Too much to do, Too little Time

Since spring is in the air, its boat launch season, and its pool opening season, and its back yard reno season, and its gardening, vacation planning, and NHL playoffs season (Go Habs Go!)

Yesterday the pool guys came over at lunchtime and scratched their chins while looking at the pool.

They shared some pretty good news, but everything came with caveats. Going from worst to best here are the scenarios for the pool...

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Worst Case:

The most expensive way to do what we want to do is to drain the pool, cut back the concrete deck by about a foot, remove the concrete and unscrew the coping from the steel walls. Replace the liner and coping and reassemble. Cost to do this would be start around $5500.

Better Case:

The next best case would be to detach the liner, letting it fall into the pool, cut back the concrete deck by about a foot, remove the concrete and unscrew the coping from the steel walls. Replace the coping and reattach the liner. If the liner tears or stretches out of shape in the process, see previous paragraph. Budget for this is around $3000

Best case:

Leave the coping on the sides, but cut back a keystone shape at each corner (carefully) allowing access to the broken corners. Remove and replace the corner pieces. The stretched liner in the corners can be reattached using steam to stretch the liner and glue, if the pool is drained before they arrive. Budget for this is under $500

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So I am aiming for the best case (although I should be honest and say that a new liner would look really nice). The pool guys also saved us money by pointing out that rather than having them pump the leafs out of the pool, we could do it ourselves by attaching a "leaf bagger" to our garden hose. We will give that a try before hiring someone. International has saved us a pile of cash in this house call, and I am very appreciative. We will stop by the store in the next couple days to book the crew for the liner reattachment and to buy a leaf bagger.

In other news, we worked out our estimate of bricks for the retaining wall in front of the pool. It looks like we are about to buy 7 skids of interlocking brick. and 10 yards of gravel. Then I will get a case of beer and watch as Chuck installs the wall. OK, that beer part won't happen, but the bricks sure will. Maybe one weekend we will have a wall party and play Pink Floyd. You're invited.

In case you are wondering where the wall is going, there is a pink string across the backyard. It is our imaginary wall.

The reason that all I got done on the yard last night is a mittful of calculations and a pink string, is because the boat has to go in the water on Saturday (which means the wall won't get started then either). Since the boat has to go in the water on Saturday, I stole SWMBO and the boys away to the yacht club and we emptied the boat so it would have the best chance of getting from its trailer to the lake once the cranes arrive. The truck is now full of boat, the boat is full of nothing the yard is a mess, and everything is everywhere.

While SWMBO and I were loading the boat stuff into the truck, the boys decided to go to the beach and throw rocks in the lake. Small boys everywhere love throwing rocks into lakes. Somehow in the process, they both managed to get very wet. Or as Buddy said - "I had a nice swim, but Cuppa fell in the Lake." Suuuuuuuuuure Bud, that's exactly what happened.