Just Keepin' On Keepin' On...

There is no way that we will ever be able to repay all the guys who are volunteering their time and expertise to get the Third Street Cigar shop up and running.  Numerous members have unselfishly chipped in since we started and continue giving.  

All the pre-finished flooring in Big Jack's public smoking lounge has been installed and the new wide baseboard is being painted for installation this week.  The flooring came out beautifully and with our new leather club chairs and accessory furniture arriving next week for Big Jack's the room will be ready for a quiet, comfortable and relaxing cigar and perhaps a sip of your private liquor stock.

Rich Jessup has installed the security doors at both the top of the back stairs in Big Jack's as well as the door between the kitchen and the retail area.  These doors will be locked at the close of the retail shop each night and will enable the Private lounge members full access to the kitchen facilities on a 24/7 basis.

Our two additional smoke eaters for Big Jacks should be arriving in a week or so.  

We have decided to put ten designer rail lights in the ceiling where the fluorescent light fixtures were taken down.  The original holes will be repaired and light hangers installed between the ceiling joist to hang the rail lights.  Each rail light will have four spots that will illuminate the various art work for a total of forty overhead lights that will wash the walls in a subtle glow.  Table lamps located throughout will add an atmosphere conducive to a relaxing environment.  There will be no public smoking lounge to rival ours anywhere within a days drive -- Period.

Proceeding down the Victorian stairway to the retail space, Jim Mackiewicz, of Metro Homes, and a local expert in restoring historic buildings, has been busy replacing the treads and risers with oak.

We are going to great lengths to keep and improve the beauty of our featured interior architectural asset and the new treads and risers, when stained and finished to match the existing decor, will highlight the retail space.

We have also decided to have the existing 1890's wood beadboard ceiling repaired and updated rather than installing the tin ceiling which was our original intent.  Jim Mackiewicz recommended, and rightfully so, that it would be a shame to cover this one hundred and twenty year old historical ceiling when we could choose to preserve the past.  

The team of Dave Graven, Bob Miller, Dave Kervorkian, Tim Hawkins and Jim Gregory, among other wonderful people, worked all week installing the unfinished red oak flooring that matches the existing retail floor.  It was decided that, in order to create continuity as well as keeping the look simple and understated, we would run the same red oak into the humidor.

The retail red oak floor, both old and new, will be sanded, the old finish removed, stained to match the floors in Big Jack's and finished, leaving the entire floor looking fresh and new.  Dave Smith, who earned his living for a number of years refinishing oak floors, has volunteered to do the same for us for a very nominal charge.  We cannot thank Dave enough.

The humidor manufacturer should have our new humidor on site by week's end.  Tom Clark will have our humidor windows to us this week and the room should be up and running next week to season the Spanish cedar.

So, folks, things are coming along nicely, we are ahead of our projected timeline and well on our way to completing the retail space and public smoking lounge.  

Then, we move to the private smoking lounge...

A Special Thank You to Mike Masterson who generously donated a refrigerator for the kitchen...  Thanks, Mike.