Destruction, Debris, and Dumpsters

Life is strange.  Sometimes the things that we worry about the most turn out to be the exact things that are the easiest to accomplish.  I mentioned in an earlier post that the task I most dreaded to see Rick tackle was to take out the floor of the shower.  We had only a bit of work on the ceiling, and a few tiles and the floor left for today.

The ceiling work, because it was overhead, actually took some time to finish.  Rick had to use all of his might to take down a couple of stubborn boards, yet in the end he was able to get down what he needed as he removed the last of the drywall at the front of the shower.  We have two boards left to remove, but we cannot do that until we are ready to climb into the attic.  If we removed those boards now, the insulation from the attic would cause a "blizzard" of white insulation into the area where the shower used to be.

Getting out the last row of tile around the left hand and the rear of the shower took a bit of brute force, but in the end a good hammer and chisel left the tile and cement as just more rubble.  That left only the old blue tiled floor set up on about two inches of cement.  We were leery of chipping it out because we did not know where the cast iron drain pipe was under the tile.

"Let me see how this will go," Rick said.  He took his hammer and drove the chisel straight down about two inches from the corner. A couple of good whacks and the corner broke free.  Rick moved the chisel over and soon he had one whole row broken off in fairly good sized pieces.  Then he took the chisel and drove it under the slab that was left.  About one-quarter of the slab lifted up!  Within five minutes, Rick had the entire tiled floor of the old shower broken up and out, leaving only the drain itself suspended on about two inches of cement.  All of the pipes from the drain were still safely buried in the slab on which Gladys rests.

The walls are down, the blue tiled floor is up, and the
debris is out of the way.

Interestingly enough, when Rick took out the threshold to the shower yesterday, he wanted to see how far under the threshold the terrazzo floor continued. Ha!  We should not have worried.  You see, once the plumbing was embedded in the original cement slab,  the cement walls were built for the house.  Once those were up, the terrazzo floor was poured over the entire slab inside the cement block walls.  Therefore, the terrazzo floor was under the shower threshold and under the cement and tile, all the way to the drain.  If we wanted to bring in Barry's crew, they could polish this newly uncovered terrazzo, and we could put in a claw-foot tub or a differently configured shower of any size. The terrazzo floor is under everything.

The terrazzo floor actually goes all the way
to the drain.  We'll leave the drain where it is,
letting the plumbers slope the new floor to the
old drain position. 

The demolition is now complete.  We are left with a huge opening for our new shower and with a huge pile of debris.  We originally thought we would add a bit of debris to our garbage every week, but to get rid of this mountain of old tiles, timber, and cement, we would be filling the garbage can from now until next year at this time.  This is especially true because the City announced recently that they are cutting back on garbage pick-up. The recycling has gone so well that people no longer need twice-weekly garbage collection. Starting in January, Dunedin will reduce garbage collection to once a week.  Since we will only get garbage taken away once a week in a couple of months, we had to come up with a better plan to get rid of all the shower debris.

We decided to get rid of it all at once.  Early this morning Rick called the City to have a six cubic-yard dumpster delivered to our driveway.

Just before lunch, our tile contractor came over to do final measurements of the space.  He gave us the dimensions so we could order tile.

After lunch, I stayed home to wait for the dumpster delivery and to try to rid every surface inside Gladys of an inch of plaster dust while Rick went to ProSource to order the tile.  The dumpster was delivered just a few minutes before Rick came home.  By that time, I was really tired.

Rick, of course, could not sit still.  He changed into his work clothes and went outside to put the wooden frame pieces and the drywall/ plaster wall pieces into the dumpster.  When he did not come in after a while, I went outside to investigate.  I found that the neighbor man to our North, Mark, was helping Rick load the heavy plastic bags of debris into the wheelbarrow.  God bless Mark! They then manhandled the bags into the dumpster.  I could tell that Rick was really beat, but he was not about to pass up an offer from Mark to help him get those heavy bags into the dumpster.  Mark had a few old pipes that he wanted to get rid of, so those topped off the dumpster.  All of the debris is now inside, and the dumpster is full.  Rick called the City, and they will send a truck tomorrow to pick it up.

Once again, a turquoise Dunedin dumpster graces the
driveway. It is full to the top with the remains of our shower.

Sweeet!  Yes, the dumpster cost us $77.00 (which will be added to our next water/ garbage collection bill), but it was well worth it.  We do not have piles of debris littering the yard, and by tomorrow we will have the dumpster removed and our driveway returned to us.

The demolition is finished. Tomorrow, construction begins.  We will buy 2 x 4s to frame in a new right-hand wall and a little drywall to enclose the pocket door.  We still have the ceiling fan and attic to contend with, but each day we move toward getting a new shower in the master bathroom.  Not bad for being in Florida less than a week, is it?