Condo Renovations

So, we’ve experienced a pretty significant setback this week. Our living floor has, for lack of a better word, exploded. On Thursday night, Brett and I came home a little later than usual, around 11. I started walking down the hall to put my backpack in our room, when I heard a loud crack and a shout from Brett. I spun around as he jumped back from the tile he’d stepped on in the living room, and we then heard a loud POP! It was like there was a firecracker right in the room. Lo and behold, eight of our 2’ x 2’ floor tiles popped up into an elongated “tent”. For the whole weekend, we could hear ominous pops and cracks as grout squeezed itself free from between our tightly packed tiles. 

We’ve had multiple building staff, our landlord, as well as contractors look at the floor in dismay, and they’ve all assured us that A) this is happening as a result of the cold, and it’s not our fault; B) it’s been occurring in other units; and C) the apartment is not going to come tumbling down on our heads. We’ve been wearing our house shoes around a lot more than usual, but things are largely back to business as usual. Once we got over the initial shock and terror of walking near the tiles, we moved a bit of furniture and have been able to shimmy around the disaster zone to use our living room in much the same way we did before.

It's a shame that Boje was so excited to finally be free of unit renos and construction when he sold the condo and moved to Asia, and now we have to deal with this! So far everyone who's been through to look has been really kind, and our landlord felt so terrible, but I really hope it’s fixed soon. I don't really want to be scheduling workmen here while we're out of town for a week over Chinese New Year, and I really don’t see my mom having a relaxing stay in February with men cutting tiles in the hallway!