and from the "thank god it's not as bad as we thought" files...

we spent several sweaty hours last night pulling down the rest of the tiles in the bathroom, exposing the wood structure all around. a dozen garbage bags full of tiles, drywall, and insulation later, we have wood planks that don't look bad at all, 2x4s that look pretty rotted, and no more ants (whoo!).

this morning, we met the roofer (who we'd hired sight-unseen based on a recommedation from our realtor, who really came through with the floor guy, so it's all good) at the house to have him look at the bathroom and tell us (we were sure) that we'd have to re-do the structural wood, and then take off the new roof that he'd just put on and re-do that, and had we by any chance seen that movie "the money pit"?

but no! the stars were aligned! he looked around and pronounced us in good shape. the actual structural wood (5/4" thick planks) are in great condition ("they sure built houses good back then") and the rotted 2x4s are not part of the structure at all, and were just holding up the drywall. solution? sister a new board to each 2x4 just to have something to screw the drywall to, and move on.

now, it's just a question of whether we can find someone to finish ripping up tile (the floor has to be done) and re-do the bathroom in a week or two, since that's all the time we have til we move in.

the race is on!