Welcome to the NSJ pool renovation project blog.  Here you’ll be able to track project progress, view pictures of the renovations and otherwise get the inside scoop on everything that we’re doing at the pool this winter.  Sounds like a real party, doesn’t it?  Well I’d like to see YOU make this cool and interesting.

Have you ever wondered how much it would cost to transform a leaky pool into one that, I don’t know, actually holds water?  Turns out it costs quite a bit, a bargain only  if compared to the cost of signing an SEC quarterback or, say, Mrs. Holland's shoe collection.  Still, the first thing I thought when I heard what it would cost is “HOW ON EARTH COULD IT COST THAT MUCH TO FIX A LEAKING POOL???  Was the guy who gave you the price wearing a mask and pointing an Uzi at you?  Caulk, right?  How many tubes are we talking, like a million?”

And then, as in most things, I learned that I knew nothing.  I learned that a leaky pool is a big old expensive pain to fix.  That an army of guys with backhoes and shovels and sore backs would need to spend weeks there digging and sweating and pointing and yelling manly construction-type things at one another.  That, it turns out, is the way to fix a leaky pool.  That and a large pile of benjamins, more if they uncover a pet cemetery or Jimmy Hoffa or whatever.  Let’s not even go there.

“Wait, back up.  Did you say the pool is leaking?”  You could say that.  And not just a little.  Our pool was losing about 5000 gallons a day this summer.  Yes, that’s three zeroes.  F-f-five thousand gallons, more water lost over the season than the collective water contained in the humps of every camel that ever lived.  Possibly anyway.  I mean, how would you even measure that?  Okay so forget the camels.  Let’s just say it’s a lot of water and leave it at that.

Besides the fact that it’s very planet-hating to waste that much water, you might be tempted to ask “so what?  So we waste some water?  Surely we aren’t paying that much for water, right?  So let it leak.”  Which is exactly what I said.  And, after enduring the many judgmental glares offered by those board members who clearly love the earth more than I do, I was given the real answer.  The real reason you can’t say whatever-let-it-leak is that we don’t know where all that water is going, exactly.  We don’t know where it’s coming from nor what it’s eroding.  We don’t know what it’s doing to our pool structurally.  We don’t know if it’s carving the soil out from under the pool or gathering in a vast subterranean lake, which on second thought sounds pretty awesome.  Whatever it’s doing if we don’t fix this problem we may find someday soon that we need to start all over with a new pool.  How much is that?  If you have to ask then you can’t afford it.

No, it’s not fun to spend money on stuff that will go largely unseen.  I liken it to spending money to fix a clogged toilet: you hate to do it but if you don't you wind up with a crapload of problems.  It would surely be cooler to add a second story men’s-only lounge onto the pool clubhouse, complete with flat screens and kegerators and poles for…stretching. You don’t need to tell me – I’m the one who submitted the drawings.  But eventually that lounge would oversee nothing more than a gigantic sinkhole, membership would dwindle to nothing and the ruthless Ellicott City frozen yogurt syndicate would buy our property and bulldoze it for another Yogi's Castle.  I risk everything telling you this.  The syndicate runs this town and there’s nothing they hate more than being called out in a pool blog.  If I disappear you’ll know what happened.

In truth, we are very excited about these changes and the visible facelift the pool will enjoy as a result.  In 2008 NSJ was transformed by a massive renovation that delivered a host of improvements, not least of which was the beautiful, good-as-new clubhouse.  And though our current renovation will be largely structural there will be many visible, tangible benefits.  We'll have a new concrete deck surface around the perimeter of the pool, wider in places where foot traffic tramples the grass.  We'll get rid of the Fred Flintstone rock drainage system surrounding the deck and the malarial swamps that border it, installing a modern system that we hope will devastate local mosquito populations.  We'll even end up with a shiny white and less abrasive pool bottom, one that’s easier on the eyes and feet.  So while this project is mostly about plumbing it is surely the logical and essential conclusion to the work begun in 2008.  We think you’ll love it. 

But why am I spending so much time trying to convince you that it makes sense?  It doesn't really matter, because the construction guys are already digging and pointing and yelling construction-type things at one another.  All that's left to do is follow along.

Photo Tour I