Tangent Thursday: The Basement

 I like this blog.  It helps me reflect and focus my attention.  But there's a lot more going on with me than losing weight.  So I thought I'd ramble about something else today.

If you're only interested in a fat guy struggling to not be as fat, you might as well move on.  If you want to see what I've been up to, keep reading.

We bought a house in April.  Since then, we've been doing exciting things like painting and watching the principal on our loan go down by a seemingly insignificant number each month.  One of the selling features was an unfinished basement.  It was a blank canvas.  A chance for me to increase the value of our home, give us more living space, and get my hands dirty doing something.

The hardest part of doing something isn't the doing, it's the planning.  I've watched countless youtube videos on every aspect of finishing a basement, spent hours and hours drawing plans, then hours more after they were rejected by the planning office.  I've pulled three permits so far and have at least one more to pull.  It can be a little overwhelming.

But the work has started, and over winter break I was able to get some work done.  My basement isn't a blank canvas any more.  It's a work in progress.  I'm doing the physical part now.  There's still a lot of planning that needs to happen, but I have something to show for the work I've done so far.

What would a weight-loss blog be without pictures?

 Let's start with the egress window.  My brother and I dug a big hole in the back yard.  It ended up being about six feet deep, five feet wide, and four feet long.  I felt super productive with the hole at first, but by the end one out of every ten or so shovelfuls of dirt would come back down all over my head.  I wasn't mad about the face full of dirt, I was mad the dirt was still in the hole.

 

Next we went to home depot.  I've got a window well, window, treated lumber, and some odds and ends.  It was pricey, but not nearly as pricey as hiring someone else to do it for me.

My uncle came over and cut out the hole in the wall.  We took turns with the sledge hammer knocking out the blocks in the wall.  This part was super rewarding.  After all that work we could finally see into the basement.

 Here's a photo from the next morning.  Pretty artsy, eh?

 Then we did a bunch of stuff and the window and well were in place.  This step went pretty fast and I had my hands full, so I didn't get a chance to take any more pictures here.

 Here's a view from the inside.

There we go.  An egress window installed and two giant piles of dirt left in the yard.  Good work Andrew.

The last thing I did was put in rigid foam insulation.  This took about four days.  I could have done it in one if I had more junk to lean up against it to keep the panels against the wall.  I could put up three or four panels at a time then let them dry for a few hours before moving to the next batch.  There's three more panels that have yet to go up, so I'm not quite done yet.  In addition to insulating my basement, this stuff will be a good vapor barrier to keep moisture out.

It's been a lot of work and there's a lot more to go.  Thanks to my brother, Erick and my uncle, Paul, and my dad for their help.  Thanks for reading about my basement.  It's fun to share.  I'll post updates as work continues.