Leave it to me to time it so that my “luxury hotel” (aka the folks’ house) will be undergoing major demolitions when I’m there. The most recent post from our reporter on the scene (aka Mom):

I think I told you that when we arrived back here in the fall, our sliding doors (east wall looking out on back yard) didn’t move well (in fact, the one in the bedroom wouldn’t shut at all). Even our unenlightened eyes could tell the beams supporting the upper windows seemed to bow out and everything looked like it was sagging. Our contractor assured us the place wouldn’t fall down between then and Christmas and he’d fix it after the new year. On January 2, he took out all the sheetrock and exposed the worst framing job in the history of house building. A 20′ header was supported on one end by 1/2″ of post. It was really ugly. Last Monday, all the windows and doors were removed from the east side of the house and reframing started on Thursday. One slider has been reframed and looks so solid that we think the end of the world would have to occur before it falls. Two more slider areas and the big picture window to go. Contractor hopes to have those done by Tuesday night with windows and doors being scheduled to go back in Wednesday and Thursday. We’ve had plastic over the openings for a week now and it’s been surprisingly warm but pretty ugly since we can’t see out. Fortunately, we’ve been so busy working on our consulting project we haven’t had time to notice. We have the rug pulled back and all furniture covered in plastic. We’ve been living in the kitchen, den and guest room (we had never slept in there before and were happy to find a comfortable bed – hope you enjoy it too). Anyway, this is to say that the place is a mess but by Friday, we’ll take the plastic off the furniture and can sit around and enjoy our new framing. We’ll move back into our bedroom and return the guest room to you after our company leaves Sunday morning. I’m sure the contractor won’t start sheet rocking until after you leave. So expect ugly, but VERY SAFE!

I’ll be sure to post photos for all of you to enjoy. Maybe Greg will share some photos of the five star hotel he’ll be staying in while he’s in New York at the same time. You can compare and see who got the better deal!