The depleted supply of clean sox determined that I should start the new month doing laundry. I also wasted part of the day trying to update my computer's operating system. In the end I got an error message to the effect that the software recommended for my computer won't work on my computer. I was too disgusted and infuriated to pursue the matter. I may try again later.
Monday, December 2, 2019
Disgusting and infuriating are the words. Saturday's mail brought the seedlings I ordered from the Arbor Day Foundation, so today was planting day. The instructions that come with the trees say the dormant seedlings should soak in water for at least three hours before planting, so I set them in a pail of water about eleven and then went to pay some bills. I paid the fertilizer bill north of town, drove on to the courthouse in Winfield to pay the property taxes, and then to the AC Clinic to pay the bill there. After a stop at the market for bananas, it was almost three when I got home and I set about planting my little trees. There were two American sweetgums I had bought, plus the free red maple that comes with every order. I dug a hole for the first sweetgum, went to the shop where the seedlings were still soaking, put one of them into the full watering can, and carried it to the hole. When I got there the seedling was missing. It had fallen out of the can. I walked back along the route I had taken, about a hundred feet, without a glimpse of the AWOL vegetation. I covered the same ground at least ten times, with increasing frustration and anger. The ordering deadline passed last week, so there was no chance of getting a replacement before spring. Finally I gave up the search, went and got the other sweetgum, and planted it instead. Then I dug the hole for the maple and went to fetch it. That's when I spotted the missing seedling where I had dropped it. I put it back in the pail to soak some more, as it had been lying out for more than half an hour. The planting instructions emphasize not letting the roots dry out before getting the trees into the ground, so I hope this one wasn't too badly damaged by lying out in the open air as long as it did. I finished planting the maple, then the last sweetgum, and finished a little before five. I have to remember to keep these new trees watered all winter so they can be off to a good start in the spring.
Tuesday, December 3, 2019
When I was in town today a sign crew was taking down the old Kansas Buffet sign and fixing to put up the new Pizza Ranch sign. The building was a Sirloin Stockade for many years, then became Kansas Buffet until it closed down a couple of years ago. This fall the building has been undergoing renovation, and is scheduled to reopen as Pizza Ranch sometime this month. It will be a pizza buffet, which sounds like my kind of place. When I got home I took advantage of the mild afternoon for another session with the chain saw and the splitter. Little by little I'm reducing the pile of wood behind the shop. When that's out of the way I want to get my loader tractor running and go pull some inconveniently placed trees out of the ground.
Wednesday, December 4, 2019
It was a waste of time today when I tried again to update my desktop operating system. Some websites refuse to work on my outdated browsers, and the new browsers won't work on my old OS. After downloading a more up-to-date OS I tried to use the installer, and it crashed every time. After the third crash I gave up. I'm not smart enough to know what to do about it, so I suppose I'll have to take the job to a computer shop.
Thursday, December 5, 2019
With pleasant weather that allowed outside work without a coat, I fired up the chain saw and attacked the wood pile behind the shop again. I did some splitting, but there's a lot more to do, so tomorrow's work will inlcude more splitting and hauling in.
Friday, December 6, 2019
As planned, today I fired up the splitter and turned big pieces into smaller pieces. I split a lot of wood, and was nearing the end of what I had to do when the machine died and wouldn't restart. I had planned to haul all the wood and stack it in the garage, but I found live bugs in some of it. I decided to leave it out in the yard with a tarp over it in case of rain, hoping that the freezing nights will finish them off. Any bugs that are still in there are in much smaller pieces of wood now, with less insulation around them, so maybe the cold will get them. Meanwhile, I need to figure out what's wrong with that splitter.
Saturday, December 7, 2019
Drat! I thought I had fixed the splitter. I found the carburetor was hanging by one loose screw. No wonder the machine died. I managed to find the missing one where it had fallen, put it back in, and tightened both screws. Then I pulled the starter rope. I should say I tried to pull it. Something is binding inside the engine to keep it from turning freely. So one of my jobs in the coming week will be to haul the thing to the small engine shop. It's a good thing I have enough wood already split to last awhile.
Sunday, December 8, 2019
 |
 |
Monday, December 9, 2019
It was a good day to be outside as little as possible, with a cold north wind blowing most of the day. I went to Wichita and shot video of a house for sale. An old friend in California is considering a move to Wichita, so I'm scouting a couple of houses for him. If he likes what he sees in the videos and the paperwork, he'll come take a look himself. The one I saw today was a swell joint priced at $544,000. On either coast it would probably cost a million and a half.
Tuesday, December 10, 2019
First thing this morning I was off to Winfield to have a more up to date operating system installed in my iMac desktop. I should be able to do that myself, but I don't know what to do when the instructions don't work, so I'm handing the job off to a computer pro. So I'm working with the laptop until I get my big computer back. Today's outside work was clearing some weeds and little trees out of the way, preparing to build the forms and pour the foundation for my new shed. I also walked down to the wood lot to fetch kindling for the next three days and was encouraged to find the road slightly less swampy than it's been for several months. There's still plenty of standing water down in the bottom of the draw, but the road has gone from sloshy to just muddy. Maybe I'll be able to drive there sometime this winter.
Wednesday, December 11, 2019
During the war Gabe Heatter always began his evening broadcast with, "There's good news tonight." He always found something positive to report. Tonight I can report that my splitter wasn't as bad off as I thought. When it died due to the carburetor vibrating loose the ram was in mid-stroke. After I reattached the carb I tried to restart the machine and found the starter rope suddenly hard to pull. I figured there must be something binding inside the engine. But today I pulled the rope a few more times. That slowly moved the ram back to the neutral position, taking the load off the engine, and I was able to start the engine normally. So I proceeded to finish splitting the rest of the pieces I was working on last Friday. This was a pleasing development. I brought the truck around and moved all the rest of the pile into the garage. The other piece of good news is that another walk down to the wood lot to fetch more kindling reconfirmed what I found yesterday. The road is drying out. It's still swampy by the big cottonwoods, but other parts that had standing water are just muddy now. That's progress.
Thursday, December 12, 2019
This morning the forecast was showing rain tomorrow and Saturday. So after another good session with the chain saw and the splitter, I moved some of the wood inside and put tarps over the rest. The big pile that's been blocking my loader tractor in the shed is almost gone. This evening, with all the wood safely tarped to keep it dry, the rain is gone from the forecast. Easy come, easy go.
Friday, December 13, 2019
This morning I went back to Wichita to shoot video of another house for sale. The price on this one is $144,000 less than the one I saw Monday, but I like it better. It's a beautiful place. I'll send the video and the property disclosure to my friend, and whether he likes either place enough to check it out in person is up to him. In the afternoon I had a visit with my doc and had an EKG to see what's up with my high blood pressure. It turns out I have a little extra beat in my pulse that causes the BP machines to read high.
Saturday, December 14, 2014
Part of today's activity was a bit of sorting and putting away in the shop. But the main job of the day was drawing a floor plan for my new shed. That will help me figure out how much lumber I need. Saturday being my usual night in town, I had enchiladas blancas and frijoles refritos at La Fiesta, one of my favorite meals, then went to see A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. I don't think there was a moment when I forgot it was Tom Hanks playing Fred Rogers. That didn't make the tears any less real. The term "hero"gets thrown around a lot these days, but that's what Fred Rogers was — a gentle hero.
Sunday, December 15, 2019
The forecast has been showing a good chance of snow overnight and into the morning, so just in case it really happens and turns out to be enough to make some good pictures, today I put the plugs back in the runabout and made sure it would start. A real snowstorm that covers the ground has become a rare thing in recent years, so I want to get some shots of the old T in snow if the opportunity comes.
Monday, December 16, 2019
It wasn't quite nothing, but pretty close to it. Snow fell all morning and into the afternoon, but so little that in the end it wasn't deep enough to cover the lawn. It may have been an inch deep in some places. I spent the day inside. In my office I composed an email to a friend in Spain, which is slow work. My Spanish vocabulary isn't very good, so I have to check my work with the dictionary as I go. In the shop I did more cleaning up and putting away. The slow part of that is deciding where to put things.
Tuesday, December 17, 2019
This was market day. My cousin Pete will be cooking for Christmas, and today I went shopping with her to buy the supplies, then bought my groceries for here. She's a good cook and I'm not. I hardly ever cook anything. My only regular cooking is rolled oats for breakfast a couple of times a week. In the shop I did more cleaning up and putting away. That's an ongoing thing that's never finished.
Wednesday, December 18, 2019
With the clean sock supply down to one pair, this was laundry day. After putting the clothes on the line to dry it was time for a trip to town for medicine, a fifty pound bag of dog food to refill the feeder, a box of borax, and another jug of fabric softener. If I don't use that last item the clothes will dry stiff as a board. In the shop the ongoing putting away and cleaning up continued, plus putting some parts to soak in Evaporust. That stuff is a bit pricey, but it gets the rust off.
Thursday, December 19, 2019
 |
 |
Friday, December 20, 2019
It's Saturday morning and I'm posting from my obsolete laptop because I can't edit HTML files with the wonderful new operating system on my desktop computer. I spent all day getting some things to work but failing to get any satisfaction on most of the things I used to be able to do. The reason for installing the updated OS was to have current browsers that can handle all websites. As things stand now I'm using the desktop iMac for online activity, and this old laptop for everything else.
 |
Saturday, December 22, 2019 After another aggravating morning trying
the make my desktop computer work with the new software, I celebrated
the first day of winter with a firewood session. That
was splitting some big pieces into smaller pieces, then fetching
some kindling from the wood lot. I'll do more of that last activity
tomorrow, and stack some kindling in the garage so it will stay dry
when the rain comes. The forecast claims there will be a good chance of
rain next week.
Sunday, December 23, 2019 Dealing with the new OS ate up most of my day. I figured out how to do some of the things I used to do on the old OS, but there are still some things that have me stumped. I'm still using the old laptop to maintain my website until I can find a new editing program that's simple enough for me to understand. It's not just the OS that's changed for the worse. I can't use the current Firefox browser to post web pages. Fortunately I still have the old Firefox on the laptop. |
Monday, December 23, 2019
Another day of contending with the new OS got me back to filing receipts and figuring out how to use the spreadsheet function in LibreOffice. But I still have to use the old laptop to work on my website. I didn't spend all day slaving over a hot computer, though. This afternoon I moved a bunch of wheels, rims, steering columns, and other Model T parts out of the shop and into the barn. In March I'll take them to the Chickasha prewar meet and try to sell them. They're all stuff I'm unlikely ever to need.
