What Time is it Mr. Fox?

3:30 Leaving work- Getting into car.

3:40 Entering Menards

4:00 Deftly executed- walking through Menards' exit with bags- stain, paint, nails, quotes.

4:20 Arrive at apartment. Change, grab a bite.

4:40 Leaving alley.

5 to 5 Roll up to Lodge

8:30 Dark, beat, ready for a shower. Turning onto 1st from Union.

8:33 Waiting for burgers at McD's. Notice I better switch the truck to heavier oil this spring.

8:35 Shake fist and curse city for Dam Neglect.

8:42 Alley. Home. Shower and Schlitz.

10:21 Posting this blog.

Pinkertons

Once again, my plans thwarted! Old man winter (Old man river?) and young, woman, spring? (this doesn’t make any sense) teamed up to bring us continuous rain on Saturday in amounts sufficient to trigger a flash flood watch by the afternoon, and a bout of snow on Sunday with flakes the size of Chinese Stars (Jet Li?) that are still sticking around today. Since temps were above freezing pretty much the entire weekend, it’ll be some time before I can navigate the Blazer out to the lodge to move around the 5000lb bucket lift without a) getting stuck on the way in, and b) carving deep, muddy ruts around the building with that sucker hitched up.

 

So what did we do instead? Made excellent use of Saturday by getting up early and taking to the road. Headed down to Des Moines to the ReStore  to see what they had to offer (scored a nice stack of 9x9 VAT) and some DalTile. From there to Calypso in one of the malls down there (http://www.calypso968.com/new/home.html) which was a very surreal experience in that you weren’t surprised by the Mohair Pair-esque items, but were caught off guard by vintage typewriters, chrome tables, radios and dinnerware actually for sale….inside a store…in the mall. Cara, being a pen lover, picked up another in the Retro 51 series and I couldn’t resist a chrome Colibri. The spacing and typeface on the clip reminded me very much of that used in the late 50’s, early 60’s on high-brow adding machines and computer equipment. Very Remington-Randish.

 

The rain continued off and on and we kept our eyes on the field waterways, driving north taking in the show. Stopped off at Bob and Barb’s after passing through Eldora and got the full tour of the place. A few hours later….still soggy and getting dark. Headed back and phoned in a pizza. Changed the clocks and collapsed in a pile of utter-tiredness.

 

More Sunday. Vowed to sleep in (huzzah!) and yet we were still tired. Shopped for groceries, spent a couple hours on laundry, and trekked over to the CF Lib with Cara. Here’s the deal: They have no books. Cara got her stuff, I found 3:10 to Yuma (2007) on DVD and upon looking over the Technology/Video/Computer non-fiction choices, I was awestruck by the fact that pretty much all the books were the exact some ones I checked out as a kid over 20 years ago. Nothing new. I cracked a couple open and sure enough, it all came back to me. Left with a very tattered copy of one I recognized, copywrite ’81. Flipped through it last night. Why should I pick VHS? Why should I pick Beta? The last half are all the machines on the market- features, prices, reviews. Interesting to actually own many of the machines and learn of their context in that time, 30 years later.

 

3:10 to Yuma (2007). Good movie, even with the english subtitles stuck on. 

Sour Sequence

There really wasn’t a good reason to be so sour yesterday, and yet by the time evening rolled around, I was simply Not Pleased with Anything.

 

Got up, hefted out the laundry, filled the tank with fuel for the gen and headed for the lodge. Put in a 4 hour shift before coming in for lunch and starting on the copious amounts of laundry we’ve got. This may have been the start of my discontentment, watching usable daylight slip away. Didn’t change the fact that it was only 20F, though. While the machines were humming, Cara brought over the supplies for me to make a batch of my tempting egg-salad.

 

Got through most of the laundry, went back out until dark, realizing along the way how tired I really was. But there’s no good reason for that either. Then, back to the parents to finish up. Grandma stopped by which was nice as we hadn’t seen her in some time. Endured ridicule by the group on my anti-closet policy while I thumbed through the Menards ad waiting on the dryer. Also learned that my other grandma had purchased a 17” PC laptop a couple months ago and I will obviously be expected to help with the matter as sometimes things work, and other times not. This is probably what put me over the edge.

 

Undoubtedly, I am the most vocal Apple enthusiast in the family. Apparently I have no right to be offended when people ignore me (that’s their right), but dear reader, you know how this is going to work out. If I decline to help, stones will be cast upon me like a sequel to The Lottery. Worst. Grandson. Ever. If I do help, it goes against every fiber of my being and my words (all these years) are simply hollow. Why did she buy this computer? There were rebates.

 

I find it a shame for a couple reasons- One, this is her first foray into computing and this experience is only going to reinforce what post-boomers tend to think about computers. Two, she doesn’t have a tech service next door to her. This isn’t going to bode well when she picks up some spyware or a virus, or the registry gets corrupted or she has to figure out the Task Manager on_her_own. In the end, I’m betting this computer gets put aside somewhere because of all the niggling little problems. (BTW, I’m on a PC at the moment, drafting in Word because my Outlook keeps crashing.)

 

Friday night was a blast however. Blew off some steam from the week down at the PL. A couple girls at the bar wanted to know if Ben and I were any good at pool. Any good, ha! So we racked ‘em up and started shooting. This was, however, moments after getting off the phone with Cara and inviting her down (she was getting off work). As you can imagine, the scenario was quite odd but I’m thinking this may have worked to Ben’s advantage. After a couple games we turned the table over to Levi and chummed it up at the bar, discussing marriage, kids, and being ostracized by coworkers for holding atypical views on such. Cara asked Mel her take on things and her response was A1. Ben was agog.

 

Saturday: Re-assembled the medicine cabinet I had re-hab’d, then toiled at the lodge in good spirits. At nightfall, home to cleanup and we set our sights on Applebees. Packed. Fine then, Taco Bell it is! Home again. Shawshank Redemption on LD. Then, a good night’s rest.

 

 

 

Small, Strange, World.

Friday. Finally. Odd week at that. Spent my evenings trying to recharge my batteries (semi-successful) and took advantage of the warm temps mid-week for some staining, planing and painting. Unfortunately, yesterday's oddball spring storm and day-long mist meant I'd be walking in the rain, through the mud and standing water (ground still frozen) for a little lodge action. And I was tired, too. I turned to plan B: courthouse for title transfer and plates, parts store for a pressure hose for the Blazer (rewards card, cha-ching!), a quick stop to investigate a couple woebegone Cads, inspection of a tractor that's priced right and will soon be needed out at the land, pickup of laundry and signing the lease extension. Then home for a movie, cold beer and a good pipe.

 

I had one of those life-imitates-art experiences Wednesday afternoon. Stopped by the UNI surplus sale preview after work and the fella that runs the place saw me eyeing a Radarange they had up for sale. We're perfect strangers except for him remembering I'm the guy that bought a 5' tall spotlight earlier in the year. While looking over the merchandise, he mentioned he had done a little research on it earlier in the day and that he felt the $10 price was fair. After all, there's a guy on the internet that will sell you the trays for $25 alone! I grinned, looked at him and asked, "would you believe I’m that guy?" He stared at me, not sure how to reply or if he even heard me correctly. After a moment, and without missing a beat, he replied, "Oh, so you have that model."  And thus, the circle of absurdity is complete.

 

We'll be shifting into March here momentarily and suddenly, without warning, the water and ice on top of that soil is going to disappear completely overnight. It's strange to observe. An additional day or two of sun and wind and the dirt will be ready for work. The PoCo can get their trenching contractor in for power without getting stuck. I can deploy the post hole auger and get some timber in the ground. Temps will be up enough to schedule the brick work. And with dedicated power, I can actually weld. It really is the kickoff of construction season as it use to be (before the days of crews pouring cement in the dead of winter). But things won't be in full swing until May. The most action always happens in May.

 

It's interesting to look back 36 months to March '06. Pictures show a brown, dry landscape. Us in jackets. A pile of I-beams on the ground and a cement pad, waiting. I made a statement back around December this year that barring temp related activities, March will be the turning point, the "conclusion" to the project. I'll stand by that. We're ready for the carpet crew to roll in now (yet it might be May before we find the right red!). Interior glass gets ordered next week. All the sheetrock is in, upstairs and down; just need a mud job downstairs when temps improve. VCT is in boxes, waiting for a 50F slab. Same for the bathroom tile. Cedar is done. Woodwork is shellaced. End of the month, both garage doors will be ready for installation and the exterior front soffits and fascias should be done, too. Etc. Etc. April through June will be the finishing touches. The exterior railing, gluing Formica over the installed cabinets, epoxy painting the floor. Cars and furniture should be rolling in. Lots of exterior action in the yard, too, when summer breaks. Planting trees. Seeding the prairie. Building fences. Pouring more cement. Constructing both the pumphouse AND a picnic shelter. Improvements to the road. A new gate. Should be a "good" time!

 

 

Two Times the Toner

I actually watched the 1972 NBA All Star game last weekend. I kid you not. And I found it strangely intriguing. Sure, it doesn't hurt that you're watching the best of the best duke it out at the Forum, but there was something else. For one, there weren't ads and banners hocking cell phones and diet drinks all around the court. In fact, the court itself appeared to be the apex of what a court should be. A couple 70's colors and "The Forum" in a circle at the center. Simple, but not plain. And not a hint of commercialism. Cara pointed out the player's shorts weren't the shiny, baggy, distracting garments you see today. And all the light in the place was focused on the court rather than the rafters of spectators; makes sense. And you know what else? What you saw on your TV screen was the game, not a tickertape of numbers and stats and continuous gibberish rolling across the bottom half of the screen in 20 different hues. When points were scored, you got "east vs west" and the tally superimposed over the action for a couple seconds. Brilliant! And something else, too. Despite many greats in the game, nobody was hanging off the backboards, not a lot of hot-dogging and the commentary was concise and unobtrusive. Simply put, it was an entertaining, un-sensationalized, basketball game.

 

Started a terrific rant yesterday but lost interest. And it's been a while since I've had a good rant.

 

OK then. I'll move onto the latest. Spring is almost here, and with it, some great excitement to roll my sleeves up and put the finishing touches on the lodge, get the cars out of storage, move things in, and maybe try out that hammock Cara convinced me to buy 2 years ago that's still wrapped up. Things would move a lot faster, and my creative drive wouldn't be so tempered if I weren't working 40 hours a week in a cube farm, totally under-utilized. And despite warnings from friends and elders that going full-time where I work was a bad idea, the bills still must be paid. The silver lining is that I do not consider my occupation to be a career for me, though many would be thankful to have such a job. And more unfortunate, this is not really the economy to go job-hunting. But spending time at the office, and placing the majority of passion in outside activities yields an interesting perspective that makes one wonder, is everyone else just doing this for the money? Or do they genuinely enjoy frowning all day, complaining about their jobs and counting their years to retirement?

An Atypical weekend.

Last week Ben and I were on the road with a car in tow, doing our best to keep our eyes open and put a few miles under our feet. This weekend, a different pace. Friday night was the standard PL visit with the crew. Shot some pool; won a few, lost a few, watched a few. And didn't close out the place as is my wont. It was a welcome break from a week of lodge work and a couple days recovery from last weekend. Before heading out for the PL I played with the ETC a bit and finalized some dimensions for the kitchen island so I could actually build it Saturday.

 

Come Saturday morning I was up and out the door, and spent pretty much the day building said island/bar. First time building "cabinetry" and no real blunders to speak of (knock on wood). Clamped everything together over in the kitchen and to my dismay, even though the dimensions were conservative, the angled sides made the scale appear much too large for the space. Took a few notes and headed back into town after running a load or two of laundry. Made a few modifications to slim down the island visually while Cara prepared for a night out with friend. With the place to myself, I poured a drink, lit my pipe and put on a favorite movie. (Followed by opening every window and running all the fans less someone confuse the place for an Elks Lodge.)

 

Sunday was bittersweet. Laundry, a couple hours at the lodge making alterations to the island, and a trip to the Humane Society with Bandit, who had passed away that morning. She lived to 105 in dog years and beat the vet's expectations for her size, but she was in failing health the last year or so and we knew her time was coming. People always like to think their dog was the best, but it was tough to beat a dog like Bandit. She would refuse to bite anyone no matter how riled you got her, never chewed on furniture, didn't slobber all over you and everything else and was all-around a "good" dog. Spoiled rotten. She had a penchant for lurking up the street to the neighbor that would cook her eggs and give her scraps when you turned your back, and she'd sit at your side and cry for table scraps once she knew we were all a soft-touch. She will be missed.

 

Finished up the night with big shopping at HyVee where we ran into both Cam, and Alex's parents. Partook in the manager's Chinese special; lost half an hour ironing, and we called it quits early. Didn't help. We're still totally wiped.

 

Blockin' the Blues

Never trust a month that only occupies four lines on the calendar. This February is going to be a flash in the pan as far as I can tell. Just enough time to see some improvements made, and one big step closer to Spring, without the lethargic waltz March puts on that makes you want to pound your fists and shout "enough already! Get on with the thaw!".

 

We had a break in last week's cold streak that let me get some construction work done on Thursday, with a solid Saturday and Sunday encore. I know I've mentioned it before, but the only thing equally as irritating as not being able to finish off big tasks due to temperatures (anything involving grout, thinset, paint or adhesive) is not being able to polish off big tasks due to being limited to materials that can only be carried in by hand. If it's heavy, awkward or fragile (like the large panes of glass I'm ready for) then I'm just SOL. On the bright side, temps were in the mid-30's this weekend which allowed me to sand and shellac the woodwork upstairs. Cara came out Saturday and I helped her with a project she's been wanting to do- make a notebook with wood covers. Garage door #1 is now 95% complete, with the skins of panel #2 firmly glued and nailed in place. A followup around the perimeter with the router will cut the luan flush.

 

I gave the old eb#y a spin last week and dumped a load of excess….stuff..onto the interwebs to see who'd bite. Slow market indeed. Though a couple items are finding happy bidders. And if nothing else, such an activity does a fine job of bringing out the total internet junkie in me, checking ten times a day to see if anything's new in the sales department. Remind me to avoid Mesquaki.

 

In the blowing-off-steam department, it was a fine weekend. Vic's, E-dale Casey's, and the PL were the places to be Friday night. I would have rated Vic's pretty good if not for the lighting. Neon accents and carpetted interior? Excellent. Then add compact fluorescents sunken into dark stained cedar. Ugh.

 

Sat nite Cara and I closed out the Hydrant, finding several bizarre opportunities to test our dance skills. By the time we arrived for dinner Ben and Cam had already found a booth. Spectacular showing by "wild Bill" on the karoake over the course of the eve. I told Ben I was going to make it an early night but I was having an uncharacteristically good time and knew I'd be too pooped to pop next weekend. The "bucket brigade" hit the spot, and Cara was in good spirit, too. Not only that, but I was the winner of a rare opportunity on that auction site mentioned before. A 1985 Eldorado Touring Coupe. Tough to have a bad time, really. All-in-all, I'm totally exhausted.