Month: September 2024

I have been sorting the house ever since the day in late August when my wife returned to work, after a 14 month long sabbatical. I have cleared out closets, drawers, toy bins, toy boxes, baskets, clothing, boots, shoes, coats, and junk of every shape, size and colour. Once we removed all of the easily accessible low hanging fruit I had to get a bit more inventive, and really knuckle under. So for me, and my various collections, it was a matter of paring down the number of books, magazines, and such that I have been hoarding. Earlier in my life all I wanted was a massive library, type of books be damned. Now that I’ve had to lug those self same books about for twenty five years or more, and make allowances for how much room they take up, I’ve had a bit of a shift in my thinking. So I went through, on three separate occasions to donate books to the care and share. Books I read and didn’t like. Books I nolonger have any interest in reading. Out of date text books that serve no purpose anymore. And several book series as a whole that I don’t care to ever read a second time. Besides my new books, and those on the TBR list which I do plan on reading at some point, the only books I kept are ones I loved, and if I could never buy another new book, would be more than happy to read a second, or third time. You’d think after donating, recycling, or burning something like two hundred or more books that my collection would be small, but that isn’t the case. I still have quite a few left! Outstanding.

I am now trying to clean up other areas of the house. I have gone through my CD collection, where I was gifted a bunch of random CDs from Universal, but never opened them, and don’t much care for the artists in question. So those will go out too. Along with any of those monthly distributed demo games from the old Xbox magazines. I didn’t make a huge dent in either of those areas, but some is better than none. I wish they still sold CD books, so I could dump alot of the dvd cases. We tend to buy Blurays if they offer physical media at all now. I’m keeping the disks, just not the cases. Waste of precious space in our small home.

That’s also why I removed all of my dust jackets. The shelves that continue to house books are stuffed right full. Now you can remove a single book without five on either side coming out along with it. Just a few additional millimeters of space on each shelf has helped immensely. Not that I was really a “get rid of the artwork” kind of guy, but a lot of the second hand books I owned were pretty badly ripped. So off they all went. I’m not sad about it. The good part is still here, the book, with the words! That’s what was important to me, not the randomly shifting jacket designs.

Part of the purge/clean up was bringing the refurbished table inside to swap it in for the old folding table that was in the middle of the room. Now the fixed table is sturdier, wider, and longer to boot! The kids can play Legos, and have room for multiple mid size puzzles, or one really big one. Nice. The black legs don’t look out of place, so I’m happy.

Opening up space on the shelves, and keeping things more tidy is a real chore. Coming together though. Still have boxes & bags of crafting materials to sort through. Not looking forward to that – at all. Moving in waves does seem to help. Big stuff first, then work your way down organizational level by level. How deep into the organizing game I want to get will determine how many times I go over an area. Right now it is just a surface level thing. I could get a label maker out, and sortimoes and get real near OCD about it. But it isn’t me whom uses it. That level of fine tooth organizing will stress out my wife and kids. So I won’t go that far with it.

I do plan on taking my totes out to the garage at some point, if I can’t get them into the crawl space under the stairs. That will open up the basement closet for all of the spring/fall coats. It will also mean I can keep all of our winter gear in one dedicated closet all spring/summer/fall. Which will allow me to actually use the closet in my office, which currently has coats in it, and not much else! One easily accessible coat closet would be really handy.

Funny story about the refurbished table. I managed to drop it on one single toe yesterday. It has throbbed ever since. The dog continues to find said toe, and stand on it – repeatedly. Not the smartest thing I’ve ever done, dropping a wooden table on one toe. It’s not broken, but it isn’t a very pretty colour anymore I’ll tell you that much for free.

One day you’re sweltering in the heat and 72 hours later we’re all bundled into sweat pants, fleece lined sweaters, and huddled under blankets on boat rides across the lake. Now here we are second week of school and the kids need a jacket in the morning, and a sweater for the chill winds blowing. These seasons change on a dime, about 3 weeks earlier than they should. It’s not autumn until the 22nd of September, but you wouldn’t know that if you looked outside, or took sight of a thermometer.

Not that I want it to be all humid and gross forever more, but these quick dips makes it easy to get sick. Now my cough is likely to be from running my dehumidifier at too high a setting to keep the basement from being damp and musty, but in the process drying out my nasal passages, and hurting my lungs/throat with the constant dryness. I hate damp feeling sheets, so it’s an issues I’ll need to live with until the snow comes, and the humidity evaporates anyway. Life is a delicate balance.

Day 13 of my cough and it does seem to be getting better, slightly. No meds since Thursday morning, and I have longer stretches with no coughing. Leaning back, reclining and lying down will still trigger a cough, but oh well. I pulled a muscle over the weekend in my abdomen from coughing. That hurt. Like doing too many crunches/sit ups without a break. Could have done without that!

Domestic Duties Monday is here again!  It’s two of my brothers birthdays today. They are 47, and 49 respectively. Happy birthday!

Managed to find a free moment to add the dark ebony stain to all four ash table legs yesterday. I applied it pretty thickly with a sponge brush, but it went on evenly, and I think it will look ok. The wood itself was not the best. Has a fair few knots, and some cracks I had to glue & clamp. Some of which held up, and others failed. On the plus side the stain was not bothered by the glue residue. Score one for me! I just want to hide the legs as much as possible. I’m looking for a sturdier surface to play on, not a gorgeous finished product. I still have a few steps to go, but I should be done this coming week. Yeah!

In other news I have pulled a muscle in my lower abdomen coughing in the night. That sucks. It hurts a bit. Feels like I tried to do five hundred sit ups while I should have been sleeping. But only on my right side. Strange. I remember pulling a muscle in my belly from throwing up, that was a decade ago. Also turned out to be EBV, so I’d love to not experience that again. What a shite three months that was. No thanks, I’ll pass.

Taken the oldest child to an outdoor laser tag combat party today. Looks awesome. I never did stuff like that as a kid. We didn’t really have it as an option as far as I know. When I did do paintball I kicked ass, and had a blast doing it on the company dime. Too rich for my blood. The paintballs alone are fairly cost prohibitive. Let us see what laser combat costs. Maybe we’ll add it to the list of potential fun family outings.

Happy Sunday!

Well, first off I started the sanding process on what I had thought was a hardwood table, to find out later that I had in fact sanded through some badly gouged veneer whilst attempting to restore the eating surface. I was very disappointed by this revelation regarding veneer. That took the restoration job down a peg to a mere repair. So I ended through all the grits I felt it needed, stopping at 220. I stained it twice with two heavy coats of Danish Oil Dark Walnut Stain, and eventually caved into adding a spray on Varathane brand diamond clear satin finish. Very light mind you. I sanded that with 400 grit once dry to take down any micro bubbles or lumps. My shop is dusty and particles get everywhere regardless of how much I vacuum the space.

Once that was all squared away I turned my attention to milling up some simple Ash legs, instead of gluing up a bunch of Walnut legs. So I spent a full day jointing, edging and then planing some three inch thick legs. I rounded those over with a repeatable stop at one end. As I need to capture the square end against the table to properly align the inserts for the bolts. I’ve made the legs 36 inches long, which feels like the right height. I should double check that though. I’ve sanded all four legs up to 220 grit. I am going to stain them a dark black/ebony to hide the lesser quality wood used. We’ll see if that works at all. Ha. Then I need to build the caps, match the drill holes, countersink the rim of the holes, add the inserts, and assemble. Take a photo for my records, and then bring the whole lot down to the basement for use with Lego, puzzles, and homework. The folding table currently in use can get put away beside the basement fridge where it lived for ages, out of the way, but accessible.

Besides the table, I  did a fair bit of reading, played some video games, worked a little, did the lawm and gardening, laundry, dishes, and floors. I didn’t do any fair entry stuff, but I still might? Hard to say. I really was focused on the table because I had high hopes it was of a better quality than it really was. I was terribly disappointed to find the veneer. Just gutted. What a let down. On the upside it is still real wood through, and through. Just not the rich Mahogany of the top most layer.

Doing wood working with a cough is not much fun. Wore my dust mask so as to not make things worse for myself. Still floats up into my eyes though, goggles be damned. I think I will turn my attention to a new sculpted fair entry once I get the table build completed. I’d like to keep making furniture as my time in the shop is limited by the weather (temperature). By November it’ll be too cold on there to use hand tools comfortably without them making my hands go numb. My tiny little heater may keep my back hot, but it’s not enough to warm up the entire space, and everything contained within it. I usually like to spend June/July in there, and Sept/October too if I can find the time away from paid work. May not be as big a concern this year. If we get a warm spell in November I can be out there between 10:00am and 2:00pm to putter around. By then the leaves take up 90% of my outdoor activity. Raking, blowing, vacuum bagging, mulching, and dumping them all back into the beds to protect my flowers through the winter, and add clean fill for the following growing season. Soil levels drop faster than I can replace them!

Happy Saturday out there in internet land. May your coughs be short lived, and not aggravate your throats/lungs too much. Ciao Bella!

Feeling more gurgley now, than in the early days. What started as a throat clearing tickle, is now a very phlegmatic hacking, wracking cough. I could honestly do without it, but that’s not my path right now it would seem. NyQuil at least gets me better quality sleep, even if my mornings are more groggy than I care for. Oh well! I feel like, now that there is a physical aspect to the cough, the gurgle of mucous in question, I’m making headway towards getting over it. Eight days of just painful coughing with no real definable source was annoying. Now there’s phlegm, so… that’s the point to attack I feel. That’s where I direct my attention now. So – is it really getting better? I don’t know, but if history serves as any guide, I’m going in the right direction. I think. But after looking up a few things, I do not believe it to be Whooping Cough. A sigh of relief was had by all.

It’s Friday today! End of a short week. The first four days of school have come, and are almost gone. No major morning melt downs – yet! So that feels promising. Have yet to lay eyes on my oldest child’s teacher, so I need to figure out who it is, beyond just a name. I’ve met my youngest’s teacher a number of times through the years, so no issue there.

My table project is progressing, albeit a tad slowly. If I can cut, and round over, and sand the legs today, then I can stain them on Monday, and build the capture point, and drill them all out, and think about putting it all together downstairs at the end of next week. I’d love to let the stain off gas outside of the house before I bring it all downstairs to stink up the basement with stains, oils, and sprayed clear coats. But likely I’ll rush to bring it inside just to have it done, and over with. So there is that to contend with. The kids don’t spend a whole lot of time downstairs, so I don’t think the smell will bother them. Just me. My office is downstairs, and that’s where I spend the majority of my day.

What else to say? Oh yeah – wife has been back to work for two weeks now. House feels empty with just the dog and I here. I have yet to venture out to grab a hot lunch. I do make a mean sandwich here with all my fixings, so it’s not really a problem. Work has quieted down a touch, but that’s because all of the marketing interns have returned to school, and the brand people are circling wagons, and looping back to see where they stand on any given project. Could be a few more days before I see any new items become available. It’s to be expected.

Still have not found the time to go see Deadpool 3, nor Alien Romulus. I’d like to catch at least one of them in theaters, but streaming will suffice if I end up having to wait even longer. I will eventually see them. Just a matter of time.

Well, I should get back to my table project. It won’t finish itself. Ciao Bella!

In his shop, sanding unknowingly through the veneer top of what was assumed to be an heirloom piece of hard wood furniture. Upon closer inspection it was then decided, by our intrepid friend to continue to upgrade the table into a suitable crafting/homework/Lego station rather than completing the original quest of a complete restoration. Now it’s a mere refurbishment meant to keep the table top level, and free of gouges. No more, no less. Also the idea to stop the Walnut leg build and course correct to simple Ash legs was implemented. Saving an expensive resource for another project. Also relieving himself of a rough sawn Ash board he’d been hoarding for nearly a decade. A Win-Win if you will. Hold for applause! Divine.

Also – yeah, day eight of this cough. It sucks. Day-Quil, Robitussin, Benalyn all seem to be next to useless once the fits kick in, but otherwise, no fever, no nasal congestion, no fatigue, no nausea, no upset guts, no nothing. Just a cough that has now aggravated my throat. I can still eat & drink without issue, so… there is that. I hope to be rid of it by this time next week, or I’m going to have to see a doctor about it. We’ll wait and see what shakes out. NyQuil however works extremely well, as I had the first good nights sleep in seven days last night. So, much obliged NQ!

I did manage to put two thick layers of dark Walnut stain on the table top yesterday, as well as complete all the initial sanding needed to apply them. Which was nice. Looks great where there is still veneer! Less so otherwise. But I’m in no position to reapply veneer to the top so it is what it is at this point now. Table clothes or Jraft paper will cover the top from now on. No so much to protect it, as to hide my discovery of the falsehood behind this table we’ve held on to for nearly 20 years because we thought it was better than it really is. No matter, another solid work surface is always appreciated. More horizontal space to hoard “things” I guess.

It is now Thursday, the third official day of school, out of two hundred and sixty some odd. So the next ten months are firmly in motion. I think we have about four weeks until the classroom assignments are set in stone, so the kids could still move, get bumped, or placed elsewhere before October 11th (which was a previous years deadline for such things, if I recall). So no cause for celebration just yet.

Back to school means birthday parties are kicking off again! No shortage of friends with gift requirements at my kids school. I think both of them have something or other coming up in the next ten days. Lots of weekend shuffling about from venue to venue, event to event. Fun, fun, fun.

The first day back to school! It has arrived with a flash, a bang, and nary a whimper. I took their photo to commemorate the moment, and then we found the lines we needed for each class, and the bell rang, and BOOM! home alone for the first time in more than a year. I ran a couple errands, and have mowed my lawn. I’m about to walk over to the in-laws to put out their recycling, and that’s my day. Perhaps some laundry. A bit of a tidy up. But nothing major. I’m going to save the driving range for tomorrow. All of last weeks organizing, and cleaning has paid off. I’m several weeks ahead on inside stuff. I’m not totally ready to start the table just yet, but that will start soon enough. Just trying to bask in an ever so slightly decluttered, and quiet house. TV isn’t on. Radio isn’t playing. Dogs asleep at my feet. It’s all good.

Lawn is done. I cut down yet another small tree that my wife wasn’t too fond of to clean up the front of the house. If I pull up the tomatoes that will go a very long way in tidying up the front yard too. This year it’s not the pumpkins being a problem, but the tomatoes! Gardening, what a hassle it can be at times. I took a few outlier branches off of some ground cover shrubs near our front door, so they are longer a tripping hazard. You can clearly tell where the step ends now. So nobody should twist an ankle by over stepping it anymore. Not that it has happened. But it could have, due to the poor visibility due to the branches. Either way, it will make shoveling snow there just a little bit easier.

I do have a fair bit of exterior maintenance left to do. The back hedge needs another trim up, along the sides, and top (if I can reach!). The patio space feels crowded in by the hedge growth. I have at least one full bag of weeds to pull out from the back alone. Some neighbourhood cat is using my front, and back flower beds as a litter box. Not a fan of that. I deal with my dogs poop, I don’t need to deal with somebody else’s cats bowel movements.

We got home later yesterday than I would have liked. When we did venture off the traffic was lighter than usual (a nice bonus!) But the sky grew dark way too soon. Far too soon for my liking. Well, I best venture off to the inlaws to catch the blue box man. Ciao Bella!

That’s the benchmark I just hit, and I’m not sure whether to be excited to have hit that number, or sad it took so long. I imagine some sights do that kind of traffic in less than an hour. But you know what? I’ll take the win. Ten thousand individual views of my various forms of content. Images, video, audio, and written posts. Even my interconnected short story series has a chunk of those views contained within it. Yes – yes I believe that I will be happy about what I have done, and not compare it to other things. I choose to take the win in the spirit in which it was given. Congratulatory. With animated fireworks even! Go me!

I’ve had this cough now since Thursday, and it isn’t accompanied by a runny nose, fever, tummy troubles, or any other major issue. Except that the sudden explosive bursts of coughing has caused my throat to become sore in spots. I can (as of this moment) still swallow without issue, and I can eat/drink without trouble. Gets worse when I lie down, or recline, otherwise it just kind of bubbles up every so often.  It isn’t constant, and feels like more of a nuisance. Quickly running out of cough syrup here though. Wish I’d have though to bring more.

It is the holiday Monday, Labour Day to be exact. This is it, the last possible day of summer break 2024. Soon my phone will start to blow up as other parents try to figure out if their kid has any friends in their newly assigned class. It won’t be set in stone until the first week of October,  so no cause for celebration just yet. Lots of shuffling/juggling of kids left to do between then and now. By this time tomorrow my wife will be at work, and both of my kids will be in class.

I’m going to celebrate with a visit to the driving range. And possibly a bunch more cleaning around the house. The gardens, and the leaves coming down will take up a bunch of my time soon enough. I need to cut my grass too. We never did reach a point this summer where the grass stopped growing. Really strange (read : wet) summer this year. Rain fall for the record books if I’m not mistaken.

Funnily enough a big draw, and portion of the 10K views was due to the images, video, and play by play of the war gaming terrain I built during the height of the Covid lock downs of 2020/2021. I still have all four boards displayed in my basement. I did however get rid of the secondary buildings I’d made. Four “stores”, and the bad guys hide out which was just too large, and too similar to the Inn I’d made first. So now that Inn is loaded to the tits with all the 3d printed interior terrain items, like beds, boxes, chests, and sacks of coins. I have an itch to build more, but I don’t have anywhere to keep it at the moment. Isn’t that the story of our lives.

It’s a well worn pastime of every single dog I’ve ever owned personally. Doesn’t matter what make or model of toy it is, they are going to back chew it to death and extract the frosted white gold inside. Super tuff, unbreakable, extra hearty, nothing much matters as my dog is going to get down into the juicy, squeaky heart of it, and RIP it’s stuffed guts out. I spend a good deal of time picking up puffs of dog toy stuffing from the floors all over our house. The garbage can is currently full of it.

I managed to declutter the living room, and the basement bookshelves in one fell swoop on Friday. I got two large tote bins full of stuff. Giant floor puzzles, colouring books, baby/infant toys, Peppa Pig brand mini figs & houses/vehicles, Barbie dolls, their vehicles, and clothes. Plus every single low end Mc Donald’s toy that I could lay my hands on. I’m so far ahead of schedule that I can start my table project on Tuesday of this coming week. I managed to clean out the toy box in the living room, and the associated bins of Barbie, LOL, and Shadow/Rainbow/Monster high dolls, and all of their accessories too. Bins of blocks, and all three wooden stacking toys which my two year old nephew is very excited for (as I knew he would be). All of this cleaned not only my living room, some of the dining room, but opened up shelf space on the basement bookcases. I do still have some totes on that bookshelf to look into. We have an awful lot of broken WII guns, steering wheels, mats, and paraphernalia. I’d like to toss all that, plus some other broken technology that is taking up space.

I know I’m on the right track because on Friday, while I was purging the house, two new bags of clothes showed up on our doorstep from our friends whom have an older daughter. That’s why I had to move stuff out, as more was coming in! Can you believe it? Ha. I do appreciate it, a great deal. I just have to be the one to keep the cycle moving. If it were up to my wife our basement would still have 20 bloody great bags of baby, infant, toddler, small child clothing, plus all the cribs, change tables, swings, exercise circle thing, and floor tummy time mats etc… I had to be the coldhearted SOB who removed it all.

I think a trip to the driving range to celebrate is in order!