Catch up time

Oops! I totally forgot to post after the piano came in. Ah, well.

I'm borrowing my husband's laptop to write this. Hopefully, I'll catch all the typos I'm going to be making before I publish this. LOL

So our piano arrived, mostly safe and sound. It took 5 guys and a lot of struggling for them to get it up to our door. The stairs to our place are split in two sections. The first lead right to the sidewalk and there's a landing between them and the next set. They were able to use a ramp for that. The second set is longer, steeper, and enclosed between our unit and the neighbour's. Just to make it even more fun, the landing between the two is just narrow enough that the two guys at the top had to start lifting it up the second set before it cleared the ramp. The piano was on skids that had to clear about half the staircase before they could start sliding instead of lifting one step at a time.

Then they had to deal with the landing at the top. Actually, things were a lot easier once they cleared the stairs. The landing turned out to be adequately large enough to turn the piano. Then they had to get it over the door sill, get it back on wheels and set it up. We bought a heavy duty rug to put under the piano to protect the carpet. They got hung up on that a bit and had to lift the piano one side at a time to straighten it back out again. It's now several inches past where I meant it to be, but I wasn't about to complain! *L*

After they left, I got Eldest to start going through the keyboard and we were startled to find one that wasn't making any sound. We opened the front up and discovered a missing hammer. Youngest found the hammer sitting on the works below. I've since verified that the hammer was broken *before* it left the family that had it for the last few years, and they thought it had always been that way. They left it where they found it, so it wouldn't get lost.

Other than that, the piano needs a serious tuning. I have an idea of how much that will cost, but I'm almost afraid to find out how much fixing the hammer will cost. We'll also be looking into finding out how much it will cost to re-varnish the thing. After 200 years, it's got quite a bit of cosmetic damage. ;-)

We haven't really started playing it yet. I've still got to dig out my old music books. Unfortunately, they've been buried in a storage closet already. In the process of digging out the A/C unit, various other boxes and whatnot got shoved aside. It will all have to be pulled out for me to reach the box my music books are in. *sigh* I've printed out some sheet music from online, but it's been so long since I've played, I have to learn how to read notes all over again! Especially since Eldest has already asked me to teach her a bit. *L*

All in good time. Right now, I'm just so glad to finally have it here. It was worth the cost, as painful as that was.

Next painful expenditure of funds: a new (to us) vehicle, so we can visit family and start doing some road trips again! :-D