First Things First

Tools of the Trade

Given that the house had been a rental for ten years, it was quite dirty.

All that I did for the first several days was to clean each room, mostly by wiping down the ceilings and walls and mopping the floors with bleach water.

One of the first rooms that I cleaned was the living area where I setup our blow up bed as my bedroom and base of operation for the first couple of weeks.
 

Home Sweet Home

I also installed a new carbon monoxide and smoke detector, since I was going to be staying at the house while we got things rolling.

In fact, when the ATMOS gas company technician came out to turn on the gas and ran a "pressure test" (to make sure the gas line would hold pressure) the test failed.

He asked if the house had one of those "old gas heaters" in the bathroom. I said that it did. We went in and checked on the heater and it was in the "on" position, which was why the pressure test was failing. As soon as we turned it to the "off" position, the gas line pressure tested fine.

The Offending Heater