A Night of Snow for Leap Day

I got up early this morning to clear the snow that fell during the night. I didn't even break out the snow blower as it was early and the snow that fell was pretty light. I cleared the driveway and the front walk but left the sidewalks untouched. I'll get those tonight.

We have to spend tonight cleaning up the house. We have a guy coming by on Friday to give us an estimate on our fireplace and Susan won't have some stranger tromping through our house the way it is now.

We haven't dusted in weeks. That would be bad in any event but with all the sanding Susan's been doing, it's even worse.

And far be it from us to allow a stranger into the house to look at our fireplace without it being spotless...and that includes the fireplace box.

Celestial Wondermentation

I have been remiss in keeping the Blog current. It's because we've been doing stuff in the real world. Now it's time to visit the Blogosphere and get updated.

There is a great Celestial party going on tonight and I got a couple of crappy pictures of it.

The above picture shows the crescent moon way up high, followed by Jupiter below it and Venus just below the Jup.

 

Here's a closer shot without my neighbors garages in it. These pictures do not come close to doing this view justice as my camera is not really built for this kind of action shot. In any event, it's a cool image and I felt I needed to share it.

I have been continuing my project of stripping and re-staining the trim in the area of our current project. For clarity, let's call this project "The Back Hallway".

I still have four doors that require a new trim job. Wait! There are five doors. I have done the dining room, so that leaves the kitchen, the basement, the bathroom, the TV room, and the closet. That's five!

I am doing my portion of the project in the Carriage House. I usually turn on the radio while I'm in there and listen to whatever catches my attention.

Tonight I decided to turn on the Hillbilly Inter web.

This is my old Midland 40 channel CB Base Station, which is my conduit to the Hillbilly Inter web.

What you get is a bunch of guys (no woman) talking about hunting, their trucks, their radios, and how good or bad everyone else sounds.

It's fascinating! I heard from Pipe Layer, Golden Eagle, and the Falcon. I'm still working on a handle for myself. In the past I have been the TunaBoat) which was more a name for my 67 Bonneville Convertible) and Gutter Monkey. I'm considering V.I.P. for my name. Then I can get on the ray-did-io and talk about my immense V.I.P.ness.

Valenday's Tine

I looked back for the last two years to see what I posted on Valentine's Day. There was nothing last year and only a brief mention in 2010.


So I thought I had better make an entry of note for this year. That's because we have had a wonderful day of Looooove!


It has been a rainy and snowy day. I sent Susan a batch of flowers and a card I made detailing the 50 reasons I love her. She got me a bottle of wine and some chocolates. She also bought the ingredients for a fabulous Valentine dinner. Tri-tip and asparagus with a nice Caesar Salad. I barbecued the meat and the asparagus and it came out pretty good. We opened a bottle of Zinfandel wine from Vineheart winery. 


After dinner, we enjoyed a nice soak in the hot tub. Now the evening is winding down as we watch a little TV and finish the zin.


Hopefully, I left enough information here to be able to remember it next year. We have no idea what we did on Val Day last year.

Trim Work Winging

I spent a good portion of the weekend working on my dining room doorway while Susan continues the seemingly endless task of plastering and sanding, plastering and sanding, plastering and...one gets the point.

I shall begin with the work space.

 This is the Dining Room Entry I am working on. Here you see a view from the kitchen and a view from the hall.

I have stripped all the paint off the wood. Now I have to fix the mortise that used to hold a hinge. There was once a door here but it is long gone, at least it was gone before we took ownership.

So I took a field trip to Windsor Plywood for some advice and they suggested I just use a piece of 2x4 and create a little wafer of wood for the patch.

Well, that seemed like a good idea and so that is what I did.

Here is an old 2x4 I recovered from the garage.

It took several tries but I then began trying to cut a thin wafer of wood from this board with my chop saw.

After a few shots at it, I cut a piece I was happy with.

I trimmed it to size and then, as is often my habit, I marked it with a little information for future treasure hunters.

I then slathered it with wood glue and fit it into place.

I of course copied the above methods for the hinge mortise on the bottom of the door jam.

I let it dry over night and returned on Sunday to sand the Fu...heck outta it.

The sanding went smoothly and quickly with the help of my new orbital palm sander. That is really a great tool.

Finally , I brought out the three pieces of trim that go around the door to see how they will fit. Because Susan had skim coated the ceiling, the the cross piece of trim buts right up against the aforementioned ceiling, the side pieces would not fit. I am going to have to trim them a bit. Probably no more than the saw blade width...perhaps a touch more. Maybe a whole lot more. Who the hell knows...certainly not me.

I winging it here!

Full Moon Febberrary

The moon is full tonight and we decided to get out and enjoy a nice hot tub under the warm moon glow.

Afterwards, I went out to see if I could capture some good moon pictures of the house. I should have grabbed my tripod. It's difficult to hold the camera steady enough under low light conditions. Nonetheless, I'm satisfied with the photos I got...at least for the purposes of this blog.

Here is my best shot.

Not the greatest shot, but I think it captures the feeling of a cold winter evening...when the werewolves are out.

XLVI

It is another beautiful day in the Inland Northwest. It is also Superbowl Sunday, which has meaning to people who are fans of the New York Giants or the New England Patriots. Neither Susan or I care.

We have a couple of parties to attend today. but first, we have some stuff to do around the homestead. I'm going to try and finish the stripping I was doing yesterday. And then there is just general housekeeping, which has once again gotten away from us.

9:45PM: The Superbowl is history and the Giants have won, 21 to 17. It was a good game this year. It really came down to the last few minutes. Actually, it came down to the last play. Has Tom Brady been able to connect his pass, the Patriots would have won. But there were about 47 guys down in that end zone son there was not a big chance of threading the needle.

We ate a lot of great food. Especially at Party Two, where pork was smoked. Man, it was tasty.

Now it's time to prepare for another week of drudgery and another day closer to death.

We ended up losing around 20 bucks on the various bettings going on.

Spring in Febber Arie

It is February 4th and it might as well be the eighth of May. What a beautiful day. Unfortunately, I have to spend it inside stripping trim. It's just as well. After last night's drinking fest, it's probably best that I stay inside and move very slowly.

Susan is progressing with her mudding and sanding while I am stripping. Here are some pictures to fill the space.

The paint was laid down pretty thick. There was at least two layers and I'm betting more. I have serious doubts about the remodeling credentials of someone who wood paint over stained would.

Friday Night

We have begun the weekend by drinking heavily!


I am planted in front of the TV with the Blues Music Channel on and Susan is napping in the other room. I had an appointment with my Cardiologist today which left my afternoon wide open. I met Susan and her boss, Bill at the Illinois Avenue Tavern and we has lunch. I had an appointment after that at Fast Eddie's and Susan joined me for the Dollar Beer Hour. After that, we moved on to the Hub, the local tavern only a few blocks away.


It appears to have been a full night and it is only 8:45PM. We are light weights.


For news on my Cardiologist appointment, visit my health blog at www.porkymccorpulent.blogspot.com. I try to keep a semi-complete record of my health issues at that blog. It's just me complaining about my health so there is really no need to bother. Really! Don't go there! I'm not kidding! Stop it!


We are at the start of Superbowl Weekend so we are not expecting a lot of progress out of us. We'll do some work on the house tomorrow but that will be about it. Whatever we get done before 5:00 will be the extent of it for the weekend.


We have some tickets to a concert tomorrow night and we are clearly not going to accomplish anything tonight.


Great to talk to you. Geez I feel like shit!

I'm a Weirdo!

The snow that fell a couple of weeks ago is just about gone. It certainly no longer poses a threat to driving or getting around. Most sidewalks are clear although there is the danger of ice in some places as the snow melts and then freezes across an area of pavement.

I don't know why I'm bringing this up other than to update the Ethernet on this sitch. (That's hip InterWeb slang for "Situation")

Here's another useless bit of information I feel compelled to impart. No...not useless information...more like a stupid observation.

I spelled the word "cauterize" today. I used it in an e-mail. I have used it in conversation lots and lots. In fact, I can remember the first time I ever heard the word.

It was on "The Six Million Dollar Man" when Steve Austin was marooned on an island and administered first aid to an injured guy by cauterizing his wound with his bionic finger.

I believe this is the first time in my 54 years that I have spelled the word.

The reason I bring this up is because I think it is interesting (and weird) that this has any significance at all in my memory. I'm a weirdo.

Oh wow! I just found my header.