Just....stuff.

I keep thinking of things "to share",  which is almost as bad as some of the nonsense folks put on other forms of social media (Book of Face comes to mind,  no names please)  but then most times I just figure, "Really, who da f**k cares?"   But here goes.

I get these....ideas,  let's just say?  There always seems to be something or other that needs taking care of and admittedly,  there are things that I still haven't gotten around to doing.  Like,  since last year maybe?  Stumps to remove.  Fences to install.

But once in a while,  I just want to do something for just....me.

For a number of years now,  I've had what amounts to a "parts cart"  hanging around in my garage er,  *shop*.   Back in the pre-internet days,  when there were these things called "books",  I used to read about how to, you know,  do things?

And some guy somewhere had this idea that you should move stuff around on wheels.   Considering I like to put the car in there over the winter say,  I like having things on wheels anyway,  so I came up with this:

Which of course,  gets loaded up with nothing anywhere close to "parts" of a project,  but just a bunch of other *stuff*.

The blue tote has painting stuff,  like drop cloths and such,  and the other "stuff" is tool boxes.

As you can well see,  this thing isn't (well, *wasn't*)  all that pretty,  so I decided to come up with something new and improved.

Admittedly,  this did take me a bit longer than I had really wanted,  but then what else is new?

This is the replacement:

Somewhat fancier?  Also on wheels,  and meeting the maximum height of twenty-nine and a half inches,  so it'll fit in under the end of the bench.


Much easier on the eyes,  and hopefully easier to keep clean, with a compartment in the top:






I used some plastic laminate that I've had hanging around for a very long time for the top,  as glue doesn't stick to it,  and the rest is melamine with oak trim.

The idea is,  the top bit had to be deep enough for "stuff":

And this is how I fritter away my time.

Oh,  and this:

Um,  it's a log splitter....

Which results in this:

I have a smaller version,  which is capable of splitting stuff up to about maybe 18 inches.   Much bigger than that though and it starts to complain.   So I had to break down and rent something from Home Despot.  Worked like a charm,  especially since the ram moves vertically,  meaning there was no need to hoist those huge honkin' things up onto the carriage. 
My nephew came over and was a big help (Um,  he's a firefighter,  you figure it out) and when we finished up here,  we took the machine up to his Mom's place and sorted out the remains of a walnut tree we had cut down a few years back.
The only slight consideration? 
With such s short tongue length,  it was murder backing the thing up.  Couldn't see the thing in the mirrors,  so I had to rely on the back up camera on the truck  (yes,  there's a back up camera)  but that wasn't all that much help.   By the time it looked like the thing was going cock-eyed,  it would be too late.
Whatever.  I managed.


Oh....and I do make the odd thing now and again for Travelling Companion.

She had this concern (question?)  about these "hoops" that go with her embroidery machine, so we came up with the idea of hanging them on the wall,  thus:







Had paint left over from the bathroom trim,  so that's where that came from.  Seems to work.
It's kind of a carry over from the way one mounts tools in a tool cabinet.  Like that.


It's been a couple weeks since Thanksgiving.  The weather was most cooperative I must say.   Some years it's down right miserable,  and there was some rain Saturday morning, but then it cleared up when it needed to,  and the whole weekend was fabulous.  You might have seen a sunset pic I put on the Book of Face.

You get the idea.


I think that's about it.

Anything else is old news at this point.

Keep that stick on the ice,  and thanks for moving your eyes back and forth.

Fighting with the wasps.

By that I mean,   the little "yellow jackets" that are out in full force this time of the year looking for...whatever.   Sweets?  Nutrients?  A date with a flyswatter?



Anyway,  I managed to harvest the remainder of our grapes yesterday.  Not as big an offering as we'd like,  due to the incursion of the little masked bandits,  but we (well,  I say "we",  but really mean T.C.)  can make a few small jars of grape jelly.

At least at this point I've figured out what measures I need to take next year in order to keep the critters on the ground.   I'm hanging on to a couple of the contraptions,  that I'll simply re-install at the appropriate time next season.



Then it was time for nine holes of golf with T.C.

That's actually my "happy face".   No,  really.

We didn't completely suck.   I only lost one golf ball,  which is typically the means by which I measure my success or lack thereof.   It's those damned water hazards.   Some sort of mental block.   I did manage to nicely shoot over one hazard on the way out,   only to plunk one in to the adjacent pond on the way back (sigh).


And considering I found a pack of three brand new balls on that course a couple weeks back,  my golf ball inventory count was actually on the plus side.

This is how we measure success.  Lame,  I know.


That's it for today.  Short and sweet.

Thanks for stopping by.

So...it's hot.

Which is why we've been mostly staying indoors.  Whimpy, I know.  But I've done my time working in the sweltering heat,  and we didn't put in that air conditioning to simply go out in the blazing heat and sweat like crazy.

There was something in the news about the Teachers in Toronto getting a wee bit vocal about the temperature in some of their schools, like...30 Celsius,  which is just shy of 90.F.  As was the case with my previous employer, less than half of their schools are air conditioned. 
Used to be, that wasn't too much of a problem.  Septembers would typically be cool (ish) or at least cooler at night. 


Thankfully I also put a left over window unit in the garage er, shop.  Stays pretty cool in there for a time,  but I usually run it when I'm not there,  as I find the air blowing on me a little annoying.

Anyhoodle,  T.C. and I thought maybe we'd have toasted tomato and bacon sandwiches for our dinner,  which meant having to cook up the bacon indoors. 
Normally,  that would be the plan,  but adding heat to a house that's being air conditioned didn't seem too terribly clever.

Then,  it occurred to me that I have this skillet type contraption that I had bought many years ago to use with the Weber.  It's been hanging in the garage (this time it's "garage",  not "shop",  by the way)  for all these years,  so I cleaned it up and put it to use.

Used to carry it with us in the Motor home for just such an occasion.

Not sure how common these things are,  but it worked just beautifully.  And,  while I certainly love the smell of bacon being fried up,  I certainly didn't miss smelling up the kitchen with no chance of airing it out by opening the windows.

We figure we'll do some tomato sauce on Thursday,  as the weather is predicted to cool off somewhat by then.

We'll probably have to start shoving these guys in the fridge in the meantime.

Oh and,  that too will be the day that we pick our grapes.  My latest contraption seems to be working, as there has been no evidence of visits by the little bandits.


That's it for now.

Thanks for stopping by.