may week 2 & 3 ~ anything new and exciting?...

...condo, kitchen & kitties; respectively.

Condo

Mid-week, first thing in the morning we got a call from our condo tenants.  We had to attend to a leaky bathtub faucet...actually it was pretty much pouring out.  We took a half day and it was a simple enough fix.

We attended our first condo association meeting and expressed our concerns but mostly listened to others.  As they say, it was a lively meeting - I was smiling the whole time.

Then at the end of the third week of May, we were getting a new AC compressor installed.  With anything that we ever do to improve something, it comes with it's own set of problems.  By the end of the day though, they had working AC and I hope they are very happy about that during these very hot months.

Kitchen

Jerome has been working on the electrical configuration for the kitchen, which then leads to certain switches and fixtures that are just outside of the kitchen.  He wanted to make sure that the kitchen no longer had any old wiring.  He made sure that all the outlets are ground and that there are GFCIs where they need to be.  We will have several lights; recessed lighting and pendant lighting.

We had called a million companies to come and give us estimates for the drywall work.  They ranged from $950 to $1600.  We went with the $950, not only because he was the cheapest, but because he could start right away.  He really only needs to be good on the ceiling, as the walls will mostly be covered by cabinets and tile.

We hung the insulation and have been amassing many items for the kitchen, such as floor tile, backsplash tile, microwave and lighting.  We'll be buying the appliances soon.  We were going to try to get the new GE Slate appliances, but as it turns out, they don't make the stove-type that we need, so we needed to change our direction to stainless steel.

Kitties

Mid-week of the third week of May, we received a phone call from our old neighbor Ruth.  She's the one that is caring for the feral cats next to our other rental property.  Apparently, someone turned her in to the police.  The police showed up, took some pictures of the feeding area and told her to stop feeding the cats.  They seemed to be most concerned with the kittens.

I spent the rest of that week trying to find anyone willing to take in these kittens.  I didn't care if it was a barn or a large piece of property.  Finally a friend of mine that I used to work with introduced me to his cousin who lives in Pontiac and has plenty of experience socializing and re-homing kittens.  My mother got me in touch with the lady that TNRs in her condo complex.  And together we spent nearly the entire Sunday trying to trap 5 kittens.  We got three in the morning and then came back and got the other two in the late evening.  Jerome and I after each trapping success, then took the kittens to the woman in Pontiac.  A total of 228 miles driven that day! Now when the police come back, Ruth can tell them that the kittens have been taken care of.  PHEW!  We still have a couple of adult cats to get fixed, but the colony is shrinking.

The tenants in that property are new and Ruth and I agreed that they are the ones that turned her in.  They are not big cat fans.  Their daughter is allergic.  The cats were making themselves nuisances in the flower box and sleeping under their cars and on our deck.

We explained what we've been trying to do and also explained that the adults will be staying there.

We will try to address the other concerns that they might have, but the cats have been there longer than the tenants have, so they need to be a little more tolerant, in my opinion.