Order and Conformity in a Chaotic World

What you are viewing is a picture of furring strips on the wall for finishing my basement. They are set on 16 inch centers to accept drywall. Since we put the house up for sale it dawned on me (somewhat later than earlier) that in this market a finished basement would be helpful in selling our home.


The reason I show you these pictures is to illustrate that order and conformity have their place in our personal universes. In my little corner of reality my days are spent improving our investment and working to make our home show better and sell quicker. Had the previous owners not allowed morons (with apologies to Dianne who says her entire home was built by morons) to finish the basement the first time, I wouldn't have to be redoing it now.


You see the paneling that was originally applied was done so poorly and with no thought to the moisture issue in the basement that all of it on the outside walls had to be removed. Of course it would have had to have been removed for the termite treatments anyway, but that's another story.


So here I am at this late date establishing 16 inch centers for framing and drywall, redoing the electrical outlets, (the yellow blobs you see on the wall in the first picture are holes that were punched in the block to allow large metal electric boxes to be installed) and repairing and retiling the suspended ceiling.


Order and conformity play a large part in good construction. Perhaps you can notice the haphazard framing behind the washer and dryer. It will require some adjusting and adding to before I can put up drywall. I'm leaving that till last because once I pull the washer and dryer out from the wall and disconnect them I want to drywall, finish and paint before moving them back. All that needs to happen as quickly as possible once they are out of service; my wife thinks she should be able to wash clothes and I agree with her.







This last picture is the other plumbing wall that I attacked first. With the exception of finishing the corner bead on the windows it is ready to mud. I'm not looking forward to that. Of all my skills, my drywall mudding ones are the weakest. I guess you just have to do it more frequently to get good at it.







Then of course there's the sanding and painting. First a primer then another coat. I will prime and paint the remaining paneling to match and hope the outcome is acceptable.



Wish me luck in finishing this project and making it look right.


The Daily Husband