I think we're going to need that monkey
posted by peppermint at 8:55 PM
As I type this Tom is in the kitchen removing the old General Electric cooktop. Attempting to remove it, I should say.
When I was a kid our playground consisted of a bunch of giant tractor tires stacked haphazardly on an asphalt playground and a 6 foot tall metal slide strategically placed in the sunniest section of the playground. A section of the playground that hadn't seen shade in years! A couple years later they decided to expand our horizons by installing a monstrous galvanized steel jungle gym apparatus that reached heights of 6-8 feet in some areas. To protect us, they spread out a couple bags of wood chips. Not delicate, cushion-your-fall woodchips either. They were woodchips as big as your shoe - large, jagged-edged pieces of broken sticks. People really used to hate kids.
My point is this - When they say that they don't make things like they used to, THEY are not f'ing kidding. And there's good reason for that. Things used to suck. If things hadn't sucked, they'd still be around. No one would have toiled away for the better part of their life inventing better things.
We looked at several houses before buying this particular one, all in this same area of post-WWII era ranch homes. Three of them had the exact same original GE electric cook top and oven. Ours is the only one with the controls mounted into the wall behind the stove. Everyone else had their push-button controls mounted on the cabinet or counter top in front of the cook top. At some point in our home's history a tile backsplash was installed in the kitchen and they tiled the control panel into that backsplash. So in order to install the new cook top Tom had to chisel out the grout all around the controls and then pry the entire panel out and disassemble it - because the wiring runs to the control panel. We need those wires to run underneath the counter, inside the cabinet, not up the freaking wall. So there's a big rectangular hole in the wall where the electrical housing was installed and it will obviously need some fixing. Yes, we already knew this going into the project but it's always different when you're actually face to face with the problem.
I suppose I should be grateful that we just have to remove a backsplash and install a new one. After all, we were looking forward to learning how to install wall tile. At some point we're going to be taking down what can only be described as "an assload" of wall tile in our bathroom, so the backsplash will be good practice. It would have been much harder to try to patch a hole in the front panel of these 1950s cabinets, right?
I still tried the whole "Maybe we could just hang a picture there?" suggestion, but Tom wouldn't hear of it.
When I was a kid our playground consisted of a bunch of giant tractor tires stacked haphazardly on an asphalt playground and a 6 foot tall metal slide strategically placed in the sunniest section of the playground. A section of the playground that hadn't seen shade in years! A couple years later they decided to expand our horizons by installing a monstrous galvanized steel jungle gym apparatus that reached heights of 6-8 feet in some areas. To protect us, they spread out a couple bags of wood chips. Not delicate, cushion-your-fall woodchips either. They were woodchips as big as your shoe - large, jagged-edged pieces of broken sticks. People really used to hate kids.
My point is this - When they say that they don't make things like they used to, THEY are not f'ing kidding. And there's good reason for that. Things used to suck. If things hadn't sucked, they'd still be around. No one would have toiled away for the better part of their life inventing better things.
We looked at several houses before buying this particular one, all in this same area of post-WWII era ranch homes. Three of them had the exact same original GE electric cook top and oven. Ours is the only one with the controls mounted into the wall behind the stove. Everyone else had their push-button controls mounted on the cabinet or counter top in front of the cook top. At some point in our home's history a tile backsplash was installed in the kitchen and they tiled the control panel into that backsplash. So in order to install the new cook top Tom had to chisel out the grout all around the controls and then pry the entire panel out and disassemble it - because the wiring runs to the control panel. We need those wires to run underneath the counter, inside the cabinet, not up the freaking wall. So there's a big rectangular hole in the wall where the electrical housing was installed and it will obviously need some fixing. Yes, we already knew this going into the project but it's always different when you're actually face to face with the problem.
I suppose I should be grateful that we just have to remove a backsplash and install a new one. After all, we were looking forward to learning how to install wall tile. At some point we're going to be taking down what can only be described as "an assload" of wall tile in our bathroom, so the backsplash will be good practice. It would have been much harder to try to patch a hole in the front panel of these 1950s cabinets, right?
I still tried the whole "Maybe we could just hang a picture there?" suggestion, but Tom wouldn't hear of it.
Labels: homeimprovement
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