Old windows are bloodsuckers

ID called me up this afternoon with a status update after the aluminium guys came by.

Keyword: CMI.

Really cannot make it... The windows and door (also my poor heart at hearing the cost lol) are goners. All the hinges on the front metal gate (2 sets) and 4 of our top casement windows (3 in the bedroom, 1 in the foyer) have gone to hell and need replacements. In fact, according to his subcon, most of the window hinges are close to their ends and he recommends a complete change! But my ID knows I've gone way beyond my budget for this renovation and have asked them to only replace the ones that are truly spoilt, while servicing (oiling out) the rest for now.

Damage: $80 per window hinge & $70 per set of door hinge (upper and lower)

That's half a grand (almost) strolling out the door... Also half of our fridge. It's starting to look like Bailey and I may have to live without a fridge for the first month of moving in. And beg for food while we are at it, hahaha.

Useful tip from ID: To maintain the lifespan of your hinges, spray it regularly with WD40 to prevent rust.

Ole parquet, dear parquet, how I love you so!

Dropped by our place this afternoon (Saturday) to check out the parquet work and also secretly keep an eye on the glass installers to make sure they don't scratch up our revarnished floor when putting up the sliding glass doors for the kitchen.

Opted for a matte (low-gloss) varnish. Absolutely adore our brand new (looking) floor! ♥ Have I ever mentioned how much I dislike gloss in furnishings? Haha. If I have (sorry) I felt the urge to reiterate. :P 2 tiles replaced, some skirting added to the external left wall (partition) of the storage cabinet (left image below) and a bit of it removed from the external right wall of the kitchen (right image below). Pictures taken before the work was done.

 

The 2 large sliding panels and tracks are also up, but the smaller fixed panels have to be brought back to the workshop cuz they were too big apparently. I didn't realise the glass doors were so heavy until they asked me to try it lol. No wonder I paid a pretty penny for it - 10mm glass is pretty solid stuff. Didn't bother with pictures since it's not completed yet.

The partition guys were supposed to be in on Monday but are now on hold until the glass guys get their work done. And the painters can't come in for retouching until the partition guys finish their part... Domino (delay) effect lol. Good thing our move is planned for late September. :P

Aluminium guys due in this coming week to service the windows (and door) hinges!

New senior citizen in the house

It's official. Bailey has just attained senior citizenship. :(

We went to the vet this afternoon (had to wait 2 hours even WITH an appointment, doh!) and she has been diagnosed with arthritic changes in both her left hip and knee.

I was told to fast her 12 hours before her appointment so that she can be sedated for her x-ray. But Bailey (being the scaredy cat she is) was paralyzed with fear and got through the entire x-ray without it! 

Paralyzed old lady little girl in her carrier while waiting for the doctor

Unfortunately, there is no cure for arthritis. All we can do is give her health supplements to slow down and help her manage these joint changes... For now, she's on bone/joint (glucosamine) and nerve (neuroforte) supplements, painkiller (meloxicam) as well as a weekly jab (cartrophen) for the next month which (according to Dr. Heng) binds to cartilage and will hopefully improve her condition. 

The good doctor has also advised to start her back on fish oil... I stopped giving it to her for the time being cuz the one we have is huge. We have to cut it open and squeeze it into her food each time, which she doesn't like - turns her nose up at her food, this diva. So I may have to look around for smaller ones that I can just feed to her directly (ie. throw into her mouth), rather than these giant human-sized soft capsules at the moment.

We are due back for a review at the end of August, when we ascertain whether to continue those cartrophen jabs and the interval between them, should we do so.

Hope we see some significant improvements by then!

Switched on and lighted up!

After a short but hectic 10-12 hours per day work week, my long weekend proved to be just as busy, if not more so. Not that I'm complaining - I made full use of my time running around town.

Friday
Shopped TVs at Courts Jurong Point.
Watched Ant-Man. (It was surprisingly good)

Saturday
Dropped by Choo Chiang for an item exchange.

Put up the lamp shades for the pendant lights in our kitchen.
Attended a friend's father wake in Marsiling.
Shopped TVs at Gain City Sungei Kadut (abrupt halt due to sudden movie plans lol).
Shopped TVs (and nearly bought one) at Courts Lot 1.

Watched Magic Mike XXL. (Channing Tatum is still as hot as EVER)

Sunday
Minor area cleaning over at our place.
Major QC inspection to mark out 'defects' and other random things to fix.
(48 points identified - the bf says I must be every ID's nightmare hahaha)

All the switches have now been swapped out. Pretty switches = happy Mummy. :)

Was told by the electrician on Thursday that I'm missing a crucial part for the pendant lights in our kitchen so he couldn't fix up the shades for me. When I went over on Friday night to pick up the extra Legrand stuff leftover from the installation, the pendant lights in our kitchen was just the bulbs hanging off the cable like this.

I love warm lights but you have to admit they do look kinda sad and bare hanging there. I was determined to get those missing parts pronto. The plan was to get them from Choo Chiang on Saturday morning (if they had it) but I was late getting there and barely managed to barge run in (they've already put out the 'Closed' sign but I chose to ignore it). I didn't dare to push my luck (or try the salesguy's patience) since he had already told me 他要回家了... I had to say pretty please to even get my stuff exchanged lol.

Which turned out to be a small blessing in disguise. When I got to our place after Choo Chiang, I decided to rummage through the boxes that the pendant lights came in and actually found what I needed to get the lights up! Ta-da! Just call me Ms Handywoman. :P

The upper and lower cabinet mood lighting (with warm T5 LED tubes) in our bathroom is also up and running. The effect is as pretty as can be. My personal spa kinda feeling! :D

Unfortunately, it can't always be a bed of roses when it comes to renovations and furnishing. True enough, I got a call from Mega Discount Store this evening to say that the Toshiba fridge I bought from Rakuten previously is permanently out of stock (now that Toshiba has pulled out of the local market, the agent will no longer be bringing it in). I was asked to either choose another colour (I only wanted white/light colours which they no longer have) or change to another fridge altogether. That kinda put a damper on my weekend high since I was promised back in May that stock will be in mid June. Sigh. Gotta shop for a new refrigerator...

Oh well. On a happier note - parquet revarnishing to start this coming week! :)

Switcheroo!

When I first told the ID I was thinking of changing out all the electrical switches at our place, he said I should expect to spend about $200-300 for them all (and not to waste money haha).

But as usual, the OCD in me I couldn't stand the different shades of white going on in all the different brands of switches his electricians used around the house. To put it simply, it drove me nuts lol. I need consistency, darn it! (I do realise it's a waste of money, kinda.)

Just look at the 3 shades of white in a single spot!

Luckily for me, my Legrand Mallia switches from Choo Chiang ended up costing less than $200. And they had a retail outlet just diagonally across the street from our house too! What convenience. In case I need more. :P

I first found out about Choo Chiang from the kind folks on the Renotalk forum. Obviously, I also did a fair bit of research before I was convinced that they had the most competitive prices. I asked the kind folks (Nicole) over at Home First (whom I bought my lights from), another seller from Carousell (who is apparently one of the local distributors for Schneider) and also called up Choo Chiang to compare basic prices.

1G1W @ $  3.80 (Home First) / $2.60 (Carousell) / $1.60 (Choo Chiang)
2G1W @ $  6.80 (Home First) / $4.50 (Carousell) / $3.00 (Choo Chiang)
3G1W @ $10.00 (Home First) / $7.10 (Carousell) / $4.40 (Choo Chiang)

I was convinced. Choo Chiang it is. :P

Pricelists for future reference

Legrand Mallia (matt white)

1) Choo Chiang Marketing (prices before GST)

- 1G1W @ $1.60
- 2G1W @ $3.00
- 2G2W @ $4.00
- 3G1W @ $4.40
- 3G2W @ $6.30
- 4G1W @ $7.20
- 4G2W @ $10.00
- 13A S/S/O @ $2.80
- 2x13A S/S/O @ $5.10
- SCV @ $3.15
- TEL @ $ 3.00
- CAT6 @ $8.80
- 20A @ $6.80
- Doorbell (switch) @ $3.15

Choo Chiang accepts cash, NETS and CC, with a 1-week exchange policy.

2) Carousell Seller

- 1G1W @ $2.60
- 2G1W @ $4.50
- 3G1W @ $7.10
- 4G1W @ $14.80
- 13A S/S/O @ $4.50
- 2x13A S/S/O @ $7.40

3) Home First

- 1G1W @ $3.80
- 2G1W @ $6.80
- 2G2W @ $9.20
- 3G1W @ $10.00
- 4G1W @ $16.00
- 13A S/S/O @ $6.40
- 2x13A S/S/O @ $15.00

Schneider Electric

1) Carousell Seller

- 1G1W @ $1.80
- 2G1W @ $2.50
- 3G1W @ $4.00
- 4G1W @ $16.00
- 13A S/S/O @ $2.50
- 2x13A S/S/O @ $4.40
- 20A @ $7.90

According to the Carousell seller, Schneider is having a 40% discount for trading in your old switches (any brand) at the moment. 

Oh yeah, and the electricians are due back at our place this coming Thursday. Can't wait to see all our pretty switches in place. :) 

Another step towards our Japanese-themed home... :)

Our Japanese shoji doors have finally arrived at the 65daigou warehouse in Guangzhou yesterday! YAY! :D This is for the doorway between the foyer and the living room, so I can carve out a proper, enclosed cat corner for when I foster cats, like I've done in the past.

What a nightmare it has been, coordinating the logistics of this thing. I opted to place the order myself initially cuz there were way too many options to choose from to custom-make these doors. I had to choose the number of tracks, the number of panels, the pattern of the wooden frame, the pattern on the shoji paper etc. It just seemed like too much information to convey so I spoke to the seller myself to get the details of the order ironed out, made payment via credit card and figured that that would be it (just sit back to wait for the items to arrive at the warehouse in a bit). Boy, I was SO off the mark...

I got a shipping notification via the Taobao app on June 27th and when I checked, it has already arrived in Guangzhou for 3 days, with a daily 提货通知：短信 通知失败 since June 24th! I was baffled - this was my 1st Taobao order after all - so I assumed it would all sort out by itself since I have already put in the 'Ship For Me' order the very next day after I got the notification.

After 3 days and no updates, I decided to drop 65daigou an enquiry on July 1st. 2 days later, they replied that they have no idea why it hasn't been delivered yet and advised that I should get the seller to have the item delivered to their warehouse. So back on Taobao I go, to chat to the seller and to ask her to get the local delivery company to deliver to the warehouse. The next day, 65daigou dropped me another note that the local delivery company that the seller used practises self-collection which they don't do. Which is all well and good since I've already asked the seller to get them to deliver. Ok great, no more problems, the total amount I've paid should include delivery right? ...WRONG!

On July 8th, when I checked the delivery status in the morning and it said 派送中 - I was over the moon. YAY, it's almost there! ...I thought. But in the afternoon when I checked again - the latest update said 派送失败（原因：付款问题（客户））BLOODY HELL. That was when I came to the realisation that I've just made the biggest, dumbest mistake of all, which was to assume that the price is inclusive of door-to-door shipping. I blame it on all the Chinese on the product page - it boggled my mind good. I even asked a friend to pore through the item page for me after that - there was absolutely no mention of the shipping / delivery methods on it. I should have asked the seller, instead of assuming! DOH! (Cue smack forehead lol) So back to 65daigou I go... They checked with the delivery company and were told that the seller opted for collection of delivery charges upon delivery. 65daigou's usual practice was to refuse anything that requires payment (which was what happened with my 1st delivery) but they agreed to pay the shipping charges first, if I could just let them know the exact amount.

Morning of July 9th had me speaking to the seller to get her to check the total amount to pay for delivery (inclusive of the 1st failed delivery, grr). She replied to me that night to say it was 198 RMB but I didn't see it till 10:30 the next morning. She also left a message earlier that morning with her mobile number to say that delivery mode cannot be changed after 11:30am! That set me in panic mode, so I quickly made a call to her (international call charges, gah!) to find out the details. That was when she told me to just pay her the delivery fees and she'd pay the delivery company on my behalf.

That set off another round of confusion cuz I wasn't sure how to pay her. She then told me to just order any item on her listing and she would change the price for me, just like the previous order for my doors. After 20 minutes of figuring out how to pay via the Taobao mobile app, I finally got the case settled. It was going to be delivered that very day. And all this while I was on the way to work! What madness, lol. Needless to say, I was checking delivery status on the app every other hour the whole of Friday. It finally got updated late that night with a 正常签收.

HIP HIP HOORAY! :D

Damage (till date): 1749 (doors/tracks) + 198 (2 x delivery) RMB ($450 ish)
Shipping @ volumetric weight of 42kg (sea) + 7% GST (for items above $400): $155 ish

If I'd gone with the 'Buy For Me' option - the agent fee would have only been 140 RMB (8% of item cost) and a lot less hassle. I wonder if I should try that for my next purchase haha.

In any case, what I've paid is still a lot cheaper than what I was quoted locally (2-3k range) for similar-looking wooden doors and this being the real deal. Provided the dimensions of the delivered product are accurate, of course.

A $600 gamble... (I have terrible luck tho.) Hope all that trouble will be worth it. :P

Slow return for Bailey

A little slow for my liking but very surely, my manja little girl is coming back to me! Bit by bit! :)

She has already spent most of the last 3 nights in bed with me. Now for her to stop being afraid and jumping at the slightest movement. (Might need Feliway's help for that... if I can just remember where I kept it, doh!) She complains a fair bit when I make her take her painkillers but it's a necessary evil, unfortunately.

In any case, she's due back at the vet in 2 weeks' time and I'll probably still have her x-rayed just to know for certain her body's condition.

Her Royal Highness from about 2 weeks ago, when she was feeling better of late. (Please ignore the many carton boxes in the background - those are the stuff I bought for our place that I'm keeping at my parents' for now haha.) You can tell she's in a better mood when she chooses to bestow you with her royal presence lol. Else, she's usually under the bed.

And that's a (carpentry + plumbing) wrap!

Our remaining cabinets have finally been completed! And most importantly, done correctly this time. WOOT! :D Even got my ID to get his subcons to fix up the IKEA metal wall shelves within the storage cabinet, which the previous owners had up in the foyer before.

Foyer Cabinet

Storage Cabinet

The plumbers have also come and gone last week - the bathroom basin, our cheap US$35 double-bowl kitchen sink (a backdated story I hope to get to eventually lol) and the rest of the sanitary ware (taps and accessories) have all been installed. Love my big bathroom basin~ ♥

Off to Admiralty tomorrow morning/afternoon to collect a carpet I bought on Qoo10 a couple of weeks back for the living room. I actually ordered 2 pieces but in separate orders and requested that shipping be combined for both - unfortunately, the seller missed the special instructions I left and refused to do anything about it, so I have to travel down to their office to collect instead. BLEH~ to crappy service but I guess that's what you get when you buy cheap things - no customer service, so to speak.

Update [13/07/15] : They ran out of stock and asked if I wanted to take another colour instead (no thanks) so I have to wait another 2 weeks for them to ship the colour I ordered to me. Wasted a few hours of my precious weekend for nothing!

Also figured I'll make that trip down to Choo Chiang Marketing in the morning to grab those Legrand Mallia switches I've been eyeing for the longest time. Gotta get them for the electricians asap or work progress will be stuck, cuz parquet revarnishing can't happen till electrical is done (ID said it'll be too dirty otherwise).

So many errands, so little time!