Well…yeah, things have changed in my schedule today once I got to working on the drawers this morning…they need so much work that there is no way I’ll get them done this weekend…had to remove the head of the small one since it was so cracked and I couldn’t get to the cracks with it still attached…so I had to re-glue it after I did the repair and now it’s drying with my heaviest toolbox sitting on the face of it…and I had to remove all of the partitions in it which took a heck of a lot of work…I did get the two big doors hung but had to take my grinder with a cutoff wheel on it to shorten the screws so I could tighten the door handles…both of the sets they included were way too long and I wasn’t going to go out and buy all new screws for them…the doors actually close now but they still bind a little but they wouldn’t even close before so I’ll take it…a little paraffin rubbed on where it binds helped a lot…I don’t think I could have gotten them to work better since both the doors and the cupboards are warped…but I probably should have waited til Monday to let the paint cure since it is so soft that I peeled off a couple of spots that I’ll have to touch up later today….I am done for the day…abused my hands again and peeled my knuckle open that had started to heal and my thumb hurts like crazy every time I use it to hit the space bar…3 1/2 hours is enough for a Saturday and I am going to take tomorrow off completely to let my hands and back rest…but I will be back for a political one after I take a break…I forgot that the circuit that I have my microwave and toaster on temporarily won’t take running them both at once so I had to go downstairs and reset it while I was making breakfast for lunch…can’t wait to get them back in the kitchen where that doesn’t happen….
Tag Archives: life
February 5th
Well..I gave up at 5:37 this morning when I lay there for a few minutes and quickly realized that I was not going to get back to sleep…but, I went to bed at 10:30 from boredom so I guess that’s okay….feel okay this morning and that is from resisting the urge to have cocktails to celebrate finishing the cupboard doors yesterday…I am a little disappointed in my work on them when I missed some obvious flaws in them that should have been repaired…I guess I can say they look like distressed antiques since they are 82 years old…and I still fall back on my idea that they are okay since they are now clean and that’s really all I wanted…and with what I had to work with, they are okay….still pretty darn sore from all of the work I’ve done this week and I am glad I get to take the day off the bike tomorrow…I am going to get on the drawers today so I can have them done tomorrow….they built some really crappy dividers in the top one and I think I’m going to remove them since they are so half assed and I need them gone to get at the bottom of the drawer where it looks like they just poured paint in them….so, it looks like another all day work day to get the drawers ready so I can paint them tomorrow….not much to do today…going to get on the bike early to get my miles in and I may start cleaning my dishes so I can start putting them away since the insides of the cupboards have had 10 days or so for the paint to harden….but maybe not…the drawers are in such sad shape they could take all day…more later…
My free covid tests came today…
Well…it was a little bit of a surprise when the free covid tests that I ordered showed up in my mailbox today…I read that I didn’t qualify to get them with having Medicare but I’ll take it…and I now have 6 n-95 masks that I got at Meijers the last two weeks with groceries so I’m set for a while…still not going out for anything but groceries and to depot for supplies and won’t until the hospitals are no longer full out here and the infection rate subsides some…I wonder if I’m still being too careful when I see almost all of the rest of the people everywhere who aren’t doing anything to mitigate the spread of the virus? I guess I don’t follow the herd when my health is concerned…but I am considering having cocktails soon since I do miss it a bit and I do need a reward for all the work I’ve been doing lately…but not tonight…darn…
Got the doors finished…
Well…that was pretty easy…got all of the fronts of the doors for the kitchen finished with two coats of paint on each….but I did notice that one door was not sanded enough so there is a little line where the filler was put in…and the bitch is that you can’t see it until it’s painted so that door will probably need to be removed, re-sanded, and repainted at some point in the future…but not now…just want to get the doors installed first and take some time to get the kitchen finished…will probably do the drawers tomorrow but won’t be able to sand and paint them until Sunday even though my Sundays are supposed to be my one day off for the week…it would be nice to have all of the kitchen cabinets completely finished Monday so we’ll see how it goes…I think I’m taking the rest of the day off after all of the work the past week…I can use a little veg time…more later….
February 4th
Well…up at 4:51 this morning but was able to get back to sleep until a little after 6 and I’ll take it…it’s 2 degrees out there right now and I am happy that I don’t have to go anywhere for the next couple of days….just checked the weather and it looks like not much snow for the next 10 days and that gets us 10 days closer to spring…it hasn’t been a bad winter for my first one out here and I do need to check to see if this is a normal winter for Muskegon or if I need to plan for a worse one next winter….with all of the work I’ve been doing on the house I’ve let this place go a bit and I need to clean and straighten this place up some after I get the kitchen done…but I still need to finish the doors this morning and start planning the painting of the rest of it….the downstairs cleanup is going to be a little worse than I expected…I guess I didn’t have the dust corralled as well as I thought and there is a light film of it everywhere…but that can’t happen until I sand, fill, and paint the drawers and I will get at that after the doors are hung Monday….the cortisone cream did work on the rashes I got from sanding yesterday and they are not itching nearly as much as they were….but, I’m still concerned that this is going to happen every time I expose myself to dust and that is still going to happen a lot as I prep for painting…not much to do today….just going to get the bike ride in and then get painting on the fronts of the cabinet doors that will probably take most of the day…but it will be easy with no detail work to do so I can just use a roller to get a good finish….oh, I did paint one of my detail touches on the edge of the countertop where they had painted it white and I changed that to the same grey as the doors and the walls of the kitchen…it looks pretty cool and I can’t wait to see how it looks with the doors up…more later…
This is new…
Well…as you know, I have been bathed in dust for the past couple of months filling and sanding the cupboards and today the doors for them…and now I think I’ve become sensitized to the dust with breaking out in rashes everywhere that itch and hurt like crazy…and this has never happened to me before even using all kinds of chemicals my whole life…so, I slathered myself in hydrocortisone lotion and I really hope it helps since I am really uncomfortable and don’t need to go to the emergency room…I think I’ll try some antihistamines later if the cortisone doesn’t work and this does not bode well for completing the rest of the house….crap, crap, crap…it’s bad enough that I’m beating the heck out of myself working hours and hours on this place every day…but I can deal with that pain since I live it every day…but this is new for me…at least I got everything sanded and I even got all of the insides of the doors painted two coats today…so tomorrow will be painting the fronts of them and that will be pretty easy since the fronts are all done with a roller and it only takes about two minutes to do each one…but then I have to wait for an hour so it can dry some before the second coat…so, another all day of work but at least there is no dust…other than cleaning up all of the dust from today…but, I’m not going to do that until I have the drawers done since they need to be filled and sanded before I can paint them….owww….
Doors are ready…
Well…are you getting tired of me chronicling every damn thing I do restoring this house? I’m not tired of it yet so if you don’t want to read more about it, just skip over these and get to the political one that I’ll be doing later….I did get the doors finished sanded this morning and looked like a damn ghost by the time I was done….the sheeting I put up to create a room to contain the dust downstairs worked pretty well and it was funny how much dust I had on me when I finished…and I left dust footprints when I went over to shut down the music and then upstairs to get a towel to brush myself off outside before I tracked more of it into the upstairs…but, I still need to go back down there to change the setup and get my other two sawhorses set up so I can paint 5 or 6 doors at the same time since I need to put two coats on and wait an hour in between coats…so, tomorrow is going to be a long day getting the backs of all of the 11 doors painted…I think the doors came out okay and I’m sure they will look much better than the did with all of the excess paint, runs, and drips they had on them…and the grey should hide some of the flaws that remain but if it doesn’t, I can live with it knowing I gave them the best finish I could and they are not dirty anymore. Man, I can’t wait to get my dishes and food back in the cupboards but I am going to wash everything that is going back into them…the dust is just pervasive and got everywhere even with the airlock I had up in the kitchen….at least I made it though with my toes not hurting any worse…
February 3rd
Well…damn, that sucked…up and down all night and I’m not sure why that would be other than today is going to be a long work day with doing the final sanding of all 11 doors for the kitchen and keeping the doors straight so they go back in the same place they came off…I think I’m only going to have to fit one of them after paint since I did the big doors before I started…at least I hope I don’t have a lot of fitting to do since that would mean drilling new holes in my nice white paint on the cabinet frames….so, it looks like I’ll have the doors hung by Tuesday of next week since I am going to take Sunday off after painting Friday and Saturday….my toes are still hurting and I may have to take some ibuprofen before I get to the work today with being on my feet for another 3 or 4 hours…still not sure what the problem is with them but I need to survive the next 3 days of sanding and painting and then I can put my feet up Sunday and rest them….it was a nice surprise that we only got an inch or so of snow when they got lots south of here and I didn’t even have to shovel…but, I may go out and skim what snow there is off the walks and get them salted again since there is a little ice on them and I want to stay ahead of it…had a really cool grocery bill yesterday with not buying cocktail materials anymore…only 11 bucks at Meijers and 8 bucks at Aldi’s and I can’t remember spending less than 20 bucks for a week…not much to do today….just the bike ride and then eating dust for a few hours and I am going to set up my pedestal fan to blow some of the dust out of the little window in my glass blocks…not sure how effective it’s going to be but it may help…more later….
A few last things…
Well…I would be remiss if I didn’t bring today’s date to everyone’s attention…2-2-22…and it’s groundhog day where there is no consensus on whether or not we are going to have 6 more weeks of winter…from what I’ve seen, it’s about 50/50…back to the date…this is probably the last date like this I am going to see since the next one is 3-3-33 and I’m really not sure if I have 12 more years in me…that would make me really old and, while there is longevity in my family, it might be a bit much to hope for 12 more years….it looks like they are putting a second house on the lot across the street that is going to be about 3 feet from the first one that went up…and I know they are going for over 150K but who the heck wants to pay that much to live right on top of your neighbor? It won’t be much different than living in a damn apartment and you will be able to hear everything going on next door and I really, really hated that when I lived in an apartment….but, at least it will block out my view of the ugly, run down rentals that are one street over and they are new so that is cool…and I can luxuriate on my double lot with my big lawn and I don’t have to hear the neighbors…and I didn’t pay 150-180K for mine…and the forecast for price growth for housing this year is about 16%…so if mine is worth 110K now, it will be worth 126K by the end of the year and I will have made almost 40K in the year and a half I will have been here….and that means I’ll have almost 80K in equity by the end of the year…not bad for being broke three years ago…
Damn, I’m old…
Well…you know I’ve been complaining about getting old and all of the aches and pains that comes with it when I work hard around here…I still have the energy to do it but there is a much larger price to pay in pain as I get older…okay, that was the preface to what I really wanted to talk about and it has to do with what I got in the mail yesterday…my only mail yesterday consisted of two pieces…one a solicitation for “final expenses” insurance that you see all over the tv these days..at least during the day when every damn commercial seems to be about it….and the second piece was advertising for bargain cremations from a local mortuary…now, if this is the only kind of mail I’m going to get from now on, I’m going to be pretty pissed…what happened to the new car adverts or the ones for travel or sporting goods? I wonder if they think I have one foot in the grave because I’m getting old? Now it would be nice to get some for bargain kayaks or used Miatas or motorcycles, but I really don’t want to start thinking more about how short of a time I have left so they can just stop with this crap….so it went straight into the trash as the rest of them will if they keep sending them to me….grrr….