Monday, June 30, 2008

Shed Wish III

My white whale.

This is pretty much all I got done this weekend choosing instead to hang out with the old lady* and the chilluns.

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The Satan is in the particulars they say, and they are right. I slapped up two walls in a day, but all this nitty bitty detail stuff is a pain and takes time.

I know nothing about putting a roof together. This has been made very clear to me. A lot of mistakes I have made. And that's just the mistakes I know about. Imagine an experienced roof guy coming along, "Yuh shoulda not done it thataway..."

I've learned some valuable lessons in this project. How I apply those lessons has not yet been determined.

*Although I shouldn't have to add a disclaimer to this post, you never know who is reading, and I want to say, I have never called my wife "my old lady." Not because I am all high and mighty, but because I think it sounds stupid. I worked summer jobs where these grizzly old "beer for breakfast" types (gene, you out there? shout out to you bud for coining that phrase!) would refer to their common law wives as their "old ladies".

I lost my train of thought.

Oh yeah, I was using "my old lady" for some sort of comedic effect (making fun of roofers). No offense toward females intended.

Monday, June 23, 2008

Cat on a Hot Shed Roof

I'm sorry. I haven't finished my photographic evidence of Neighbor's Lawnmower Fetish Exposed!

But I did manage to build this neat loft where I will store all of my hay.

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Picked up a new tool from Home Demarijuana with some money I gots for my birthday. Hey, I know I'm too old to get money for my birthday, but what would you do if someone gave you some dough?

I had intentions of getting a new circular saw, but this baby was on clearance. I've never owned or used one before, and now that I have I am a card carrying member of the National Sawzall Association (NSA).

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Me and the boy and my chlorophyll stained sneakers chillin' in the hayloft.

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Have you ever been in a real hayloft? I did when I was in the 6th grade way up in Canada. What seemed like three stories of hay bails in a 3 dimensional maze. One incandescent bulb at the very peak of the barn. Even my frosty flake addled brain didn't think that was the safest thing to use. Better than candles I guess.

Ahh, the roof, in all its glory.

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View from afar.

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I remember once when I was 14 I helped someone reroof their 2 1/2 story New Englander. Thirty feet up in the air on that day, and I was just about as nervous on this project as I was on that one.

There's some words of wisdom about getting old here, but they escape me.

There's probably some words of wisdom about getting more forgetful, but they escape me.

Friday, June 20, 2008

Night of the Living Shed

It was pretty cool out last night, so I felt it would be a good time to bang out another part of the shed.

The eaves on the east gable end.

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A view from afar.

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The roof is all framed. What's next? I'm not really sure. The book I got from the library was overdue and had to go back.

Stay tuned tomorrow for Neighbor's Lawnmower Fetish Exposed!

Wow. I'm lame.

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Goopy Eyes

Ever have a day when one of your eyes is producing mass quanitities of eye snot and you wear contacts and your glasses are broken and your life's work depends upon reading a computer screen and you have a release to do but there was a problem with a stored procedure that you wrote but it is almost impossible to think about a solution when you are constantly blinking and can only read out of one eye?

Faster, Shed! Kill! Kill!

Yeah, I haven't gotten much done lately.

Two weekends ago was wicked (why do people make fun of me down here for saying that?) hot, and all I could muster up after mowing the pasture was putting studs in the gables.

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This past weekend I had relatives visiting, my great uncle francois and his fourth wife Lucille and her adopted children from Thailand. Needless to say, I didn't get much done. Mostly, just the eaves on one end. It was tedious work.

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This coming weekend...I'll get a lot done.

Here's a view of the pasture, for those who care.

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Wow

I don't watch much basketball, or maybe I should say I haven't watched any basketball since Reggie Lewis died until these NBA finals. Man. What a great series it was. I'm glad I was caught up in it. I think that I would have regretted it forever if I hadn't watched.

Oh sure, it wasn't like watching the '04 Sox, but I never jumped off that bandwagon. Ever. If you are a die hard Celtics fan, don't hate me for being fair weather, I never judged you for not knowing who the Red Sox opening day starter was in 1997.

Saturday, June 07, 2008

Fabulous Movie Review®

Dan in Real Life
The family portrayed in this movie is quite possibly, no, is, the whitest family ever.

It's a nice movie, and a safe movie, and a happy movie, but it really didn't hit me.

The other day I was walking down the street, and this guy stopped me and said, "Hey, Gagknee, how come you aren't doing any Fabulous Movie Reviews?" (not sure of the proper punctuation here, and frankly, I don't care).

After recovering from the shock of someone recognizing me on the street I replied, "Because I'm thoroughly wrapped up in watching The Sopranos right now, and there hasn't been anything out that I've been dying to see."

"What about The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford that you posted about on April 28, 2006 which sparked a New Hampshire-wide scandal about your sexual orientation?" he asked.

"Um, I had no idea it was on DVD yet," I sheepishly replied.

"Of course you didn't because you're an @%&^%!&. You $#%@$@% ?#$%."

Edit: I forgot to mention that this movie is mind numbingly boring.

Gagknee's Grade: C+

Central Air Would be Nice

Last summer our AC unit broke about 2 weeks after we bought the house. I had it fixed and then a week later it broke again. It would have cost a grand to fix, which would have been a stupid amount of money to sink into a 30 year old unit, so I bought this little 10,000 BTU baby right here to cool the upstairs of the house. At least we would be able to sleep well.

That didn't work out so well. The upstairs never got really cool and the living room, with the sun beating down on it all day, was like a brick oven. So when I saw this heat wave in the forecast. Actually, when the first day of this heat wave hit on Wednesday, I said screw it, and bought three small air conditioners for the upstairs. The big one is now in the kitchen. And it is cooling the downstairs of the house like a champ.

I should have had the central air replaced this year, but I had other goals, like some landscaping, ceiling fan, shed etc. that I wanted to accomplish, and the 6 grand price tag scared me off.

Last summer wasn't too bad and I figured we could make it again with the one window unit. Basically, I played chicken with Mother Nature and lost.

Its So Hot

I had an out of body experience mowing my pasture today. One good thing about the onset of hell err summer, is that hopefully the grass won't grow 6 inches every week.

There IS a riding mower somewhere in my future.

Whats Missing from this Picture?

I almost dropped my coffee Thursday morning when I peered out my kitchen window. My prayers to the Patron Saint of Lost Causes have been answered!

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Compare it to this, but give it a try without going there first.

Sunday, June 01, 2008

Shed: Shed's Revenge

"Framed" the roof this weekend. I say "framed" because it didn't come out as well as I expected, and certainly not as well as a professional.

Saturday I got the supports up the for the ridge beam and I cut out all the rafters.

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About 3/4's done with the rafters. Its tough work with the heat and humidity, plus the nail gun. The weight. It was pretty hard to hold up in the air over my head after a while.

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This would be a great picture that why my wife took except for me in my Cabletron tshirt with the sleeves that I ripped off my one day while playing softball in the dead of August. Not to mention the stupid look on my face.

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No fear that kid, no fear.

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Victor Victoria

Took a little trip to Victoria, VA on Saturday about 60ish miles southwest of us.

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I've decided that I am going to retire there. And buy this house.

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It was originally built around the railroad, but all that really remains is this restored caboose.

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On the way to Victoria we passed through Crewe, another railroad town. They still have a really large rail yard, of which I didn't take a picture unfortunately. I did however capture a few shots of the Crewe Railroad Museum. They weren't open, so this is all I got.

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Also in Crewe, but more on the outskirts between Crewe and Victoria I snapped a shot of this dilapidated farmhouse. I would have taken some more shots of it, but I was wearing shorts and a little afeared of snakes. Just looking at it I can't imagine why its sinking just to the left of the entrance. Oh wait, yeah, the cobbled together 50 year old roofing patch job.

The architecture of the whole place was amazing. It's a shame that it's left to rot. I'm going back when it's not hot out and/or I have long pants on.

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Oh, right, why did I travel to Victoria in the first place? To get me some winders for m'shed. Twunny bucks for the pair, plus the twunny on gas. Not bad.

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