Dumb Things I’ve Done

Fixing Up Our Christmas Present

Neither of us had any presents under the Christmas tree (which we don’t have anyway) this year because all that kind of money is going into furnishing and resupplying the one big shared present, 1025 Pacific Terrace.

The last owners of our new home were only in it for 2 years. I’m mildly curious as to why, but whatever. In those two years I don’t think they ever really cleaned. They must have done some sort of quick clean before they left because the place was habitable when we moved in, but a deep clean, not so much. We are on our second box of Swiffer cloths removing dust and cobwebs from nooks and crannies in every room. We are also on our second container of Clorox wipes removing various stains and dirt spots from the walls and ceilings. In the Master Bathroom there were lots of black hairs stuck to the walls and ceiling from the previous owner blow drying her hair.

I have replaced between 15 and 20 light bulbs throughout the house. I don’t know what the reason, to conserve energy or just plain laziness. I betting it was mostly the later because there was a burnt out bulb in almost every 2-light fixture. The light on the front and back porches had bulbs, but the one on the pole in the front lawn for the stairs didn’t. The light in the bottom of the microwave that illuminates the stove top was out. The light on the garage door opener was burnt out and this was vexing because the garage is really dark when we get out of the car at night.

On Christmas Eve I decided to replace the bulb in the garage door opener. It worked fine using the wall switch, but when the garage door would go up and down the light would flicker like a strobe light. I opened up the light compartment again and noticed the the bulb socket was held in place by some tabs, thinking maybe it was loose wire I pressed the tabs and pulled the socket out from the opener body. FLASH! CRACK! It was a loose wire and when I pulled the socket out the two wires touched and shorted out. Now we have to manually open and close the door until I can find someone to install a new garage opener.

I don’t think the previous owners used the two car garage for cars. I have been sweeping out dust and cobwebs from all over in there too. There was a long bench along one side of the garage that I decided to take apart today to make room for the imminent arrival of the Miata (supposed to be sometime this week.) This thing is big, about 2 feet wide and 8 feet long. Sturdy too, it is made up of 2x4s and half 1/2 plywood screwed together with deck screws. There are about a a dozen nails in one end. I figure whoever made it started hammering it together and realizing that that would be an awful lot of work, then switch to screws. I was about 90% through disassembling it when I accidentally stepped on a nice long nail. OUCH! Went right through the sole of the sneaker, my sock and probably a 1/2″ into my foot. Direct pressure stopped the bleeding after about 5 minutes. Thought it might be a good idea to go to the Emergency Room , but then thought of the cost, so just cleaned it out with some alcohol and dressed with a band aid and some polysporin. I’ll try and get a doctor to give me a tetanus shot tomorrow even though the nail was clean and shiny having spent who knows how long inside that 2×4…

I think I need to reassess my handyman qualifications…

My $55 Mistake

I have been wearing the New Balance Men’s Coast V4 FuelCore Athletic Shoe Running since I retired. They are comfortable and I love the slip-on nature of them. You tie the laces until they are snug on your foot and then the stretchy upper material allows you to slip your foot in and out. The first pair of them I bought upon retirement were in Techtonic Blue and I wore them out before 2018 was done. The second pair I purchased was in Phantom Gray (like linked above) and made it to this September. Not bad, a nine month life span, considering I’m averaging 2-1/2 miles a day every morning 5 days a week.

Both previous shoes were bought at Academy Sports. When I replaced the first blue pair I wanted blue again, but they didn’t have it, so I opted for the in stock gray. This replacement time they didn’t have any of that make and model shoe at all. Donna and I hunted high and low looking, but no dice. I wanted a slip on, I am basically that lazy, so my options were limited.

There were about a half dozen slip-on shoes, but of those available only 2 were were nice enough looking that I would put them on my feet. The first pair I tried on was too loose, I normally wear a size eleven and even in a 10.5 they slipped off the heel when taking a step. The next pair I tried were the Skechers Men’s Equalizer Double Play Slip-On Loafer. There was no size 11 available, but they did have a 10.5, so I put them on and walked around the aisle a bit. Not too bad, so we bought them.

It wasn’t until the next day on my walk that I realized I should have test walked them a little more in the store… They were too stretchy and too tight at the same time. My heel felt elevated forcing my foot forward hitting my toes on the front of the shoes. I didn’t end up with any blisters, but I did get a sore arch. I thought I would be alright and maybe I’d get used to them after walking in them for a few mores days. Wrong. On the next day’s morning walk after only a couple of blocks I decided to cut the walk short and head home. It was then that I pulled the badly worn pair of New Balance shoes out of the trash, placed the Skechers in the ‘Going to Goodwill Pile’ and ordered another pair NB Coast V4 FuelCore in Phantom from Amazon.

Everyday Driver Bingo

So for practically every Tuesday and Friday morning walks since sometime in May I have been rocking the Everyday Driver Podcast on my walks. So that is around two dozen hours of listening to these two guys talk cars. They also have a show that runs on Motortrend TV first, before ending up on Amazon Prime, so I have been watching those when they air and the old ones on Amazon, so there have been about 28 episodes of that I’ve seen. They also have a YouTube Channel with a literal crap ton of videos, of which I’ve watched a bunch of.

Needless to say, I am familiar with their work. The other day while walking and listening to a podcast I had a crazy idea. But I then quickly realized my database skills are not as good as I thought, so all I managed to create was my one demo. I emailed it to them at their gmail address and told them to feel free to run with this idea and sell ’em on their Amazon Store.

Spray Paint Bounty

A project that has been on my Honey-Do List since I retired, “clean up the garage”, is underway. In cabinet number one I found a treasure trove of cans of spray paint. Several of these I have no idea way I have them and I’m giving them away, so if you see something you like, come on over and its yours.
 

1. Orange High Temp – Was I going to paint the Miata’s muffler? A portion of it is visible from the rear…
2. Red Wrinkle – I did use this to do the valve cover on the Emperor.
3. Custom Automotive Touch Up – Somehow I ordered 24V, a special Australia/Japan only color instead of the 22V Sunlight Silver of the CTBNL.
4. Automotive Clear Coat – I used a little of it to cover the wrong silver from above.
5. Metallic Gold – If I used this, I don’t remember what for…
6. Metallic Silver – Used to paint the black Konig wheel center caps. It didn’t come out nearly as shiny as the cap.
7. Dark Gray Primer – No clue.
8. Light Gray Primer – This went over the black center caps after painting directly on them wasn’t shiny enough. Still didn’t help.
9. Satin Finish Brown – Not sure why I have this either, but I did use a little the other day to turn a black planter pot brown.
10. Satin Finish Olive – This can may not even have been used. If it was, it was a long, long time ago.
11. Clear Top Coat – I think I used this protect a jigsaw puzzle that we turned into wall art.
12. Silver Wheel Coating – This paint is the perfect paint for the plastic center caps of the OEM Miata wheels that have yellowed over time.

Brian Versus The Giant Lizard

This morning we were enjoying the screened porch and watching the Tour de France on the laptop, when Donna noticed something moving in her peripheral vision. When she saw what it was she jumped up. I turned to see what she saw and it was a giant gecko (or maybe a skink)1 crawling along on the screening, inside the porch.

It was requested that I remove the offending reptile. I went out to the garage and grabbed a pair of work gloves, a one quart pitcher (normally used to water plants) and a clipboard. My plan was to corner the sucker, force it into the pitcher, cover the top with the clipboard and escort this huge, Godzilla-like, beast outside.

I have exaggerated the size a bit, but this thing was more than twice the size of any we have seen around here before. It was probably 6-1/2 to 7 inches long, tip to tail, and it had a body diameter about the size of a Marks-A-lot.

After a couple of misses trying to get the lizard into the pitcher it became clear I needed something with sharp corners, not something round, because it kept evading me by slipping between the lip of the pitcher and the screen. Back inside. This time I returned with a rectangular piece of Tupperware. On my first attempt I almost had him (or her) but then he (or she) abandoned the screen and took to running along the floor hugging the back wall.

I side stepped around it and opened the door to the porch. I tip-toed back around where it was hiding, under the table that holds the portable gas grill, came at it from that direction, hoping to force it outside. We chased each other back and forth a couple of times until, surprisingly, it climbed the wall and ducked under the wood wall that closes the porch off from the old roof line.

As yet, our enormous lizard interloper has not reappeared.

74,000 Large Pieces of Gravel

Andy Jordan’s Bicycle Warehouse in Augusta has been putting on a ride called the Lock to Lock Ride for 27 years and Donna has been trying to get me to do this ride for most of them. This year she wore me down and I acquiesced. The route is a little over 18 miles one way, there is food and door prizes in the park, and then if you are brave enough, you ride the 18 some odd miles back to the start.

The eighteen miles is broken down into three almost equidistant segments. The first part is along the Augusta Canal tow path from the head gates on the north side of town into downtown. The second part is mostly through downtown city streets with some along a paved section of the tow path. The last part is along the top of the levee from town to a park at the lock & dam on the south side.

We were brave. We figured, how bad can it be? We ride a lot and 15 – 20 miles is a piece of cake, it is all basically flat, no big hills, and we’d be on the tandem, so it will be half as easy. The first third of the journey we were familiar with as we used to ride it sort of regular like back when we had mountain bikes, it is a hard packed dirt road and quite shady. The middle third we have driven the car on enough to know that it was dead flat and the traffic would be minimal on a Sunday afternoon.

The third third was the big surprise, we had never been on it as it is normally locked because the levee runs along behind several industrial plants. The worst part of this segment was in the middle of it was 2-1/2 to 3 miles was covered in loose, large gravel rocks. After the smooth dirt and city streets, this stuff was a rude awaking. You had to keep moving to keep the bike on a straight course. It was nearly impossible to get to the water bottle or catch a quick break by coasting. I felt like I was riding in the Paris-Roubaix road race which is called the Hell of the North or A Sunday in Hell.

When we arrived at the park for lunch (very good BBQ sandwiches with a large selection of snacks) we kidded that maybe we should shop around to see if we could get a ride back to the start. But with our bellies full and our thirst quenched, determined, we stated back. On the way back we contemplated walking the bike over the gravel section, but when we tried it, was almost harder walking on it and much, much slower, so we rode. When the 74,000 pieces of gravel was over the rest of the ride back really wasn’t too bad.

We made it back to the start point dead tired and there were only a few other cars in the parking lot. There were around 275 entrants and I bet less than a quarter of them did it both ways. The ride is very well supported and we might do it again, if it is not ninety degrees out and if the gravel wasn’t there and maybe just one way…

Not far from home on the way back the CTBNL ticked over the 74,000 mile mark.

Name of Thrones

Disclaimer – I have not watched a single episode of the show, nor have I ever read any of George R Martin’s books. We have HBO in our cable package, so I have glimpsed drips and drabs of the show, including one brief scene that showed some sort of woman warrior, in a weird armored outfit that left one breast exposed, so that a 10 or 12-year old male child could suckle, but it is just not my cup of tea.

But seeing as I am a sucker for a well crafted name (or stripe or book title & plot or advertising slogan or movie genre) generator, how could I resist trying the Game of Thrones Name Generator.

Brian Bogardus = Brlian Arryn