I know I’m getting older.  I don’t know when it happened, but at some point I stopped watching MTV’s Real World and started watching HGTV (Home and Garden Television).  I became less interested in a show about a group of people living together in a house, and much more fascinated by the house itself.   Maybe it has something to do with the fact that we are in the process of a few renovations ourselves.  We’re adding a sunroom, a more substantial front porch, and a pool. We’ve been working with an architect and we just sent the project out to builders for bids.  The problem with watching HGTV is that the more I watch it, the more things I add to our own project.  I saw an episode of “Million Dollar Rooms” that showed a pool with one side that was all plexiglass so you could see through it.  When I asked our architect to see about incorporating that into our pool plans, he just shook his head and said it was out of our budget. I guess the show is called “Million Dollar Rooms” for a reason.  And then I chose railings that I saw in a special they ran on Newport Mansions. Again, not just any mansions – Newport Mansions.  So, needless to say, I guess I couldn’t be that surprised when the architect recently came back to us to say that the bids he was getting in, were over the highest range he projected.

So, I don’t know that my addiction is a good thing.  I have even found myself referring to HGTV designers and contractors when I talk to our architect and potential builders. I referred to an episode of one of the shows where even the “famous designer” had trouble having his contractors show up on time and so if it could happen to him, how could we be assured that it wouldn’t happen to us.  I actually saw them roll their eyes at that. And we haven’t even gotten started on the actual construction.  I see whole houses being renovated over the course of a sixty minute show. I’m afraid I’m in for a rude awakening with the actual time this project is really going to take.

The construction phase will probably start in about four to six weeks. Will living my own renovation reality show curb my addiction to HGTV or will it just make it worse?  Will I be happy with the finished project or are my t.v. expectations too high? Well, our next meeting with our architect is next week to review the contractor bids and decide where we need to cut back to bring the budget back in-line. But on HGTV when a family has to get realistic and cut some things out of their budget, usually at the end of the project, the designer on the show gives them a new couch or flat screen t.v. and that makes them feel better.  Does that not happen in real life?

Well, either way, a couple of months living with a construction crew for eight hours a day, should be an interesting experience. I just hope they don’t have to cut for too many commercial breaks…