Trading Freezers

I traded freezers last evening.  I been meaning to for weeks, but finally got around to it.  Well, I should say I traded the contents of my refrigerator freezers.  I don't have an individual freezer.  But I have refrigerators in the kitchen (with a bottom freezer) and the basement with top freezer.  

I find the kitchen one convenient because it has the crisper drawers in the middle and I am in there more often than anywhere else.  I spend a lot more time with getting at fresh fruits and veggies than frozen stuff.

The old previous basement fridge (and I mean "old") was more of a root cellar and storage for bulk items.  Bags of potatoes, onions, fruits etc.  And certainly horribly inefficient, energy-wise.  I replaced it months ago with another top freezer model, because I buy meat in moderate bulk on sale and I bought shoebox-size plastic containers to store the various kinds in.

But the kitchen freezer was the bottom type.  Stuff like frozen veggies, bread products (which freeze well), and leftovers stayed in containers on the (unmovable) top shelf.  Larger containers were in the bottom slide-out tray.  It became unmanageable.  Stuff on the top freezer shelf were impossible to sort through a small container at a time down on my hands and knees.  And the stacks just kept falling over, which destroyed any organizing I tried to maintain.

The slide-out shelf was not very helpful.  It was "necessary" to slide it out to get at anything, but basically, it was just a loose pile of variously-sized containers.  Even though I labeled them, it didn't help much trying to find anything

So I thought about that for a few weeks.  And I think I found the solution.  Reverse the contents of the freezers.  First, I emptied out everything from the slide-out kitchen tray.  Separated them into meat and veggies in a large plastic bin and put all my freezer gel packs on top to keep them frozen.  Then dumped all the small containers on top and closed the lid.

Then took my 6 shoebox-size meat containers to the empty Kitchen freezer.  They fill it up.  And since I have labels in front and on the top, they are easy to find and don't mix into each other.  The unmovable top shelf holds easy-to-manage stuff like breads, bags of frozen veggies, and smaller containers for various sausages/baked bacon. 

All those leftovers (and I do choose them sometimes just to use them up) are in the basement top freezer.  They are more stable there because I can see them better.  Most labels are on the top of the containers, but future ones will be on the front for easier identification 

A benefit of the freezer content exchange is that I used up some stuff I didn't remember I had.  I poached 4 chicken thighs in previously-saved frozen broth.  That had to start them out well.  I have a container of beef broth left over from a spicy chuck roast recipe, to make more beef stew tomorrow from a chunk of other slow-cooked chuck roast from last month I also found.  

So the transfer has worked out well.  I can see the contents of the small leftovers in the top freezer refrigerator more easily now without have to shuffle them all around on hands and knees.  And the bulk meat containers are easy to take out of the kitchen tray easily.

I say "bulk meat containers", but they are all cut up into in 3-4 oz portions and stored in zip lock bags.  All I have to do is lift a lid of the meat container I want and thaw it out.

This looking like a "winning" change.

Daffodils

 I musn't ignore the daffodils!  They are blooming well.  It was a wet Winter and they seem happy!  Yeah, they want it dry during the Summer/Fall but late Winter rain seems to suit them...

Yesterday, I had the first good blooms.

OK, those last are getting ready to bloom, but they will open in a series of weeks as there are early to late bloomers in the bed.  I did that deliberately.  I wish I had just mixed them all up instead so that there would be blooms all through the bed.  Seeing the bed in quarters of blooms isn't as good as I imagined.  So I think I will start sneaking different-time bloomers among the earliest and latest ones.

There are a few empty spots where some died out so I will mark those spots and plant opposite-time bloomers there.  When you change your mind about some things, there are usually ways to adjust over a few years.

Flowerbeds Part 3

The 2nd blooming of the daffodils... The mid daffodils were opening.

And you can see a hint of the 3rd group at the left.

But the midddle bllom whites were at their best.

I love the changes from week to week.  Changes are better than "one-time-all-at once".

Fixing My Computer World

There are computer problems you expect and ones you don't.  I have been gradually examining all my apps to see which aren't 64 bit.  There are a LOT, so I have some work to do.  That is likely the source of most of my problems.

I have also added a Password Manager and better security software.  Until I actually go through them, though, they actually cause problems.  For example, when is the last time you turned on your computer to be met with the sound of a growling lion?  That surprised ME for sure.  It turned out it was a signal from the security app that I had malware ad apps that needed attending-to.  Not the easiest way to start a day, LOL!

Fortunately, Consumer Reports magazine has a 10 part step-by-step article on computer security.  I will follow that over the next week.  Some I learned myself; some I was not so aware of.  For example, I had just gotten their recommended password manager, but I also just acquired my first smartphone and was clueless.  So it is very helpful (and includes things I don't have but you might).

I will be spending some time following MOST recommendations.  I have a problem with deleting cache and cookies.  It always causes problems getting into some standard sites.  For example, I deleted them on recommendation from my security software (which, naturally, I don't want to identify for security reasons, LOL!).

But it took me almost an hour to get back into Feedly.com.  Apparently, I have it directly through Google, and they didn't want to recognize me for Feedly.  I got around it, but it took a while.  I'll be more careful of security advice.  After all, their purpose is "security", not "accessibility".  

My password manager may help on that, but my list is daunting.  I have so MANY sites with accounts.  Well, time to trim the list.  Many sites are old, and some are easy to access once a year as a "guest". 

Such fun!

Like, I only order seeds once a year.  I don't need to keep track of an account with 6 companies when I really only order from 1 or 2.  And entering my address once a year as a "guest" isn't worth keeping track of username/password.

Simplify and update.  Keep a clean machine.  Search for and delete 32 bit old stuff and replace with 64 bit apps.  That's my new rule...

After that, get my darn email straightened out.  I may reduce to one.  Having several themed-accounts was nice when it was supported by Verizon, but it is getting impossible to keep them working on AOL (which Verizon sold my account to).  Time to accept the inevitable and go with one.  

And that "one" will be "cavebear2118@verizon.net".   The others receive but replies stick in the outbox.  I will miss them, but I won't keep fighting about them.  You can always reach me at cavebear2118@verizon.net.  The others are less certain and will vanish eventually.  But they receive so it's OK to use them for the time being.

One Day At A Time...

Google Earth - Previous Residences

Do you ever use Google Earth to look at past places you've lived?  I do.  Because I wonder how things have changed.  Even when I was young, I recall the houses and yards.  Dad used to do a lot of work in the yard and I did in my own places later.

So I decided to actually look at each today and show the changes.  Some are minor, some are drastic.  I won't give details, who knows what SOME company might find useful, LOL!

1. It was a 2 story old house when I was there.  It has been utterly replaced.  The 20'x30' sandbox Dad built is gone.  The grape arbors are gone.  The outbuilding party building is gone.  The  field of wild blackberries (where we kids stuffed ourselves in Summer) is gone.  The slope where we sledded most Winter days is now full of trees.  

I drove past the old place in the early 80s on business in Boston.  I stopped and looked.  It was the same place.  I didn't go knock on the door.  I wish I had.  The owners might have been thrilled.  I really regret that.

The next place I lived was in Petersburg.  Quite a surprise moving from Massachusetts to Virginia in the late 50s.  We had to study Virginia History (mostly how evil the North was to the South).  We were the only kids in in school from "The North" and were not liked.

The house is the same.  Dad built a massive roof over the sunken patio using tranluscent plastic.  I see it is shingled now.  The part covered with trees in the right back used to be a putting green Dad set up (of golf Course quality).  Mom and Dad both loved golfing, so they practiced there often (drive for show, putt for dough).  There used to be a fence he built around the back yard and I see it has been replaced with shrubs.  Apparently the lawn has become Zoysia grass.  Awful stuff; green in Winter but brown in Summer.  The trees in center left cover what was the gravel driveway Dad and I build to Roman quality roads.  As a mechanical engineer, he never did things halfway (much to my dismay as a teen converted to serf labor).  There were gardens and borders of strawberries when we left.  Those are all gone now.

We moved to MD after that.  The house looks about the same.  My room (my first ever own room) is the left back window.  The yard is ruined though.   Dad and I and my brother spent a Summer building an below ground swimming pool from a massive kit when I was 15.  Worst Summer of my life!

Dad had some company dump 3 dumptruck loads of dirt in the back and then dig a pit to his specifications.  And he wasn't wasting any dirt.  He knew the dug-out dirt would match the slope he needed around the outside.  Engineers LOL...

I spent the Summer digging out soil to precise depths and tamping it down flat with a damned heavy flat weight.  My brother was younger, so not expected to do much except when Dad was there to guide him.  But I worked like a mule all Summer in the heat.

When the hole was to specifications, we had to install 4' sections of metal panels and drill holes in them for bolts.  Drilling through metal with a handheld drill is not easy.  Bits broke constantly.  But entually we had the steel panels assembled.  Then we had to backfill around the outsides.  Guess who did most of THAT?

Finally, we installed this HUGE plastic liner.  It was AWFUL.  It had to be slid along some plastic ribs inch by inch.  And we had to do it from above because you couldn't walk on the sand layer the liner would rest on.

Dad designed and built a diving board and a pool filter and skimmer.  Too tricky for me, really.  Then came the day when a water tanker arrived to fill the pool.  Dad was fanatic about angling the input pipes so as to not put pressure on the bottom (and well he should).

When it was filled, we had to wait 4 days for the water to get to ambient temperature.    We dove in, and I thought I would freeze to death.  I seldom went swimming in it and went off to college 3 years later only daring it in the heat of August.

And after Mom and Dad moved to NH, these people who bought the house filled the pool with dirt to bury it.  It was to left of the pin...

And not only that, they completely ersaded the garden and the landscaping.  The lower right of the house had a wonderful broad patch of boxwoods and butterfly bushes I had installed to get my Boy Scout Landscaping Badge.  If they wanted a yard like a pool table top, why didn't they just buy one?

After several apartments after college, I rented a house with a friend.  It was treeless except for an old apple tree.  I was experimentig with raised garden boxes. so I built a star-shaped one in the lower left, an octagonal one  on the opposite side of the sidewalk, planted marigolds along the sidewalk sides, removed the old apple tree (with the owners approval) and grew veggies there.

You can see the outline of the left star.  Just a few years ago, you could see the outline of the right octagon.  The trees have exploded into growth, hiding the old veggie garden.

So here I am in my Forever House.  There are fewer trees and greenery than this pictures shows.  A lot of that is wild underbrush and blackberries I cut down last fall.  The stuff at the bottom is a screened garden and 2 toolsheds.  The lower left is all cleared...

The good thing about this place is that if I ever leave it, I probably won't be capable of looking back at it...