Category: Around the House

Crash!

Flash!

GRUMBLE!

I already knew what needed to happen.

It’s been far too long, and being a man of efficiency, I try not to spend time fixing high maintenance situations when they’re just going to get bad again. But it’s something every property owner does unless they’re a posh city-dweller.

So I ran to the garage, filled up the tank with fuel, opened the garage, and went as fast as I could.

I knew I had to mow the lawn quickly if I was going to beat the rain. I also knew it was long because I find it more efficient to not mow it too often (when I apologized to y neighbor for letting it get so long, George replied, “that’s okay. I like grass.” Best neighbor ever!)

Needless to say, this wasn’t my first time mowing long grass quickly (did I mention efficient earlier? Why take time mowing when you can take less time?). So I thought I’d share the secret with you.

When you mow quickly, you basically run behind the lawn mower and jump to the side to turn it (picture rotating very quickly on the outside of a lever). There’s a problem:
The blades slow down and eventually stop. If it’s warm out, the lawn mower will overheat.
I pay attention to the sound of the blade, and when it slows down, I quickly (because everything is quick) throw up (lift) the handle of the lawn mower to raise the rear wheels off the ground. This releases all the grass clippings out of the mower centrifuge, the high density of which is the reason for its slowing down.

I hope these tips help you waste less of your life doing lawn maintenance.

Cheers!

(Yes, I just wrote 2 pages about how you should lift the back of your mower when mowing fast. But the video before the storm didn’t turn out)

Sometimes, I have to sew.

Sometimes, it’s part of a gift. Like a Christmas gift that is long overdue.

Always, it takes forever.

It takes forever because, like my work, I have an innate focus on quality. Unlike my work, I do not do it often. Therefore, I am really meticulous and slow.

One thing I do that takes time (besides just threading the needle) after every stitch, I tie a knot. I’m not a huge fan of sewing, and I don’t want to have to resew it just because one thread breaks.

Well, if it’s my own clothes, I tie one occasionally, but when it’s for other people, like cooking or taxes, I have the highest quality standards.

While most of you may think I’m talking about a phone app, I honestly do not and have no interest in “coding”.

I’m, of course, talking about appetizers. For the first time in too long, I made an appetizer for a party.

I brought brushetta. Not too complex: tomatoes and bread, right? Well like my incredibly simple recipe for truffles, it’s all about the extra things you do that makes it exceptional and complex.

My brushetta includes:

• Deseeded roma tomatoes, diced, partially softened
• Fresh basil leaves, shredded and finely minced
• Four garlic cloves, crushed, generally mixed in tomatoes
• Once on serving tray, balsamic glaze lightly drizzled over tomato mix
• Oven fresh baguette, sliced diagonally to about 0.50″ – 0.75″ thick.

It was a hit! People even scraped the plate clean!

Yes, you heard that right. I am one of the few residents of Saint Paul with a civilized mailbox.

First of all, let me describe:

In fancy neighborhoods, like Midway, the mailman or mailwoman walks up to each house and delivers mail at the front door into a slot. About 70 years ago, someone decided it would be a good idea to deliver it to the front of the house, not necessarily the door. It was more insulated.
That was a great idea. In theory, Let me show you a futuristic computer graphic of this concept:

Unfortunately, this makes the mail slot have a very low capacity.
Well, our postal couriers, being the clever folk that they are, plus they don’t have time to figure out every single house, like to find a magazine, roll it up (or fold it in half), and stick the letters, client checks, and whatever else you have, and just jam it in the slot. Another technical schematic is needed:
So I had the task of making it bigger.

It must have been installed before the house was finished, because there was a large metal box in between the walls.
First ripped off the front slot. You can see the top of the metal box.

Here;s what the inside looked like (sort of):
The wall was in the way:

You can see the metal box in the prior picture, If you can’t, it’s better in this one:

Now to make the replacement. For a couple days, mail just went into a basket that I set on top of the insulation to help guide mail onto the floor (it rarely caught it)

At the store (Saving BIG Money, as one can only do in Midway), I got materials to make a new, bigger, better mail slot (I call it a “mail box”). I needed wood, trim, paint, a hinge, and a knob. I was looking at knobs and saw the perfect one. I loved everything about it.

Except I was looking to spend $2.50 on a knob, so I chose something a little more boring.

 

In the end, with a little fanagling and lot lot of help from my Dad, I had a quality finished product so I can finally have a good mailbox.

Problem for three yeas solved! Thanks for the help Dad!

Sometimes I like to tinker with my side projects. Today’s side project? Sewing. My friend ripped my shirt, which kind of made me mad. He offered to buy a new one, but I just told him to save his money.

Now, most of you probably think I’m cheap, but that’s not always the case. It’s true, I don’t like wasting money. But I just don’t like wasting anything. I mean, no, I don’t wash my paper plates or anything, but I tend to avoid paper plates.

I take care of things so they last. Like my bright colored shirts? They’re bright colored because I hang dry them.

I don’t like to waste things. So even though my friend offered to buy a new shirt, I told him no. It was a casual shirt, and therefore didn’t need to be prefect. This is the tear:

 

It was along a seam, so I think it’s fixable, right?

Well, I went to it. The first thing I did was clean the edges because they looked messy.

Then I tried to use pins to hold it still. That didn’t work at all, so sewing it was a lot of hand maneuvering.

I eventually got it decent looking. Two things were off. The main thing was the extra bits of fabric after sewing it together. I trimmed that. All the cutting I did for the entire project basically produced balls of fuzz because it was so little.

I initially started sewing a loop to mend the pieces together, but then I decided that wouldn’t allow for the angles of the fabric to line up right, so I changed to more if a weave.

Here’s the final product:

Believe it or not, I have a small hole gym, or at least a room in my basement that could be used as a gym….

I use it sometimes, but about a year ago, the treadmill broke. It was a pretty cool fold-up machine I had in my apartment a while ago. Okay. Then, during tax season, I must’ve set down a weight not-so-gently, because it made a hairpin fracture in one of the discs.
They are the Bowflex Select Tech Dumbells (clicky adjustable weights).

inside the handle are different discs that rotate in permutations that hold different amounts of weight – 5 to 52.5 lbs.

The fracture made it so one disc couldn’t hold the weight because it had done flex in it.

“Why don’t they make the discs out of metal?” you ask. That’s a good point.

The weight has a bunch of ball-bearings and springs. I bought the repair kit, so now I have every part….. except for the discs. I had to order one of those separately.

Taking it apart and replacing the disc wasn’t hard. Putting it back together was tedious, probably because I took a short cut taking it apart.

It works now, so I can randomly lift weights again!

Here’s the video I used:

An easy solution for a common problem for homeowners is not known by everyone.
I’ll illustrate with a very simple drawing made on my Photography Advanced Image Necessity Tool program (PAINT).
Here is a house and lawn:
Obviously, it’s a Saint Paul house because of the detached garage.

I know not everyone knows about this because I see messes all over.

Many people mow in straight lines, which makes sense. But this causes our problem:
The problem is when a lawn mower crosses the sidewalk from one area of lawn to the other, it leaves a big clump of grass clippings. Generally, that will wash away with heavy rain, but not always, and it doesn’t always rain. Many homeowners pick it up themselves.
The solution is simple. By simply not crossing from one lawn to the other, the clipping messes will be avoided. Of course, it’s still a pain to turn the lawn mower 180 degrees more often, plus such a rotation will often leave clumps of grass clippings anyways.

When using this solution, in those rare moments you may have to cross the sidewalk, pull up on the lawn mower handle to let the lawn mower shoot out the grass clippings, then cross while the mower is still angles.

The solution is to mow in a box shape, completely avoiding any edges or high-angle mower rotations:
In this way, your lawn will be smooth and your sidewalk clean.

Since I work all day, I do take occasional nights off. Instead of working, sometimes I work. Here are the results (I tend to do 4 feet at a time. There are no ‘before’pictures. Just imagine a bunch of weeds and a few other plants I decided I didn’t like so ripped then out as if they were weeds (I’ll just update this and make the days current when I do more).

[update]
No significant progress today, but I did take a picture during the day!

[/update]

I didn’t do any more work, but I decided to use my real camera because my phone images didn’t do it justice. So here’s my backyard at night:
f/4.5, 20/1 s, ISO-200

(This is actually 3, 4 foot sections and 3 separate nights)

Someday I might even think to take pictures during the day.

Another great day to keep the great summer going!

Business
To start with,  I did a lot of business. Nothing billable,  but I’m working to greatly increase my offerings,  create another revenue model, plus get everything lined up for that. It’s pretty tedious, but that’s how summer is in my business. I’m doing lots with people, though.  It’s exciting!

Cooking
I had a jolly good evening. First of all, it’s grilling season, so I grill burgers, brats, chicken, and, and…. pizzas?!

It was perfect. Golden cheese, crispy crust. Yum!

Landscaping
If you’ve never been to my patio, there’s an awkward triangle of dirt in the middle of the patio, sidewalk, and grass.
It was always bad at holding mulch and it was over crowded.

I had the triangle cleaned out as far as old mulch and wretched Elm seeds (that are everywhere.  Always. Dirtiest tree ever) are concerned.  I took a good look at it and realized the problem:
Too much dirt

I proceeded to loosen dirt clean it up, and put it in a bucket. It’s good dirt,  so I piled it in back where I’m going to tear out some plants (hopefully before it grows).

I was literally digging in dirt all night. I had a tool to loosen the dirt,  but my hand proved more effective.

After I got the triangle below the brim of the sidewalk and patio by removing dirt, I filled it with mulch.
After that,  I added my new solar lights.

The finished area?

My parents always tell me to wear gloves,  but I never do. I figure it’s my fault for not having the calluses needed.  Eventually from all the dirt, blood, cracked skin, and cuts,  either my hands will adapt or they will fall off.

Hoping for the former.

leaf bags get heavy when they’re full of hostas I don’t want anymore.
By heavy, I mean heavy for the paper.
My landscaping will look really good when it’s done. The plan this year is to remove everything I don’t like.
The “done” point is still years away.