Snafu!

As I was leaving the kitchen on tuesday night, I feel something damp on the carpeting at the edge of the kitchen floor. Sure enough, the whole edge of the carpet was very wet. I thought Steve probably wiped some spill. But, I could place a paper towel and wick quite a bit of water. I called Steve and he told me that there was a water spill as he was trying to fix the plumbing and he had cleaned it up. As I was talking to him, I see a gleaming bead of water in one of the joints in the flooring. Again, placing a paper towel on the flooring, I could draw a couple of drops of water. I also place a paper towel under the dishwasher and pull quite a bit of water. I immediately tell Steve that he needs to come over in the morning and take a look.

Wednesday morning, Steve arrives to take a look. He removed some of the flooring and assures me that rest of the flooring is OK.

That evening when I arrived home, I see that Steve has only removed a strip of flooring under and near the stove. I'm not convinced he has done a complete job because I can still see joints in the flooring buckled. Where I had drawn water the previous day, flooring is still intact. I called up Steve at 8:30PM and he tells me that he had removed the flooring, examined the underside and everything was fine. I'm still not convinced. I just placed another paper towel under the dishwasher and pulled up some more water. This is a bigger problem that Steve is downplaying for some reason. He has only removed the flooring from the stove area, overlooking the area near the sink and dishwasher. I called up Ken to let him know and asking Steve to come over the next day and take a look. Soon thereafter Steve called me back to tell me that there was another leak - once again, he did not tell me this had happened - and that he probably forgot to wipe the area under the dishwasher. I explain to him that the flooring needs to be removed. He'll arrive here tomorrow morning to take a look.

Meanwhile, I took some pictures of the floor and sent them over to Ken by eMail, for reference.

Work nearly complete

By friday, Victor has finished the tile work. He wanted to come back on monday to complete the grout work. Steve has patched up the walls, hooked up the stove and garbage disposal. No faucet or plumbing yet.

On monday, grout work is complete. Kitchen looks wonderful.

Tuesday, Steve completes the plumbing work, installs the faucet and the only thing remaining is the vent hood. By the way, as I had feared, Steve Adams called me on saturday to tell me that he got the wrong information from the distributor and the hood is still "in transit". He assures me that he is as frustrated by his distributor's behavior as I am.

By tuesday night, I got back from work, photographed the kitchen from all angles and feel good.