Aside from the fact that the freaking renovations on our new place have (of course) cost more than we thought, there are other things that I have learned about constructor workers and contractors that I did not know before.

Here is what I have found out in the last week:

• Home Depot is usually playing very feminine pop like Celine Dion, Michael Buble, and whoever sings “How do I liiiiiiiiiiive without yooooooou? How can I breathe without you here in my liiiiiiiiiife?” or something like that.
• The 4 painting/remodeling guys also seem to enjoy some good power love ballads. I don’t know for sure because it was all in Spanish, but the songs involved a great deal of strong feeling on the part of the singer. I would not have expected that.
• If you bring your kids to Home Depot, even if they act like perfect angels the entire time, the male Home Depot associates will ignore or patronize you.
• If you are a woman at Home Depot who is about to drop several hundred dollars on paint, but you are, nevertheless, still female – the male paint associates will still ignore or patronize you.
• If you are a woman and try to go into the insulation part of Home Depot because you will be dropping hundreds of dollars on insulation in the near future, you might get asked to leave because “this is a contractor area”. It’s not. It’s insulation, anyone can buy it. What the guy means is “we think this is a male area”.
• If one contractor doesn’t agree with how another contractor is doing something, they get really girly and snippy about it. They will both call and talk to me about the other person, and then one went so far as to do some work anyway despite the other guy telling him not to, because he claimed that the first guy was going to do it wrong. Which also delayed a third guy doing a totally separate job. Am I in middle school again?!
• They will do totally amazing things to your house and then explain how great a job they did, and just as you get super excited about how awesome it is, they tell you that it cost several hundred dollars more than you thought it would. Then you kind of wish it was maybe a little less awesome.

So, lessons learned. Of course you know that I have also learned that some leases cannot be broken. Since that is still the case, I would still appreciate everyone passing on our Craigslist ad to anyone who might be looking for a house in Richardson!