Setback

We reached our first major setback this afternoon, coincidentally Nathan's birthday, and we are more calm that I would have otherwise expected. It turns out our plumber, whom we both checked with the city and had a recommendation for, used type M copper pipe for our gas, instead of the Laclede specified types L or K. We are still researching but so far, the news is not good. The general consensus from other plumbers we have asked, say that not only is type M to be used only for water, it is illegal to use for gas lines. We have had a number of other problems with this plumber including having him forget to sauter the main connection to our gas line, so at this point, we are ready to find another plumber. Does anyone see a major problem with this? I do. We were supposed to finish hanging the drywall today, and since there are gas lines run up to the 2nd Floor laundry room, as well as the lines into the kitchen, we not only couldn't finish dry-walling, we have to now take down some panels and take out the insulation to have someone run the correct pipe.

The frustrating part isn't so much the extra time it will take, although that makes me cringe inside, but that we are tired and do not have the extra money to hire someone else for a job we already paid someone else to do. We could probably have our plumber come back and run the correct pipe, but then again he also told Nathan that type M is legal and approved with the City of St. Louis. I hope he is right because then at the very least he is not lying straight to our faces, and I would perhaps feel more comfortable letting him fuck up the rest of the plumbing we already paid him for. At this point though, because of the number of other problems we've encountered with him, I just don't feel comfortable. I feel like we took a risk going with him as opposed to a more expensive, well-established company, and that we should just count it as a loss, pay someone else, and move on.

The other frustrating part is that any extra money we were going to have was to go towards having our floors refinished, a project that will once again be for Nathan and I to complete. Not that I mind doing the work, it's just that I was so excited to get in there by May and to have someone else do the floors. To take down drywall and pay AGAIN for something that should have been done right the first time, just eats away at me. It would be one thing if our plumber had made a few mistakes, but it is entirely another story when he makes "mistakes" that he is fully aware are wrong, and then doesn't own up to any of them. I'm hoping that we learn differently tomorrow, and that perhaps it's really not as bad as we think it could be, but until then, I am not happy. Especially since this happened on Nathan's birthday and we were supposed to CELEBRATE! Asshole.