Tuesday, September 4, 2007

What a Holiday Weekend!

I did a lot this weekend... at least on Saturday!

I cut the lawn, cleared out the old "fort" that was built in the garage rafters prior to my ownership, cleared drains, tried to empty the truck, poured a new concrete slab, cut the trim for the small bathroom redo and spread a combo application of lawn care products. All that and a lot of maintenance stuff as well (laundry, grocery and supply runs, e-mail, etc.) plus entertain a guest on Sunday. Whew!

The original plan was to be entertaining visitors all three days, from my parents to out-of-town friends to local dinner gatherings to my wife's family. When everything settled, the only entertaining we did was the out-of-town friend... and ourselves. None-the less, we got an awfully lot done this weekend.

I started Saturday with my normal crack-of-dawn run followed by an attempt to unload the truck so I could do another filling of the bed. I drove to Pitsch wrecking to unload, but they were closed for the holiday weekend. D'oh! I've done this before for both Labor and Memorial Days. I should have learned this by now. So I drove back home and decided to overstuff the truck.

The grass was back with a vengeance with all the rain the past few weeks and it needed to be cut. I did so and found a way to get all the clippings into the back of the truck, still separated from the "junk" in the front of the bed. I mixed up the combo fertilizer made up of Scott's Plus2 and Haltz with the rest of my diazanon stash. This Plus2 provided anti-weed, Haltz crabgrass protection and the Diazanon kills every living thing in the soil... good and bad. I watered everything in good to get down deep. I really want to get all of the ants and grubs out... earlier in the week, my wife pulled up a chunk of grass only to uncover a lot of grubs happily chewing the roots. This is several weeks after the lawn service applied a good helping of GrubX... which apparently did not do its job.

As the sprinklers soaked all the goodness into the ground, I proceeded to tackle the garage fort. Talk about a lot of junk and nothing... it took several hours to get every piece down and all the nails hammered down. I managed to get it all into the back of the truck with the help of my trusty sawsall. Good ridden. There was some interesting objects up there amongst the walnut shells... a dated paper from the kid using the space... Bill Smolenski, 1975. Sweet line green and orange shag carpet. Interesting 12" X 12" multi-colored carpet tiles. A checkerboard with all the pieces.

I also junked a lot of building materials. A ton of oak trim I ripped out of my kitchen. Conduit from a previous owner. Wall track. Some curtain rods. Even a scary hook tool appropriate for Halloween!

The truck now sags a bit from all the wood and such but it will find its way to the junkyard in a few days :D.

While I was tending to loading up the truck, my wife began to rip out the threshold of the back door, which over the 100 years of its existence has eroded to a pile of splintered chunks. It did take me to hit it with the sawsall to get it all out. When she was done, she commenced with the cleanup of the driveway and garage. I think she covered the area with the little magnetic pick-up thing about a dozen times before she stopped picking up nails. What persistence! While she thoroughly combed the area, I mixed up several batches of concrete and built up a new, more durable threshold for the back door. It took a while to build it up and apply an angle to it to direct the water out, but I did it. My wife watched me at the end of the process as I labored to get it nice and flat. I should be, in the next couple of days, reattaching the weather guard strip to the concrete. That's the thing that seals the bottom of the door to keep the unwanted out... ill temperature air and the bugs.

On Sunday, I started with some small tasks and went for a grocery/supply run. My wife and I then had a long "career" conversation that eventually lead to our guest arriving and then heading out for some sun and company.

Monday we really didn't feel like doing a ton, but a lot of options were on the table including a trip to the nearby amusement park. We ended up stopping into the Lowe's for a couple of things and then grabbing a couple of Blizzards from the Dairy Queen. We wandered downtown and checked out the new museum just off of the park. We returned home and napped. I got up and began to work on the trim for the bathroom project. I measured several times and then went out to do the cutting. It took a little while, but the wood cut easily and very clean. I brought it all into the bathroom and dry-fit everything. I noticed that one piece was too long and a couple of pieces may be a touch small. D'oh. I fit up the longest and most complicated piece and it dropped in, no problem. Whew! I tacked that one into place, but it may need a little adjustment a little later. I was soon working by flashlight but decided to pack it up as I needed to whack off about 1/16" from the next piece in the puzzle for the fit.

I plan on doing a quick buzz tonight before heading out to do something else, but fit and attach everything either Wednesday evening or on my day off on Thursday. This will let my wife finish painting the space before we get to the next weekend's activities.