Showing posts with label What I Do. Show all posts
Showing posts with label What I Do. Show all posts

Thursday, February 2, 2023

More Things I Did

OK, nothing major.  Just small things I did staying busy and productive...  As I've said before "try to do something useful every day".

1.  My clock/radio has a backup battery to keep the clock running in a few hours of power outage.  One of those old-fashioned rectangular 9 volt types (its a very old clock radio but it still works).   The last few times when there was a brief blip in the power, it failed.  I get tired resetting it.  So I turned over the clock/radio and found the battery.  The plug-in attachment was broken.  How something that does not move "breaks" is beyond me.  

And it took a while to even see that "something was broken.  My initial response was to buy a new rechargeable battery.  But it would attach.  That's when I discover part of the old battery was broken off in the plug.

I have a lot of good tools.  One is a tiny, thin needlenose plier (and this one is really "needlenosed").  But I don't have the steadiest of hands these days.  So it was really hard to get the plier to grab the old  broken-off battery attachment.  Sometimes I scream in frustration trying to work at tiny things!  And the plug-in didn't offer any firm leverage. 

It took 15 minutes to get the broken battery attachment loose from the plug-in.  That may not sound like very long, but 15 minutes of frustration is like an hour of real time.  

The tiny little bit of broken metal suddenly popped out!  The new rechargeable (and newly charged) battery connected perfectly.  I can't wait for a 1 minute power outage to see if it works.

2.  Checked the snow-blower.  That meant dragging out 150' of heavy-duty extension cord to reach the toolshed.  And remembering to plug it into the outside outlet before I went, LOL.  It has an electrical power-start which I love.  I can't pull those damn "cord-pulls" like I used to.   

We aren't forecast to have heavy snow this Winter, but surprises happen.  So testing the snow-blower made sense.  But it wouldn't start.  OK, I tend to leave gas in equipment.  Purists say to drain gas every month, mechanics say once every 6 months, and there are additives that extend gas life to a year.  I don't do that.  Most equipment starts when I want it to.

But the snow-blower didn't.  I checked a few obvious things.  Then looked in the gas tank.  Couldn't see a thing!  So I found a 3' bamboo stick and put it in to see if there was gas.  No gas.  I actually stored it properly (drained of most gas and then run til it stopped).  I had forgotten that.

Added a little gas and pushed the priming button a dozen times.  It started right up.  So, I'm ready for any serious snow...

3.  Filled the thistle seed birdfeeders ( a daily thing - I have a flock of about a dozen goldfinches here and I bet no neighbor can claim that) and the black oil sunflower birdfeeder (for the other songbirds).  Filling the sunflower feeder is wearing me out.  I need to drag over the 8' stepladder to reach the top to dump in a bucket of the seeds.  It gets harder every year.

What I need is a pole that lowers and raises the sunflower seeder.  I've looked for one to buy for years but I never find one.  I think I'm going to have to build my own. I 'm thinking a pipe through the center with a rope through it, a couple of pulleys, and a small winch.  I need to sit down and draw the details.  But there is always something else higher on the To Do List.

4.  Went shopping at Walmart.  I go there for odd items.  Or maybe I should say their "profit-losers".  There are some things I buy there that are way under-priced compared to competitors.  So I take advantage of that.  Fancy Food canned cat food is cheap there.  Tidy Litter is cheap there.  Milk and Ice Cream is cheap there.  Some other things aren't, so I buy them elsewhere.  I have NO store loyalty.

5.  Bought a steamship round roast at the meat.deli/liquor store.  Roast beef is $7.99 a pound and too often "medium-to well" cooked.  I like medium-rare.  So I marinate and cook my own.  I have an electric slicer and do my own sandwich-thin slicing (set into 2-day batches in zip-lock bags).  And a few 1/2" slabs for different meals.  

6.  Took one of my 24"x6"x6" planting trays and dumped the soil into a bucket to mix it up with organic slow-release fertilizer .  Put it back in the tray and planted more lettuce.  I love salads, so I can't really have "too much" lettuce.  Red leaf, green leaf, and romaine.  And since lettuce has jumped from $2/pound to $4.50, that's a sensible thing to do.

7.  I've been collecting fallen branches.  I don't often have fires in the basement fireplace, but a short one would be nice to watch.  Sadly, my little electric chainsaw is giving me problems.  The chain just doesn't want to adjust in tension properly.  A project for another day...  But the fallen branches are small enough to cut with my "saws-all".

DEWALT Reciprocating Saw Bare Tool DCS380B 20-Volt Max Li-Ion ...


8.  I use a drywall tape tool to scrape the litter boxes clean.  It works great for cleaning the edges and loosening everything from the bottom for scooping after.

But it has always "caught" on the middle of one of the litter boxes.  So I empties the litter into the other boxes and scrubbed it.  There was a slight raised spots in the center.

Hurray for sharp chisels!  I scraped away the high spot!  Perfection in scraping is available again.

9.  Sorted out a 10" stack of bills and notices.  I have a very good system of file folders, but I am terrible at keeping up with the filing.  I got 90% of them divided and filed in subjects.   That was a relief.  The other 10% is hard to decide where to file.  And I only did it because of possible bad cat.vet records as you see below.

10.  Looked up a lot of stuff on email and websites.  First, I think my new vet was sent bad records from the old one.  I don't yet want to say it was deliberate, but a lot of what the new vet is telling me doesn't match up with my mental recollections of annual visits for shots.  I have the previous vet receipts on the dining table and will make a list on times and dates.  Then I will bring that to the new vet so that we can compare records.

Second, some poster (elsewhere) suggested "diclophene" for knee problems.  The stuff seems almost lethal.  I'll stay with generic 4% lidocaine and Walmart 'Equate' equivalents.  

11.  Almost time to start planting some slow-growing perennial seeds.  I mix my own starter-soil .  Made a list of the parts I don't have enough of.  Time to visit Lowe's or Home Depot.


Saturday, September 30, 2017

A Week In The Life.

Some of you know that I don't live a regulary-scheduled life, LOL!

So here is the past Tuesday through Saturday:

1.  Stayed up all night Tuesday 8pm - Thursday 8 am visiting cat blogs, processing camera pictures, and shifting between a gardening forum and an atheist forum.  Yeah, that 36 hours.  Went through a 1.5 l bottle of wine and 4 packs of cigs (hey, it WAS 36 hours). 

2.  Visiting my cat-friends takes about 2 hours, and then I get email notifications to new posts and I comment.  I always comment.

3.  I love reading posts at the gardening site and spent a total of a few hours there.  Sometimes there are questions I know something about and I answer.  I've been veggie and flower gardening for a few decades, so I have some experience.  I I have a good library to consult when I'm not sure.  I consulted my Peterson Guide of Eastern Trees when somewhere was trying to identify the specific one in her back yard.  It was one I have never seen, but the leaf shape was unique, so I mentioned it.

Sometimes there is new information I value.  Sometimes I ask questions.  I am new to growing Venus Fly Traps (for example) , so I'm the one asking questions there. 

4.  The atheist forum takes a lot of time.  There are atheists, agnostics, and theists there, and many of the posts are long and factual.  It takes some time to reply to those well.  I probably spend a lot of time there.  I joined this forum October last year and have over 4500 posts there now. 

Mostly, I discuss everyday events with other atheists.  Yes, atheists discuss almost everything from politics to cooking, to movies.  But it does mean we don't have a religious view on them.  Atheists may have a more reality-based approach to life, but we also love sci-fi and can do the "willing suspension of disbelief" as well as anyone if not better.

5.  I tend to switch back between the gardening and atheist forums.  I use up all the threads in one and go back to the other.  I don't mean that I post fast.  I give a lot of thought to each.  My interest is to answer posts carefully, well, and in detail without be overly long.

You can always tell tell the theists' posts by length.  They go on forever before they start quoting religious texts to get to their point.    I treat them kindly, with facts.  They can decide whether to change their minds if they want. 

6.  After a long time on the computer, I usually feed the cats (yes I fed them regularly before) but always make sure to feed them a good meal before I go to bed.  Because staying up that long means I'll sleep 12 hours after.

7.  When I got up Friday, I started on making a hinged top for the new compost bin.  Sometimes you build things by measurement.  But having the compost bin built, I simply put boards on the top and marked the edges for cutting.  Friday, I cut a lot of boards to size.  I glued and clamped some but even with mosquito repellent all over me, they were fierce around my eyes and fingers.  I worked fast and ran.

8.  Saturday afternoon (after another 12 hours in bed- I did have to catch up)  I went out to complete the top.  Fortunately, it was windy and the mosquitoes have trouble with winds over 10 mph.  I got the entire top structure completed.  OK, not the screening, the wood structure.  The hinging was perfect.  The 2 bins now have tops that lift up smoothly.  All I have to do now is attach 1/2 wire mesh to the top and add a few spacer boards under it.  That will leave no space for even a mouse to get inside.

9.  Added a lot more garden stuff into the old toolshed with the new shelves.  Every day, I will clear more basement space.  Weeded the Fall garden a bit.  Not many weeds left.  A year of weeding as removed most and I suspect there aren't many viable weed seeds left there.  Which means I can FINALLY tackle the part of the backyard overgrown with wild blackberries soon.

There is always SOMETHING that needed attention "last year", and I am always behind on some part of the yard.  On the other hand, suppose I caught up with everything?  What would I do?  OK, fix up the house better...

I'll do that when Winter arrives...

Looking Up

 While I was outside with The Mews, I laid back and looked up.  I thought the tree branches and the clouds were kind of nice. Nothing import...