Last weekend was a series of ups and downs.

Things are moving forward again.  Last week, all the debris was removed from the house, the footings were poured, concrete testing was performed, engineer inspection was complete, and they will be installing forms for the foundation walls, which are scheduled to be poured by this mid-week.

This weekend we got a call from our neighbor.  In the middle of the night the wind blew a partition (the old wall of the extension was left up to block debris from getting in this neighbor’s yard) into his backyard and damaged his barbeque, table, fence and garden hose.  Now he is hopping mad.  We told him our contractor would cover the cost of the damages but now he says he does not want to let the construction crew on his property.

Last week we offered him some “inconvenience money” to make up for the noise and the hassle of the construction but he wouldn’t take it.

We don’t know how this will effect the work but hope he will come around.  After all, if we can’t get on his property he will have to look at a wall of cinder blocks and flashing which won’t be pretty.

In these old Brooklyn neighborhoods, the real culprit is change.  No one likes it.  We find it funny that our neighbors would rather have the old overgrown backyard overrun with mosquitoes and rodents than suffer for a couple of months and have a nice clean well-kept house and yard next to them.