Hormigas Part III

There's no food in the cabinet, but they're all over the dishes!  I threw everything in the dishwasher, peppermint soap sprayed everything, then dusted with ground cinnamon again.  WTF.

Hormigas Part II

This morning there were ants EVERYWHERE.  Ok, that was hyperbolic, but there were at least 1,000 ants in my lunch bag.  Was there food in there?  Nope.  There were crumbs on the bottom of the bag.  CRUMBS. 

They're also all over the glassware in the cabinet.  All the cups have ants crawling all over them.  Dishwasher time!  

We are supposed to get the tree today, too! I put the bag in the yard and attempted to contain the ants in the kitchen.  This time, there were soldiers, too.  Peppermint soap and ground cinnamon all over .  I found the hole they were coming in from.  I made a paste with the cinnamon and water, and packed it into the hole.  We'll see if this does it. 

Hormigas!

M-F'ing ants.  Ants in the kitchen.  Ants on nothing.  Ants. Ants. Ants.  EW.  There were a few scouts around all week, but tonight they came out in full force.  It was gross.  They're in the kitchen coming out of a cabinet with no food in it!  Peppermint soap and some ground cinnamon mixed with water to seal the holes fixed the problem today.

Flex (Doesn't) Seal

Welp, that didn't last long.  The kitchen wall is leaking again.  I got up at 3 AM last night to check on the buckets, and all three were almost full.  At 6 AM, they were full again.  Good news is the rain let up during the day, and they didn't overflow while I was at work.  The bad news is it was starting to rain hard again.  I looked in the storage room, and I had a tube of window and door caulking.  I loaded it up in the caulk gun and went upstairs to patch the gaps. 

Go figure as soon as I walk outside, it starts to pour.  To do a quick and comprehensive job, I start putting the caulking on heavy, then POP.  The tube explodes.  Did I stop? Nope!  I started applying the caulking that was squirming from the opening by hand, smearing it into the gap and all over the wall.  I wonder if this will dry... ever. 

The good news is the dripping in the kitchen has significantly slowed down.  We'll see how well this holds up!

It's Raining!

And that's a good thing!  California's had a drought for several years now.  This will also let me test how well the Flex Seal is holding up on the exterior wall above my kitchen. 

NEST is coming!

So last Winter, my utilities bills were a little bit of a pain.  Given that we now had a functioning furnace, we were definitely living in a warm(er) house.  It was literally a difference of night and day!  Because the thermostat was programmable, though, when we were home off schedule, we would switch it to "On."  Inevitably, we'd forget to turn it off when we left. 

I've been thinking of getting the NEST thermostat for a while now, and Amazon just published this deal today: Get a $40 Amazon.com Gift Card with Purchase of a Nest Learning Thermostat.  BOOM!  How could I not have one of these beauties?!  

It probably won't be sitting at 72 degrees, but it is my hope that it pays for itself in its energy savings thanks to my own forgetfulness. 

I checked the NEST website, and it says that my wiring should be compatible with this.  I'll update once I get it, and post the installation. 

Heat, Heat, Heat...

So the cold season is upon us once again, and I am still grateful for Rudy on the installation of the furnaces.  It's amazing how much of a difference a warm house can make.  One thing I may upgrade soon is the thermostat.  We currently have a programmable thermostat from Honeywell, but I often put it on, "Hold," to turn it on and forget to turn it off when we leave the house.  Depending on what this next PG&E bill looks like, I may be replacing it with a smart thermostat, like the NEST,  VERY soon. 

Windows... Anderson... UGH

The crew from Renewal by Anderson came to fix everything.  I missed the appointment back in March due to illness, so we rescheduled.  This is was first Saturday they had available.  Well, actually, I had it in my notes as October 12, but they arrived today.  :-/  Anthony and "Earnest" (not his real name) replaced the picture window's glass with privacy glass.  It was relatively painless.  A bulk of the work was just cutting the seal between the frame and the glass.  I just hope the silicon seal doesn't leak now that it's been re done. 

Anthony looked at the dual hung windows and said that he doesn't have any felt strips that can be placed anywhere to seal it better.  He looked at the lower sash and said that he thinks it was made incorrectly, and that's why it's not sealing properly!  I don't know why Rich didn't mention this.  Anthony said that the way the window was now, when it closed, because a piece was upside down, the window wasn't sealing.  He looked at the others in the room and one in the living room, and they were all like this.  He said he'd recommend that the lower sashes be replaced. 

They also redid the caulking in the bathroom around the window. 

Anthony said I should get a call in a week or two to schedule another visit to fix the front windows. 

I'm frustrated by the fact that these windows cost about 3 times what another contractor quoted me.  The reason I went with Renewal by Anderson was because my sister used them, and they seemed to have done good work at her place.  I can't believe it's been three service calls, and almost a year, and the issues I called about have still not been corrected.  I spoke to another contractor about the back wall, too, and he said that if they (Anderson) used an electric saw to cut out the old door (they did), it could have rattle the wall enough to break the seal, allowing water to get into the wall!  Whatever.  It's hard enough to get them to fix the mistakes that are completely clear they made.  Looks like this is another contractor mess that I'll have to clean up.