April 3, 2009
new cement steps, with reservations
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Our new cement steps wait, just shy of being complete. The contractor hurt himself or something at home last weekend and we haven’t heard from him since. He hasn’t asked to be paid yet, so perhaps its a wash.
The steps are somewhat shy of being necessarily what we were expecting or desired. Solid, but crooked enough to note. Eh.
It’s not the crookedness that’s noticeable, it’s the sloppy chunks of cement stuck to everything that’s going to take some chiseling to get rid of. I feel so sorry for you. This resembles the new front walk the city put in my terrace last year. Chunks all over and slopped on top of the 100 year old iron water access cap.
“Crooked” as in not aligned with the street sidewalk, or slanted down from one side to the other? If its the latter, it looks like one of the side buttressing walls is lower than the other – it may be that it was the only way they could be rebuilt without re-doing the lower buttressing wall. Don’t sweat it – they still look nice. And hey, when is anything associated with an old house level and square anyway??
Crooked like not aligned with the sidewalk and bottom step. The steps actually appear to be correct, but the larger last step at the bottom is wonky. I’ll get used to it eventually, everything passes.
We’re used to old not-square work and my own, newly not-square work, but what chokes me a little is paying someone else a grand for this kind of thing.