Savannah

Last weekend Lita and I went to Savannah for a few days. It was our first time going there and didn't know what to expect. Lita was told by a coworker that Savannah was a very nice looking city, with its old buildings and such. I didn't know what would actually be there and just figured that it would be like Jacksonville, old buildings here and there sprinkled with some new towers. Boy was I wrong!

Our hotel was about 10 minutes away on Abercorn Street and the neighborhood looked just like any suburban neighborhood did, with its strip malls here and there, Burger Kings and McDonalds on each corner, of course it was the first time I saw an actual Piggly Wiggly! After checking in we left the dogs in the room and went straight down Abercorn. At first it was the normal bungalows that I have been accustomed to here in Jax, but then out of nowhere came these rowhouses. You could tell they needed help but they were so beautiful, I thought already it was the greatest place. Little did either of us know that we had just only been through the Victorian district. This district is starting to revitalize just like Springfield is. I figured it couldn't get any better, but then the oak tree lined streets started to part and in front of us was a little pocket park with grand homes all around the park. I couldn't believe what I saw and as we kept driving the houses were just grander and grander. As you can tell, that is how it went the whole time we were there. Every turn we were just in awe of whatever was in front of us. I couldn't believe there was a city that still had most of its historic buildings intact. Jacksonville has lost a lot of it's history to the wrecking ball. A lot of the buildings being torned down to be rebuilt as parking space. Our Main St. isn't even the main street anymore. There is absolutely nothing on that street to go to, besides the new library. It is a shame to see the old pictures compared to what is there now. Anyways back to Savannah. We had a blast there and my wife is for certain that our next home will be in Savannah. I think our next trip is to Charleston, heard it was a bigger version of Savannah.

Here are some pictures of our trip:

The Return.....

Well it has been quite some time since I last wrote anything, but I am finally back. Well for now at least. I guess after the debacle my FSU Seminoles have been having, I just couldn't get up to write anymore. But since the season is over (which actually ended about 4 months ago) I can go back to writing about my house.

Since I last left off there has been no real changes. I did prep the master bedroom for paint, which it hasn't been painted yet. I have also replaced the bad floor boards that I have in the living room. I thought this job would be hard, but I found out that it wasn't as bad as I thought. The worst part is finding replacement heartwood pine flooring. I'm lucky enough to have some dumbass neighbors who buy historic homes and just rip out everything inside and throw it out. As you can tell I have been dumpster diving a lot. I also found 2 old sinks from different eras. I'm not sure how old they are, but they have openings slotted with 2 faucets for hot and cold. So I can only assume they are old. Back to the flooring. Another thing that was difficult with replacing the wood flooring was cutting out the bad parts. I could have done it the easy way and just ripped out the whole floor board, but I wanted to save as much flooring I could, so that meant squaring up and cutting the floorboard while it was still on the ground. Let me tell you that was hard, I could never get a good perpendicular cut. And when I did get a good cut, using the chisel was horrendous. I found that putting a saw blade on my dremel was the best way of getting a good cut.

When I finally got everything cut to size and installed the new old floorboard, I ended up with space between the new and the old floors. The new floorboard I had was about 1/16th skinnier in width. I though it wouldn't make much of a difference, but after putting it in, you could see the spacing so well. Solution: Use a broom or brush and brush the sawdust that will no doubt be there into the crevices. I forget where I got that idea, but I think it was on someones blog. That worked like wonder. Now all I have to do it complete the other floorboards, sand the floors and then put some shellac on them. Yes folks you heard right, I am going to shellack these damn floors, but that will be another day. Until then Merry Christmas and send me some money.