Re-work

During my gig as CIO I managed all aspects of the company's IT world.  We had a national footprint but a relatively small IT staff.  When called upon to do specialized software development we'd put together out best estimate and then multiply by a factor of three.  Normally users provided inadequate specification which lead to many re-writes, substantive changes and once in a while, re-starts.  Executives and users always hated our time estimates.

It's not clear why IT was held to such a critical examination of estimates.  Commercial design projects and land development projects had almost never-ending re-pricing, re-scoping and re-definition, all within a frequently changing financing and economic market.  We simply multiplied by three.  In hindsight (ever good) it's possible that we should have made it more complex, a multifaceted estimate or simply revised our estimate every couple of days.

The remodeling project is proceeding well.  We've not run into anything insurmountable.  I have found a few interesting things. This plaque is mounted inside the front door frame.  The Federal Home Loan Bank Board was created by the Federal Home Loan Bank Act of 1932.  The Board was superseded by the Federal Housing Finance Board created by Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act of 1989 (FIRREA) following the 1989 savings and loan crisis.

The layout of the house appears to reflect pre-war (WWII) conveniences.  I'm unable to locate any information about this plaque.

The original plumber's information is also nailed to a floor joist.  Perhaps this was a plumbing upgrade given the format of the phone number which might have been from the late 1950's.

I've been pondering this as I work away but now I've asked my daughter of the age and she quickly responded '1940.'

The original bedroom closets had conventional doors.  The closet space was normal depth but wide.  As some point one of the closets was opened up and the doors replaced with bi-fold doors.  The trim and bi-folds appear to be from the 1960s.  Door upgrades are on our our list and I've started to replace the older bi-fold with a new six panel arrangement.  In the broad perspective of a home's life this is but a bit of re-work.  Interestingly my daughter is the second owner.  The original owners built the home and raise three children in a small two bedroom home.  At some point one of the residents did the door remodel or had it done.  

The bottom jam-side door pivot hardware is more or less in the same location.  The instructions with my new door, likely from China, really made no sense with more screws than available holes  ( or potential holes) and nothing that made sense in the enclosed diagram.  Taking out the bottom bracket I set the screws aside, put the new bracket in place, looked at the new screws, reached for the ones I'd just removed and put them back in place where they've been for forty or fifty of this home's seventy year (more or less) life.  Who knows how many years down the road someone will start another re-work project on this and ponder "why is this a newer bracket with older screws?"