going to dwell on whether I am right or not, I just have to make sure I make it right.

Jazzfest is on the horizon, and though the road just jumped out and bit me, I still have to get a little further down the line. If I have learned anything about living, leaving, coming back, rebuilding, and working in this city, it's that better times are just around the corner. For now, I need to get drawing and scheduling!