Sack Time went on to 8:22 AM, and by the time I was dressed, had breakfast, and ready to do something it was 9:00. I spent way too much time playing online, had a visit fom my cousin Wally, started this new page for the blog, and it was about 1:00 when I went back to work on the house. I was just getting back to work on the west porch when thunder reminded me of the forecast for rain this afternoon and evening. I decided to avoid getting soaked by getting a monthly job done before the rain arrived. Shorty and I went to town and I got a can of dog food. It's time for her monthly heartworm pill, and I find that getting her to take it is no trouble at all if I bury it in canned dog food. This evening the exasperating desktop computer was being unreliable again, refusing to do anything online. After 10:30PM it decided to work.
Thursday, May 2, 2024
There are two ways to look at today:
1 I was worthless, spending most of my time playing online.
2 I spent most of the day playing online, and had fun.
Friday, May 3, 2024
Oh, my. It's worse than I thought. I suppose the brain injury has damaged my sense of balance more than I realized. I set about installing new plastic sheeting on the paint booth in my shop. Reaching up above my head to tape plastic to the frame was a struggle to remain on my feet. It was surprising, disappointing, infuriating, and scary to be so unsteady. With the project half done, I quit to recover. I've recovered enough to walk without a cane most of the time, but my sense of balance doesn't go far beyond that. After a long break I came back and put up the rest of the plastic for the walls. I was not a happy camper, but at last I got the walls held in place by clamps. I hope tomorrow I can replace the clamps with Gorilla tape and get the roof sheet in place, and maybe even get some painting done.
Saturday, May 4, 2024
Damn! I thought I would use a step stool to reach the work of applying Gorilla tape to replace clamps holding the plastic sheeting on the paint booth. The first one was terrifying from start to finish. I'm so unsteady that the whole time I felt that I might topple over and fall, and maybe break something. I need to have a lot better balance before I try anything like that again. So I went and got a step ladder, which would give me a place to lean or grab when standing on the first step. That was better, but it didn't completely eliminate moments of terror that I was about to fall. By 3:30 PM I had the walls in place, held by Gorilla tape, not clamps, and the roof sheet spread across the top of the frame with clamps on its edges providing weight to keep it stretched across the frame. At that point I needed a break, not physically but mentally and emotionally. This week's Saturday treat night was dinner at the Chinese buffet and The Fall Guy at the cinema. The movie was full of great stunts and lots of action, but I didn't always understand what was going on.
Domingo, 5 de Mayo, 2024
Independence Day? Nope, that's September 16. May 5 is the date when the Mexicans kicked French booty in 1862. Emperor Napoleon III thought he would install his relative Maximilian as ruler of Mexico, and the Mexicans objected militarily. Maximilian was a bust as a ruler, but he turned out to be an excellent firing squad target.
On this auspicious day, figuring that the paint booth was sufficiently finished, I painted mower parts for my mowing tractor. I used the second Allis Chalmers orange. The first Allis orange was more the color of California poppies, while the second orange is a little darker and a little redder, and is the color that is available commercially today. In the afternoon I went to town for groceries and other stuff I use regularly. I have to watch the spending because I've already put too much on my credit card this month, with another week to go in the current billing cycle. I'm what the credit folks call a deadbeat, because I pay it off every month so I never pay any interest. When I got home I took the bolts I painted this morning and put them in the oven to bake overnight. There's one more piece to bake, but that will have to wait until it's dry enough to handle so I can get the masking tape off before it goes in the oven.
Monday, May 6, 1024
Today I actually accomplished a couple of non-internet chores. I finished cleaning the west porch to my satisfaction, at least for now. When I went to town for groceries I stopped at Walmart for a nail clipper. I observed that the once standard file that was always attached to the clipper is no longer standard. If you want it, you had better inspect carefully to see if it's there. That's like cereal that's in the same old box at the same old price, but the box now has less cereal in it. One job I did do online was buy a USB hub not sold in local stores. I believe its delivery deadline is May 13, a week from today. More and more things have to be bought online. A couple of weeks ago I bought some ⅜" shrink tubing. It's in a 50-foot roll. I could buy the same stuff at the local hardware store, but it would be in three short pieces totaling less than a foot at an Ace price. For a few dollars more I might as well get a roll of the stuff that may turn out to be a lifetime supply. When I got home from town I cleaned up something else — myself. With the Maytag out of the bathroom and back in its place on the west porch, the coast was clear for me to hit the shower. When my dad got old, it seemed to take him forever to bathe, shave, and get dressed. Now I am him. The whole thing took me well over an hour. A feature of spring in this part of the country is paying great attention to the weather, which is considerably more active than in fall or winter. It's not at all unusual for normal TV broadcasting to be interrupted by a weather guy standing in front of a map showing the location of the latest storm that may produce a tornado. There was no tornado here, but a little after 9:00 PM the power went off, and came back on about 10:00. If that's the worst that happens, it's no big deal.
Tuesday, May 7, 1024
The nice drying weather and the depleted supply of clean sox made this laundry day. While I was at it I tried to rough up the drive roller on the wringer with a wire brush, as it had become hard and slippery with age. The wire brushing didn't soften it, but the rougher surface improved its ability to grab and pull in wet laundry. Another activity was taking advantage of ground soft from recent rain to get in a nice hour of weed pulling in the yard. When I went to town I stopped at the optometrist's office to ask about my new glasses and found out that they had arrived. With the bifocals I don't have to interrupt what I'm doing to put on the Walmart readers for working up close.
Wednesday, May 8, 2024
My outdoor job today was pulling weeds behind the house. I got a lot of them out, and ended up with a pretty good pile. Indoors I composed this rant which I posted on Facebook, along with three pictures:
At Fort Polk for basic training in 1965 I was issued GI glasses. They were modern, with a plastic frame. That June I arrived in Korea. Summer there is much like Kansas, but a bit more humid. I got sweaty while working, and the plastic glasses would fall off and hit the ground. The solution was simple and cheap. I went into Seoul and found an oculist. Pointing to glasses in the shop window, I made it clear that those were what I wanted. The man took the prescription from my GI glasses and in a few days I was wearing the new replacements. They cost me $5. In those days they were popularly called "granny glasses". I have worn nothing else since then. This spring I needed new glasses. What I wanted was not one of the choices available at the optometrist's office. I went online. Apparently nobody sweats anymore. All the frames now available have the same feckless little angle over the ears and depend on gravity to keep them resting there. No. No sale. I refuse. I googled "vintage glasses" and found exactly the right glasses. I'm guessing they are pre-war, about 90 years old. I took them to the optometrist for new lenses. Yesterday I went and got them. I'm wearing them now. They HOOK BEHIND THE EARS so they will stay on. So here we are. Just one more change that is THE OPPOSITE OF HELPFUL. When I say, "Don't get old. You won't like it." I may be thinking of changes that are uncomfortable, unpleasant, and maddeningly inconvenient.
 1965 |
 1930's |
 2024 |
Thursday, May 9, 2023
Today's job was going through a box of switches looking for three to replace the ones in the house that aren't up to the job. All the switches in my house are the old push button type that were in vogue a hundred years ago. Most of them are fine, but sometimes they get balky and won't keep a light lit. When I see a good one in a second hand store I add it to the collection. I have several extra good ones, plus some that need fixing.
Friday, May 10, 2023Oh, my. This afternoon I set about replacing those three switches with better ones. I got one done. It's infuriating and alarming how clumsy and fumbling I've become. That first replacement took over an hour. I kept dropping things, not getting the screwdriver in the slot, fumbling to get screws started, and so on. I dropped and lost three screws. A the end of that ordeal it was obvious that I wouldn't have time to do even one more replacement today, so the others will wait at least until tomorrow. Earlier in the day I went to town and got a 44 pound bag of dog food for the feeder. I used to move a bag like that without much trouble, but I'm so weak now that it's a struggle. My practice was to open the bag, then pick it up and dump it in the feeder. Now I use a gallon bowl for a scoop, put a few gallons in, then dump in the rest of the bag.
Saturday, May 11, 2023
Oh, my, for sure. Have I ever mentioned that I hate being old? Apparently from now on everything I do will take four times as long as it used to. From buttoning a shirt to bathing, from cleaning house to replacing a switch, being feeble and clumsy works its magic. The only exception is having to go, which sometimes prompts a mad scramble to get to the bathroom and onto the throne before disaster strikes. Anyway, I spent most of the day on switches. The main switch in the living room wasn't too bad. I got the defective switch out without a lot of struggle. Putting the "new" one in, even in my fumble-fingered current state, wasn't a major ordeal. Going upstairs to my bedroom was another story. The wires connected to the switch were short, and getting it out and disconnected was harder than it should have been. At that point I had those short wires to deal with. I decided to make them longer. I went to the shop and got a couple of pieces of braided wire about 3½" long, stripped the ends, and took them upstairs and soldered them onto the ends if the short wires. I even insulated the splices with shrink tubing. Shoving the switch and wiring back into the box was tricky, and I lost a couple of screws trying to get the switch secured in the box and the wall plate back on. At this point my back and my balance were past their limits. With my head spinning I sat down in a chair. A quarter hour of rest was nowhere near enough, so I went to my office above the shop, lay down on the mat on the floor, and slept for over an hour. Fortunately, despite my lingering weakness, I've regained enough strength to get up off the floor without grabbing anything, including a cane. Feeling OK to get back to work, I turned on the power in the house and went inside to try out my handiwork.The "new" switch in the living room worked perfectly, with no problems. When I went up to my bedroom it was a different story. Not only did the lights not go on, but all the upstairs lights and sockets were dead. So finding the short and fixing it will be a project for tomorrow. I ran an extension cord from the living room up the stairs and plugged in the router in the attic, so at least I have internet in my office. The Saturday Treat Night dinner this week was enchiladas blancas at La Fiesta. The movie was Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes. I was very impressed by how the apes, played by human actors of course, spoke naturally, with expression, and mouth and lip movement that went with what the characters were saying. Another notable feature was the physical performances. The stunt people moved and jumped like apes, and there was so much action that they really earned their keep.
Sunday, May 12, 2024
Done. It's annoying that it took me three days to do what I would have done in less than one before I got so old. Today I pulled that last switch out of the wall, found where broken insulation was grounding it, fixed that, and reinstalled the switch, and now it works normally. The upstairs outlets and lights are working as they should, including in my bedroom, and today's effort took "only" four hours. The denouement is that of the three fuses in the cellar, two are dead and going in the trash. I'll go online and see if anybody can beat the Ace price of eight bucks apiece.
Monday, May 13, 2024
Yes, somebody could beat the Ace price of about $8 per fuse. I went online an ordered a box of four for $13.16, which is $3.29 apiece. First up this morning was a drive to a Home Depot in Wichita to pick up the order. Was such a long drive to save $18.84 worth the gas I burned up? You bet. The satisfaction of beating Ace high prices made it worth my time. The opposite of satisfying was the ticket I got this afternoon for driving with an expired tag. Either I got the renewal notice and forgot about it, or it was lost in the mail. Tomorrow I will go to the courthouse and get my tag up to date. Tonight brought one more online purchase. I have some wall plate screws, some of which I used in my switch replacing adventure, but I ordered another 50, probably a lifetime supply, because they are extinct in local stores.
Tuesday, May 14, 2024
Mom and I were at my cousin Clara Mae's house. The two women were visiting and drinking coffee, and seemed to be enjoying it. So I insisted on trying it. Bleccccch!!! It was the awfullest thing I ever tasted. Later, in my twenties, I had a cup just to be polite, but that was the only time. It tasted bad when I was three, and the following 79 years have not made me like it any better. When anybody asks if I want coffee, I tell them that's not my cup of tea. Funny how yard work gives you time to recall experiences from long ago or recently, and wonder why you remember them and not the jillions of other things that have faded from memory. Yesterday's ticket for an expired tag hasn't faded from my memory, and today's first job was a trip to the county seat to get the registration on the Camry up to date. Being almost a year late paying my $89 reminds me that this year I'll need to watch the mail for the renewal notice and take care of it quickly, before I forget.When I got home I worked on one of those switches I replaced over the weekend, and I think I've got it working as it should. The next job was trimming the twigs and little branches from part of a tree that was brought down by a recent storm. An hour and a half of that persuaded me to rest my aching back and continue tomorrow. Next was an indoor job which would be easier on my ancient back. I made a chain stretcher/holder. When a chain saw throws its chain, many times the throwing causes damage in the form of burs which keep the chain from fitting back in its slot. The idea of the holder is to keep the chain stretched flat while I grind off the burs. We'll see how well it works.
Wednesday, May 15, 2024
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Thursday, May 16, 2024
Except for a pharmacy visit to pick up pills, nothing worth reporting.
Friday, May 17, 2024
I started an online search for 5-40 round head machine screws. Some were available only by the thousand, and many cost way too much for the shipping. I need to measure exactly what length I need, and narrow my search. My outdoors work was more twig and small branch trimming. I now have three boxes full of the cut up remains. It looks like one or two more boxes will finish the job. Then I'll attack the larger branches with the chain saw. And those boxes of cut up trimmings? I'll dump them into big dog food bags, and next winter they will feed the stove and the fireplace. It's good to have small stuff to put in the fire to keep the large pieces burning.
Saturday, May18, 2024
The main job today was finishing up most of the small branch and twig removal. After about an hour of that, or sometimes a little more. my aching back demanded a rest. After resting between a half hour and an hour, I was ready to go back for more. During one of those breaks I started up the old Dodge truck and moved it about thirty feet from where it had been sitting since last summer. That makes way for mowing the grass which had grown up around it. For Treat Night, dinner was the buffet at Pizza ranch, and the movie was If. "A young girl who goes through a difficult experience begins to see everyone's imaginary friends who have been left behind as their real-life friends have grown up. " ~ IMDB. The movie, written and directed by John Krasinski, features Cailey Fleming as the young girl, and she plays her part very well. Despite the all-star cast of voices for the cartoon characters, this is a quietly optimistic picture.
Sunday, May 19, 2024
My friend Dallas called from Indiana and we had a nice phone visit for an hour or so. My depleted supply of clean sox declared this laundry day, and I didn't get started on that until about noon. I hung the last of the wash out to dry a couple of minutes after 3:00. After a little bit of tree trimming behind the house, I went to town for groceries. I left all the wash, including the sheets off my bed, hanging out to dry. That's OK. I'll sleep in my office tonight and take in the wash tomorrow. My current attitude is summed up in two sentences: Don't sweat the small stuff. It's all small stuff.
Monday, May 20, 2024
Well, I can't blame my age for this one. I've always had a talent for losing things. This time it's my phone. I've looked everywhere I can think of, and come up empty. I just sent a FB message to my cousin and asked her to call me. Maybe I'll hear it and find out where it is. Meanwhile, life goes on. Today's trip to town was for dog food and to pay a bill. Since I got home February 24 I've been paying off bills that piled up during the months I was gone. I think today's $206 & change was one of the last. There's one more I know of, $109+ for medical services last June and July. The inexorable wheels of debt are mighty slow, but I'm hoping they will stop turning soon. The centerpiece of today's action was another load of laundry. May is when nights warm up enough for the blankets to come off my bed. The two I washed today are folded and put away, I hope until next fall.
Tuesday, May 21, 2024
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At long last, I fired up the chain saw and attacked the big fallen branch in the front yard. Before starting, of course, I had to grind off the burs that were left on the chain the last time it fell off the saw. It fell off again soon after I started. I reassembled my saw without having to remove the bar, and resumed cutting. The second falling-apart ended my cutting for the day, because the nut holding the bar in place had fallen off and disappeared in the grass. If I don't find another nut, I'll have to go to town and get one. It's not the first time this has happened, so I guess I need to get several spare nuts. Of course, the problem after that will be remembering where I put them.
Wednesday, May 22, 2024
Drat! Another day down the tubes. I can't say I didn't get anything done, but my plan to get back to cutting up branches didn't happen. I did go to town to pick up a prescription for eye drops, and stopped at the TSC store for metric nuts for the chain saw, and stopped at the market for bananas. But reassembling the chain saw had to wait. That last throwing boogered up the chain enough that I had to put it on the stretcher and grind off the burs, which I did this evening after chow. That leaves a lot of wood cutting tomorrow. I hope I can at least finish the branches in the front yard. Maybe my back will hold out long enough for me to do some other woodcutting jobs that have been waiting.
Thursday, May 23, 2024
Done! Well, mostly done anyway. Despite throwing the chain again and having to grind off the burs, I managed to finish cutting up the big fallen tree part in the front yard. There's still a smaller branch that reaches down to the ground but didn't break off the tree completely. It appears to be broken enough that a little tug with the truck will bring it down. With it on the ground, trimming off the leaves and twigs and then cutting it up for stove and fireplace fuel should be a one-session job. I was less successful with a large branch west of the front lawn. It's high enough that I didn't want to use the chain saw, so I went and got my electric tree trimming saw. It has a long, long handle to reach overhead branches. But this branch is a little too big for the small electric saw. My back told me it was time to quit, so that branch remains for now. The penultimate job of the day was going to town and mailing payment for a bill that has been waiting for three or four days. While I was in town I went to see the small engine repair guy to find out when he can get to my sick mower. I was happy to hear that he can get to it next week, so I'll trailer it to him Monday or Tuesday. The last job before chow time was washing pans, forks, and spoons that have piled up in the sink. That's like sox. When I run out of clean ones, it's time to wash them.
| Friday,
May 24, 2024 I did get in a little more yard work today. I started up the old Dodge and used it to pull down that last branch that was hanging on the tree. One of the truck's problems is that it gets hard to start if it sits more than a couple of days, and I have to use starting fluid to get it running. Another problem is that it has taken to running rough. So I went to town for another can of starting fluid and some new points and a condenser for the distributor. Being Mister Thrifty, I use the lowest-priced starting fluid, which is from Walmart. The shelf was empty. No problem. I have enough to last until it's back in stock. So I moved on to O'Reilly. When I said I wanted points and a condenser for a 1951 Dodge B-3-C, I was asked which distributor it has. I have never run into that before. The make, year, and model have always been all I needed. I never knew there were two different distributors used on the same model. So now I need to find out which one I have. Saturday, May 25, 2024 Have I ever told you that I hate being so damned old? But so far it's preferable to the alternative, so I'll put up with it. Today's major chore was yard work of two kinds. One was to finish trimming twigs and little branches from the piece I pulled down with the truck, cutting them in pieces small enough for me to grab them by the handful and toss them in the stove. Enough of that, said my aching back. The other yard work was |
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Sunday, May 26, 2024
This morning I thought I would pull the points and condenser out of the truck and take them to town and see if the parts store could match them. Nope. I'm too fumble-fingered clumsy and weak to handle a job like that anymore. After chow this evening I came back to it. I managed, with difficulty, to get the cap back on the distributor and start the truck. It still runs, but rough. Maybe a little less rough than before I messed with it, but still not like it should. I hope I can fix the brakes so I can drive it to town and let somebody much younger make it run the way it should.
Monday, May 27, 2024
One more day with little to show for it. I did get out to pull some weeds, but trying to start the push mower was a dud. On the first pull of the rope it started right up, but ran for less than a minute and died. I tried several more times during the day to get it running, but it would never start gain. If it's not one thing, it's another.
Tuesday, May 28, 2024
Mostly a depressing day. Couldn't get the chain saw started. Didn't have the strength to operate the electric tree saw that's mounted on a long handle. Not depressing but another delay was taking the rope starter off the push mower and finding an ant colony inside. Working on that will have to wait until I get rid of the ants. A lot of the evening was taken up by working on a new web page. When that project is done, I'll post a link here.
Wednesday, May 29, 2024
Morning was laundry time. I washed overalls and sox. After I had the wash hung out to dry, my cousin Lori stopped for a visit. We blathered for a pretty good chunk of the afternoon. A lot of the discussion was about family history, and I enjoyed filling in a much younger relative on some of what I remember.
Thursday, May 30, 2024
Today's main event was a trip to town with a couple of younger cousins to discuss with a lawyer what's going to happen to the farm when I'm gone. He's going to write down different ways to proceed so I can study them. I want to know the options so I can decide what I want to do, and take care of it sooner rather later. After my wreck last September I gather some of the family expected me to be confined to a nursing home and not live long. Others figured that I might live several more years, but the farm would have to be sold. I want to keep it in the family, and in the care of folks young enough to be around long term. That's what we're working on now.
Friday, May 31, 2024
This afternoon Lori and Donna came over with Donna's mower trailer. Between their inexperience with some of what we had to do, and my elderly lack of muscle, it was a longer process than it should have been, loading the sick Dixon mower on the trailer. But we finally got it loaded and strapped down, and took it to the small engine repair guy in town. He has a couple of other mowers to finish before he gets to mine, but if it's running and home in a week I'll be a happy camper. Meanwhile I've started a list of jobs that need to be done. A few years ago I could have handled most of them myself, but now I'll need help on nearly all of them.
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