Halloween 2010

Happy Halloween!!!

Okay, its really late but here it is our annual compendium of Halloween craziness. We had several new things this year along with lots of returning favorites and a separate Halloween party to boot.

Sit back, relax and enjoy this pictorial tour of our haunted mansion...

Here's an overview shot of how the place looked during the day time. Not too scary right? Kind of a good spooky sky no?

But here's how the place looked at night! Booga, booga, booga.

Kid level view of the entrance to the grave yard at night...from this angle it looks like a boring straight shot right to the back doesn't it?

Here's how our giant scarecrow looked during the day.

Giant ScareCrow at night.... In the past several years the scarecrow 'did' things. So this year we put it right up front on the sidewalk and ....it didn't do ANYTHING, but sit there and look spooky. We put it up pretty early and EVERYBODY who walked buy asked us, 'whats it going to do this year?' Because everybody was expecting it to do something....we're kinda becoming a victim of our own fame here...lots of repeat customers over the past couple of years and they remember all the scares.....its making it harder to scare people....though, we managed to do it pretty well this year.

Wait, who's that peaking out from under the scarecrows arm? Its Silas our runaway scarecrow. He actually made appearances in the graveyard this year...when he wasn't out eating uh,....stuff.....

Up front on the other side of the path was this new addition to the Haunted Pumpkin Patch. Its a fogger uh, thingy....it attached to a little fogger and then you can make creepy fog come out of its mouth. When you time it just right it makes for some awesome creepy pictures.

Creepy foggy pumpkin and Bob.

For the brave souls who actually enter the haunted pumpkin patch, a few steps in and a look to the left reveals another new addition. This is Peter Pumpkin the Great Pumpkins half brother once removed as he said it.... Peter is a talking pumpkin who told the story of the Haunted Pumpkin patch, the rules of the pumpkin patch and lots, and lots, and lots, of really, really truly terrible Halloween jokes....man were they bad...so bad that you couldn't help but laugh in spite of yourself.

Closer up shot of Peter. We made it look like the spiders are holding him up. The 'pumpkin vines' are hiding a speaker. I just realized that it looks like Peter has a third eye...maybe he's Hindu?

We set up a little sitting area at Peters feet with hay and mini hay bales for kids to sit on and listen to him....and we actually got kids to slow down long enough to do that!

Continuing on down the path looking to your left was this scary guy. It's a pumpkin headed zombie trying to free itself from its own grave...he was new this year and got a great reaction from people.

Shot of the pumpkin zombie and Bob. This year I got the reasonably bright idea to take one of our many funkins and carve it up so that we could hide a red spotlight inside it. It worked awesome! The pumpkin zombie is creepily lit, the source of the light is hidden and it gives the pumpkin a creepy red glowing visage. That's like a Halloween three-fer. The pumpkin zombie is a home made animated prop that when triggered thrashed about violently trying to free itself from its grave and growled and yelled out for brains. This guy scared a lot of people this year.

A little bit past the pumpkin zombie on the right side was our ghost making a return visitation in the downstairs. The hanging skull bowl was where the candy was so the kids had to make it at least this far to get some. The person handing out candy was in charge of triggering the pumpkin zombie and the fog machine.

And of course at the end of the path behind the chain and floating over the rest of the cemetery is BOB, our giant floating head of doom. Bob is the face from the mirror from the original sleeping beauty movie. He can talk to kids and look around and change his facial expression to suit his mood.

A close up of the skull below Bob, just because.

Also new this year is what we where calling 'The Zombie family Picnic'. We have the daddy zombie, the baby zombie, the zombie quatoo but no mommie zombie.....do you want to be their mommy?
These guys where right in front of Bob and the quatoo gave the people a good scare. The quatoo is attached to our 4-bar lifter and when activated it jumps up 4' and out 4' to right behind the chain and right up in peoples faces. We haven't used a prop on the 4-bar this lite in years...I've forgotten how fast that thing can move....halfway through the night I had to re-rebar it down as it had pulled its stakes out and was in danger of decapitating someone...

Zombie family by night. Bob would ask people if they could tell what the zombies where eating and when people turned to look the Quatoo would leap out at them. Lots of great reactions. I think the best reaction was from our dear friend Ian. He and his two twin 7yr old boys came by dressed as zombies!!! I was introducing them to our own zombie family when the Quatoo jumped up for a hug...I think Ian must of jumped up like 3' in the air and back 4'...truly one of the best reactions of the night...

So now after you walk back out of the graveyard and are walking past the rest of the house you see this. Also new this year was granny....Irene whipped her up in like 30 min... Isn't it sweet how shes rocking her grandchild. This prop got a surprisingly strong reaction. People where never sure if it was a dummy or if there was a person in there who was going to jump out at them.

Granny at night...creepy! See how the baby has a roll of smarties in its hand? Also Irene stuck a red glow stick behind her eyes on Halloween night so they would glow spookily.

Long shot of granny framed by a couple of pumpkins with Henrietta looking on.

The spiders where up to their old tricks this year...besides holding up Peter and covering all our nice decorations with spider webs they caught their biggest meal yet

Slappy!!! oh no!!!!! Slappy, who was our lazy, snoring grave digger last year is playing the role of a cut-rate painting contractor....I think the spiders are union.....
Slappy was hooked up to a 3rpm timing motor that would make him shake every once in a while like he was trying to free himself. It was subtle but caught several people off guard.

This year we added sound to Slappy. I jiggered a motion sensor and had it turn on a set of self amplified computer speakers. I had a little mp3 player hooked up to the computer speakers with one track that was running in a loop. One channel was Slappy asking for help and talking about his spider troubles...the other channel was the soundtrack for the.....

Hell Hole
Yes, of course the Hell Hole returned this year (I mean we have the sign and everything)....its just such a good use of the otherwise wasted side yard space. This year we added more floating specters (even a pumpkin faced one of course) and more twinkling orange lights for a better 'fires of hell' effect.

Hell Hole at night. The sound track really got some people with the screams of the damned and a creepy, deep demon laugh.

Silas back in the graveyard, on the prowl.

Maybe Silas is going to help the pumpkin zombie out of its grave so that he'll have a partner in crime?

Look at Silas, mugging next to his wanted poster...

But don't worry folks, the Silas retreavel team was succesful in capturing him.

This year we were part of the Alameda Haunt Your House Contest and Canned Food Drive. We made up these Halloween themed canned food collection boxes and everybody in the contest got one.
Here's Henrietta checking to see if anyone dropped off any tuna...

Even our daughter Natasha got into the act... On a side note, I had no idea that we have so many Russian people in our neighborhood. They were all so excited to hear that we named our daughter Natasha because its ,'such a good strong Russian name!!!' Not making that up, honest.

The final haul for the canned food drive. We took in just slightly over 500 pounds of food!!! We totally blew away the folks at the food bank. We showed up and said, 'Hi I've got the food from the Halloween contest.' and they gave me this little cart to put it on and I was like... 'You're going to need a bigger boat.' They seemed so truely grateful. They even wanted to keep the Halloween boxes so that they could hand out the food to familes in them! I kinda like the idea of folks down on their luck getting their free food for the month in one of our boxes....

Here's of course a blurry shot of halloween night and the crowd of people waiting to get into the graveyard. We made them wait until it was dark enough to see Peter..we didn't use a very bright projector...

Because we are completely insane we had a party on the night before Halloween and invited all our friends, family and neighbors. This was early on, the sunken living room got so packed at one point that I was mildly concerned about somebody taking a spill into the fire pit.
SuperMan totally dug roasting marshmallows over the fire pit.

Overhead shot of the party. Lots of food on the table. We only had the fire pit and the fire flowers over the table on so none of our neighbors felt the need to call the AFD plus, they were almost all at the party.

Here is the family Madscientist after a hard weekend of haunting. We went through 6 gallons of spiced cider, untold pounds of candy, one bottle of rum (ya I'm looking at you Mr. shifty neighborhood meth head on a ten speed that was lingering too close to the spiced cider for too long I remember what you look like and if you still have teeth next Halloween you're a gonna want to steer clear of me if you want to keep em.)

Next Post, The Videos!!!!

Bath Project Problems....part 2 Vanity

Bonfire of the Vanities

Looking at how exactly I am going to install the bath vanity and have run into a couple of problems.

Here's the fabulous vanity we got from the Home Decorators Collection.

Notice the fancy sides and top edges. This thing can not be placed flush against a wall on its short sides.

And here is problem numero uno.. This is the stub-out for the sink drain...its only 4.5" from the wall....not sure how I managed to F this one up so much....because of the position of the stub-out the drain lines for the vanity can not come in through the openings in the back of the vanity. The only thing I can think off here is to cut a hole in the lower corner and bring the drain line in that way. I'll probably also have to shorten the drawers on that side as they look to slide all the way back to damn near the back of the cabinet.

Here's a shot of the back of the vanity showing the access holes for the drain and water supply lines.

Which brings me to issue #2. How to get the water supply lines in. If I have the vanity as shown in the previous post they would have to come in from the side which will be visible from the front.

One thought is, is that if I raise the vanity up enough I might be able to bring the lines down the wall and have them enter the cutout just above the sole plate of the wall. For this to work I need to raise the vanity up ~4".... I'm not sure what's the best way to do this.

Here's a shot of the legs that came with the vanity. They measure ~7.5". Could it be just as easy as buying some legs that are 4" taller? With the stock legs the vanity top is at 36" which I feel is a bit low for me and for elderly folks. I think 40" feels a lot better and with the taller legs it'll be easier to clean under it?

Vanity Questions:
1. What to do about getting the drain line into the cabinet when the stub out is unfortunately placed.
2. What's the best way to raise the vanity cabinet up ~4" so I can get the water lines into it easier?

Any useful advice would be greatly appreciated.

Bath Project Getting Started-Gots Problems....part 1 Shower

Yes it's been a looong while since we've posted on the house blog and boy do I have a back-up of posts....we've got Halloween posts, several knifecatching posts....lots of posts...if I can find the time. Right now I've got exactly a month before the permit runs out on this bath project and I'm going to attempt to get as much done as possible.
Bottom Floor Bath Project
needs help....cause we gots problems...of course.

I've spent a TON of money in the last couple of days ordering everything I think we'll need to get this project finished. I truly had no idea that shower plumbing stuff could be so expensive! It blows me away that you have to buy the fracking valves separately!!! Same thing with the dang vanity faucet!

Here is the plan view of what we are trying to do with the bottom floor bath.

Here's a total side view of everything. You can even see the ceiling mounted rain shower head and the ceiling fan and light.

Ignore the placement of the vanity in this shot it should be rotated 90deg and placed against the wall we're looking through here.

Of course before I can even start thinking about construction I've got to basically clean and organize the entire bottom floor of the house putting away all the seasonal stuff and fully recovering space from the Halloween crush...oh and I have to plug a tire on our truck too....isn't this what every remodeler has to do before starting work?

Ta-da one clean bathroom space!
Now, lets get to the problems....

I've decided to use the Kerdi system and have purchased the Kerdi Shower kit with the 32"by60" pan.
This should have everything I need to waterproof the shower floor and walls.

Problem #1...this is the drain pipe for the shower...notice how it is higher than the floor? Because of where our sewer main is, this is as low as this line can be and still drain properly....

The top of this line is ~5" above the floor! What in the heck can I do about this?
So far my only idea is to build some forms and pour some additional concrete in this area to raise the floor level up and cover this pipe. Then I could set the Kerdi shower base on this raised flat-level platform and continue as normal? I don't want the step into the shower to be any higher than required...anybody have any idea how little concrete above the pipe I can get away with?

Shower Questions
1. The rain shower will project down from the ceiling about 1' leaving it ~8' off the floor. How high up should the waterproofing-tile go and how high up should the glass enclosure go?

2. What to do about the drain line being 5" above the slab in shower area?
-Does it make sense to pour a base-footing for the shower to cover the pipe? If so should I use regular concrete? or what? Dry pack mortar?? The Kerdi shower curbs sit on the outside of the pan so I would need to size this base to be big enough for the curbs also?

3. Placing the drain- I'm pretty sure that the existing location of the drain stub-out is off by 6"...I'm worried about adjusting this as it looks like from reading the kerdi instructions that you have to have this placed EXACTLY in the right spot?

4. On the walls of the shower I would like to use plywood so that I can screw in anywhere for the grab rails and not have to worry about it. Whats the recommended thickness of plywood for this application? Can I adhere the kerdi straight to the plywood or would I have to screw in cement board to this? I'm kinda worried about the thickness of this wall 3/4" ply + 1/2" backer board + 1/2" tile...maybe I don't need to worry about it?

That's part one any helpful advice would be greatly appreciated. I want to pour the pad before the weekend if possible...

Knife Catching 1345 Bay St.

Read This:The following review is just my opinion and only my opinion I am not a professional house appraiser or inspector and I am not a structural engineer. The opinions expressed in this review are based on my own inspection of the property, the publicly available facts from aggregator sites such as Redfin and Zillow and the online permit database for the city of Alameda. I am not responsible for incorrect or missing data that appears in these sources. In fact, its probably best that you just ignore everything you read here as the lunatic ravings of an unbalanced mind.

Knife Catching 1345 Bay St.
Up for review today is 1345 Bay St. Which has the official specs of being a 3-1 of 1371 sq ft on a 6300 sq ft lot. The house is a craftsman built in 1915. The asking price is a not insignificant $679k. View the Harbor Bay listing here.

Here's the google street view of the place. Sorry, I didn't have the camera with me so this will be the only pic in this review. Take a look at the HB site above for some more pics.

First Off, This place is really a 2-1.5. There is a non-permitted half bath in one of the bedrooms. What they are calling the 3rd bedroom is really the covered porch and its right off the kitchen, it does have a closet but the room is tiny, being right off the kitchen it might make a decent home office/guest bedroom.

House Impressions
Location: Well, this place certainly has location, location, location...its on the prime block of Bay St. for Halloween. The Realtor said it was 'The' block of Bay but I'd argue the blocks that dead end on the lagoon are probably 'The' blocks... This is a great tree lined street in the Franklin school district.

Grounds: That sounds pretentious doesn't it? The place has a great front yard for Halloween and a really good sized back yard. The back yard needs some serious landscaping work but it is large and has several mature trees...In fact, I'd say if you want to grow anything other than the existing trees that its got too much tree....one of them will probably have to come down. If you tour this house check out the neighbors backyard on the south side....Its got this amazing 3 story tree house thing that looks pulled from Disneyland! Its got rope bridges and a big slide and MAN I wish I was 10 yrs old again so I could go play on it.

House Exterior: The exterior appeared to be in good shape with the unpainted shingles looking to be okay. There was evidence of dry rot in the eaves and on the front porch. Several of the windows looked to be painted shut.

Interior: The front room was a good size though I would not call it 'spacious' as the add copy does. The dining room is also a good size but not humongous. Both bedrooms are actually pretty good sized with decent closet space. The half bath in the one bedroom looks a bit uh, cramped shall we say...The full bath looks original still, but it looks nice and its actually a good size, as in not tiny.
Kitchen: The kitchen is TINY and looks to be of a 50's vintage. Off the kitchen there is a little nook that they are pretending is a breakfast nook...no way, too small, and the only way into the 3rd bedroom is through this nook. This means, that you will HAVE to use the dining room to eat in, which leaves just the one decent sized but not huge front room as common area space.

I had a nice chat with the Realtor about the place and it seems like she's not trying to mis-represent the place (a nice change). She had the certified permit history there (which goes back to the 40's! and Shows that they converted the porch into a bedroom with permits in the 50's!!!) and not one but two termite reports (~$48k in work!!!) but no house inspection. I asked her if there where any issues with the house and she mentioned the electrical...apparently it would not work when the watering was turned on????

I asked her about the price, since 1290 Caroline is about the same size house on the same size lot in basically the same neighborhood why did she feel that this house was worth ~$80k more. She said, it was the location and the fact that the house was a Craftsman and that, 'Craftsmans always go for more than 50's houses...' I don't know about that. The price differential seems a bit unreasonable to me....

I asked her who her target market was, and I was surprised to hear her say retiree's. But it makes sense, the house is all on one level in a safe neighborhood.

Conclusion: The house is SMALL!!!!!!! I don't see how any family (even with only 1 kid) that can afford the Gold Coast being happy with how small the place is. The house is probably the smallest on the block. This house would work well for a couple of retirees who want to be close to the grand kids.

What The House Needs:
There was no house inspectors report to read so based on my observations.....
Even though it has a concrete foundation circa 1915 the termite report calls it out as failing! This can happen when there is too much water seeping through the concrete for too many years...

1. New Foundation: Dig down and give yourself a real basement for storage and maybe a 'plus' room. ~$100k with good water management features.
2. New forced air furnace and get rid of all the abspestos lined ducts.
3. House is still partially on fuses in an abspestos lined box..might want to change that.
4. House still have galv water pipes that look old, repipe the place in PEX.
5. Do a pop-top master suite addition to give you the room a modern family needs to raise kids.
6. Remodel the Kitchen annexing the 'breakfast nook' space.
   

We'll call it ~$300k worth of work. If you could get the place for $600k you just might break even after adding all the legal square feet....cause the place does have location....Course if you're a retired couple the place might work 'as-is'.

And that's the way I see it.

Halloween Sneak Peek....

Something Wicked This Way Comes........

Check out this video for a sneak peek at what's new this year in the Haunted Graveyard...

This should give you some idea about how the creepy scarecrow is going to look.

Closer-up shot of what's going to be the head for our new even creepier scarecrow.

Alamedeans, Decorate Your House For Halloween!!!!
This year I'm part of the team putting on the annual 'Alameda Haunt Your House' Contest. First prize is two round trip tickets on Frontier Airlines!!!! Woo-Hooo!!!!

This year we're teaming up with the Alameda Food Bank. Every entry will get a Halloween themed canned food collection box. We hope that people will donate food on the two days of the contest and on Halloween.

Alameda is full of neat old houses that would look even more amazing spookified for Halloween don't ya think?

Its easy to enter the contest just email your name address and the name of your entry to boo@alamedahauntyourhouse.com Deadline for entries is Oct 25th.

We're getting the word out about the contest as best we can. The Journal ran an article about it, the AAPS is putting an article about it in their newsletter, we're flyering around town, we're even working on a short 5 minute commercial to be played on the local cable access show about Alameda!!

We could use your help to spread the word even farther. Know someone who lives or has a business in Alameda who loves Halloween? Send em the link to the contest!

Thanks,
Madmadscientist