Back to work.

Ed and I resumed heavy duty activities in the house. I got a couple of smaller projects finished in the garage and then started a rewire job and some framing for the future bathroom. Ed prepped the main room and the old sparkly green megawall, then painted its' first coat. We're trying to like the color..... it's just a hella change..... textured sparkling seafoam green has become "orange creme". It changes the room on so many levels, I don't think we know whether it's right or wrong. Time will tell.

38 to 42

Temps today were 38 to 42. Weather was dry and I rode the R1 to work. Glorioski, I'd forgotten how different it is to scoot to the office instead of caging it. In spite of the cold and the need to suit-up before and after mounting, I still prefer scooting. I'm not even gonna try to explain why. It's just different. More satisfying. Less of a drone. A remover of tedium. Now I just need to try it in the wet once or twice.

Somehow the Concours pops into the picture again. It'll make a much better commuter than the R1. Much.

Holidays are here.

The holidays are here. My brain is clear. Life is good. I think I'll ride the motorcycle to work in the morning. It's supposed to be in the upper 30's. Yippee.

Motorcycling in Seattle

So I went for a ride this morning..... It was about 28 degrees, maybe a bit less. It was just supposed to be a quick run to the coffee shop to meet my buddy Jay and see if any of the poseurs show up.

Turned out I was the only one who went. Something about ice on the streets seems to freak people out. Hell, it's not like the ice was everywhere. It was only in the spots where one might expect it, and it was easily seen. There were only a couple of creepy parts and they were all close to the house. No biggie.

Anyway, I had no problem getting back on the steed. Muscle memory seems to still be there. My only input error was an over-application of the front brake.... not a lockup, just a "wow, these sure are responsive" kinda thing. I corrected as quickly as my goolies hit the back of the tank!

PNW Storms

You've been reading about the storms in the Pacific North West. Yeah, we got them. Our power was off for about 18 hours. Typical scenario though..... the weather here is so mild that anything extreme snaps off all the trees and the power lines go down. It didn't really qualify for a "toad strangler" back in the midwest.

Rick and Gary

My brother Rick and his hubby Gary were here for the weekend. It was good to see them again. Last time we visited was right after the elephant arrived and things were a bit stressful. This time we just looked at a couple of books of childhood photos, laughed a lot, spent decent time together eating too much food, and having Ed killed us all at Scrabble. I guess it'll be our turn to fly down there next time.

New rings.

I had a little accident yesterday with a power tool. It smashed my hand and my ring pretty well. The little ordeal precipitated a conversation between Ed and I.

We came to the conclusion that 6.5 years together as a loyal, happy, dedicated couple, we're as married as two people can possibly be without the sanction of the state or the church. Neither of us is religious, so the church holds no power over us, and the state is......well, the USA. Every possible piece of legal work has been done to make one another equivalent to a spouse, so the state is taken care of. We could go to Canada for a license and a ceremony but there are practical issues involved right now.

We're married. So, we went out and bought new rings today.

Anniversary

November 15 was the 6th anniversary of Ed and I moving in under the same roof. It's sort of our tertiary anniversary, but it's a milestone none the less.

This weekend

We got the catalytic converters replaced on Ed's car this weekend. The dealer told us we were on the verge of cat failure and O2 sensor failure, and that's why the car stumbled and stalled when the temps got low. Trouble was, the dealer wanted $4400 for new cats and sensors. A local shop did the deed for $1000 and the car seems to run OK. Ed thinks it's not quite as powerful as it was, but since he's never (and I mean never) stomped on the gas pedal in his car, he might not be a good judge.

I have a small worry that the local shop might not have done something right...... simple price/value/correctness concern, but we'll see what comes of it.

In any case, it was a productive weekend. House cleaning, garage cleaning, car repair, just "stuff".

Oh, the main pump on the hot tub failed. Looks like it's locked up. Guess I'll have to attend to that in the middle of winter. Yippee. C'est la vie.

Good people

Ok, so I ordered the Kawasaki and told the good folks at D&H Cycles in Cullman, Alabama I might need to unwind the deal if the cancer and chemo thing didn't work out.

Since then, I've gotten two very nice signed cards from their staff with psalms and good thoughts. I'm not a religious man, but it seems to me these are decent folk who are just doing what they see as the right thing. You have to give credit to people who follow their beliefs and who support others.

I don't know of another dealership on the planet that would do this. That's why I still trade with a dealer in Alabama and I'm in Seattle. Some things have value.

Looking into the near future.

I ordered a new Kawasaki 1400 Sport Tourer last week. Confirmation came in the mail this weekend. Sometime about April or May I'll have to go down to Alabama and ride the poor little thing back up to Seattle. You know I'm gonna hate that.

Maybe if I can put it off until late May, I can take a more northern route than the I-10 corridor. Been there, done that. The last time I changed routes, I was hauling an 18' trailer full of furniture behind my pickup. Won't quite be the same on two wheels.

Good weekend....

Friday night dinner at Santorini. Saturday was a nice roaring fire in the fireplace with a decent Caberet-Sauvignon to further warm the soul. And of course, romance..... coming up on 6 years living under the same roof.... and we still love each other enough to be romantic..... unplanned, enjoying the fruits of life and appreciating what we give one another. Just me and Ed and some fermented grapes and some burning logs. Simple. Wonderful. Elemental. Us.

House progress

So, let me say that my outlook on projects is improving. I'm ready to tackle the house on a limited basis, working until I get tired and then waiting to move forward another inch.

This weekend, Ed and I removed all the tack-strips and cleaned up all the floors a bit.... no more need to watch where you walk and be afraid of exposed staples. It's a relief and the floors actually look less ugly. We also relocated the cabinets so I can get the plumbing in behind the sinks, move the electrical supplies, and generally get going on the rough stuff.

Layout went well and all the holes are drilled thru the floor to connect to supply and drain lines. It's going to be a bit tricky adding supply lines for the toilet and tub, but a teeny bit of tear-out in the back wall should solve the issue easily enough.

Wiring in this room is going to be 'too much fun'. I'll keep you posted.

And the rains came.

Seattle has been seattle-esque for the last two days. Thankfully it was an effective test of my tarp system for the boat. Everything seems dry AND well ventilated. I'll be doing some winterizing this weekend so I'll check for mold and mildew now while it's still manageable.

Damn, I wish I could ride my motorcycle. I'm getting the urge to be stupid. Hopefully I can remain in my "adult" state and keep off.

Anyway, besides winterizing the boat, I have to plumb and lay underlayment below and behind the new cabinets. I'm gonna need Ed's help moving the cabinets, but the rest should go AOK if I'm patient with myself.

Progress

Ed and I layed out a plan to make some progress on the upstairs bathroom. Underlayment was purchased and we're gonna set things in motion. I certainly feel well enough to get some work done at least a couple of hours every day, so the going will be slow, but it'll certainly be faster than we're going now. Photos will follow of course.

Ed's closet.

Ed opened his closet door to his mom on Sunday. It went well, and Ed's happy as a clam in deep mud. His brothers and dad don't have any idea, but mom was the big step.

I'm so proud of him!

The out of towners.

My brother Rick and his husband Gary came up to visit us this weekend. They've never been to Seattle and it'd been a year since we'd seen one another.

We had perfectly clear skies on Friday after they landed, and they got to see Seattle in all its sparkling beauty. I think they were impressed. Rick, Gary and I ignored the elephant in the room almost all afternoon, and then Ed got home and we went to Salty's for dinner.

I crashed right after dinner. Apparently the three of them talked about the elephant at length. I know it helped Ed immensely.

Sunday morning included a little session that had my brother and I talking about the elephant. My view was that the elephant exists and reality suggests we have to deal with it. Wailing about the elephant doesn't make it any less real, and in fact, it tends to make the elephant appear larger and smellier than he is.

Anyway, we sent the boys off back to Dallas on Sunday. They want to come back soon, and certainly they're more than welcome. I look forward to seeing them sometime before the elephant sits on my chest.

Ed's new toy.

Ed finally made a logical choice with regard to the Prius. SELL IT! It was $530 a month he was spending on something he never drove. Seriously, he was only driving it about 100 miles a month. Yeah, a HUNDRED miles a month. So he decided to cash-out of the nerdmobile and only spend his reserve on another car. Here are a few pics of what we picked up. Hellova way to go get groceries! Oh, it's a 740i.

The fleet is in.

Ed and I bought a boat. It's a 19' bowrider runabout with a 5.8 liter I/O (351 Cleveland V8). Here's a pic of our captain. Click on the pic to see his smiling face almost full sized.

"Before and After" time

This is the guest bedroom. Not 100 percent finished, but 99.5 ain't bad.

Picture time

Click on the pics and they should get larger.

This is the "fiberglass pond" and surround. Pardon the yard!












ROGER. "Valiant protector of the thermostat."




The sun room. Sorry, no "before" shots. This room used to look like it belonged in the garage.

Night shots under the lights.

BFR

BFR stands for Big Freaking Racoon. He walked across the deck yesterday afternoon......I thought he was a dog! It's not often you hear footsteps and discover a stripe-tailed bandito padding across your comfort zone.

Hopefully there will be more pics this weekend. The sunroom and the guest bedroom should be finished by then.

Contemplation

Yesterday was the worst travel day in my entire life. I've been on the road for more than 25 years and yesterday took the cake.

On Wednesday, I awoke to a full day of exciting activities with customers, having been asked to babysit a problem-child during a sales walk thru. I dilligently patted this guy on his little head and made him feel like his little project was the most important thing on my agenda. Yippee...

Then I had a quick dinner and got on a United flight to Boston via San Fransisco. Full. Sitting next to an overweight moose with an IQ of about 7. (Seriously, the arm rest for the row in front of us was in the UP position. Bullwinkle decided to push the buttons to see if he could get the channels to change on the TV. I'm not shitting you.)

Then I switched planes in SF to head to Boston. Guess what? There were twenty 12 year olds on a field trip to the national Scrabble tournament on board. I took a melatonin and still didn't get any sleep. 12 year old girls go to the bathroom CONSTANTLY.

So I arrived in Boston at 7:00 AM with enough time to get my luggage, rent a car, check in, shower, and get to the class I was there to take. Class was supposed to start at 10:00 AM and I arrived at the office at 9:45.

Then I discovered that we wouldn't be starting until 11 to 11:30 because the other student was running late. OK, shit happens.

Class consisted of NOTHING. No printed materials, no curriculum, no diagrams, no powerpoint presentation, NOTHING. "You guys play around with the machine and let me know if you have any questions." is not a class. This bullshit lasted until 5 PM when I declared myself DONE.

I was exhausted, so I ate and went to bed at 7 PM. My body clock got me up at 3:30 AM Boston time, so I did emails and generally worked for about an hour, then I got ready and went to the airport so I could avoid all the inbound rush-hour traffic headed for Boston. I had breakfast in the airport and boarded my plane home at 8:30 AM Boston time. We departed a few minutes after the scheduled 9 am departure for Chicago.

Guess what? I was sitting aisle next to the two fattest lesbians I've ever seen. These girls were HUGE. I mean "seatbelt extension" huge. Yeah, both armrests were up in our row because they couldn't fit in thier seats with the armrests down. My body is 15 inches wide at the hips. I had 14 inches to sit in. No, the girls weren't just going to Chicago. They were going all the way to Seattle and there were no empty seats on the plane. This was gonna suck.

Thank goodness they were nice and sorta fun. Otherwise I would have had to deflate one of them.

Ok, yadda yadda, off to Chicago we go. Landing, taxi in, get off, stretch my cramped legs, and then back on the plane to play "Sardine Boy" with the tunas.

Moulded earphones in my ears, trying to zone out so I can survive the crush, I hear the captain announce that we'd levelled off at 36,ooo feet and that he was turning off the seatbelt sign... Pleasant music lulling me to sleep..... la la la la la......and then the voice of a professional (but stressed) flight attendant:

"Ladies and Gentlemen, it's obvious that the smoke alarms are all going off and that the cabin is filling with smoke. I need EVERYONE to start feeling the floor, walls, and ceiling of the aircraft and let a crew person know if you feel anything hot."

I wasn't in Kansas any more.

The FA was right. Every alarm in the airplane was screaming and I couldn't see the pilot's door from the 31st row.

FUCK. This is it. We're 7 miles from the nearest water hose and this fucking 757 is on fire. FUCK. This is gonna suck. I'm gonna die some time in the next 5 minutes and it's not gonna be quick or painless. I also can't call Ed to say good-bye. THIS SUCKS!

The pilot called a MAYDAY and shut off all the power to everything in the rear. He put us on the ground in Rochester, MN in about 10 minutes flat. By that time, the smoke had dissipated and it looked like we weren't gonna die.

5+ hours later, United flew in another 757 that flew us to Denver. Then we sat on the ground while they changed crews and did paperwork. We arrived in Seattle some 8+ hours late, exhausted and traumatized.

United's response? A $50 voucher for future flights on United. I'm not kidding.......

FUCK UNITED AIRLINES. I'll never fly their bankrupt POS airline again, and I'll do everything I can to make sure nobody does.

Yes, it's been a while......

......but we've been busy. Time for more before and after shots. This is the media room now. It was the master bedroom. Can you imagine?!

The best laid plans......

Ok, so we went to buy carpeting for the media room on February 25th. Today is March 16 and they installed the carpet right around noon today. Yeah, three weeks to get carpeting!

As the installer was vacuuming the carpet before he left, I heard "Oh no!", and then "Gee, it looks like we'll be seeing you again soon to do this job over again."

NOT FUN.

Looks like there's a flaw in the carpet. It's two feet long, up to three inches wide, and permanent. Now we get to wait for the seller to contact us, send a "mill rep", and then determine what they're going to do about it. The installers seem to think the carpet should be completely replaced.

THIS SUCKS!

We're basically 3 weeks into this. Now I have to make sure I have time off to let an inspector in, then negotiate with the seller about a solution, then start the whole process of ordering and installing all over again!

If you've ever had new carpet installed around new paint, we have at least 1/2 day of "touch up" to do on the walls and the doors. We can't even start that until we come to some determination of our solution.

THIS DOUBLE SUCKS.

At this point, we're not gonna discuss who the nationwide vendor is. If we don't get satisfaction, we'll be happy to tell the world. More on this later.

Change of plans!

Ok, so we pulled up the carpet and the padding from the living room for transplantation into the media room. Two problems reared their ugly heads.

One, the padding was sorta old and laden with sand. (Why sand?)
Two, the carpet had some interesting stains on the underside. They were mostly in the far corner of the room and against the far wall..... Hmmm.... I guess the previous owners had pets at some point.

So, the hardwood floor underneath the carpet can be resurrected because it's in decent shape (despite the cat/dog piss stains), but there's no way I'm gonna transplant bad carpet into a fresh room!

In any case, the change of plans turned into a complete rethink of the media room. The dark green wall paint we chose was based on the dark green carpet. Since we no longer needed to re-use the carpet, we could change the wall color.

SO..... we repainted the entire room and ordered a brownish copper colored carpet. Black miniblinds and curtains will block the sunlight, and the screen surround, media center (rack), wall unit, tables, and chairs will all be black. Thus, we have a room that's sorta medium saddle leather color with black features. I'll post pics as soon as the carpeting gets installed. I promise.

It's been forever......

...since I last posted here. I've been busy.

Ed and I have been finishing the media room. I bought new doors for the closet but I haven't hung them. We pulled up the carpet and the padding, as well as removed all the staples and crap from underneath it. The floors in that room aren't in very good shape, but they're red oak none the less...... so we pulled up the dark green crap from the living room for 'transplanting' into the media room.

The floors in the living room are resurrectable and we've gotten bids at $3.50 per square foot to have them redone by a pro. Looks like a plan.

Anyway, we're going to put the dark green carpet down in the media room this weekend, hang and paint the doors, trim the screen, and refinish all of the trimwork that needs touchup. I wanna get that room DONE so we can move forward.

Ed has a plan to do the guest bedroom next. I can't say I blame him, but I need to finish the ceiling project in the sun room and get the walls in the living room painted. The painting projects are jobs Ed can do. We just need to concentrate on getting our paint coverage more even.

So, it looks like we'll be moving back into the "future bathroom" instead of being in the "guest bedroom".

After we get the living room, the guest bedroom, and the media room finished, we can start hanging enough of our artwork to clear out the downstairs bedroom. Then we can live down there and finish the upstairs.

Oh, we also moved the hot tub on Sunday so it's closer to the deck. Now I have to build a short walkway from the deck to the tub. Yippee!

Pictures will follow soon.

The Oddest Thing.....

Something pretty unusual happened today as I stood in the kitchen looking out over our vast holdings (mess of a backyard).

We have hummingbirds (that's not the odd part, we have a hummingbird feeder so we know they exist) and a male I'd never seen before flitted into view.

The odd part was that he hovered between the feeder (hanging below the eaves) and an adjacent cheezy lantern I haven't taken down yet. He looked from one item to the next as if to say, "Bob told me to come over here for a good meal, but which one of these joints was he talking about?"

Yeah, I realize that's anthropomorphism at its worst, but it honestly seemed that he was confused. (It was sorta like I feel sometimes.)

After a good 5 seconds making up his little birdbrain, he buzzed toward the lantern first, realized his mistake, and then zipped over to the feeder. The little pig stayed for 3 big gulps and then flew off again. I've seen him 3 or 4 times since. Maybe he likes the food but doesn't care for the decor or the service.

SAT/SUN Feb 4/5

Saturday it rained, so we spent half the day shopping for stuff, half a day working on the media room, and the evening watching NunSense 2 an the local musical comedy troupe half a mile from the house. Everything was good.

Sunday was sunny, so I worked Ed's ass off outside. Installation of a deck light, shoveling compost, replanting bulbs, and spraying weed killer took up most of the morning. Our Dallas friend Chris flew into town and we did lunch with him, and later we had dinner with our local buddy Ming at Pomodoro (good stuff). Later, Ed went out galavanting with Chris. They were out late, but didn't get into any trouble.

Progress happens one foot at a time.

Today.....

....I fixed the leak in my truck cab lamp (or at least I serviced it, I dunno for sure if it's fixed). I used a hair dryer to dry the carpeting in the truck. Hopefully I did a good enough job to prevent mold and mildew.

Then I went up on the roof to figure out why the kitchen fireplace is always full of water. Oddly, there was a tile on top of the opening, but the tile was below grade, so rain would just puddle up there and run down the inside of the chimney. Gravity is an amazing thing. My solution? I cemented the tile to the chimney and covered the fresh cement work with plastic so it can set up correctly. While I was up there, I also taped and trimmed the HVAC outlets to prevent drips. Preventive maintenance.

I registered the R1. $212.25

Oh, and I sprayed some of that high dollar brush killer. I'll let you know if it works.

EDIT - The high dollar brush killer won't work. It started raining again. Damn!

Rain, Rain, Go AWAY!

A bazillion inches of rain have fallen this week. We're something like 5 inches above the norm for January. Yeah, +5" in a single month!

We've found the source of the wet spot in the downstairs office. It's the fireplace. Someday when it stops raining, I'll put a tile on the opening to the kitchen fireplace since this seems to be the source. Unfortunately, a steel roof and incessant rain make it impossible to go up on the roof.

I've also discovered that the seal for the bed light at the back of my truck's cab leaks like a sieve. I'll probably spend part of tomorrow with a hair dryer inside the truck so the carpet won't get mildewy. Obviously I have to fix the leak.

The pilot light went out in the water heater overnight. This is the second time this has happened since we moved in. I have to get that thing moved and properly vented this weekend. Yippee.

We planted herbs by the front door last weekend..... Ed checked to see if we had shoots yet. Horticulture isn't his thing.

January 28/29

Ok, so what did we do this weekend.

I made Ed get up in the 18" high attic to string cabling for the media room. The whole claustrophobia thing kept me from trying to crawl thru spaces too tight for a grown adult. We got it done with lots of cooperation and calm heads. Then I connected some of the items, but it's still not running. Maybe I'll do that Sunday.

Ed primered the ceiling in the sunroom. Since the sunroom was added to the front of the house, and half of its ceiling is actually the old redwood eaves of the roof, the redwood leeches thru the primer/paint to make sorta a brownish yuck colored paint. This was Ed's third coat of primer. We'll migrate to the high coverage white next and see what happens there.

The sun came out a bit in the afternoon so I cleared and raked the area inside the curve of the walkway to the front door. Despite the relatively small size of the space, I ended up with about 5 wheelbarrows full of organic matter that I dumped in front of the house by the bus stop. (I'm in the process of turning that area into a flower garden. I just have to build a small perimeter wall around it.)

Afterward, I changed the front entry light from industrial halogen spots to a nice three headed spot.

Then we went to the Asian and Fabulous - Miss Gay API Pageant with our buddy Jay. What a fucking train wreck! Late, Lame, and LOOOOOONG. Hell, even the Dragon Dancers from the local Kung Fu Shaolin group went on FOREVER. Their drummer sounded like he was inspired by the drum solo in Iron Butterfly's Inna Gadda Da Vita. What is it about drag queens that inspires them to drink and get loaded before they perform?

Anyway, we left early and went to the grand opening of Cafe Metropolitain in Cap Hill. It was OK. Decent place to hang with friends.

Sunday was sorta relaxing. We took a walk around our 'hood, then came back and planted herbs in the front entry planter. I also transplanted some bulbs we found growing there.

Then there was lunch at Mr Villas Restaurant. Certainly adequate CalMex food. Pretty damned expensive for lunch.

We cut holes and strung wiring for the recessed lighting until after it got dark. One of the holes ended up in a place that won't work, so we have to patch the ceiling and change locations about 6 inches.

Ahhh, the trials and tribulations of home improvement!

Sunshine!

Ok, so the rain finally stopped. Hell, we didn't even set a record at 28 consecutive days..... We needed 33 and came up 5 short.

The sun was out today with a vengeance. Naturally, I spent the day deep inside a hospital's mammo suite setting up computers in the dark. Reality bites. I should have been out riding scooter. (I came home a bit early so I could spray some miserable plantlife to make it DIE. Spraying the stuff while it rains is useless. It has to sit on the leaves for a while before it works, and the rain sorta prevents that.)

Seattle weather isn't really as depressing as people assume it is. Most of the time, we see the sun part of the day. It seems that the sun is up from sunrise until about 8:30 AM. Then it turns gray and possibly rainy. Does it depress me? Not really. Does it make me enjoy the sun more than usual? Probably. Even Ed was extolling the virtues of sunshine a couple of days ago, and that's unusual for him.

I miss riding my motorcycle. I'm afraid I'll lose my skills... Yeah, like totally. ;-)

Before and after pics

Here are a couple of before and after pics of the front of the house. We'll be doing this kinda thing a lot in this blog.

Life in Seattle

Ok, it's the new year. Well, actually it's January 20th so we're starting off a bit late. Let me get you up to date.

Ed and I moved to Seattle sometime in early November. Ed got a position as a research scientist at the University of Washington and Andre left his old employer for an opportunity with another medical connectivity provider.

We'd been looking at houses for some time over the internet and had been shocked by the prices and the absence of good real estate agents. (We still haven't found a good one, even though ours eventually turned out to be adequate for the task at hand.)

We originally set a price threshold at 350K for a house, but once we arrived, I discovered I didn't want to live in any of the places we'd found. Ed would have moved into any number of them because he demands so little, but I tend to have higher expectations of my domicile.

So we drove around looking at damned expensive places and didn't like any of them. Then Ed stumbled across this house........



We looked at it and thought it was interesting. Certainly we could see the potential in the place (or at least I could). We made an offer, they countered, and we finally came to an agreement.

Roughly 4 times the price of our house in Texas!!

Now, let me say that the two guys who lived in the house before us had been there for 17 years. They were a gay couple involved in what I believe to be a triangular relationship. Cool, whatever floats your boat... but these guys never got the decorator gene. The place was/is hideous.

Green sparkly paint on the common area main wall. Green peas and cream vomit colored exterior. Green steel roof. DARK green plush carpet in the common area (covering the 1958 oak floors). Brown sculptured pile carpet in the bedrooms. Pink flowers on the wallpaper in the kitchen. Burgundy formica in the kitchen contrasts strongly with the off-white floor, off-white cabinets, and green carpet/green walls of the adjoining areas. Yeah, they had burgundy leather furniture in "greenland".