Weather or Not, El Nino is coming....

They say that California does not have seasons. As a Californian I offer that we have two seasons. Drought and El Nino. Here is a description of El Nino from NOAA:

• El Niño is an oscillation of the ocean-atmosphere system in the tropical Pacific having important consequences for weather around the globe. Among these consequences are increased rainfall across the southern tier of the US and in Peru, which has caused destructive flooding, and drought in the West Pacific, sometimes associated with devastating brush fires in Australia
• El Nino's usually bring heavy rain to the west coast of California with frequent flooding and mudslides. Mostly in the first 3 months of the calendar year.

Why this is of interest to me is because it usually means rain in biblical amounts. At least for California. The average rainfall in the Paso Robles area is between 12-14 inches per year. The past 5 El Nino events produced yearly rainfall as follows

• 1978 23.38 inches
  
• 1983 26.46 inches
  
• 1993 23.01 inches
  
• 1995 27.95 inches
• 1998 20.65 inches

This may not look significant but in 4 of those years over 14 inches of rain fell in January and February alone. This causes the ground to become saturated and mudslides occur like this one in La Conchita, south of Santa Barbara:

The recent work on the road here:

should mitigate the erosion and mudslide that blocked the road that in 2005 after 14 inches of rain Jan-Mar.

I sincerely hope this is my only post on El Nino.

Getting Your Fair Advantage

A former co-worker of mine has moved to India for a year. He is finding it to be the adventure of a lifetime and is learning what it means to be a foreigner in a very foreign land. I mention this because he and his spouse recently experienced something that seems to be one of the few behaviors that does not discriminate, is multicultural, and leaves the people experiencing the wrong end of it feeling guilty of who and what they are, what they have accomplished. Not to mention a rather large dose of anger as well.

In short, they were taken advantage of by someone they trusted. While it happens to most people at one time or another it still elicits a range of emotions, most of them negative.

What is amazing to me is that this seems to be a human phenomenon, not a cultural one. A trait of being homo-sapiens. The anthropological/cultural reasons for this to exist and be so similar across cultures and geographies is fascinating to me.

Could it be as simple as risk vs. reward. In high order primates, taking advantage in small ways is not punished severely if at all. It is theorized that keeping the social fabric together is more important for survival than ostracizing only the most egregious transgressions. While this is an oversimplification I think it plays out in how people learn to take their 'fair advantage'.

I have come to the conclusion that understanding how people assess risk vs. reward is key to long term working partnerships. If there is very little risk in someone getting their fair advantage, rest assured they will take it. The book Freakonomics has a great chapter describing the risk vs. reward aspect of taking advantage"

"Levitt, the author of Freakonomics, caught teachers cheating by analyzing all the individual answers of every student in the Chicago public school system. What he found was that after students had turned in their tests, teachers were going through and changing their answers. Not every answer, mind you, but enough to boost scores. In his example, he shows how in a class of 22 students, at least 15 students had the same string of six correct answers. At first glance, this seems a little suspicious, especially since the string comes towards the end of the test, where the harder questions tend to be. Not only that, but several of the students who got these answers correct left at least four of the questions in the same section blank, showing they probably could not have answered the earlier questions correctly. To add to it, these were poor performing students who did not have strings of six answers correct anywhere else on the test. The students made huge leaps during this year, however, the next year they sank back down to their low level. Obviously something was amiss."

The motivation was obvious. Teachers, who are notoriously poorly paid anyway, needed the money and were willing to engage in unethical behavior to acquire those bonuses. The teachers did not do this solely because they are unethical, they did it because they realized there was little risk involved because no one was minding the store. A system was set up with no checks and balances.

The community at large is one way to mitigate this. Find out their standing in the community and use your intuition. If you feel like you are helping someone out, perhaps they need help because of how they conduct themselves. If they are going out of their way to help you out, ask yourself what reward are they looking for and what are they risking by helping you.

Fer Sizzle, my rizzle...

It is a bit hot at the ranch today:

But what is impressive is the dramatic change in temp, 3:30 pm, 111 degress.:

but 1 hour, 39 minutes and 88 miles later. 66 degrees:

In other news the road has been regraded and a fresh load of decomposed granite dropped and compacted.

Work to minimize erosion of the road entrance was also done. Mari Landscaping once again came thru and did a great job.

84 years

When my grandmother was born:

• The USA was only 5 years removed from allowing women to vote
  
• The Great Depression was still 4 years away
• Calvin Coolidge was President
• The US was 17 years from entering WW II
• Brown vs. Board of Education was 30 years away
• Wikipedia was 76 years from it's first entry

My grandmother died last week. This has given me the opportunity to reflect on how much has changed and yet how little time we take to appreciate the changes that define each successive generation.

84 years is enough time to see societal norms shift, to see technology begin to supplant human interaction and to see what was once thought impossible, become routine.

I only hope in the next 50 years the change I see is as beneficial as the change my grandmother experienced.

Strange Views This Weekend..

A few months ago while watching the webcam, I saw two dogs run through the courtyard. A yellow lab and a chocolate lab. The did not hang around, just cruising through. Strangely enough I so them again today. Both had collars and looked healthy if not a bit dirty from their adventures. What I don't understand is why people let their dogs roam. Not only are there coyotes but there are mountain lions, deer, and people who would not hesitate to shoot them.

Another strange view I saw was this:
The really odd thing is that there were two people riding in it. They looked no older than 18-20. Was someone filming a Wells Fargo commercial? Yaaaaah!

Visitors to the House...

This weekend I had several guests visiting the house.

Allow me to introduce my good friend Lizard Large:

His partner in crime Fuzzy Spider:

And Mothras' Evil Twin:
Brought to you by 104 degree weather:

Moths, Meritage, and Me

The title pretty much sums up the past few days. I have seen moths the size of small birds,

tasted at least 20 different wines at the 27th Annual Paso Robles Wine Festival
It only took me 9 years to finally go and I really wish the fashion police were there.

Visited with several friends from the Bay Area and the U.K. and lastly enjoyed the sunsets
Nothing major or earth shattering but it was good to get a few days away from it all after all of the travel and long hours.

Earth, Fire, Ice and Sweat

While winter afforded me the opportunity to install shelving in the kitchen, install webcams, and finally get the utility bath faucet running correctly (No thanks to Harvey Plumbing), spring offers the opportunity to more ambitious projects. A few items on the list:

• Landscaping Part 2
• Install the fireplace the 1st contractor never delivered on
• Install air conditioning

I lean towards landscaping as it softens the view on the house, the landscape contractor does great work and is a nice person, and I don't have any baggage associated with it. Here are some of the sketches he has produced for the back of the house.
A fireplace would make a lot of sense in this corner due to its' proximity to the door:
I could break down and install Air-Conditioning. The house is very efficient and does not vary more than 10 degrees 92% of the time, the 8% of the time it does get to hot makes me want A/C.

And lastly, this blog, this story has been ongoing for almost 5 years. When I started this blog I could not have fathomed the journey I embarked on. I did not know how much blood, sweat and tears it would take get to this point. Oddly enough the my life has been influenced more by people totally unrelated to this project and for that I am thankful.

Here's to another 5 years of blogging, living, and learning.

snake...

I think this snake must be French as he has effectively blocked the road. Must be protesting the lack of mice to feed on.

And ya know, this is a really big friggen snake!

Sunrise and Sunset

Today marked a momentous occasion. I was up for the sunrise and sunset. Enjoy the view...

The end of the marathon...

After 16 days, 5 countries and 6 cities I will be sleeping in my own bed Sunday night. There have been sights, sounds, and unexplained situations which I will never forget. I will have ridden the public transportation of several countries, walked miles in places where no one speaks english, wondered why everything smells like a campfire and taken my life in my hands trying to cross the street.

Here are a few images...

Out and About...

I am out and about for the next few weeks. Here are a few visual snippets from my journeys.

Are you where you live?

At times the irony of where I have chosen to live makes me wonder whether I chose the place or did the place choose me. I have lived in cheap apartments below sea level, a ginger bread house on the beach, and more recently a straw house and a nut house. Makes you wonder.

Here is where I live today:

and a view from the straw house this weekend:

Elections, Economy, Environment. Oh My!

For those of you following the blog, check out the Garden Cam to your left. Great sunsets and every now and then Road Runners.

I also want to take a moment and touch on what is happening in our country these days.

Every time you turn on the news there is bad news. Unemployment is up, consumer spending is down, revelations of fraud has eclipsed the scandals of the 80s and 90s, dogs and cats living together.

Amidst all of this bad news of people losing their jobs, losing their homes, losing their life savings due to people named Hursts, Madoff, and Cosmo, the risk of 'deflation' is not only real but increases with each successive bad quarter.

To illustrate where the economy was and where it is now one need only read this news release from 1/30/2006

"Americans’ personal savings rate dipped into negative territory in 2005, something that hasn’t happened since the Great Depression. Consumers depleted their savings to finance the purchases of cars and other big-ticket items"

Today consumers have not just stopped purchasing big ticket items but are actually putting money into savings. Something that has not consistently happened since the mid-90s.

Perhaps this is the time for all Americans to rethink what it means to be wealthy. Could it be that the accumulation of consumer goods is not the true measurement of wealth?

And on that not I leave you with a few pictures from my newly installed Garden/Sunset Web cam. Have a great week.

It goes without saying...

From this day forward, America can say that it overcame it's shame. For on this day, all Americans can stand proud and marvel that we have taken yet one more step on the unending road towards a more perfect union.

Spotlight on 7

As usual 7 will find the spot of sunlight and well, the picture says it all...

Infrastructure Projects

So begins the work the winter work. Here are the projects completed in the past week.

• Install wall speakers in Great Room (finally)
  
• Weatherstrip the clerstory porch
• Install R30 insulation in attic where straw bales were not used
• Paint trusses black in attic windows
• Shelving in kitchen
• Wine Tasting on Peachy Canyon Road
• Mop the floor
• Fill in the den of the skunk who moved in when the coyote moved out

Regarding mopping the floor. That has got to be one of the most unforgiving jobs around the house. Or maybe I am just old.

Gung Hay Fat Choy!

My Favorite Time of Year

Post grape harvest is my favorite time of year. The contrasting colors make for some seriously good scenery. Click in the image for a close-up.

7 has found her place...

7 has a internal clock that alerts her to when she HAS to be fed. This happens twice a day, every day. On the days I do not pay attention to the time, 7 will find a spot in the house where it is hard to ignore her. I refer to it as staging. 

Here is 7 staged for feeding time:

No On Prop 8 but stop the Civil Rights Comparison

While I agree and support that all couples regardless of gender should be afforded the same rights, responsibilities, privileges etc, I do not think it is the gubments job to define or otherwise rule on what marriage is. In my opinion gubment should recognize civil unions for all and mandate that all entities that confer benefits on couples not discriminate based on the gender of the couples.  That is what people can and will agree on. But when you have some people up there continuing to call it 'marriage' and equating it with civil rights, it alienates a whole group of people.

When people start equating the civil rights movement and treatment of minorities/indigenous peoples with the right to marry, they totally lose my vote. Last I checked the definition of marriage did not stop someone from voting, obtaining a job, moved to a reservation, lynched, or legally prevented from living their lives. 

Personally I think the No on 8 people got caught sleeping. They lost the political battle due to arrogance, poor planning, and poor PR. And if the No on 8 people keep throwing in my face that this is like the civil rights movement, I may just totally ignore them. Have them give a compelling argument akin to my second paragraph and I will agree with them and vote to support the cause.

Just my 02.

Better to have signs stolen than an Election

They campaign signs were stolen but not the election. Obama won in San Luis Obispo County 51%-46%

Thanks to everyone in SLO who voted!

And take to heart what President Elect Barack Obama said last night: 

"I may not have won your vote tonight, but I hear your voices. I need your help, I will be your president too."

Go Obama!

Go United States!

Intolerance goes hand in hand with greed and fraud.

Estate Financial and Hurst Financial. These names will be familiar to many folks on the Central Coast. These two companies represent almost $400 million dollars in mortgage securities. Securities that people on the Central Coast invested in. Securities that retirees invested in. As of today, both companies have been shut down by state regulators. And in the case of Estate Financial, only $48,000 of cash was in their accounts. Even though at one point they had almost $300 million in mortgage securities and almost 2000 investors.

I mention this because as Barack Obama has been saying, "the meltdown financial markets is the final verdict on 8 years of failed Bush/McCain economic policies"

Well, I guess the people in Northern San Luis Obispo County don't see it that way because they have consistently removed the signs I have put on my fence.

On 10/19 I put these series of signs up:
It was stolen within one day. Luckily I had more so I put them up again. Once again, they were taken down within 1 day.

Not to be deterred, I put this sign up on on 10/25:
I would like to believe it is still there.

What I find interesting is that I am sure some of the people who are supporting the GOP(and stealing my signs), are the very same ones wondering how Estate Financial and Hurst Financial could be 'allowed' to take their money. My advice to all of you is to reflect on what party has led the deregulation of the financial services industry.

Good luck on 11/04/08

Owls, Horse Sentries and Obama

When the house was being built there was a Great Horned Owl that lived in the rafters. He would occasionally leave a few owl castings and owl crap. The past few years I have heard the owl outside making, well, owl sounds. Now for the first time, pictures of the Owl:

I wonder if this is why the internet is slow.

There are also guard horses for goats:


And since this is election time no better time than to say GO Obama!

Is the moon really this full?

Reflections on Paso

Another summer has past and I am reflecting on the work that was completed this past year.


From finishing out the kitchen island to the landscaping and resealing the floors and patio. I also got a chance to stain concrete in both bathrooms with varying success.

The past year, 7 learned to hunt lizards but not catch them and to relax in the sun. As a matter of fact, she may be reminiscing about Paso in this picture:

Wine and Waves

I spent a great day at a friends wedding on the coast.

As much as I love the warm days and cool nights of the wine country nothing compares to the blue sky and ocean.

7 does not care where she is as long as the sun is involved.

Not Much Labor on this Day

It seems as if 7 was the only one working this weekend as she could not get enough of hunting for lizards.She spent hours trying to catch Lizards. After the Frisbee this is her next favorite hobby.

7 hunting lizards is now a spectator sport.
As is cooking dead meat.

Blue Skies...

Sunsets are always a good encore to the day.

Walking Introspection

It occurred to me that I have been walking city streets late at night for most of my life. I don't mean taking a 15 or 20 minute walk. These are walks measured in miles and hours and stretching over several decades and continents.

At one time or another I have walked for hours in every major city on the

west coast of North America and many cities around the world. So much of who I am has been developed on these walks. These walks help create and define who I am and who I want to be. They allow me time to review decisions and choices and reflect on causality. I am at my happiest and my saddest during these walks. I am at my strongest and weakest as I wind my way in and out of seven figure neighborhoods and slums.

I have run for my life, been propositioned by men and women, physically assaulted by men and women, and abused by the police. I have stood my ground and fought. I have shared laughs with strangers and helped by strangers. I have met amazing people and truly disturbed people. I have witnessed the best in humanity and the taking of a human life.

Walking has allowed me to discover humanity and discover myself.

August in New York

Another flight,and another week in the Naked City. New York is quickly becoming the 2nd most familiar city to me. To think nothing of hopping on the subway and heading to a museum like MOMA: walking around SOHO and people watching:
or wandering around and seeing this:
makes you appreciate how much life can be enhanced by dense urban living. Until you hear sirens for 1.5 hours at 3am.

Day of the Reptiles

Lizards are living large in the house these days. Here is a picture of the lizard that makes his home along the back of the house. He was nice enough to pose near a standard size electrical outlet for size comparison.He has a cousin that lives in the house under the refrigerator. About the same size and just as fast. My thinking is that as long as they are around, there are no snakes.

One last look out the window before I hit the road again for some bi-coastal travel.

Tropical Sunsets and Rainbows

Something about being on vacation makes sunsets special. Not sure what it is so I will let you decide.There were also rainbows everywhere. I think there must be a convention.

And nothing like getting blown on vacation.

Cows again...

It seems as if every vacation I go on there are a few recurring themes.

1. Nude people hanging out somewhere
   
2. I run into people I know
3. Cows in the middle of the road

Halfway thru this vacation I was cautiously optimistic that this vacation would spell an end to those themes. No such luck. While 1-2 have not happened, 3 was on full display yesterday.
Go figure.

I have been to the mountain top...

and it was wet!

Workin on my tan

I may have overdone it

Guess

Ah

Vacation at last

Summer Solstice, Summer Sun, Summer Scorcher

Summer has arrived. It was 109 degrees on 6/21/08. Not the kind of heat where you go outside. Unless you are 7 of 9. 7 insisted on playing Frisbee. I think we both are sunburned from that experience.

After that experience we retreated to the comfort of the straw bale house. After being closed up for 3 weeks in 100+ degree heat for 5 consecutive days, the house was a comfortable 79 degrees. Not bad for a place with no air conditioning.

One of the great things about the heat is that it produces magnificent sunsets. Here are some panoramas from that most blistering day.

This was taken 1pm when the recorded temperature was 107 degrees.
And these pictures say it all.

Straw Wine

I have been in a wine mood lately and decided to map out the wineries that I prefer. These are all within a 10 mile radius of the house. Most are pouring 2006 in the tasting rooms but if you ask you may get something out of the ordinary.

Wine Drive

What Up with 7, What Up with Camera, 7Up!

For those of you who know 7, you know she is a very active dog. Lately she has been running 4 miles in the morning, playing frisbee for 30 minutes a day and getting walked 3 miles at least 3 times per week. I think she has finally had enough as she is now reduced to just standing around looking tired:

The picture of 7 above and the flowers below were taken with a new camera. Yes, after 6 years I have traded in my 4 megapixel camera for a 9.1 megapixel with all the bells and whistles that I will never use:
And finally, I like 7Up. Always have. Though I do not like the amount of sugar they put in soda so when I drink 7Up, it is Diet. While enjoying the cool refreshing taste of 7Up I decided to read the label and educate myself on what I am putting in my body. I was heartened by reading the I was 7Up is using '100% Natural Flavors' to help quench my thirst:
The next question that popped into my head was "What are these 100% Natural Flavors". Reading the back of the can was less than informative:
Can someone tell me what ingredient is 'Natural Flavors".

7 is not sharing her frisbee.

NYC-SFO-Paso and 7 of 9

Paso Straw Bale at the end of May. It is only 81 degrees this weekend vs. 104 degrees 2 weeks ago.

As you can see, 7 is enjoying the cooler weather, playing frisbee,

and hiding in the landscaping. Can you find 7?

A little bit of hunting:

And after all of that excitement, 7 went to Silver Horse Winery and made herself at home:

Finally here are a few panoramas from this weekend:

Only in California...

do cherries grow at the oil change shop.

Reflections on the Naked City

The Naked City is endlessly fascinating to me. From the food, architecture and most importantly the people. Several moments for me were especially poignant. Grand Central Station will always be a wonder of the modern world to me.
The Chrysler Building never ceases to amaze me. To me it is the pinnacle of art deco and one of the reasons I fell in love with Art Deco in the first place:
Another Art Deco building is the Beekman Tower Hotel. Great Views and a great example of Art Deco at its' best:

Last but not least is the Woolworth Building. To me it is one of the most imposing buildings in Manhattan. It just stand up, out, and about:
It is hard to not fall in love with the vibe that is the Naked City. But alas, Paso calls, after spending time with 8 million of my closets friends.

Yet another flight...

and all alone in exit row!

Japanese Comfort Food in Tribeca

Great japanese curry and Hoegaarden beer. Yum!

All Alone on the E Train

Over 8 million people in New York City and during rush hour I am the only one in this car on the E train.

Eerie...

Warp speed Mr. Sulu

Another Airport. Another Flight

And loud baby behind me again!

From Whiteboard to Reality

Several years ago the builders of this house took it upon themselves to design the landscaping. We started with some simple goals like drought resistant, deer resistant, and naturally offensive to fleas and ticks. We also wanted low maintenance, low overall water requirements, and last but not least it needed to blend in with the surrounding environment AND the house.

The photo of the whiteboard below was drawn in early 2006. The house is to scale as is the landscaping.


Mari Landscaping did a great job in taking this:

To this in Nov 07:



and finally, to this in May 08:

David Brown is going a great job and it shows not only in the work he did for me but in the reputation he continues to develop in North County.


And finally, a plug for Jeff Pipes of Pipestone Vineyards. Even tho he ran out of Zinfandel the Syrah 'almost' made up for it. ;-)

Jeff is doing some amazing work and I wanted to thank him and his wife for taking the time and sharing some of their experiences.

Don't you know i'm loco...

One of the unintended benefits of this blog has been that it is a unique form of therapy for me. So imagine my pleasant surprise when I happened upon THIS article.

Another of the unintended benefits I have personally derived in this experience on the blogosphere is rediscovering how much I enjoy writing. In a way I can sense the new neural pathways being developed when I am attempt to find ways to communicate in writing landscaping projects, flooring work, owls keeping me awake at 2am, and the battles of the tarantula hawks vs. tarantulas.

So to the friends and associates who have been supportive during these most interesting times, I say many thanks. To the ones who have humored me and made me laugh and see things from a different perspective, thank you. And to the very special people who have stood by me during the moments when I actually may have lost my sanity, I owe you a debt I can never repay.

A window to my

landscaping.

Had I known that having the landscaping done would significantly alter my perception of the house, it would have been done 2 years ago. No longer do I have 5 foot weeds to look out at when I sit in the great room...

Patio Work

It only took 1 year but I finally cleaned and resealed the patio. It makes a huge difference in how it looks and hopefully how it wears. Here are the before and after pics

Before:
After after cleaning and scrubbing in 90+ degree weather, this is what it looks like:Of course a weekend in Paso Robles would not be complete with out a little:

Play an accordion, go to prison. That's the law!

On New York Time

Another great day in the naked city

Babies everywhere, must be the red eye to JFK

Babies 2 the left and right. This was one of the worst flights of my life. There were two infants in front of me and one behind. To add to the mix, was a person with the worst smelling body odor in the aisle across from me. Never again will I take the red eye. NEVER

Another airport

and now a word from our sponsors

For the first time in over 40 years a leading politician has made a head on attempt to begin the discussion of race in this country and to begin the discussion on why racial division persists in this country today.

Very rarely in my life have I read or heard a speech that touches my soul.

Obama's 2008 Philadelphia Speech

This is a non-partisan attempt to begin a substantial discussion that has been pushed to the margins vis a vie 'playing the race card for as long as I can remember.

I truly hope that we begin this discussion. Not just on the racial stalemate Obama so accurately touched upon, but by beginning the discussion of "investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in the criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations"

This is the discussion that needs to happen along with why we have this racial divide 45 years after MLK's 1963 Washington Speech

The politics of the last 40 years has been one of division, of Blue vs. Red, Left vs. Right, White vs. Black, and the Haves vs. the Have Nots.

Obama states that "It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper."

Perhaps America will rise to the challenge of having this discussion. Perhaps we will look past the race baiting divisive politics of the last 40 years. Perhaps we will see that the politics of 'values' is frequently used to divide us.

My hope is we will. My fear is that we will not and continue down the path of divisive politics and lack of true leadership.

The reach of the Web

I was chatting with a certain someone who is building a straw bale house in Atascadero and it was never clearer to me that with the proliferation of technology it is possible to influence, impact, and assist, people from all over the world. For example here is a map of one day visitors to this blog:What is amazing is how narrow a category straw bale construction is and yet people from Japan to South Africa find their way here.

Thanks Al Gore...

Spring is almost upon us...

The winter is receding into the background (along with the rain I hope) and warmer weather is on the horizon.

Amazing that the floors are done, landscaping is pretty much complete, and yet there are any number of projects that still remain to be done. Among them:

• Air conditioning
• Weed control
• Re-grading the road
• Sealing the Patio

But I have been finding time to visit a few wineries within 10 minutes of the house. The wines are great, the tasting rooms intimate and the staff are friendly and accommodating.

• Silver Horse Winery
  
• RioSeco Vineyards
  
• Mitchella Winery
  
• RiverStar Vineyards

The flowers are starting to bloom, the days are warmer and unfortunately the insects are coming out as well. Does anyone have a suggestion for environmentally responsible insecticide? Last year was a bumper crop for insects and I would appreciate not having to view the sequel.

It is snowing...

Ah.. first 13 degrees and now snow. NYC in Feburary
No kids playing in this park:

Hula n East Village

Blame Dima

New York State of Mind

Paso worked me..

I finally finished 'remodeling' the master bath. The thing about trying to get a occupancy permit by a certain date is that you make choices about things that are in the heat of the moment. Sometimes not so good choices. The master bath was the epitome of poor choices.

Having written that, here is where the master bath is at today:

Along with that, the floors were in for a serious cleaning and sealing. Imagine having to mop a 2700sqft floor 6 times. That is what needed to be done. Here is looking from the kitchen to the great room:

This is facing the front door:
and this is facing the back door:

Not that Paso

How did I end up here??

Yet another line...

San Diego Southwest line. A01 boarding pass rocks

2007 Was a Long Year

It is hard to believe this year is coming to an end. Many things have changed. Some for the better, others not so much.

The house saw a combination of frenzied activity starting with the pump freezing at the start of this year, to neglect in the summer months, and finally, the landscaping being mostly done.

To that end I want to share these final images from 2007 that show the beauty that was so often not evident in the building of this house.

Ask 7 about the landscaping

If you were to ask 7 about the landscaping, what do you think she would say?


I think the following picture answers that questions. ;-)

Can you believe it...

Landscaping has not only started but there is measurable progress.

I am adding a few pictures for but the great part is that it is drought tolerant, deer resistant, and blends in very nice with the house and the surrounding area.


Mari Landscaping is doing the work.

Denver airport security line

Yet another line in life

Laid back 7

7 after a hard day in Paso

Landscaping is sooooo close

Landscaping is so close I can smell it. A mix of lavender, rosemary and sage. Wish me luck.

I just don't get it...

Are all contractors incompetent asshats? Most likely not. Are most contractors manipulative bastards? Unlikely. But what is true is that a significant percentage of contractors are incompetent, manipulative asshats.
I mention this not because of my own experiences but with a friend of mine who lives on the east coast. The contractor they are working with has lied and manipulated them to such an extent that it should be criminal. While their situation is markedly different than mine, the excuses are the same, the shifting of blame is the same, and evasive, dismissive, communication is the same.

What I don't get is why some contractors manipulate the dreams that people have. How they play off your emotions. Continue to mislead you to cover their incompetence, ignore your request for truthful information and take advantage of the your desire to work to get your dream. Some contractors take your money, take your time and offer nothing but excuses in return.

If you are a honest contractor who lives up to their word, communicates effectively, and works with their customer to help them achieve their dream, thank you. If you are the contractor who makes excuses, manipulates your customers to cover up your incompetence, and refuses to take responsibility for ruining peoples dreams I hope the next client you take advantage of uses this medium we call the internet to let people know that you have liens against the homes you build, that you do not pay your subcontractors, that you consistently lied about your progress, and that overall you are a miserable human being that should not be allowed to ever put hammer to nail again.

I hear my friends pain and frustration. I understand much more than I would ever want to admit the hurt, the disgust, and the loathing they are now experiencing. I wish I could do more for them except listen and offer limited advice. I so wish I could pimp slap every contractor that treats people this way.

Stay strong, you will get through this.

Only in Paso

Mom's 60th birthday n virginia

Mom having fun on birthday

Paso is not red

Guess where i am

Subway

This is cool But warm this time of year

Lincoln Center Jazz

Just a Ballad

View From Offices

Great morning here in NYC. The sky is blue, the city smells... well like it should, and here is the view from the deck adjoining the cafe.

Chrysler Bldg

Hudson River

Central Park in the distance

Here's a hint

Guess where i am at

Fight is over

Zab Judah ko'd in 11th rnd

Let's Get Ready To Rumble

Zab n da house

Almost time

Fight Night at Madison Square Garden

Big Big hot dog at The Garden

Am I dreaming

Mecca of boxing

Still not in Paso

Madison Square Garden

Not in Paso this weekend

My room n NYC

7s' memorial day christmas tree

7 wants landscaping 4 her xmas tree. These posts r taken and posted with my phone

7 needs landscaping

As you can tell, 7 would appreciate someplace to lie down. Any landscape people want to help?

This Rocks

Landscaping has begun with a small experiment. Since there are no rain gutters and having standing water next to your house could be bad, follow these instructions:

• Order 1.5 cubic yards of cobblestone and 3 cubic yards of pea gravel
• Rent BobCat
• 
• Buy 125 feet of bender board
• Dig trench 6 inches deep, 53 feet long and 4 feet wide
• Place rock as pictured

Got Work Ethic

Remember elementary school where you got kudos for perfect attendance? There were some kids who went 3-5 years without missing a day. I remember my 2nd grade teacher never missed a day of school for 4 years. Amazing consistency and dedication to her job.

My parents have an amazing work ethic. My mother worked her way up from the fabrication line at a semiconductor company to upper management within 10 years. Before my mother returned to work, my father worked two jobs to make ends meet and was still working 2 jobs in his 50s'. They instilled a similar work ethic in me. Sometimes it is to my detriment, but it has been more good than not.

That said, I have decided to do the landscaping on my own. This after 8 months of dealing with the local landscaping companies that do not call back, do not show, and do not follow thru. They all talk a good game, tell you how much they know, kick down some knowledge but then they do not follow thru.
Here is the list of landscaping companies who failed to either call back, show up, or follow up after the initial meeting:

• R&S Landscaping
• Elements Landscaping
• C&C Landscaping
• AAA Landscaping
• John Flanigan Landscaping
• Cumbria Construction
  

In the event that I would get a bid, it would be so generic that I could not tell the scope of work, would be rife with misspellings and if you can believe it, there would be simple mathematical errors in square footage/material costs. My two favorite interactions have been:

• The initial $18k bid that morphed into a $36k bid when I asked the person to come back with a lower cost proposal.
  
• The father of one 'contractor' who tells me his son went to the snow and will get back to me and the other 'contractor' who calls to tell me he is going to the snow and does not have access to the bid to discuss the inaccuracies.

Remember, Paso is Darn Near Paradise!

Straw Bale Tour

I had the opportunity to tour another Straw Bale structure yesterday. They did some cool things like color coding the exterior walls to denote framing and using water tanks built into the walls to moderate temps in the structure.

What I really like is the exterior truth window:And something that said a lot to me which is a poster of Malcolm X next to a truth window. Appropriate if you ask me:Reminds me to do my truth window...

99 Degree Difference

6 months ago the temperature was 113 degrees this weekend it was 99 degrees colder.


The booster pump on the water tank froze and failed. They tell me this happens when it is 14 degrees. It was replaced and the resulting damage repaired for about $900 by the pump division of Farm Supply. As I have come to expect, they were professional and courteous. Most of the neighbors had bursting pipes, or some plumbing related issues due to the extreme(for California) cold. I will break out the costs and materials of this in my next post.

SLO B Slow

What a past few days in SLO County. The weather has been mild and that has allowed some very important erosion mitigation in the areas that were burned this summer.

Straw rolls or waddles, and jute netting is not cheap but Farm Supply comes through again with low prices, great pricing and much help in finding the right vegetation to plant in the burned areas.

Also, the tortured tale of landscaping continues its' slow inexorable march. Perhaps it will begin sometime in Feb 07. In trying to find landscapers, there seem to be some fly by night operations and I seem to be going thru them alphabetically. For example, the companies that I have contacted, AAA Landscaping, C&C Landscape, and R&S Landscaping , either stopped returning calls, did not follow through on when they said they would provide a estimate to me or failed to show up.

Happy Holidays!

Hopefully the gentleman who I am working with now will follow thru. Wish me luck.

...and then there was the Blogosphere

My apologies for not keeping up to date on my blogging. It has been a busy time with the holidays, travel, and work.

As for the Paso Straw Bale House, the December cold weather wreaked havoc with the pipes from the well, to the pump, and to the water tank. Several days the temps dropped to the mid 20s and by 5th day of cold weather, the exterior pipes finally froze. Good thing is that after the ice thawed out, insulation was added to prevent a recurrence, the bad thing is that there was no insulation in the first place.

Unfortunately a bigger problem surfaced, mainly a broken piece of PVC at the well. This resulted in a mini-geyser while the pump was on. Luckily a cool head and fleet feet cut power to the pump and called Farm Supply in Paso Robles. If you ever have to call the Pump Division of Farm Supply on the weekend, be prepared to spend $200.00/hour. Fortunately they were not needed on the weekend and during the week they charge $100.00/hour.

FLASHBACK:
In July I blogged about a grass fire. This fire damaged some of the plastic PVC that went to the CDF line. I called out Miller Drilling(who originally installed the well lines and water tank) and received a bid as follows,

• Replace a pressure Gauge $4.50
• Check Valve 1, 1 1/4x80 $35.00
• Misc. Pipes & Electrical Fittings $150.00
• Sales Tax $13.74
• Labor: Replumb Booster, 4" CDF Line $500
• Total: $703.24

End Flashback

Farm Supply came out on a Monday, fixed the broken PVC at the well that was causing the geyser AND fixed the damage from the fire in July for the grand total of $224.29. For those of you keeping score at home, that is a $478.95 difference with a larger scope of work. Farm Supply good, Miller Drilling, perhaps they do a good job but I cannot understand the price difference.

The irony is that Miller Drilling did the original install and did not use insulation. Needless to say, Farm Supply has my business from here on out.

Panning the Paso Straw Bale House

I would like to share some of the views I have had over the years as well as some interesting Panoramas of the house being built. Click on the pictures to see the full size photo. Enjoy!

Foundation Form

Post Harvest

Early Framing

Post Storm

1/3rd Framing Complete

Summer Heat

Center Beam View

Over the years I have taken hundreds of pictures of the house, the surrounding countryside, and the vineyards. The view from the Paso Straw Bale House is awesome. I sit for hours gazing out over the vineyards, listening to the horses, and enjoying the scents of the grape harvest.

Harvest Time

I have to say that this is my favorite time of year. The vines are heavy with fruit,
it is warm in the day but cools down nicely in the evening and the sunsets are breathtaking.

In light of the beauty of the harvest and the smell of fermenting grapes, I do have several projects that I am contemplating for the winter:

• Re-staining the porch area
• L-Headers for windows
• Polishing the interior concrete floor
• Landscaping

If anyone has experience in polishing concrete floors, hit me up. I would like to know:

1. How much does it cost for the machinery and polishing pads?
2. How messy is it?
3. How long does it take?
4. Is it really a DIY task?
   

Blue Pill, or Red Pill

For those of you who have seen The Matrix, the premise is that we are all living in a programmed dreamlike reality controlled by computers. The lead character along with other has figured this out and now are fighting against the 'machines'. At the end of the 1st Matrix movie, the lead gains the ability to see the 'the Matrix, e.g the dream world in the native code that is used to construct 'reality'.


I bring this up because I believe I look at this house in much of the same way. I see how it was constructed. I see every nail, stud, post, shear wall, A35 connector, hvac ducting, pex, etc. It is like I am looking at the code used to construct the house. And for those who know how programming, sometimes code can be elegant, and other times, not so elegant.

It it those not so elegant code fragments that cause much consternation.


So the question is, do I take the Blue Pill and stay in dream world or the Red Pill and see how far down the rabbit hole goes?

Got Wood?

I have access to 80+ year old redwood timbers from an old building. I would like to have these re-sawn for moulding and what not.

The problem is finding someone or someplace to re-saw them. Suggestion are welcome.

Wild Kingdom Battle Royale

I remarked in an earlier post about the Tarantula Hawk. Here is a picture of a Tarantula Hawk as it drags a tarantula it paralyzed into it's lair:The Tarantula is to the left. But this was no ordinary tarantula beat down. After this Tarantula Hawk incapacitated its' victim, another Tarantula Hawk swooped in and tried to gaffle it.
A fight ensued between the two T-Hawks with the winner being the one that originally captured the Tarantula. After battling two worthy opponents, the T-Hawk dragged the paralyzed arachnid more than 10 meters to this spot in the picture.

Here are a few more pics of the dragging...

Needless to say I did not get that close because I have a healthy respect for any insect that can take out a tarantula, kick another Tarantula Hawk to the curb, and then drag it's victim 30 feet.

Take that Brady Barr!

Look Who Visits the House

Not for real, but virtually.

This is a cool way to see the reach of your blog graphically.

In short, a geographic representation of who has visited this blog for the last 12 hours'




Just a little snippet of internet love.

Are we there yet?

In my rants, I believe I have never mentioned that the house is fully functional. You can cook, clean dishes, bathe, run the climate control systems, watch the sunset over the vineyards, marvel at the red tail hawks as they float over the ridge looking for prey, and just relax. There are times when it is difficult to see past the memories, the mistakes, and the money spent on fixing anothers mistakes. But there are times when I catch a glimpse of what it could be, what it should be, and what it can be.

Ok, enough of that, this is what I have planned for this weekend. Touching up the paint on the eaves, staining the posts and if time and weather permits, re-etching the concrete patio. I will be satisified with getting two out of three of these done.

I am hoping to get the patio to look similar to this:



Does anyone want to bet whether or not I can do a better job than Dave Exline at staining concrete? :-)

Where is my fireplace...

So I never got a fireplace. No wood stove, no gas stove, no nothing. Strange that I remember asking for the draw of the fireplace and transfering the money to the contractor but I never got one. Funny how that works. But in my archives I found where my fireplace went:

----- Original Message ----- From: Leslie Miley To: Janice Exline Sent: Friday, October 22, 2004 5:56 PM Subject: Re: Invoice from Three Little Pigs Construction

Janice, All draw requests are deposited in the same account. For example when I request a draw from line 760, it is deposited in the same account that you withdraw funds from. I am trying to avoid either of us withdrawing funds that are not earmarked for our specific items. i.e. after you withdraw funds, the account balance should be zero or close to it. We had the situation with the fireplace where you withdrew the funds that were earmarked for the fireplace draw with draws from other line items. This gets confusing for me and since we are moving so fast, I need to manage what is being paid when very closely to avoid that potential conflict At the end of the day, I need to make sure that each invoice, whether yours or mine will be paid with the appropriate draw.



So I think I will either go with a Kiva style as I originally planned, or a wood stove. Any suggestions?

The emotional cost to build this house

I am not referring to dollars but emotionally. I look at this house and see what is not done, I look at this house and see where someone else made decisions for me, I look at this house and I see what should have been, not what is. I look at this house and see a broken dream.

2004-2005 was not a good year. From crazy tenants, to shady moving companies, to Dave Exline and Janice Exline, to trying to run a coffee bar in a ultra-conservative, racist town. Who and what I am was fundamentally changed and not all for the better.

I do not believe in people as much as I used to. I do not trust that people will have anything other than their own interest in mind when I deal with them. I no longer see people as individuals but as competitors and roadblocks to my happiness. When I look in the mirror, what disturbs me the most is that I no longer dare to dream.

Tarantula Hawk?!?!?

I was minding my own business, walking around the property the other day when I saw this 2 inch long black thing with wings, flying around. I was amazed because I had never seen anything like this. I asked a few people what it could be and lo and behold, it led me to the Tarantula Hawk.


Upon researching this little creature I came upon the following descriptions:

• The tarantula hawks prefer female tarantulas and seek them in their burrows. They capture (often following a dramatic battle), sting and paralyze the spider. Next they either drag the spider back into her own burrow or transport their prey to a specially prepared nest where a single egg is laid on the spider’s body, and the entrance is covered. The wasp larva, upon hatching, begins to suck the juices from the still-living spider. After the larva grows a bit the spider dies and the larva plunges into the spider's body and feeds voraciously, avoiding vital organs for as long as possible to keep it fresh.
• The sting, particularly of Pepsis formosa, is among the most painful of any insect. Commenting on his own experience, one researcher said, "You will curse your mother for ever having you." Another described, "...immediate, excruciating pain that simply shuts down one’s ability to do anything, except, perhaps, scream. Mental discipline simply does not work in these situations." Yet another said, "It's not like things that make you swear and say bad things about somebody's mother. These things, when you get stung, you might as well lie down and scream. Why not? It takes your attention off the pain." It is listed near the top of the list in Schmidt Sting Pain Index.

I have no shame in saying I ran when I saw this buzzing around.

Now I know where Ridley Scott and Dan O'Bannon got the idea for Alien. If you see this thing, run!

Dave Exline Demons

I have been working on the Paso Straw Bale House for some time now. Strolling down memory lane can sometimes be educational, inspirational, humorous, sad, or downright painful.
Here is the memory lane I was down today.

Dave Exline (partial) email communication From 12/3/2004:

"It appears, after looking over all of the correspondences, reviewing the verbiage, the attitudes, the half-truths, the excuses, and the half baked "negotiations", that you have had an intent to take over this job for a long time. I really believe that you have "set me up". I believe that you thought you could take over the job at the point that we now are. Yet you now discover how much "more" there is yet to do, and you now find yourself incapable of doing it, and you bring in Turko. Not a problem, I hope it all goes well for you and you end up with what you anticipated. It is no longer my art, no longer my product, and you may no longer use my name in connection with it."

To finish my walk down memory lane here is my analysis:

1. Painful and Sad is Dave Exline alleging that I set him up to take over the job and that it was my intent for a long time.
   
2. Educational is "discovering how much more there is yet to do". If he meant re-installing the windows, bringing the house to code due to his unauthorized engineering changes to the roofing system, and re-doing the majority of the electrical, he was right. If all this was done the first time, there would be no need for this blog.
3. Humorous is that "I can no longer use his name in connection with it." :-)
4. Inspirational in being able to chronicle this house via blogging.

In my stroll down memory lane, I have come across a few other websites of people who have had issues with their respective contractors. It is amazing to me how similar the stories are. If there is such a thing as a shared experience, having issues with your contractor is one of them.

There must be a school somewhere that teaches this. It needs to be closed.

• Insulated Concrete home gone bad
• Bad Oregon House
  

Blogging rules!

It was bound to happen...

I ran into Dave Exline of Three Little Pigs Construction today at Mayan Hardwood. Dave was kind and polite enough to acknowledge me and even made a comment about this blog. Thanks for reading my blog Dave. It is an honor and a pleasure to know that Dave Exline cares enough about the projects he works on to keep up with them.

In fact, I really do miss the great times we had. From the missed schedules, the infamous window install, the unauthorized change to the roof engineering and the wrong gauge wire for the electrical. And let us not forget the T-111 Dave Exline decided to use, and the funniest of all times was when Dave was trying to convince me I did not need to have heat in the master bedroom and bathroom. He was considerate enough to put it in the laundry room. All in all, having to correct all of those was the highlight of 2005 for me.

Once again, good luck with your legal issues and I hope to run into you again soon.

NOT!

Did I say it was hot?

I would really like to thank my neighbor Peter for calling and letting me know there was a fire going on and for sending me the pictures below. I also want to thank the California Department of Forestry for responding in force and limiting the amount of structural damage. As you can tell from these photos, those guys did one hell of a job. Thanks again. It is not that often that you get to see your tax dollars at work this well.

Click on the photos for a close up view



Unfortunately, it got a lot hotter on Sunday, July 24th thanks to a small fire.

This is the view out the back door:


Lucky the water tank did not burn but it is scorched.





The fire burned right up to the 5th wheel and only 15 feet from the house.




It looks like the electrical pole behind the house had some issues and started a grass fire.

...and it is still hot

I admit I am fascinated by this weather. Global climate change or not, this heat is unprecedented. A picture is worth a thousand words.


To say this is out of control is an understatement. I love the heat and have no problem functioning in temps up to 105 degrees, but this type of heat makes me want to lay on the stained concrete floor and not move. Stay cool and stay sane

Summer In the Wine Country

Can I say it has been hot. DAMN HOT! This is from Friday, July 21st.



To cool myself off, I dug these pictures out of the vineyards in different seasons. This is the view from the courtyard.


The daily temp has been above 100 degrees for about 10 straight days. The house (with no airconditioning) stays in the upper 70s' most of the time. Late in the day it can creep up to 80-82 degrees. If I had blinds or curtains the temp would stay in the 70s' all day. Cooling the house is as simple as opening up the windows at night. The house cools to 72-74 degrees by 8am. That said, even with the house performing this way, air conditioning is still needed. If only to cool off the house when it has not been opened up for a few days. Thanks again to Dave Exline for ignoring the energy calculations that were done for the house. After re-reading them, it was clear that air conditioning was needed, even going so far as to spec out the exact unit needed.

I have been thinking of posting the energy calculations, engineering plans, roof, foundation, and electrical plans online. I also have some documentation on a particular construction defect lawsuit. If there is serious enough interest, please let me know.

Have a great weekend.

300 Pics of Paso Straw Bale House

After much procrastination, I have uploaded 300+ pictures, arranged chronologically, of the construction of the Paso Strawbale House. Here you can see up close and personal many of the issues I have previously written about. I hope this is a helpful guide to all of you current and future strawbale, and conventional home owners.

NOTE!!! This is a picture heavy page and could take time to load

Click HERE to view!

This is how contractors do?!?!

I do not mean to beat a dead horse, but there seems to be something really wrong with how contractors/service providers treat prospective customers in San Luis Obispo County.

For example, the sub who installed my plumbing (Harvey Plumbing), they did not show up on time, did not do inventory prior to starting the job and I just realized, they did not install my sink correctly. Only one side was bolted into the wall so now the sink leans. WTF?!

R&R Heating took 6 months to install the filters for the heating unit, and 4 months to figure out why the unit would not run for more than 7 minutes before turning off. They would also make appointments and not keep them, say they fixed it when it was not fixed and pretty much ensured that the master bedroom went the entire year without a functioning heating unit. Thanks Kenny.

To be clear, these contractors were chosen by Semmes and Company and in the end the subs did do about 85-90% of what they should have.

A few more tidbits of how contractors do in SLO County:

• The excavator DKS Construction who took weeks to fax a bid that did not contain all aspects of the job. I guess he missed all of the grading around the 1 acre building site I need to have done as well.
• The landscaping company that promised to email a bid on 6/5/06. Still have not heard from them.
• The water treatment companies that never called back.
• Mayan Hardwood that never called back with a quote for columns I planned for the porch. When I showed up in person the person who helped me actually said, "I called you" after 10 minutes of discussion, she realized she did not even have the pricing information she was to call me about.
  

Would I have had better luck on my own, I doubt it, but it seems as if this behavior is more the rule rather than the exception when it comes to the construction related trades here in San Luis Obispo County.

I just needed to get this off my chest.

Adding to the Blog Roll

I am adding the blog of another Straw Bale house to the blog roll. Mark Frazier is in the early stages of his adventure and has provided me with useful information regarding box beams. I am hoping it is smooth sailing for him from start to finish. Check out the blog for his house Casa De Solariego and perhaps send a shout of encouragement out.

Back to Box Beams

It is Memorial Day weekend. I am sitting here blogging and looking at the vineyards about to drive to SLO to look at paving stones. But what is really on my mind is how I am going to construct box beams.

Do I use hardwood or a treated MDF. Perhaps a false collumn would be better. Red oak or Maple would run $3.00-$6.00/linear foot. Treated MDF would be $1.00-$2.50/linear foot. Mayan Hardwood in Paso has some great product but I am not sure abour the pricing. Big Creek in Paso could also be a resource but I can never make it in there when they are open. (Mon-Fri 6:30am-5:00pm Closed Sat and Sun) HUH? And people complain when Home Depot comes to town...


I am trying to find resources on the web but I am still not sure I want to tackle this on my own. If any DIY'ers want to pipe in I would appreciate it.

Straw Bale House Budget Circa 2003

After agonizing over this for several months, I have decided to post the original budget submitted by Three Little Pigs Construction. It is a great view into their cost estimating abilities.

Line items 101-201 were paid prior to actual house construction as well as lines 303 and 308. Take note of the permitting costs and the school fees on lines 103 and 105

This is for a 2500sqft house with mid level finishes and no landscaping.

The actual budget to this point is more than this spreadsheet. At some point I will publish that as well but as work continues the costs are continuing.

Since I do not do construction for a living I do not know how this compares to traditional construction but I suspect it is more. In my opinion, the house could never have been built at that price.

Blogging the Straw Bale Home

When this project started to have issues, I started a conversation with myself. This conversation allows me to turn the many events over in my mind and hopefully learn from them. Blogging has allowed me to articulate the negative thoughts, feelings, and frustration associated in dealing with contractors in general and Three Little Pigs Construction in particular.

This blog is a conversation about this frustration. This is a conversation with those who are looking for straw bale construction info, those who are looking for construction nightmare stories and those who just desire to have more info on Green Building or the Central Coast of California.


I have stated time and again that the internet is leveling the playing field. Whether you are purchasing a car, or buying a house, the internet gives you access to information that until recently was hard if not impossible to come by. And by extension, blogging allows us to have a wider conversation about our lives experiences that others can learn from.

What this blog is not. It is not 'Top Ten things that went wrong with building my house'. It is not 'Things I hate about my contractor', it is a conversation with all of you about my experiences. It is a small window into my life.

Someone said to me that this blog is a poor reflection of me. Perhaps it is, but I am not perfect. Trying to hide my dislike at feeling as if I have been taken advantage would not do any good. Keeping silent about my pain and frustration in watching a 9 month construction schedule stretch to 23 months does not do anyone (mostly myself) any good. Keeping a stiff upper lip and my mouth shut as I see what should have been a very nice looking custom home become a project I have to salvage is not who or what I am about.

As I continue to learn and grow from this experience I can only hope that others take away enough to avoid some of what I have experienced. I will continue to blog and flog.


And for those of you who read this, please take the time to leave a comment. It only takes a second and I would appreciate it greatly.

Throwing a Fit over Finish

I am having a fit over the finish. There seems to be so much to do and not a good way to prioritize things.

For instance, I want to do some type of finish wood over the huge (and infamous) center beam in the great room, the overhang that makes up the clerestory and the posts in the great room. Also, I am trying to decide what type of moulding to add to the clerestory windows. This picture shows the windows, center beam(between the fans), the support posts, and the overhang.

Perhaps something like this along the beams and the overhang (from a different house):

In addition baseboards are still vexing me. Do I just paint and caulk or do I use Flex Moulding products. Does anyone have experience with flexible moulding? I cannot find someone who stocks it. This website is what I am thinking Flex Moulding.

Speaking of windows, I just noticed the interior plaster folks brought their plaster all the way to the edge of the window leaving no header, or side space to hang anything on. Here is an earlier picture of the window in question.


Yes, contractors do need to be babysat. I am just not feeling the love for SLO Contractors these days.

Doors, Floors, and Chores

I have included pictures of some of the doors, the floors, and a list of chores that need to be done. Enjoy.

Here is the entrance to the Master Bedroom and 2nd bathroom. Thanks for doing a knockout job on the doors Scott.

I have not made a decision on whether I want to keep the floors this way or change them. Right now, I think they look good but we will see how they hold up.

Here is the entry way to the kitchen.

A view of the great room window

And for posterity, here is the post that was inexplicably placed in the center of the window. The good thing is that I have found 80 year old Cedar or Douglas Fir reclamimed wood that I will have re-sawed to cover the posts. Should add a bit more character.

Near Term Projects:

• Wrap support posts and add top and bottom detail
• Install baseboard moulding
• Blinds for windows
  

Seeing Results

The house is starting to resemble a home. With paint complete, doors hung, and the final fixtures going in, the negative aspects are begining to recede into the past. Someday, this will all be a memory. Hopefully a lot sooner than later.

At the other end of the spectrum, getting this project to a point where I am proud of it has taken hard work, intestinal fortitude, and many, many sleepless nights. I really want to thank all the well wishers, the people who have patiently listened to me rant and rave, the friends who have supported me, and I want to thank Al Gore for creating the internet :-). Without this outlet, I surely would have gone mad.

Unfortunatly, not everyone is well wisher. Some people believe that in spite of the unauthorized engineering changes, the poor window install, the support post smack dab in the middle of the picture window, and the lack of heating in the bedroom and baths, that this is somehow my fault. As if I MADE the contractor do these things. As if the contractor actually informed me of these changes. To these people I say leave a comment with your opinions. Please share with us some of your insights. Or you can remain in the shadows lurking...

Re-doing the floors

I spent this weekend stripping, cleaning, and waxing the floors. What a difference. They look much better than they did before.

There are a lot of marks and from the equipment used to etch and stain them. Areas that are not that smooth or well finished. I would like to make them more uniform.

If anyone knows how to smooth out a concrete floor, let me know. The contractor who originally did the floors (Dave Exline) did them at his usual level of quality.

Check out the new section to the left. Three Little Pigs and Uncensored, and Uncut...

What do snow and contractors have in common?

There was snow at the straw bale house today. Something totally nice and totally different.
While it was snowing and 33 degrees outside, the house remained 63 degrees overnight without running the furnace and nothing but paper blinds.

Please enjoy the pics..



So what do snow and contractors have in common in California?

• You never know when they are going to show up
• They never stick around for very long
• When they leave, they usually leave a mess
• Both are made of flakes

What brings this to mind:

• The HVAC sub contractor who did not keep his appointment to come out and install filters and fix the thermostat.
• The Plumber sub contractor who likes the term 'manufacturer defect' as an excuse to why the plumbing fixtures do not work.
• The Internet Service Provider who cannot figure out why he is not getting emails and now wants to charge to remove his equipment. There is a long post about this guy in the near future.

There must be a school in San Luis Obispo County that teaches contractors how to 'treat' their customers.

Three Little Pigs Nightmare

I have remarked many times regarding my opinion of the quality of work, the timeliness of work, and the overall work ethic I observed from Three Little Pigs Construction.

Too many times have I heard 'professional' contractors say things like, "manufactures defect" blame the owner for delays and changes, not show up when they arrange to show up or show and and then have to leave right away. I found this link about contractors from hell. Funny thing is at least 10 of the 15 warning signs happened to me.


As the house takes on character,

I am in serious reflection on the emotions I have experienced. The emotions involved in planning, the emotions involved when ground was first broken, the emotions involved when the foundation was poured. Those were good feelings. To see something you had in your mind for many years taking shape was very satisfying. To go hope to despair inside of 4 months is difficult. To see what you have wanted so much, worked so hard for, sit unfinished, with no progress and no guarantee that is will ever be done is maddening. To have someone explain to you that things were done so wrong that the possibility exists that you may have to tear down the roof framing and rebuild it correctly is the ultimate nightmare come true. Fortunately, that did not happen but it was THE low moment in the building of this house.

War Paint

To watch a house go from all white to the colors you have chosen is a wonderful thing. Unless you do not like the colors. To that end, I think I have found one of the few good, dependable, hardworking, sub-contractor in Paso Robles. AScotty Painting. The owner, Scott Strong (no relation to Mack Strong Seahawks fans) is really doing a great job and I would highly recommend him. He has explained the entire process, is not shy about asking for clarification, does not try to impose his asthetic sense on your project, and overall has been a great person to work with.

He does interior and exterior work. If anyone wants his number, please contact me.

p.s. He is not from Paso Robles. I think that explains the work ethic.

By the numbers...

In all of this, I have neglected to communicate the financial cost of using Dave Exline and the Three Little Pigs to build a house. Here is a very crude and incomplete breakdown of the additional costs and time incurred:

• Three Little Pigs Construction Est. cost to build: Slightly under $400k
• Actual cost to build: Over $500k

To be perfectly clear, in my opinion, this house could never have been built for the contracted price. A reading of this book would have helped in this case

A further breakdown of some of the costs

• Cost to correct structural engineering per Patrick Marr Engineering Memo: over $10k
• Reinstall windows correctly: over $7k
• Install heating in Bedrooms and Baths: over $3.5k
• Fix electrical: over $3.5k
  
• Additional loan costs: over $20k.
  

In addition, there was the additional year it took to complete the house when you should be paying on the mortgage and not paying rent somewhere.

To be clear, Dave Exline would argue that all of these costs are overblown and that whoever gave those numbers overcharged. I find that strange in that the cost he estimated for installing heating in the bedrooms and bath was $1100 more than I had it done for.

In some respects, I actually consider myself lucky. I discovered most of the issues with Dave Exlines 'work' before it was closed in and covered up. Imagine if you will, discovering that you have no heating in your Master Bedroom and bath after you move in? Or maybe when you run your microwave and it trips your circuit breaker because the wrong wiring was used. The aforementioned issues are minor when compared to what could happen in a major earthquake with a roof system that was not built according to the Structural Engineers specification.

What I find sad and downright disturbing is that in the various lawsuits Dave Exline has had to defend himself against, some of these types of issues are alleged. These types of problems were also experienced by some of Dave Exlines former customers.

A lot of lessons have been learned. Not only on my part, by I am sure on Dave Exlines as well.

Lemonade to Lemons

During the course of this blog, I have alluded to unilateral engineering changes made by the contractor. To try to illustrate I have put together a couple of pictures that I hope can better tell the story...

These pictures were taken on or about 11/27/2004. This picture is the T-111 that the contractor installed. The roof framing and rough framing inspections had not been completed by this time yet much of what could have been inspected was covered with T-111 and wrap.


The picture below was taken on 4/15/2005 of some of the engineering work that has been completed. Notice that the T-111 was removed, exposing where we had to add metal hangers above the windows. You can also see where plywood was added for shear transfer per the engineering memo



And here is the page from the Structural Engineers memo from 1/19/2005 that shows where shear transfer should have been installed. The detail below is for the top part of the structure specifying plywood


Thanks to Patrick Marrs for the Engineering memo and Semmes and Company for doing the work to get the house to code and to pass roof and rough framing inspections. They made sure that the house did not come down around me.

Civil Engineering, Oh My

The civil engineer came out. Nice guy and very knowledgable. Other than the house being built in a totally different location than he had based his plan on, his overview was that the building site has held up very well. The road needs to be re-graded and the drainage needs to be done properly but overall his report was positive. Nice to have good news every now and then.

Score 1 for the little guy.

New Year, Same Result

Updated court calendar for Dave Exline. Yes, that is Dave Exline going to court yet again on 1/10/06. Updated Court Calendar

Let's recap 2005 for Dave Exline and Janice Exline DBA as Three Little Pigs Construction:

• Sued by Leslie Miley for Breach of Contract and Negligence.
• Settled lawsuit with Dulce Marrs
• Sued by Dan Conner Plumbing for non-payment of plumbing services
  
• Sued by Michael Boyajian for non-payment of legal services
• Sued by American Contractors Indemity for various claims and lawsuits that were made against the bonds described in Exhibit 2, because of Defendants' violations of the applicable provisions of the California Business and Professions Code"
• Sued by Rosemary Thorne for Breach of Contract

Of course all of the above people don't know construction like Dave does. These legal proceedsing are all because know one knows custom home construction like Dave Exline. Because if they did, they would know that Dave is a salt of the earth guy. Honest as the day is long, and builds homes he is proud of and stands behind.

Have fun Dave!

P.S. The Morgintini Project is done as is the Wild Coyote. I can only hope they never end up on this blog.

Everyone needs an Outlet, but 24 outlets?

This blog is my outlet. It allows me to articulate the frustration, anger, pain, and disgust I have with Three Little Pigs Construction. It also allows me to illustrate some of the more 'interesting' aspects of Dave Exline's construction technique.

Today for your daily edification, I sumbit 24 electrical outlets that are not needed.

The 24 electrical boxes for these outlets were strategically placed every three feet on most of the walls in the house. Yes, The Pigs KNOW electricity. After consulting with a REAL electrician, we decided to remove them.

In case you are wondering, I still have plenty of outlets.

In closing I ask each of you to count the total number of outlets in your house. Email me with how many you have.

Year End...

The end of this most interesting year is approaching. This is the time for friends, family, and for some, more court dates. Dave Exline, Janice Exline, and the Three Little Pigs Construction Company are in court again this month. I wonder if Dave Exline is on a first name basis with judge yet?
P.S. I updated Dave's 'Court Calendar' for those of you keeping track

Three Little Pigs Data acquisition

In trying to figure out how I could have been so wrong in choosing Dave Exline and Three Little Pigs Construction, I decided to research his construction business and whether or not he had other legal issues in San Luis Obsipo County. Little did I know what I would find out.

To start off with, here is a picture of Dave Exline of Three Little Pigs Construction being served with my lawsuit alleging breach of contract, fraud, and negligence. He is the little guy on the right. He was going into the courtroom for another construction related lawsuit.

I started out by doing legal research at the San Luis Obsipo County courthouse. Finding out that your contractor has been involved in lawsuits in the past is not a bad thing in and of itself. But finding out that your contractor has been in lawsuits with his immediate family should be cause for concern.

Then I decided to check with the San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara County Clerk Recorders. There was even more info to be found. Looks as if Dave Exline/Three Little Pigs Construction filed mechanics liens against Roger and Jeannie Hunt in San Luis Obispo County and Dulce Marrs in Santa Barbara Country. Go HERE for information on how Mechanics Liens work.

Upon finding this, I decided the next course of action should be to contact the Hunts and Dulce Marrs and to contact former customers of Dave Exline/Three Little Pigs construction to find out their experiences. My list was as follows:

• Ducle Marrs(mechanics lien filed by Three Little Pigs Construction)
  
• Roger and Jeannie Hunt(mechanics lien filed by Three Little Pigs Construction)
• Steve and Judy Brysinski
• Kathy and Craig Bonelli
  
• Rosemary Thorne (Filed lawsuit against Dave Exline/Three Little Pigs)

After hearing their experiences, I thought it would be good to keep an eye on the court calendar in San Luis Obispo County and much to my surprise Dave Exline was a frequent visitor to the courts. Here is a link to a page I created to keep track of his legal issues. This is not a complete list but should give you a sense of how often Dave Exline and Three Little Pigs Construction was showing up on the docket.

In reviewing the calendars I happened upon the case of Michael Boyijian vs. Dave Exline/Janice Exline. A bit of research revealed that Boyijian was retained by Dave Exline in his lawsuit against Dulce Marrs. Something must have happened as now Dave Exline is/was in a lawsuit with his former attorney. How that works only Dave Exline could tell you.

The interesting thing is, if you go to Dave Exlines' website, and look at his current projects, one of them is his sons' house in San Diego, and the other is the Thorne project. The very same Thornes who have filed a lawsuit.

After discovering this information it was clear to me what I was dealing with. Unfortunately most of this information was not as readily available in 2000 as is in 2005. Because if it was, Dave Exline would never have gotten my business

My advice to anyone doing more than $500.00 worth of work with a contractor, spend some time researching them. Check the county clerk recorder for liens and other info, check the civil and criminal courts for info, use internet search engines like Yahoo, Google, and Dogpile by typing in their personal names, company name, and combinations, and also check out your states Contractors License Board just to make sure they have a valid license.

End of the nightmare...

365 days ago, I started peeling back the onion of Dave Exline and the Three Little Pigs Construction companies work. Little did I know that the onion would be rancid, rotten, and slimy. So like so much kitchen waste, I am turning this rancid, rotten, slimy, stinky, onion, into a compost. A compost that can fertilize, that can encourage growth, that will keep giving back something positive and healthy long after the smell has gone.

This house can now be lived in. It can have laughter, it can now have warmth, it can now have happiness, it can now have hope. People will enjoy the holidays in the house, they will create new memories to replace the old memories and fill the house with its' own life.

There is still work to be done, but it is work I gladly do. It is work that will make the bad memories recede into the past.

As the house continues to take on character it will be posted here. As it continues to grow into a home, it will be chronicled here.

Final thoughts on this experience and Dave Exline in particular:

• That it would take 365 days from firing Dave Exline and his band of 'construction' workers to get to a house you can live in is a testament of his construction capability
• Dave Exline will be as successful in his 'custom home construction and home inspection business as he has been in his previous business endeavors.
• Funny that I never see Dave in town.
• If your contractors home is messy, unorganized and cluttered, odds are the work he does for you will be the same
• As for Dave Exline, Janice Exline, and the Three Little Pigs Construction Company, it seems as if fate has a sense of humor in that they continue to have court dates on consecutive days

Thank you all for your support, well wishes, and kind words.

The nightmare is officially over.

How many electrical outlets

As I deconstruct the building of this house, I wonder. why do I have 11(eleven) electrial outlets in one room!?!!? I can only believe it was because The Three Little Pigs wanted to make sure I was a happy camper. Because as we all know, having 6 electrical outlets on 8ft of wall is what everyone wants.

My amazement at the work of Dave Exline dba Three Little Pigs Construction will never cease.

Yee Haw, build me another house sparky!

Court, Court, and more Court

I have found it easier to distill the past and current court cases involving David Exline, Janice Exline, and Three Little Pigs construction, into one page. Click HERE to view.

...and remember, "this is custom home construction and you will get a great piece of property"


RIGHT!!!!!

Free Speech on All Hallows Eve...

I love the Ninth Circuit Court.
Free Speech and Blogging...
http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/Speech/%5Cnews.aspx?id=11675
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,59424,00.html?tw=wn_story_related
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techpolicy/2003-07-02-blogger-libel_x.htm

High Quality Construction Managment

Available: Part-time construction project manager for small to medium size projects.

I have over 4 years experience with plumbing, basic electrical training, standard construction techniques, blueprint reading, budgeting, and purchasing. I am organized, pride myself on attention to detail, and have a unique understanding of all facets of the construction process, I will act as the intermediary workers, between the architect and his subcontractors, and between the project and any regulatory personnel.

In addition, I will meet regularly with owners, subcontractors, architects, and other design professionals to monitor and coordinate all phases of the construction project. I will regularly review engineering and architectural drawings and specifications to monitor progress and ensure compliance with plans and specifications. I will also track and control construction costs to avoid cost overruns.

I will never blame you, the customer for my bad decisions or poor quality work. I will make sure the work crew reports to work on time and ready to work. They will be honest, have integrity, and be free of any wants and warrants. They will work a full day, everyday and treat the job site with respect.

I will make sure no changes are made prior to your approval. I will ensure that all subs are paid in a timely manner and I will make sure the job site is clean, and organized.

Of course I am not looking for a construction management job, but if I had a person like the one described above, I suspect that I would not have had the issues that this project has.

In retrospect, Dave Exline and Three Little Pigs Construction pretty much lived down to their name.

Speaking of, Dave Exline was back in COURT on 9/28/05. For those of you keeping score at home, I think Dave Exline has now had at least 1 court appearance every month of the year. Can he keep the streak alive? Stay tuned.

The cost of doing business...

I have come to the conclusion that anyone who has found a good contractor has won the lottery. Everyone save 1 person I know, has contractor nightmare stories. Even attorneys have nightmare stories.

Here are some things I wish I knew, based on my research:

American Contractors Indemnity Company vs David Vern Exline an individual and dba Three Little Pigs Construction; Janice Exline. Complaint for:

• Breach of Contract
• Indemity
• Common Count
• Account Stated

My favorite line from this lawsuit is as follows:
7. "Thereafter, various claims and lawsuits arose and were made against the bonds described in Exhibit 2, because of Defendants' violations of the applicable provisions of the California Business and Professions Code"

Michael Boyajian vs. Dave Exline and Janice Exline

• currently in litigation for non payment of legal services

Dulce Marrs vs. Dave Exline dba Three Little Pigs Constrcution

• Insurance company settled construction defect lawsuit for $40,000 to Dulce Marrs

Roger and Jeannie Hunt

• Dismissed Dave Exline from project prior to finish

Craig and Kathy Bonelli

• Indicated that they would never work with Dave Exline again.

Dan Conner Plumbing vs. Dave Exline dba Three Little Pigs

• Small claims Dave Exline refused to pay for plumbing work. Three Little Pigs Construction prevailed in this small claims action
  

Thorne weaving barn

• Would not have Tim Exline work on their place.
  

This seems to be the cost of doing business with some contractors. They do not seem to care that they impact peoples lives. They always hide behind "its a business" after they sell you on them building your dream. Contractors by and large, refuse to be pinned down by dates or costs. Why? I really do not know.


When they turn your dream into a nightmare, they refuse to acknowledge it. They refuse to engage you in that discussion, it then becomes all about business.

If I never work with another contractor, it will be too soon. I plan to do my next blog from court in San Luis Obispo

Judges, Lawyers and Courts, Oh My!

I wonder how much a contractor, who stays in court so much, manages to run his business. Dave Exline does seem to spend an inordinate time in court. Whether it be construction related or not, the only way to find out would be to either call and ask Exline, or perhaps show up for one of his court dates on 8/15 AND 8/16. Could this be why the houses he is working on in Monterey County and San Diego County have yet to be finaled? This could also explain why he was not able to do more than 3-4% per month on my house, because if I spent this much time in court, my productivity and quality of work would suffer. Strangely enough, his son/my job site manager has also been spending a lot of time in court as well. The fruit does not fall far it seems.

Perhaps one of his current attorneys would be interested in knowing how much time he spends in court, how much he switches attorneys, and last but not least, how many houses he has actually finished without having some type of conflict with the owner. Finished being the operative word.

Someone once told me that reasonable people do not end up in court. What does it say when a business owner, may have to spend at least 1 day per month (on average) 'defending' himself.


In the end, it would just be best to ....To Three Little Pigs Construction. CA. Lic. #420523

This to shall pass...

To all the people who have sent me emails of encouragement, thank you very much. I appreciate the support



This project will be completed. The agnst, anger, and frustration may never give way to a sense of accomplishment that was once envisioned but it will be complete. Life has a way of bringing everything into focus, our goal is to make sure we are looking when it comes into focus. To that end, I have included some updated pictures of the house coming into focus.

As I re-learn how to focus myself on what is truly important, I find that the one of the criteria of judging a boxing matchrings true, effective aggression. That is something I need to remember everytime I look at this project and become angry. I need to focus the aggression on where it truly belongs. I need to make decisions that:

• Complete this project
• Make cost effective and timely decisions
• Remember that this is an investment
• Do not get bogged down in little details

One thing that I will take away from this is that letting someone in your life is not a trivial matter. How disruptive this project has been to my life is the poster child of that statement.

Needing to vent...

I have been trying to keep this journey in the proper perspective these last few months but this week I am failing.

The more I discover about Dave Exline and Three Little Pigs Construction, the more I am shocked, awed, and amazed that he is still in business. His name has showed up at least 3 times on the court dockets in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo Counties so far this year. At least 2 of them construction related. From what I can tell, he has spent more than his fair share of time in civil and small claims court. Of course in typical american justice fashion, going to court or settling a lawsuit is not an admission of guilt or wrong doing but it does make you wonder. Exlines current attorney(he has been represented no less than 5 attorneys the past 5 years) says he is a salt of the earth kind of guy, honest as the day is long, blah, blah, blah. If being in various stages of litigation is an indicator of saltiness and various court appearances are a sign of honesty, I would have to agree with those statements.

In this situation, the neighbors would tell me that the Three Little Pigs crew would show up at 7am and leave at 11am. That some days they would not come out, that they would look to be talking and joking and not working. I am positive that the only person with a Genreal Contractors license from Three Little Pigs Constrution, spent less than 25% of the time on my site. AND IT SHOWS. The crew he had out there were not real job site managers, or carpenters. Tim Exline(Dave Exlines son) may not have anything more than a high school diploma and he was the job site manager?!?!? Perhaps a closer look at Tim's history in a future post, will bring some clarification to the quality of the work and the work ethic the neighbors mentioned.

Is this a I hate Dave Exline site? No, it's that I hate what contractors are allowed to do to people site.

I have the perspective of someone who grew up in a very bad area. Where there were gangs, drug dealers, thugs and scam artists, etc. I have seen the hustle and the game played up close. The Contractors lobby has twisted the game in such a way that it puts almost ALL of the onus on the consumer to be educated, informed, and on top of things. Even then, it would be almost impossible to protect yourself from a bad contractor. You can call the police after someone has stolen your car or broke into your house. When a contractor screws you over, try getting the CSLB on the phone. Really, try.

The true problem is not so much with Exline but with how contractors are allowed to operate in this state. His actions and behavior is a learned behavior. In effect, contractors can legally take your money, not deliver the goods and services, not pay THEIR bills and leave the owner holding the bag. The bar to getting a complaint on a contractors record is more prohibitive than anything else. The best way I can describe it is this way. The CSLB must have consulted with the IRS's audit team about the level of documentation required to clear an audit in developing their complaint procedure.

In short, contractors have a better game than, the Pimp Game, the 419 Game, and the Three Card Monte scam. The reality is, a high school graduate with no real business or financial skills becomes a contractor and begins to build houses. Before you know it, this person is building 2-3 houses per year at an average cost of $375k. So you have this contractor dealing with subs, permits, owners, etc, and they have over 1 million dollars of budget responsibility. Some contractors handle this well, some do not. Some pay subs on time, some do not. Some play the shell game of "pay me for plumbing and then apply it to something else", where as some keep everything above board. Guess which one I got...

Lies, Damn Lies, Statistics, and Contractors

Mark Twain is rumored to have uttered the phrase "There are Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics" Personally, I think a contractor said it.

Statistically speaking, this house is very wasteful in wood, materials, space utilization, and time and effort to date. Not the 'green' house I envisioned. It needs two heating and cooling units, possibly 20% more lumber than estimated, and no fireplace. (The fireplace story is for another post)

In addition, Dave Exline took liberties with the design and architecture without ever notifying me, the owner, I have included what the house looks like now(left image), and what is was designed to look like.(right image) Of course Dave Exline swears he did this for my benefit.
How about letting the owner make the decision. Note: Please excuse the poor Photoshop job. I am a bit rusty these days.

In line with the title, here are some of the conversations I recall having with Dave Exline of Three Little Pigs Construction.

• Bedrooms and bathrooms do not need central heating and cooling because of how strawbale houses perform. (strange that the laundry room 'needed' it)
• Better to stain the concrete floors prior to framing(the floors will have to be redone due to the amount of traffic during construction)
  
• Concrete counter tops are too expensive(bid I have is over 75% less than Exline estimated)
  
• No such thing as stucco color coat(Strange, every other stucco contractor I spoke to heard of it)
  
• He had never heard of obscure tempered glass

Sometimes I wonder if he ever listened to anything I requested or did he just build the house he wanted. Maybe he was too busy working on his sons house and the project in Greenfield to pay any attention to me.

Contractor Responsibility

Progress on the house continues. It is great to see real professionals at work. People who can make a commitment and stick to it. Who update you with progress and let you know the current status of your project. Thanks again for bringing this project back from the precipice.


Which brings me to this question, why don't some contractors take responsibility? When given a job of building a house, remodeling a kitchen, adding a room, the consensus from people I have spoken to is that some contractors will never admit a mistake. Some just try to ignore it, some try to blame the customers 'meddling' and some actually tell the customer to leave them alone and they will get the job done.(as happened to me). Why not make it right? Why not accept that you did not meet the customers expectation and ask them what would it take to make them happy? Taking responsibility is something most of us learn growing up. What happened to these individuals? Did their parents not give them enough attention, do they despise all authority? Do they become contractors because they can be their own boss, make their own hours, and have virtually no accountability for bad work as long as they can make it pass code?

All bad contractors know that they have the advantage. They know they can do sub-par work and not have any repercussions. The bar is so high to get a complaint on their record that most people do not even try. A contractor can do a bad job and move on. They control who their references are, who their prospective customers talk to, and even the work their prospective customers see.

The agency that regulates contractors in California, the Contractors State License Board, makes getting a complaint on a contractors record is close to an act of god. The amount of documentation and paper work they request is amazing. The amount of paper work is more than what a bank would ask for in a home loan.

In order to have the CSLB begin looking into your alleged complaint, a contractor would have to do something like:

• Not pay their sub-contractors in a timely manner
• Refuse to correct faulty work
• Perhaps make structural changes on their own without consulting a Structural Engineer

Then, the Contractors State License Board will begin to look into your complaint. Should I consider myself lucky that there they are looking into my alleged complaint?

When I first met Dave Exline, he came across as a very dedicated, hard working, honest, upfront, responsible contractor. For me, he is just another report to the CSLB.

Why are Contractors so...

Contractors Complaints (981,000 results from Google) The word elicits the same reaction as car dealers,(527,000 results from Google) and dmv complaints,(66,400 results from Google) . My experience, albeit very limited, is that when a contractor starts giving reasons instead of results, RUN!!! When they begin to tell you how they could have done it, after they have done it, RUN!!! When they say that you don't understand something and refuse to explain it, RUN!!!

In short, do not cut them any slack. Get everything in writing, get performance guarentees, get a list of ALL of their customers, and have them abide by the contractors ethics guidebook. Getting them to include this in their contract would be advisable.

Sadly, when I brought this to the attention of Dave Exline of Three Little Pigs construction, he refused to agree to it. The tagline for the ethics guide is "Doing it Right A Contractors Standard for Excellence.

In addition, I am taking donations to send this book to the former contractors customers :-)

Perhaps there are contractors out there who do the job right the first time. Who do not make excuses, who do not seek to deflect the 55 construction defects from their previous lawsuit to others. Maybe there are contractors who take responsibility for their actions and acutally stand behind there work. Semmes and Company builders seem to fit that bill. They communicate, take pride, and offer results. Sadly they were not my 1st choice to build with.

I have learned quite a bit, and will continue to learn as this process winds it's way thru. Stay tuned, I have 10 months worth of email conversations I am reviewing. Some of them quite enlightening.

House Thoughts and Ramblings...

How did this project go awry? Why, in the face of overwhelming information would someone refuse to take responsibility? Obviously the work was not done in a timely manner. Nor was it done in a workmanlike manner. It was not even done in some cases.

I keep asking the same questions knowing there will be no answers forthcoming. At least from Dave Exline. If this were the first lawsuit against him, I could perhaps accept it. If it were first job he was fired from, perhaps I could accept it. Instead, I was drawn in by Dave Exlines proclamations of:

• "I stand behind my work"
• "You are going to have a nice piece of property"
• "This is a custom home, not a tract home, it takes more time"

So after Dave Exline/Three Little Pigs being on the job from 10/2003 to 11/2004, he was less than 60% complete, no rough framing or roof framing inspections passed, and a host of issues that are outlined in this post.

In trying to articulate how I feel about this, I am struck by the depth of emotions experienced. The questions of why and how will always remain unanswered. They will remain unanswered because Dave Exline does not finish all of the projects he starts, leaving the owners of those respective projects asking themselves some of the same questions.

Hunt, Marrs, Miley. These are the names of the people who ask themselves the same questions I do. Dave Exline/Three Little Pigs Construction started but did not finish these projects. They represent a some % of Three Little Pigs Construction work since 2000. How can you 'stand behind your work' when 3 out of 5-7 projects have VERY unhappy customers.

I removed myself from day to day involvement in the house to gain perspective. It has worked to a certain extent but the reality is that this has been extremely painful, very disappointing, and very frustrating. As the house continues to get built by true professionals, I am constantly struck by the difference in workmanship, work ethic, communication, and quality. Why I settled for less I will never know. There are lessons in every painful moment in life. The hard part is taking the time to learn those lessons. Those lessons are for another post.

Paso Straw Bale House Visit, July 2nd, 2005

This is my first visit to the house site is 3 months. The last 3 months have seen more work done than the Three Little Pigs Construction Company accomplished in 6 months. Kudos to Semmes and Company Builders, (Walt is a good man) for the high quality workmanship, and hard work. True professionals.

I enjoy seeing progress on this but still have a lot of anger and frustration. Anger over re-reading 3 months worth of email correspondence and seeing the lack responsibility for the work done. Frustration over the fact that my dream has turned into something else. Frustration that it is costing so much more in time, effort and energy than anyone could have imagined. Frustration in seeing entire housing developments started and completed in the time it has taken to get to stucco and drywall.

The Internet, leveling the playing field one blog at a time.

Two years to the day

I am two years to the day of signing a contract with Dave Exline of Three Little Pigs Construction. Attempting to re-hash everything is beyond the scope of this entry but I am going to archive the posts I was making to my website here. I will keep this blog updated with the less than enjoyable aspects I encounter as I continue to bring to closure my involvement with Dave Exline of Three Little Pigs construction.

Stoppage of work due to unauthorized engineering changes

No work is being done on the Paso Straw Bale house pending resolution of
legal issues concerning the construction performed by Three Little Pigs/Dave Exline.
:-( Please feel free to email me at Lesliehmatpasostrawbaledotcom for additional(off the
record) information. I will keep updates to a minimum during this time. To say this is very
disappointing would be an understatement. Caveat Emp-tor

Engineer visits house, depression ensues

The structural engineer who originally engineered the house prepared this
report after his review of the construction by Dave Exline/Three Little Pigs Construction:
Engineering Memo . Thanks to Patrick Marr for coming up on short notice to conduct the
review.

Working hard for???

Merry New Year. The new contractor, Semmes & Company Builders (and myself) have spent the last 3 weeks removing lath, staples, nails, etc, so we can remove the windows and install them per the manufactures recommendations. We are down to the large picture windows and should have them re-installed before the end of the year. This is the epitome of taking 2 steps backward to go forward. Upon removing the windows we discovered that the framing was not nailed in properly, in some cases only 1 nail used in the window framing, none of the windows were level, and they did not remove the wood pieces that are shipped with the windows prior to installation. Things are not all that bad. The winters in Paso Robles are mild with temps normally rising to the 60s' in the middle of the day. There are also more Wineries being built which is nevera bad thing. I have included a map of the Paso Robles Wine Country. Please feel free to visit, the red X marks the spot.

This is where the nightmare began...

12/07/04: Winter is upon us and the chill is in the air. Not just the 20 degree weather in Paso Robles last week, but with the construction of the home as well. After being over 3 months behind schedule and at least 4-5 months from completion we made the decision to change contractors late in the game. Semmes & Company Builders is taking over the project. Stay tuned...

We have arrived at this juncture in my opinion, due to the contractor making changes to the design, construction, and living conditions of the house without prior notification. Poor quality workmanship, abusive and derisive communications, changing rational forvarious costs, and arguing needlessly over items that are clearly done poorly.

Overall, it is my opinion that the quality of the lath work is poor, the installation of the windows terrible, the waterproof job under the lath is laughable as evidenced by these pictures 1, 2, 3, Take a look at the stapling job in #3. The stucco sub contractor and the County Inspector both remarked that it looked as if a kid got his first staple gun and went wild. This picture tho fuzzy, says it all. Unfortunately, they are very close to being right as the crew who installed the windows was by my observation, young, inexperienced and
not versed in how to install the windows per the manufactures instructions.

This includes:

• Not installing heating or cooling in the theater room, Master bdr/bath and Guest
  bdr/bath and not informing owner. The county inspector is requiring heat and air
  to be installed in that portion of the house.
  
• Changing the material on the clerestory from Stucco to T-111 wood siding on the
  most exposed part of the house and not informing owner. This is a link I found
  about caring for that type of wood siding. T-111. In short, this siding is perhaps
  the worst thing you could put in the location the contractor chose. It is the most
  exposed part of the home and takes the brunt of the wind, rain, and sun. It would
  need to be resealed every 2-3 years and given what the plywood on the roof did in
  106 degree heat , I am surprised he went with it.
  
• Sub-par installation of the windows and doors that require them to be removed
  and re-installed. This entails removing the lath and expanded metal, taking the
  windows/doors out and re-flashing and sealing the windows. I have included
  links to the latest County Inspection Correction Card as well as the
  recommendation from Obispo Pacific Windows. In regards to the window
  installation, this a quote from the contractor " Just because YOU.. believe it to be
  incorrect..does not make it so...even if you got the inspector and Obispo Pacific to
  side with your one sided argument. I was never allowed to put my 2+cents in, and
  my explanation of the proper way to install in "Straw Bale" walls..with 10' of
  overhang, might have a different out come."
  
• In regards to the installation job on the windows, here is another exchange.
  Contractor comments are in italics, Owner does not have an obligation to pay
  until the work that you say you completed(i.e. window installation) is done to my
  satisfaction. Lets see...where in the contract does it say this...hmmmm...seems to
  me that I am obligated to the Uniform Building Code, and the San Luis Obispo
  County Building requirements, and..State of California...but no where do I see
  Leslie Millie.., or ...Marvin windows, ...or...Obispo Pacific...hmmmmm..It seems to
  me that a f t e r I talk with the inspector, go over my plans and specificiation, the
  UBC, & my Details from the plans with said inspector, that at that time it would be
  determined what action, if any, might be required.
  
• Unfortunately, the situation has have deteriorated the point that the parties are
  not speaking to each other.

September 2004 Post

We live in earthquake country as evidenced by the 6.0 on 9/28 and the 700 aftershocks, several being 5.0 or greater. There are some additional cracks in the flooring but overall, the house withstood the shaking and baking very well. In other news, the windows are 70% complete and roof is 55% complete. I started the structural wiring for the stereo system and should be complete no later than 10/6/04. Lathing and Plastering/Stucco not yet started.

Days like this I wish I had a project schedule.

Lathing and Plastering should be happening this month. If all goes according to plan, we plan to have a
small gathering to do the plastering. Could be a good time for a mud party if it is still hot. Speaking of, it was over
105 degrees when these last pictures were taken. 105!!!! Thanks to Pedraum for giving me space on his blog.

August 2004 Post

Window bucks are in. We can now REALLY see what a Straw Bale Building will look like. Updated pictures have been posted. Go take a look HERE.

Straw has been delivered. If you have wondered how the straw bale homes stay in place, check THIS out. Looks like the set of a B Horror film to me. Speaking of B Movies, someone said there was a giant KING SNAKE in the straw. I guess he will take care of the Rattlesnakes. JOY!

The first course of straw has been stacked. As you can tell from this picture, there is still a lot of straw waiting to be stacked. Dave Exline does several bale raising per year, contact him directly at Three Little Pigs Construction in Paso Robles if you want to join in.

I added some pictures of the engineering that is going into the house. Rumor is that the house had been engineered to withstand an 8.0 earthquake. Ya gotta love straw bale construction. Check out the straps from the foundation to the post, and the extensive use of steel. I hope I never find out HOW well it is engineered. Dave Exline of Three Little Pigs Construction believes we should withstand most major quakes in good shape.

Work party is over. We did not get as much done as we would have liked but it was a great experience. We are considering having a plaster party. If you would like to join us, please email me here . Dave Exline of Three Little Pigs does several plasterings per year. Contact him for more info Special thanks to J.R., Scott, and Sharon for putting in some back breaking labor in 100 degree heat. They are good folks and are always welcome in my house.

January thru July 2004 Posts

July - 2004: Trusses complete and installed, Plywood for roof installed, facia board in place. Interior framing 80%
complete.

June - 2004: Bathrooms are designed and ready to be ordered. Many thanks to Nena at European Bath, Kitchen, Tile
and Stone for the lunches and design advice. She gets to take the first bath! :-)

June - 2004: All trusses delivered.

May - 2004: Roof trusses measured and ordered. Three Little Pigs/Dave Exline informs me that trusses were not built
to spec and have to be re-ordered. Interior framing continues

Apr - 2004: Exterior framing complete, interior framing begins.

Mar - 2004: Straw Bale Building Exterior Framing begins.

Jan - 2004: Foundation poured.