Cooking with gas, almost!

I may have mentioned that last Friday we got our final gas inspection. The city inspector took pity on us, and had consented to give us a temporary occupancy permit so we could move back into (and protect) our house. We didn't get it on Friday afternoon because there wasn't enough time.

Just before lunch today, Kurt and I went down to the city to get our gas release. We figured we didn't want to rush the inspector. As I walked into the office, there was a gal with her two young kids, accompanied by her contractor, talking to the inspector. It brought on a strange sense of deja vu from last year:

"You know, we'll need to pull your utilities before we can give you a permit."

"But we're planning to live in the house during the remodel. "

"Ma'am, I know you were planning to live in your house during the remodel, but with the second-story addition you're planning, it's just not safe."

"But we planned the whole remodel around having a section we can live in. We don't want to change schools, and we can't possibly find or afford to rent a place during this time. "

Ad infinitum. Eventually, they worked something out so there is a possibility that they can live there if they can get a structural engineer's signoff. But it had such a strong sense of deja vu to where we were almost a year ago. I just sat there and listened quietly until they were done.

When it was my turn, he had the TCO all ready for me to sign. We have until August 27th to final our project or else they'll turn off the gas. We also got our gas release, which, after faxing it to two different PG&E places (because of conflicting instructions from PG&E), and four phone calls to PG&E, we got an appointment to have our gas turned on next Tuesday, July 10th. Woo-hoo! I tried to get an earlier appointment, but it just wasn't possible. I think we can find alternate showering arrangements until then.