Celeste

That is so disgusting I don't even want to think about it. IF we did do something like that - it would be once and it would pay for an early retirement. ick

We are leaving now to go back to the hospital, in a few hours they will be taking him off of the oscillating (SP) ventilator, and will be extubated. hopefully his airways will now be open, and his blood will pump enough oxygen to his lungs. Hopefully now, he can start his road to recovery, I think hes been through enough. I am very moved by the amount of support, Prayers, Phone calls, emails and everything in between that my family is receiving. You all are truly great people. I know we bicker and argue about what sometimes seems like stupid things, But when their is a fellow contractor in need, everyone bands together. Thank you all so much, My wife is incredibly moved by all of your actions, I will try and get more pictures up tonight, I left my phone at the hospital last night so, if I don't answer, leave a message. Thank you Thank you Thank you God bless you all John and Family

Now THIS is winter entertainment :)

Found another shot of custom lattice - over koi :) This deck was amazing amazing - glass, the WOOD was custom cut around the stone. Lots of plastic!!

The thing about some of these fish is that they may start as a $5 baby - it's when they're 10 years old and huge that they have the high dollar replacement value.

We were - and are again thanks to having an organization membership winning streak in TX :)

Rick - koi can get nauseatingly expensive when they get aged (kind of like good wine!) This deck is amazing - one of two we have with the ipe lattice work.....by the koi ponds. I love our ipe customers :)

We've been taking care of this Ipe deck for two years now - no floaters yet due to great preparation. Nerve wracking is a perfect term for this as ONE fish in this pond costs more than the job itself!

Tarps, rigging, plastic whatever you have to do NOT to get ANY chemical in it!! We work around koi ponds quite frequently and you really don't want to be purchasing a half dozen $2K+ fish!!

We've installed fancy wrought iron looking things - I'll try to find pictures. They look really nice.

I'm not talking about replacing wood with wood - I'm talking about selling vinyl replacement. Tear down is silly easy if the wood is already old - generally plenty is missing or rotten. We restore by the square foot - a 4X8 sheet of vinyl lattice, even in the cedar tone, is no more costly in labor & materials than restoration. Then, next year, little housewash and poof, it's clean - still charging but less for them and no hassle for us. It leaves a great look and savings to the homeowner, which they remember!

I want my kitchen......or Beth's workers, which will net me my kitchen. Demolition was VERY successfully completed by me (anyone surprised at that:) ) but reconstruction has been slow going :(

Have you tried talking to SCORE or going through SBA? You are a small business and funds are available for educational purposes. I can't imagine finding a pressure washing scholarship but Business course scholarships should be fairly simple.

Mike - if you actually do the math, replacement costs less on both sides - we would MUCH prefer to tear out & replace than strip that aggravating, chem-wasting wood lattice.

As far as lattice goes, we have talked more homeowners into letting us replace their existing wooden toothpicks with vinyl - after a full explanation of maintenance & future costs, they switch 98% of the time.

We add vents then maintain the deck as usual. It's a nice upsell considering the range of choices out there. If the homeowner has concerns about critters getting under the deck, we will usually install wiring behind any decorative type vents to prevent them from squeezing through.

Scott you should have made this a poll :)

So that's where you've been :) Very nice John. Hope you, Kathy, the kids and the dogs have a GREAT Christmas and may we all have a peaceful, profitable New Year!!

LOL - There are NO MORE SQUIRRELS in my house :) We are certainly looking forward to working with Kelton & Julie. You know the Carolinas turn out some good contractors! Celeste

Julie - Call me :) We're right up in NC - 5 hours drive. 336-270-4598 Celeste

So, normally Mondays are the "bad day". I now officially HATE Tuesdays (and Federal Express......and squirrels) Just today we have had: * A national org "rename" our company. (Corrections in the works) * Our local/national org published our phone number incorrectly in the new member listings (which means no one can call us! grrr) At 11:40 I was wondering when Fed Ex was going to show with over $2K of product we need for a job. I check the tracking info and lo and behold, there's a delivery receipt - signed mind you, saying it had been received at our address by R Gothorp at 9:39. Let me dissect this unresolved mishap :( First - No one came to my door. Second - Roger is in South Carolina and I would never sign R Gothorp - I have a name that I am comfortable using. Third - Fed Ex can't contact the driver while he's on his route so they'll call me. WTF? Don't trucks have GPS and radios? After my 3rd call to their customer service, they tell me that the package was misdelivered - since R Gothorp was signed, someone evidently thinks they're him and should be receiving two enviro-green buckets labeled BRICK SEALER. Hmmmm - not likely. Fast forward to 6 pm, 11 hours after the truck left the facility - which by the way is over an hour to my home and he managed to deliver in exactly that time frame - since I'm sure there were no deliveries prior to mine through the two large cities in between :( Back to the misdelivered package. I have not received a call from anyone with 2 strange green buckets - and our number is clearly printed on the shipping label on the buckets. They say the driver will be able to go GET the said misdelivered buckets tomorrow and deliver them. So, if the moron couldn't deliver to the right address the first time around, what makes them think that he'll remember the INCORRECT address he delivered to today!!!! As if all of this today didn't have me scrambling for a bottle of wine, I'm hanging up the phone with FedEx for the 4th time and I hear stuff breaking in my kitchen. Kids are in the playroom - who the hell is in my kitchen? Turn on kitchen light and there is a friggin' SQUIRREL scrambling all over my kitchen (such as it is - which is worse than Beth's for the record). There are 6 Christmas trees around my house and a 120 lb boxer that hates squirrels and it looked like it was going to touch every square foot of my home before we can heard him out the door. At this point, the children are laying on the dog and I head to the door. I look for the silly rodent, and the oversized furry tailed rat is now streaking straight for me!! I managed to get the door open so the only part on Celeste that the intruder managed to dash across was my feet - had that thing run up me, I wouldn't be typing this. I will tell you this - squirrels are cute OUTSIDE AND IN TREES - they are NOT remotely cute inside your home :( Wednesday needs to hurry up!

Winterizing with an air compressor works just fine. I don't know how he did it but Roger's number is 336-516-6139 - he can walk you through multiple ways to winterize. We've had to drain and blow (no antifreeze) because we were still working during the days.

Wow - 9000 of those were in our state!! Sucks to be in NC I guess.

Hmmmm.......creepy.

How many years do you have in this now Dan?