Is it B&E if there's not a real window yet and it's sort-of your property??

I like to ask the tough questions.  I would love to know why it's a pair of pants or why one parks on a driveway but drives on a parkway.  Along the same lines, is it "breaking and entering" or just "entering" if one crawls into one's future basement through a window opening?  A real mind-bender, to be sure.

Saturday was once again a beautiful day and I was able to pry J away from his workstation on our patio to go look at the progress on the house on the way to making very bad decisions at Taco Bell.  I can't help it, there's a healing power in those tacos and I was exhausted from a very late night involving old-school YouTube hip hop videos and my awesome family members.  Side note - that run for the border worked.  Or it was the nap I had right after but either way I was able to rally for a SECOND 3am evening (what am I, 23??) so all was good.

Anyways, back to the house.  We drove up and ALMOST met our next door neighbors!  We know they're a family of 4 and also a pair of engineers.  We now know that they have a Pathfinder.  They drove off as we drove up...one of these days we will meet :).  J&I were quite pleased to discover that they've installed the waterproofing (more later on that) and the sewer pipe and managed to backfill.

Progress! (view from the garage-side)

We walked around and noticed that our waterproofing was not tight against the wall and that the anchors were in odd locations.  I'm curious if there's any rhyme or reason to where the anchors are located.  I'm also curious if it's ok to install anchors so that they're under the finishing strip - wouldn't that just be a point where water could seep up under the strip since it's not flush or tight behind the wall?  I don't think it would cause any issues but I may ask our PM just the same.

J Stew being J Stew.
Notice the waviness on the waterproofing to his left - is this normal??

Fastener under the finishing strip - ok or cause for concern?

We also noticed that we will have a bit of a dropoff on the side of our house.  I'm willing to wait and see how the final grading turns out but there's definitely a weird line or way they installed the waterproofing under our dining room window.

Remember this pic?  Now the paint instructions are starting to make sense...

Dirt to the top of the waterproofing - I think this means we get a retaining wall!!!

We got the bright idea of checking out the basement from the inside...of course we had to climb in!  J had no problems but I'm not as tall so it was a minor struggle to get my leg up and over the window ledge.  A big shout-out to my trainer for my improved upper body strength!  We took some pics and decided that our basement is a really good size and our bar is going to be a-ma-zing once we build it!

Future Bar!  (and yes, I'm wearing a shirt featuring a T-Rex.
Little known fact, but T-Rex HATES push-ups.  Think about it!)

The echo was pretty sweet.  Pretty sweet indeed.

Man Room.  He can hang his turkey in here.  It is NOT going into a common area...

My home gym!
Let's hope that the elliptical serves a higher purpose than hanging clothes :)

Surprisingly, climbing OUT of the window was easier for me - no idea why.  Although next time we visit, I think I'll wear "real shoes" instead of flats.  They're just not practical for a site visit.

Sign update:  It's on, RH, it's on.  I am POSITIVE that you're messing with my sign just to see how long before I snap.  I'm pretty sure I have about 72 hours of patience left in me with the sign.  The only reason I haven't said anything is because it really doesn't matter and I want to save my questions for real issues :)

No love.  At least today it wasn't buried but it WAS on our neighbor's lot

And because it was such a gorgeous day, we decided to end it with one of our favorite activities - an evening with the Buccos!  Our first date was a Pirates baseball game and we go to quite a few games each year, although 20 was a bit much last season (partial season tickets).  But we love our local team, our ballpark is just spectacular and really, there's nothing better than a beautiful spring evening at PNC Park, especially when Zambelli Internationale is in charge of post-game festivities!

First Buccos game as Mr & Mrs!

View from our seats - seriously, this is the best stadium in all of major league ball!

Zambelli Internationale does it again!
Only in Pgh are the fireworks after a Pirates game better than on the 4th of July...