Category Home Improvements

I got home from work a little early last night and got busy.  I did light wet sanding on a couple of the spots I applied touch up paint to on the 99 Tacoma to smooth things out.  The quality of work is below average at best but at least those areas no longer scream “HEY LOOK AT ME” and instead blend into the rest of the truck from a distance.

I also have yet ANOTHER thing to address on the Tacoma before officially listing it for sale.  Over the weekend the check engine light came on.  When I checked it with my code reader the MAF (mass air flow) sensor came back as the most likely cause, something I have replaced 2-3 times over the trucks lifetime.   It’s easy to replace and not horribly expensive but I can not believe the run of bad luck I have had with repairs on the truck just as I am ready to sell it.

When I think back through the sequence of events, everything that went wrong has happened since I thoroughly blasted the engine bay with de-greaser and a garden hose.  I can’t help but think that all of these problems could have been avoided if I just left the engine bay dirty. I know I have said it before but hopefully THIS is the last thing I have to do before selling the truck.

I spent a lot of time out in the coop trying to get my new WeMo switch working with the chicken coop door.  For whatever reason it just does not want to work despite my repeated attempts to reconfigure it.  The switch appears to go through the set up procedure cleanly but when I try to access it from my phone it just drops off the list of devices.

My situation is a bit more complex than the typical Wemo scenario where all the smart switches will be talking to the same wi-fi network.  I have a secondary wi-fi network in the coop which I need the switch to attach to.  However depending on the conditions, sometimes the wifi from inside the house is visible in the coop which can cause issues.  I have another WeMo switch in the coop already that has been controlling the light for months so I’m not sure why this one is being such a pain in the ass.

I also got inspired last night to try to run the security DVR cable to the front and back corners of the attic.  I put on my jeans, long shirt and paper face mask to crawl into the very hot attic.  Once I got up there I surveyed what would be required to get to each mounting point and it was ugly, very ugly.  The mounting point at the front of the house looked pretty much impossible for a human being to navigate.  The front office has a vaulted ceiling which is where the cable would need to go across.  There just is no space and would almost surely result in some part of my body punching through the ceiling.

The spot at the back corner of the house had more space but was just as treacherous.  The roughly 30 feet I would have to travel is buried in a couple feet of blow in insulation. What exactly is hidden below that insulation is unknown but likely includes electrical and other wiring which could be hazardous.  Never mind trying to crawl in a way that keeps all of your weight on the roof trusses and off the drywall.  I just sat up there for a few moments and looked at both spots, weighing the misery and potential disaster that awaited versus the benefit of having two additional security cameras on the property.  I gave up, telling Cindy it was just too much hassle.  I exited the attic, dejected.

When I bought the security dvr system I justified it’s purchase not only as a race timing safety net but also as a surveillance system for the house.  For whatever reason not fulfilling the second part of that plan bothered me.  I put everything away that needed to be moved to get into the attic away, feeling like a failure the entire time.

Even though I proclaimed “no mas” the gears in my head were still turning.  This morning on my way back from the dentist I stopped in at Home Depot and bought a 100 foot fiberglass snake.  My hope is to reverse the game plan, poking in the snake from the outside and navigating it to a reachable spot where I could attach the wires and pull it back out.  In theory it should work.  We will see how that translates to reality.

Saturday morning I was out the door before 8 am to head up to Fort Myers.  I had two brand new HP computers loaded in the trunk of the Prius for my accountants, a husband/wife team I first met when I lived in PA.  They moved to SW Florida permanently last year.  One of their systems had been having a ton of lock up problems the past few months which was terrible timing since it fell in the middle of tax season. Although I had plenty of stuff I wanted to get done around the house this past weekend I wanted to get their systems migrated instead of having it hanging over me.

Going in I had delusions of getting done around lunch time.  I instead wound up spending all day there, pulling out around 4. They just had a lot of data and a lot of little hurdles I had to get around.  I methodically knocked down the problems one at a time until we got to a point where they were both up and running with their data intact.  We sort of have a barter arrangement in place where I help them with computer stuff and they do accountant stuff for me.  They also gave me the one computer that was locking up.  I may fix it up and give it to Ali since her computer is about 95 in computer years.

While I was working Cindy was as well, painting the garage floor.  We spent all that time cleaning and reorganizing the garage but it still had the ugly bare cement floor that had countless stains on it.  Cindy painted it a solid gray to match the accent color on the walls.  It was a nice finishing touch to the space and makes the garage look officially renovated.

Even though I only got home about 5 we wanted to still get out to go see the new Captain America Civil War movie.  It was playing every 15 minutes at Coconut Pointe so we headed there.  I brought GoPro with to film our review of the movie.  Of course it went off the rails and included other random subject matter.

We were happy to see the theater was not overly crowded thanks to the numerous showings and the snowbirds migrating back north.  Before we got seated I made a bathroom pit stop.  As I was washing my hands a large man stood in front of the urinals behind me.  Thanks to the mirror I got a horrific view of his urinal technique.

The man apparently wore elastic band shorts.  Instead of just pulling down the front of his shorts to gain access to his penis he instead pulled his shorts down until they were resting at mid-thigh leaving his entire ass hanging in the wind.  I stared briefly in disbelief before getting the fck out of there.  It was a visual that will likely be burned into my mind for the foreseeable future.

The movie itself was quite entertaining, keeping the bar set quite high for anything Marvel related.  I am not sure why the film was pitched as a Captain America film instead of Avengers 3.  It had more super heroes than any previous Marvel movie.  Regardless of the branding we both found the movie entertaining, fun and left us hungry for the next installment of the series.  It was odd seeing the good guys beat the shit out of each other and the thought process of the head bad guy in the film didn’t make much sense to me but it really didn’t matter.  Despite being some 2 1/2 hours long the film got a solid A from both Cindy and myself.

Sunday morning we wanted to take advantage of what likely will be our last batch of cool mornings for 6 months or more to get out and run.  We first dropped off Sadie who was visiting for a couple days.  We then headed to the water park to get our run in.  Our normal run around the perimeter of the park is two miles per lap.  That course includes running through sections of grass.  We wanted to avoid grass and get 3 miles in only using one lap so we did a new route that included several back and forth turns to get additional distance in.  It was my first run in a couple weeks so I didn’t feel strong or fast.  The best thing I could say about it was I my lower body didn’t hurt too badly during or afterward.

Shortly after we got home Cindy’s daughter came over for Mother’s Day.  Cindy loves nothing more than to spend time with Katie and that was what they did for the majority of the day.  They spent most of it working on refurbishing a small doghouse they found at a yard sale.

I kept myself busy with my own projects, the most time consuming was me working on cleaning up the 99 Tacoma for sale.  I used the pressure washer and fine grit wet sanding to try to clean up the peeling and oxidizing clear coat as much as possible.  I also applied a couple layers of Nu Finish to the roof and hood of the truck which actually brought back some degree of shine to the 17 year old paint.

I spent a lot of time and energy trying to refurb the exterior to at least an acceptable level.  As a last step I pulled out the matching touch up paint I bought a few weeks ago to try to make the area on the fiberglass fender that had no paint left on it look better as well as a few small spots scattered on the truck.  I want to apply a second coat of the paint and then wet sand again to smooth it out.  It looks far from professional but still an improvement over how it was.

We cleaned up and headed out to take Cindy to a Mother’s Day dinner at Iguana Mia since Cindy is a big fan of mexican food.  The last couple times I have gone there my meal was less than spectacular.  Unfortunately the streak continued.  Katie and I both got blackened fish tacos and both of us thought they sort of sucked.  The fish was dry and basically tasteless.  Even though I am not a big fan of spicy sauce I dumped a bunch on my tacos so they at least tasted like something. Cindy enjoyed her meal more than us so that was good.  Even with the less than spectacular meal Cindy had fun.  She loves when the three of us are all together.

Keeping busy this weekend was a good thing as it didn’t give me much opportunity to focus on this being my second Mother’s Day since my mom passed away. Despite the passage of time it’s very easy to moisten my eyes by simply thinking for a few moments about her unexpected death at a relatively young age.  I miss having her around and still have a difficult time grasping that she is not.

I had an odd dream last night where I was at my grandparents home in Birdsboro.  The dream didn’t really focus on any people being there besides myself.  It was basically me going around the house remembering focal points.  There was grandpas basement that was loosely organized chaos filled with countless tools and items.  On the main floor I remember the sunroom that was off the kitchen, leading to the back yard.  In that backyard there was a garage and another shed, both of which were packed with additional stuff.  The back of the yard was framed by railroad tracks that I used to explore on a regular basis when I was there for holiday visits.

Back inside the house I vividly remember the grandfather clock and smaller clock on the mantle of the living room which would chime on the hour.  There was a small library filled with books that never held much interest for me since I was almost exclusively a magazine reader at the time.  Upstairs I remember a couple things.  I recall the toilet in the only bathroom in the house had some sort of damage to the bowl that made it look like someone abused it majorly every time I lifted the lid.  I always wondered how that could happen.

In my Uncle Randy’s old bedroom I remember a small globe that had what looked like a psuedo weather vane inside.  It had 4 paddles that reacted to light in such a way that it would spin when exposed to bright light.  I always thought it was cool.  From that room there was access to a weird second story porch that I may have snuck out onto once or twice even though I was not supposed to. The attic was on the third floor and I only recall ever venturing up there once or twice in my life.  Again it was a treasure trove of stuff.   I also remembered a small coin bank that looked like a treasure chest but now that I am awake I am having a hard time remembering if that was at my grandparents on my mom or dads side.

Anyway I am not sure what flipped my subconscious back to the Birdsboro house circa the late 70’s and early 80’s.  It was a simpler time for sure.

So I had a big agenda already for the weekend, hoping to get a number of new Tacoma accessories installed as well as completing the garage reorganization.  When Cindy reported starting problems with the 99 Tacoma late in the week I asked her to watch the video I did regarding starter replacement back in 2012, asking her if it sounded like that.  Basically she turned the key a couple times and got clicks but then the truck started normally.  That was the same behavior I had when the starter died in 2012.

I thought I should be proactive and just replace the starter, hopefully for nothing since the Autozone starter I installed had a limited lifetime warranty.  I would feel badly if I sold the truck and then had the starter let the new owner sitting in the near future.  Some people may view that as a stupid thing to care about.  After going through what I did as a result, I may agree with them.

So I got out there bright and early Saturday morning, hoping to finish up in the driveway before the heat of the day rolled in.  I assumed removal of the starter would go pretty easily since I did it before.  Predictably I had some struggles.  I used a different technique to remove the top starter bolt this time.  It required less socket extensions but more patience as I could only turn the socket 90 degrees at a time.  With a little more effort than expected I dropped the starter out of the engine compartment.

Installing the new starter went better.  After I tightened the bolts and reconnected the electrical stuff I leaned in the cab to do a test start, expecting it to be a mere formality.  Instead I was rewarded with a click.  WTF.  I turned again, hoping it was a weird anomaly.  Click, click, click…  How can this be, is it possible that Autozone sold me a DOA starter???  I was so pissed off as I imagined the hassle of having to pull the starter I just installed in order to get it checked.  I screamed a few obscenities into the wind as I walked back around to the front of the truck.

I double checked my connections and again tried the key, only to be greeted by more clicking.   I realized I had no choice but to remove my second starter of the day.  Luckily by this time I had become rather adept at it, I had the starter out in 10 minutes.  I loaded both starters AND my battery from the Tacoma into the new Tacoma in the remote chance the battery was bad as well.  The parts went into the bed.  I threw my seat cover over the driver seat since my clothes were covered with automotive fluid/dirt/grease/lubricants.

So as I pulled into Autozone I was not in a good mood.  The idea that they sold me a dead starter annoyed the piss out of me.  As I walked in from the lot my annoyance got ratcheted up a couple more clicks.  In front of the store was a pop up shelter with some kids and women that were obviously fundraising.  I was carrying the new starter in it’s box along with the old starter piled on top of it.  I was covered in dirt and surely had a sour look on my face.  Despite these obvious clues that I would not be a good solicitation target, one of the woman approaches me as I am approaching and tells me they are fundraising so some kids can go to judo camp.  I was amazed that this woman was so oblivious.   I had this immediate impulse to snap back with something like “are you blind, do I look like I am in a position to donate?”, but managed to submerge the impulse.  Instead I just gave her look of disbelief and disgust with a side order of head shaking.

So I plopped both starters on the counter and explained the situation.  The manager took both starters back to their tester.  He first hooked up the old starter.  After power was applied it fired up and passed the test.  Since the problem seemed intermittent I was not surprised.  However I expected the new starter to be dead as a door nail.  Instead the new starter fired right up as well, son of a …..

So I went into further detail about why I assumed the new starter was bad.  The manager said perhaps I have a grounding problem which he said I could check by using jumper cables to create a new temporary ground.  I told the manager I had my battery out in the truck as well.  I asked him if we could test it.  The judo woman was smart enough to not ask me for money again as I lugged the battery back in the door.  The guy slapped his tester on the battery and after 30 seconds or so showed me the result on the lcd screen, BAD BATTERY.

I was dumbfounded.  The behavior Cindy described just did not sound like a bad battery.  However the battery was around four years old which is about as long as they last in Florida conditions.  The idea that all of this bullshit and labor could have been avoided with a simple battery swap was frustrating.  I told the guy to get me a battery and that I would keep the new starter anyway. I turned in the old one to get my core charge refunded.  I returned home annoyed but relieved the solution to the problem was finally at hand.

By the time I got back Cindy had returned from the track meet she was coaching at.  I gave her the news that the starter replacement had not been going well.  I got busy installing the starter for the second time followed by installing my brand new battery.  This time I leaned into the cab and turned the key knowing it would start for sure.  CLICK.  You HAVE to be kidding me. I was in disbelief and angry.

So after verifying my connections I decided to test out the managers theory.  After disconnecting the negative battery lead I used the two black connections on my jumper cables, connecting one to the negative post on the battery and another to a grounding point on the engine. I turned the key and the truck roared to life.  Son of a bitch.  Could all of this bullshit really just be a flaky ground or bad battery cable?

I pulled out my Chilton’s manual and tried to find the battery ground location.  Unexplainably it did not seem to include that information.  I could not easily follow it visibly since it was encased in a wire loom that lead under the engine and out of view.  I then looked online for the ground location and again came up empty.  I walked back outside frustrated once again.

I decided to take a two step approach.  I took apart the negative battery terminal and cleaned it up best I could.  I also reconnected a secondary ground that was cut years ago that leads to the fender of the truck.  The combination of the two things finally seemed to do the trick, the truck fired up normally.  There is the very real possibility that I needlessly replaced the starter and the battery but at that point I didn’t care.  I’ll just add the items to the “features” list when I list the truck for sale.  The work that I hoped to have completed in 90 minutes instead wound up consuming the entire morning. If you want to see the video of the entire frustrating experience look here. I do have a sneaky suspicion that Tuffy may have knocked the ground loose during the water pump/timing belt install.  I may have to get under there one more time to check it out.

So after eating lunch I headed right back to the garage to start installing my new Tacoma accessories.  Despite my frustrating morning the Tacoma upgrades were on my mental checklist and needed to get done.  In total Cindy and I installed 5 upgrades including mud flaps, black out tailgate letters, console organizer, chrome tailpipe extension and nerf bars, which happened to show up as we were finishing the other upgrades.  I made a video for most of the stuff which is linked above.  The installation for all of it was pretty straight forward and simple but they really helped add some visual appeal to the truck.

Even though it was getting later in the afternoon I wanted to get the garage reorganization done or as close to done a s possible.  Cindy, who is an organization junkie was all on board.  I set up one of our folding tables in the garage and used it as a staging area.  We then began the lengthy process of removing EVERYTHING from the existing pegboard and piling it on the table in a haphazard manner.

As stuff was pulled off it was a good opportunity to throw out or curb items that were no longer of use.  Of course there were many things that fell into that category.  Once everything was removed we started the rebuild.  I was the one that did all of the pegboard population since that stuff is almost exclusively my domain.  Cindy worked a lot on organizing the endless surplus of screw, nuts, bolts, and washers that I had spread all over the place.  She also emptied out the area under my workbench.

It took a long time to get everything back in place.  We worked well into the evening but were driven by having the end in sight.  Cleaning up the garage was a long standing item on my winter project list.  Even though we are now far into spring it was exciting to have it finally nearing completion.

When we finally got the last thing put away we stood back to admire the fruit of our labor.  Not only did everything look better and have a spot, I had plenty of room for additional stuff, not that I am looking to fill in my pegboard space anytime soon.  Items I use frequently went in the workbench area, everything else got hung on the left in an orderly fashion.

After we were done we both felt beat up, really beat up.  All of the fighting with the truck in the morning backed up with a solid afternoon of nothing but additional work left me walking around with my ever more prevalent old man shuffle.  There wasn’t much on me that didn’t ache to some degree.  Cindy felt much the same.

I sometimes wonder what it is that drives me to fill many weekends with such an unbalanced work/relaxation formula.  I suppose it is a hereditary thing.  I just don’t feel at peace if my mental list for that time period remains incomplete.

On Saturday night we finally relaxed, watching Pawn Sacrifice, our most recent Netflix rental.  It was a movie about Bobby Fischer who I knew was a famous chess player but little else.  It seems he was equal parts genius and neurotic with a healthy dose of asshole thrown in there.  The movie was interesting enough for a solid B rating. I had no idea that later in life he lived in exile before he died in Iceland.  I guess brilliance comes with a price.

On Sunday I felt somewhat guilty for brushing off any endurance training, despite physically feeling not up to it.  I instead spent time getting the various video footage I shot the day before up on my YouTube channel.  Speaking of YouTube I hit a big milestone, gaining my 1000th subscriber to go along with my close to 900,000 channel views.   After I announced the milestone on Facebook, that number immediately decreased by a handful, dropping me back below the 4 digit mark.  I suspect some of my FB “friends” thought it would be funny to steal my thunder and unsubbed just to dick with me.  Luckily I picked up more subs to once again put me over the mark in the last 24 hours.

During the morning I also did some simple maintenance on the used Honda generator I got from my buddy John.  Instead of taking payment for the Immokalee race I timed for him he asked if I just wanted to keep the generator I borrowed since I needed one anyway.  I accepted his offer and figured it would be good to change the oil.  In addition to changing the oil I swapped out the air filter and spark plug.  None of the work was difficult but I took the time to document it anyway.  One thing I have found with YouTube videos is even procedures that may seem very simple to me can generate substantial views by others that don’t have my background.

We took the new Tacoma for it’s first Rural King run.  We got to admire the result of our accessory installs the day before.  We both commented on just how much we love the new truck both inside and out.  After picking up several items we returned home for what we hoped would be an afternoon sans-labor.

I did my weekly bill paying/budget balancing session.  That was an opportunity to shine a light on all of the spending that has been going on since the sale of the SSR. Of course I knew it was all going on but seeing the cold hard numbers helped me apply a gentle tap on the mental spending brake so I can catch my breath a little.  Sure there are more big ticket items on the list but none of it is anything that can’t wait for a bit.

Later in the afternoon I just could not help myself and began another small project.  I had a wire shelf that was displaced from the garage during the reorganization project that was sitting in the back yard.  It was one of those strong industrial models so I wanted to put it to use.  I wound up ripping out a less useful, smaller wood shelf in the large shed and sticking the wire shelf in there.  In order to make it work I also had to cut in half some wall mounted shelving in there.  The end result was more usable storage space that worked better.

My work set off an unintended chain reaction when I asked Cindy if she wanted the old wood shelf for anything.  If she didn’t I was going to curb it.  She said she wanted to try to possibly do something with it.  I carried it over and stuck it in the corner of the smaller shed that Cindy had already spent extensive time reorganizing.  She then went on another mission, shuffling things around yet again to work with the shelf in there.  She wound up working in the shed until around 7.

She worked so late that I offered to take her out to dinner so she wouldn’t have to tack on food prep to her list as well.  We went to Pelican Larry’s that is in a relatively new shopping center I never frequented before.  It was a very nice place and worthy of our future patronage.  My grouper basket was quite tasty.

When we got back home later we were both in the office.  I was watching Casey Neistat videos on YouTube.  All of a sudden I saw movement by the office window.  At first I though it was just the sprinklers turning on.  I then focused on the window and realized I could not have been more wrong.  There was a large raccoon on the outside ledge looking in at me.  On the ground next to it was a smaller one looking at me as well.  When I told Cindy to look she couldn’t believe it.

When I turned on the porch light to take a peek out front they had taken off.  A little later I saw the motion detector in the chicken run had tripped.  I walked out there as well just to make sure the raccoons were not trying to harass the hens, despite there being multiple levels of defense in place.  I once again saw nothing but both Cindy and I felt a bit unsettled knowing these chicken predators were once again freely roaming the grounds.

As I described yesterday, I had my GoPro rolling during various driving sessions yesterday.  As I looked at the camera it seemed like a lot of vibration was being transmitted from the two extension arms I had connected together.  Luckily the GoPro has built in anti-shake tech that compensated for it to a large degree.  If you would like to see the vlog which was mostly regarding what lead up to my sale of the SSR, take a look.

Last night I created and posted my second video of the day, a walk around of the new Tacoma.  Although having a new truck will cut down on the amount of repair/maintenance videos in the pipeline I do have a number of small upgrades that I will be filming.  Yesterday I received one of them, a new set of Tacoma OEM mudflaps.  Yesterday I ordered a tonneau cover and nerf bars which should will have both practical and visual advantages.

The tonneau cover will help gas mileage by eliminating the tailgate brick wall that air slams into right now.  Of course it will also offer protection and security for whatever I may stow in there.  I opted for a different style of cover this time, a roll up model instead of the trifold model on the 99 Tacoma.  The release brackets on the tri-fold can be a real pain in the ass at times.  Plus a friend of mine has this roll up variety on his Tacoma and highly recommended it.

The nerf bars visually are a nice compliment to the high ground clearance the TRD Tacoma has.  I got the 5″ black variety.  Not only will they look good and give shorter people a step into the high cab, they will provide protection from asshole door slammers. They will extend out far enough that if a clueless parking lot visitor throws their door open it will smack into the nerf bar instead of my door.

Yesterday the woman that paid for our fridge picked it up.  Since she seemed like a very nice woman that could use a hand, we actually extended the offer to her that she could have the other stuff if she wanted it as we valued the space more than additional money.  She came back and picked up the range later in the evening and texted Cindy that she will pick up the other stuff today which is awesome.  With all of the old appliances out of the garage we can once again park the Prius in there. I can also work in earnest on reorganizing my workbench area, utilizing the additional pegboard real estate.

Even though I have only been off for four days it feels like longer due to just how jammed pack those days have been.  On Wednesday night we did some prep for the arrival of the appliances that was scheduled for Thursday.  We got the microwave off the wall after a lot of hassle.  My brief internet research said the wall bracket for the microwave is basically just a lip the back end sits on.  Once the top two bolts are removed it should lift off easily.

Well after removing the bolts I was able to get the microwave to tip down but not pull free from the bracket.  Evidently Maytag for some reason has some additional thin side arms that slide into the microwave that were preventing me from pulling it free.  After a lot of grunting and awkwardly holding the unit by both Cindy and myself I finally got it off the wall. After that frustrating episode we deemed our appliance removal as good enough for the night.

The appliance installers had an install window between 9:30 and 1:30, a wide window.  We were hoping they would arrive early which would allow us to be able to still drive to the east coast in the evening to pick up the new Tacoma.  Cindy left early for her middle school track coaching gig so I got busy doing more appliance removal.  Our purchase at Home Depot supposedly included free installation of the stove and fridge.  The dishwasher and microwave had an extra charge.  I paid to have the dishwasher installed but not for the microwave.  Regardless the delivery/installer services should include pulling the old appliances out.  Well to expedite things I wanted to get the removal out of the way ahead of time.

I was able to get the old stove and dishwasher out to the garage with the help of my handtruck.  I removed the front handles on the fridge but waited for Cindy to get home to get it moved outside due to it’s heavy weight and tight clearance with the front door.  I had already put all of the freezer items in our coolers.  All of the fridge stuff was on the counter.  Once we got the fridge back in the garage we plugged it right back in and put the food back in there for safekeeping until the new Samsung refrigerator was in place.

Just as we were finishing up moving the food to the garage the installers showed, close to the start of their installation window which was awesome.  Both of the guys were very nice and surprised we did the prep work that normally falls on their shoulders.  They wasted no time getting busy.

The install went smoothly.  It was my time to be pleasantly surprised that they installed the new microwave as well, despite me not paying the extra money for the installation.  When we pulled the fridge out it revealed the plastic outlet cover was broken from overly aggressive fridge pushing over the years.  I ran out to the nearby hardware store and got a metal replacement.  By the time I got back home everything but the new fridge was in place.

The installers said in order to get the new fridge in it would be best to pop the hinges on the front door which was easier said than done.  The top two pins came out easily but the bottom pin was tough for them since you can’t get a good swing of a hammer on it.  Some determination and WD-40 eventually broke it loose.  I helped the one guy cart the new fridge although he did most of the grunt work.  My primary role was to make sure the doors stay closed.  Before long they had the fridge up and running.  Both of the guys were really friendly, helpful, and professional.  We gave them whatever cash we had as a tip.

After they left Cindy and I spent a lot of time just admiring our new kitchen hardware.  We liked the contrast with the white cabinets as well as the way it complemented the granite which has a lot of black.  The fridge was especially cool.  Over the weekend Cindy did several reworks of the layout trying to figure out the best way to utilize the large amount of additional space it has.  I had a big pile of manuals on the counter to look through so I had a basic understanding of how all the bells and whistles work.

So I contacted the Delray Toyota dealer and let them know that I indeed would be able to pick up the new truck that evening.  We set a tentative time of 6PM, plenty of time for them to get it all prepped and ready to go.  However before we left Cindy had a dentist appointment in the afternoon.  The plan was for me to take her there so we could leave immediately afterward to save time.  While Cindy was in the chair I ran to the credit union to pull some cash and stopped at Walmart to grab some safety pins for the race I was timing Saturday.

When we left Naples I figured we had plenty of time to get to Delray which according to the GPS should take about 2 hours.  What I didn’t give any thought to was the time of day we were making the trip.  We got onto I-95 right in the heart of rush hour which was miserable.  We had no choice but to sit in stop and go traffic for long periods of time which made the drive 30-45 minutes longer than expected.

Our GPS got us right to the door of the dealership which was visually impressive and huge.  We walked inside the massive showroom and soon met up with Owen, the sales guy assigned to delivering the vehicle.  Up until that point I had dealt with a guy named Tony on the phone and via email as he is the guy assigned to all internet/Costco leads.  Owen was an older, relaxed man with a pleasant demeanor, certainly not the prototypical car salesman template.

After a much needed bathroom break I asked Owen if we could first take the truck for a test drive.  Despite the foregone conclusion I was buying a new Tacoma I had not actually sat behind the wheel of one, I just assumed I would like it.  Owen walked us out the side door where the truck was waiting for us.  It looked awesome in it’s Inferno Orange color scheme.  Cindy had to jump in the back of the access cab which isn’t too bad for someone of her dimensions while Owen rode shotgun.

As I slid into the driver seat for the first time I could not believe how big the truck felt.  It felt tons bigger than my 99 Tacoma, almost as big as a full size truck thanks to the large and in charge hood design.  It feels bigger because it actually is bigger in every dimension.  It’s longer, wider, and sits higher.

I immediately loved the interior complete with the high tech info center that was equipped.  It had all the bells and whistles.  This was a pretty big thing for me.  Yea I had bought a total of 4 new vehicles in my lifetime but the only other time I bought one 100% based on what I wanted was my Pontiac Sunfire GT after my first divorce.  It felt sort of surreal.

The big size of the truck felt a bit disorienting.  Plus I found myself distracted checking out all of the feedback the truck gives you through the two screens, one in the radio position and another integrated into the instrument cluster.  The test drive was a couple miles at most but it was enough to convince me I made a good choice.  Cindy shared my enthusiasm for the truck, she thought it was awesome in pretty much every way.

So when we got back it was time to run some numbers.  This deal was unconventional in several ways.  Not only did I have to drive to the other side of the state to find a Costco affiliated dealer, I had no idea exactly what the truck would cost me since they will not pull out the Costco pricing book until you are inside the dealership.  So Owen brings out the book and we begin the negotiation process which again happens in reverse to what is normal.

Normally you start at the marked up price a dealer has on a vehicle which usually includes their addendum sticker and work down from there.  In our case we started down way low at the Costco member price which according to the book was 1100 under INVOICE, not MSRP, INVOICE.  So I had all of my internet pricing info with me so I immediately knew the invoice pricing they were listing was a little inflated but not much.  However from that number there were additions for stuff like floor mats, nitro filling the tires, and title/tag work which of course were dramatically inflated in pricing.  In addition there was a $799 dealer fee that Owen said was added to every vehicle they sell.  When I asked him what exactly that was for he said prep but admitted that of course there was additional profit taking in there.

So even with this subtraction followed by addition, the out the door pricing was much, much better than any number any other Toyota dealer offered.  They started their pricing at MSRP plus since the Tacomas have been selling very well with the new redesign of the truck this model year.  When I started doing my research I assumed I would be lucky to just get the truck for MSRP.  Even with the overpriced add ons I was still well under MSRP and able to very easily swing into my financial wheelhouse.  Even so I asked Owen if he could do a little better for me.  When he came back with a price 250 bucks less that was good enough, we agreed to the deal and moved on to stage 2.

So I had all my financing in place so I hoped our visit to the F&I guys office would be brief.  Even with my own financing and turning down all the extended warranties and other profit padding options we were in there for a while.  There seems to be a lot more paperwork involved than when I sold cars.  I was signing and initialing for quite a long time.  After we were done it took awhile to track down Owen so we could head out.  He had already attached the license plate and gave me a brief run down of the vehicle although I probably knew as much as he did based on my extensive internet research ahead of time.

When we left the dealership we were both starving and hit a nearby Chipotle to fuel up.  By the time we left the east coast it was quite late.  At least the traffic situation was much better.  The disorientation with the new truck continued on the way home.  It’s bigger dimensions made me feel unsure of my position in a lane.  Once we got back out onto Alligator Alley things were fine.  We didn’t pull back in the driveway until after 11PM, much later than I was expecting.  The garage was in no shape to house the new Tacoma with the old appliances residing there.  Cindy and I planned on working on alternatives over the weekend.  As we were laying in bed we could hardly believe that we got new appliances and a new vehicle, on the east coast no less, the same day.

On Friday I kept busy around the house for a good portion of the day.  Cindy had a fitness class to teach.  I told her to take the new Tacoma since she hadn’t had a chance to drive it yet.  She gave the truck a glowing report card as well.  One of the things I did was list the old appliances on Craigslist, hoping to quickly sell them to reclaim garage space.  I had exactly zero responses from the ad.  Used appliances on CL are a dime a dozen.  I followed up later on in the weekend posting on a local FB yard sale group and at least got some possible interest but as of now all of the appliances are out there.  Although I would like to get a little bit of money to offset the expense if we don’t move them within the next week I have no problem donating them as well.

I also needed to do prep for the race I was timing Saturday.  During the day I met up with John to pick up one of his generators.  The race finish line location had no nearby power available.  I also picked up Sadie for an extended visit while Ali and her boyfriend are up in PA.  I chose to do both of these things in the old Tacoma.  I figured I may as well try to keep the 2016 Tacoma as pristine as possible while I can.

On Saturday morning Cindy and I awoke to the 4:30 alarm clock.  Cindy actually had a track meet she had to attend but she agreed to follow me to the race to help me get as much equipment set up as she could.  The inflatable arch is particularly difficult to get set up solo.  I punched in the address for the race that was on the entry form which took us into the Immokalee Airport access road.  We saw noone around so I called the race director.  He said he was 5 minutes behind me and would be there soon.  We sat for another 10 minutes without seeing him so I called again.  He said he was now there but did not see us.  He described a park where the race was held which was nowhere in sight.  We came back out of the park and used his verbal guidance to get to the right spot.

So the location confusion cost us valuable time since Cindy had to leave asap.  We hustled and got the arch up and running off the generator and most of the other finish line equipment in place before Cindy had to head out.  The morning had a hectic start and it only escalated from there.  The location of the finish line was not good.  It was staged on the main road used for vehicles to park.  I had cars coming back and forth the entire time before the race.

At one point while I was setting more equipment up I heard the generator start to sputter.  Just as I thought to myself, “it better not die”, it of course did, sending the arch quickly to the ground as yet another vehicle was approaching.  I ran over to the generator and realized I did not have the vent on the gas cap turned to the ON position which caused it to shut down.  After opening the vent the generator fired back up on the first pull and was fine the rest of the event. The registration area was at least a couple hundred yards from the finish line which was problematic as well.  I had to go back and forth several times to do data entry while trying to finish the equipment set up at the same time.   I definitely wished I had Cindy there to help me.

So with the vehicle traffic constantly going through the finish line before the race I wasn’t going to put the timing mats in place for a chip start.  The field of runners was small so using just gun time wasn’t a big deal.  As the race was getting ready to start the race director came up and made some announcements on my bullhorn.  He then asked me if I had a starters gun we could use to start the race.  I told him no but the bullhorn had a siren we could use.  I showed him how to start it, assuming he would start the event.  Instead he asked me if I could start the race since he was going to run the race as well. Um ok.  Of course he didn’t realize that I already had a clipboard, my atomic watch, and a stopwatch I utilize when starting a race.  Trying to awkwardly work the siren was not going to be a good thing.  I managed to get the race started in a rather clumsy manner.

So once the runners cleared I had to quickly get the timing mats in place but I had to get the race clock set first.  I had some issues getting it set just right but eventually got it working. I then jumped on the laptop where I have to do stuff like set the time on the timing box.  I was getting no response.  A quick diagnosis revealed that the USB ethernet adapter seemed to not be working.  My only option was to power off the laptop and bring it back up.  By the time I got it back up I getting close to crunch time time-wise.  I quickly set the time on the Ipico box and got everything up and running literally seconds before the first young kid crossed.

So as I started looking at my finish line time reports I noticed something was wrong.  The times on the report were almost a minute more than they should be??  WTF…   So I started to try to figure out the problem.  This was my first timing with the Ipico equipment in roughly a year so I wondered if I missed a step.  Part of the process is setting the time on the laptop to match the time on my atomic synched watch.  The laptop time is then used to set the time on the timing box.  I had set the time on the laptop to match my watch before the race.  Well somehow my shutting off the laptop had caused the time to fall out of synch by almost a minute so I set the time on the box with the incorrect time, causing the problem.  I was luckily able to apply an offset to the finish times to correct the problem.  I was glad I had my new security dvr there to allow me review the time the race winner crossed the line so I could determine exactly how much offset I needed.

The security dvr system also came in handy for environmental conditions.  The way I was facing the rising sun was directly in my face.  The large 27 inch monitor I have attached to the DVR served as a sunvisor.  I spent much of the race ducked down behind it so I could see.

So in the end all of the race results worked out without anyone realizing just how much scrambling I was doing behind the scenes to make it happen.  It also revealed some weak links in my GMT race equipment.  My $149 Asus laptop is going to need to be swapped with something more substantial and I need to get more adept at setting the race clock.  Clean up from the event took FOREVER with me doing it solo.  I bet I spent damn close to an hour just tearing down and putting everything back in the truck.  I pulled off site mentally and physically tired.  Just as a final exclamation point on the morning, I had a hell of a time getting back on Immokalee Road due to a farmers parade going down Main Street.  I probably spent 15 minutes finding a route around it.

By the time Cindy got home I had already finished unloading all of the equipment and had started on post race work like posting results and ripping finish line video.  After we ate lunch turned our attention to the garage.  At first I had given up hope on keeping the new Tacoma housed in the garage.  It’s bigger dimensions would not allow it to fit where the SSR resided.  Initially Cindy’s suggestion of changing the layout of the shelves in there, which meant removing them, was not appealing to me since I hate losing storage options.  However the more I thought about it the more open I was to it.

We first had to get the old appliances moved to the opposite wall as they were sitting where the Tacoma would go.   We then started pulling stuff out of the garage.  Of course this was also an opportunity to purge some shit.  I had a bunch of maintenance items like transmission fluid, air/oil filters, oil and other stuff that were needed for the maintenance of the old Tacoma and the SSR.  Obviously I had no need for these anymore so we deposited them by the curb for someone else to use.  Like I said almost everything was unopened.  We moved some shelves around and completely removed others.  The non-Tacoma side of the garage looked like a mess.

After we got done we did a test park with me backing into the space.  I fit fine but it was tedious backing in there.  We discovered that I could pull in forward and still have enough room to get out of the door once I raised an adjustable shelf on the wall, awesome.  Cindy came up with the good idea to utilize the wall space where the shelf use to reside for extra pegboard space, something I have been in dire need of for many years.  We stopped at that point since we were going to a sweet 16 birthday party for Cindy’s niece.

Even though I knew sweet 16 parties existed I never attended one and I never knew anybody that had one.  I was surprised at the size and scope of it all.  It almost seemed like a mini-wedding reception.  It was held at a cool little marina that I never knew existed.  Of course we cruised there in the new Tacoma.  By Saturday I was finally feeling adjusted to the different driving dimensions and was comfortable on the road.

The party was very cute.  Cindy’s niece is a terrific young lady with a bight future in front of her for sure.  Cindy’s daughter and mom were there as well so we got to hang with them to varying degrees.  We also got to meet Cindy’s brother’s girlfriend who was very nice as well.  I chilled out with four beers to take the edge off.  After the prior three days of go go go it felt good to just sit and chill for a bit.

Despite our high activity level up to that point, Sunday morning Cindy and I decided to get out and run, something that just has not happened on a consistent level for a long time.  We put in a little over 3 miles at the track.  With my lack of running of course I never felt comfortable the entire time but at least I got it done.

When we got home we loaded up Sadie for a ride.  I needed to stop at Home Depot to get stuff to expand the pegboard and a few other things.  Going there when we have Sadie is so much more fun now that we found out she is allowed to shop with us.  The 4×8 piece of pegboard hung out over the edge of the old Tacoma but was held in place by the weight of three bags of mulch pretty securely. We took the old Tacoma, trying to spare the 2016 from unnecessary dirt and labor until necessary.

Most of the remaining daylight hours of Sunday were spent out in the garage getting the new pegboard up.  I had some challenges along the way due to inconsistent stud placement on that wall but I worked around it.  In addition we built a small shelf/table to get back some of the storage capability we lost.  We also hung a tennis ball on a string parking aid we found at HD to make pulling the new Tacoma in far enough a no brainer.  We were both quite pooped when our day’s labor came to an end.  We now are quite anxious to get the old appliances out of there so we can again welcome the Prius back into the garage as well.

Like I mentioned earlier, we had a bunch of stuff by the road to give away.  Late in the day Cindy noticed like it looked like it was scattered.  We walked down there and saw a big freaking mess.  Some idiot ran off the side of the road and into the various bottles of automotive products.  In particular it looked like he squarely ran over one of the full bottles of tranny fluid, causing it to spray all over the other items, ruining them.  The only good news I could see was the spray pattern included a good portion of the road as well so I hope the asshole has transmission fluid dissolving his paint as we speak.

Of course I would be remiss to not mention the celebrity deaths over the weekend.  Chyna, one of the first big name female WWE stars died at the young age of 45.  Her death was quickly overshadowed by the shocking death of Prince who was 57, far outside of normal dying range.  It sounds like there are some odd circumstances in the week or two leading up to his death which I am sure will be beaten to death in the media.  Regardless of how it happened he was an extremely talented performer and musician that in my book gave Michael Jackson a run for his money.  I hate being old enough that famous people I grew up with that aren’t that much than older me are dying off. RIP Prince (and Chyna).

I also have forgot to mention my thoughts about the Eagles big move, trading what many (including myself) think was too much to move from the number 8 position to number two in the upcoming NFL draft.  The team is presumably going to pick one of the top two projected QB ‘s in the draft and at this point it seems it will be the kid from North Dakota, Carson Wentz.  This move concerns me on several levels.

If the Eagles were already holding the number 2 pick and wanted to draft the kid I guess I would be ok with it.  To be successful every team needs a franchise QB eventually and the Eagles don’t think they have one currently on their roster.  I agree with them.  However to trade 5 picks to move down 6 spots to get this kid seems really, really stupid.  How often do early pick QB’s fall on their face?  The answer is all the time.  More of them fail than succeed.  To compound that, they are giving this up for a QB that played at a small school that faces a competition level far less than bigger programs go up against.  Expecting him to jump from that scenario to play in the NFL where the talent level is magnified many times over seems like a stretch to me.  When you factor in giving up all those picks it all just makes little sense to me.

Last year when Chip Kelly made all of those questionable moves, I said I thought they were bad decisions (which they obviously were), but I hoped he would prove me wrong.  Once again I am hoping Howie Roseman turns out to be some sort of super genius and Carson Wentz proves to be the Eagles franchise QB for the next decade or more but I have a bad feeling it’s not going to be the case and cost us dearly in future draft talent to boot.

The next several days are going to have a lot of “newness” in them.  It appears that April is the month where big shit happens.  Last year in April we built the chicken coop and run and redid all of the flooring in the house.  This year April is going to contain a new set of kitchen appliances and potentially a new Tacoma.

I received a surprise call yesterday from the Toyota dealer in Delray, saying the truck I have a deposit on showed up a full week early.  He asked me when I wanted to pick it up.  I told him tentatively I may be able to pick it up on Thursday since I was already going to be off for appliance delivery.

Of course that all depends on what time of day the appliances show up, if they show up at all.  Although my online order status still shows a delivery date of April 21st, it also shows it as “Being processed” which it has shown since the order was placed Sunday.  The lack of change in that status has me concerned.  They are supposed to call the day before to give a four hour delivery window so if I don’t hear anything by mid-day I will call in and speak to a human about it.  The idea of scoring new appliances AND a new truck on the same day is pretty crazy.

On the old truck front I got my 99 Tacoma back yesterday, picking it up on the way home last night. When I got in the truck I saw an empty Diet Coke can in the cupholder which I gave to the manager with a look of stink eye.  I also had the pleasant smell of cigarette smoke lingering in the cab.  The truck drove fine on the way home with the temperature needle staying dead middle as it should.

When I got home I looked under the hood at their handy work.  It looks like they topped off my fluids which I guess is nice.  They must have overfilled the power steering fluid a bit as the top of the casing was wet.  I also thought the $1500 I paid for the work would have included removal of the stickers on the new top and lower radiator hoses.  I guess that is an extra charge.  Despite these minor annoyances I was glad the Tacoma was back in action and ready for a thorough cleaning to prepare it for sale.

I am hoping having the pump and timing belt freshly done will be a strong selling point for the truck as it was the only major obstacle from the truck logging it’s next 100,000 miles.  When I priced 99 Tacomas on Craigslist I was surprised just how much money they are pulling.  I saw multiple trucks with more miles and less equipment listed at 5K or more.  I originally thought I would be happy with getting 4k for it.  Now it looks like that should be the bottom of the range I should expect.

Since I had all this new stuff potentially going on I went ahead and took Friday off as well, giving me schedule flexibility if I need it.  Even if I get it all done Thursday, then I have Friday to play with my new toys.  It will be like Christmas in spring.

Last night I did some more prep work related to the race I am supposed to be timing on Saturday.  I also received a new 23″ monitor I ordered to use on the security dvr for races.  After I unpacked it a thought popped into my head.  Cindy has dual monitors on her computer, an older 27 inch monitor and a 23 inch Acer that looked nearly identical to what I just bought.  Having the two mis-matched monitors on her desk was a bit clumsy.  The 27 incher is a few years old and as a result was physically much bigger than the slim bezel models today.

I asked Cindy what she would think of matching 23 inch monitors instead. She liked the idea.  Not only will matching monitors be more visually appealing, it also would allow her to regain a substantial amount of desk space.  After I finished swapping out the monitors Cindy went on a desk organization mission.  The end result is definitely an improvement.

Tomorrow I will have a bunch of prep to do to clear out the kitchen for the new appliances.  Getting the old fridge out is going to be a large challenge.  If I remember correctly to get it into the house we had to pull the front door off 11-12 years ago.

This was an arduous weekend as expected.  It started immediately on Friday evening with me working at one of our branches to almost 9PM.  It was frustrating because the majority of the time was spent standing around while state installers tried to figure out issues beyond our scope of work.  When I got home Cindy and I did a late pizza dinner.

Saturday morning I had to head out relatively early for the track meet.  I threw a few items in the back of the Tacoma and headed out.  There was a slight chill in the air so I turned the heat on low.  Usually the truck warms up pretty quickly so when I was a couple miles from the house and still felt no heat I glanced at the temperature gauge.  My panic level went from 0 to 100 when I see the needle pegged into the red area, wtf??

I pulled off at the next intersection and turned the truck off.  I popped the hood and looked for anything obvious.  No hoses or belts were broken but I did see what looked like coolant on the bottom of the motor, great.  I immediately wondered if it was somehow related to my thorough degreasing of the engine compartment although further mental analysis deemed that unlikely. So I turned the truck back on and babied it back home with the gauge buried the entire time.  Luckily despite the high temps the engine seemed to be running ok. I had the heat on full blast.  For brief intervals hot air would come out of the vents but it would then go back to cold.

When I got home I quickly took another look under the hood.  There was a pretty steady stream of watery brown liquid dripping from the engine.  At that point I was pretty sure my water pump had failed.  Of course I had no time to do anything further.  Cindy helped me throw my stuff into the Prius and I was back on the road.  When I got on site I asked Cindy to see if she could use her USAA membership to get the truck towed to the Tuffy where I have had work done before.  Luckily she was able to make the arrangements for a tow.

I called to Tuffy ahead of time to let them know the truck was on it’s way.  I was familiar with what is required to change the water pump on this motor,  it isn’t pretty and very labor intensive, way beyond what I am comfortable doing.  I knew this was going to be a big repair bill which of course is terrible timing since I planned to sell the truck within the next 30 days if things go as planned.  When the garage called me later in the day the estimate was even higher than I expected, $1500.  He said when you tear it down to replace the water pump you should replace the rubber timing belt as well, which I already knew.  I had it done once already at about the 100k mark.  Since the Tacoma was now at almost 190k miles it should be done anyway.  I told them to go ahead with the work.  I couldn’t believe the bad timing of the pump failure as I hung up the phone. Although in a weird way, if I sold the truck and the pump failed shortly thereafter I would feel badly for the buyer so at least it will be addressed now and perhaps I can use the repair as a basis for a couple hundred bucks more in the sale price.

So even with having to switch vehicles I got on site at the track meet on time, right around 8:30.  It turns out I probably could have showed up an hour or so later since the first action wasn’t until close to 11.  Before the main preliminary heats started I went to the snack stand to grab some food.  I went with something simple, a toasted plain bagel with peanut butter.  Instead fo applying the pb yourself they do it for you.  I thought that was nice, until I got it.

The bagel was wrapped in tin foil.  When I opened it up it was a brown runny mess.  It looks like the woman was overly generous with the creamy Jif and encasing the warm bagel inside the tin foil encouraged further melting.  My hands and face were disgusting after eating the bagel.  I went into the bathroom and tried to wash up the best I could.

This was a district track meet which is a big deal.  It also means it takes up big blocks of time.  I knew the meet was going to be long, I didn’t realize it was going to that long.  By the time we got off site it was 7PM.  By the time I got home it was almost exactly a 12 hour day.  My free time is way more valuable than the relatively small amount of pay track timers receive.  As a result I don’t expect to be doing it in the future.  Backing up the long day at the track with the late night at the office the night before made my weekend feel very consumed.

On Sunday morning we went out to Home Depot and brought Sadie along as she was visiting for the weekend.  We didn’t have anything specific to buy, I wanted to go to take a closer look at appliances, comparing models and getting ballpark pricing.  With the rows and rows of appliances it was somewhat difficult to keep straight all of the options.  One thing that was clear that it was a decent time to buy as it was Home Depot’s spring Black Friday sale where they take 10% off all appliances over 400 bucks, even if they are on sale already.  We walked out of the store not buying a single thing.  I am not sure if that has ever happened.

So while we were there we did identify what we liked and disliked.  When we got home I did further looking on the Home Depot web site.  I found the fridge we liked, a Samsung model with tons of bells and whistles.  I added it to my online cart just for fun.  When I did I saw the site popped up a window showing the matching Samsung appliances for the other kitchen pieces, like the dishwasher, stove and microwave.  Being able to easily browse them was great and a convenience we couldn’t do nearly as easily inside the brick and mortar store.

With Cindy’s help we went through each one and again added them to the cart, wanting to see the numbers.  Of course the same discounts applied online.  The grand total with tax and delivery (free) was a number well within the ballpark of what I was expecting to spend so I made the decision to convert from browsing to buying.  If things go as indicated online the new appliances should be in the house on Thursday.

We decided to go with all black appliances, the polar opposite of the all white appliances that have adorned the kitchen since the house was built some 16 years ago.  We think they will contrast nicely with the white cabinets and pick up very nicely on the black in the granite counter tops.  When I told Jeremy about the purchase he immediately said I should go with stainless steel instead as it is viewed by many as the gold standard.  I tried explaining to him I wasn’t looking to flip the house and if I prefer black, I am going to go with black.  I am confident it will look very slick.  I have never been one that is much interested in whole heartedly embracing the mainstream anyway.

So despite a large deficit in relaxation time in the weekend I filled my Sunday with more work.  I weed whacked the property to match the mowing Cindy had done on Saturday.  Mid-afternoon I decided to take a shot at getting the security dvr cables up the wall and into the attic.  My only access to the attic on the office side of the house is via a small door in the hobby room closet.  To get access to it required getting a shelf and everything on it out of the way.

Once I gained access and dropped the hatch my first visual was rolled up insulation that was covering the opening.  I was able to push it out of the way enough to get a look around.  Most of the area I needed to work in was covered with a foot or two of the blow in insulation.  Before venturing up in the attic I made sure I had on long pants and a long sleeve t-shirt to protect from the incessant irritation home insulation can cause.  In addition I had a paper air mask to keep me from inhaling tons of dirt and whatever else resides up there.  Of course it was quite warm in the attic since the afternoon temps hit the mid-80’s.

So I was very paranoid about inadvertently putting my foot through the ceiling.  I drug my body across some of the angled roof trusses to keep myself suspended the entire time.  Of course this resulted in my chest having almost brush burn like redness after I was done.  So I located the wood stud on top of the wall.  I started tapping on it so Cindy could verify I was in the right spot.  I then used a 1 1/2″ wood boring bit to punch a hole in the wood that seemed to be at least 4 inches thick.  I used my wire snake to fish down behind the drywall.  Cindy again verified she could hear the wire come down in the right spot.

I emerged from the hot attic covered in insulation.  I used the same drill bit to pop a hole in the drywall at about the same height as the other outlets.  I returned to the attic and moved the snake wire around until Cindy could grab it.  Once she did I came back down, taped the DVR wires to the snake and then returned one final time to the hot crawl space and pulled the wires successfully into the attic.  Due to time and patience restraints that was all the further the project progressed for now.  The next step will be more miserable crawling in the attic to the corners of the roof line to punch a hole where the wiring can connect up with the externally mounted cameras.  I can hardly wait.

Last night we had our second Tarpons game to attend in as many weeks.  The attendance was even less than the first week.  The game at least was more competitive, the Tarpons only won by around 20 points.

Today Cindy dropped me off at work since we only have one vehicle in the household currently.  If it was a year or so ago I would have had two spare vehicles to chose from in this situation.

I made a last minute decision to take last Friday off.  Of course as is often the case, the day was targeted as an opportunity to do more work around the house as opposed to relaxation.  There were two projects on the agenda for Friday,rebuilding the door to the chicken run and laying castle stones.

Before we got to work I drove Cindy to the fitness center where she has been teaching classes.  While she taught the half hour class I walked to the Pet Supermarket right up the street to grab some stuff for Tuki.  On the way home we stopped at Home Depot to grab another pallet of 60 castle stones.

The original door to the chicken run was built out of 2×4’s with hardware cloth.  In the year it has been in place the 2×4’s have started to warp which was making the door difficult to close and left uneven gaps around the opening.  A couple weeks ago Cindy and I bought a gate kit that is designed to fit a variety of openings.  It is basically a steel frame that you attach your own lumber to.  Having the core of the gate being steel should prevent the warping problem.

Assembly of the new door was not hard but it took me much longer than the one hour time listed on the box of course. The extra time was spent mostly coming up with the face board layout and adjusting the opening to allow for maximum swing.  We discovered that if you close the door while inside the run you were potentially locked in due to the new latch arrangement. Cindy came up with an emergency string set up that will allow us to open the latch from the inside, just in case.  We were both very pleased with the new door as it looked good and felt very sturdy.

While I was working on the door Cindy was busy doing the preliminary placement of another big load of castle stones.  Originally we were going to line the rock area with the smaller castle stones but I reconsidered when I stood out there and looked at the area again.  Visually I thought it would look better to use the same size/style of stone we had on the pool border. The larger size of the castle stone would also provide a better barrier to stones kicked around by the chickens. By the end late afternoon rolled around both Cindy and I were beat.

As we were cleaning up Cindy took notice of a bird circling over the back yard that at first looked like a hawk.  She said she saw it dive bombing something in the back yard.  It’s flying pattern looked very non-hawk-like to me.  We found out later it was probably a Cara Cara which is a type of falcon.

Cindy saw the small animal still moving in the yard so I said we should go out and see what it is.  I told Cindy I was worried it could be a baby bird as in the past there have been some ground nesting birds in the back yard.  My fear was confirmed when we saw a small baby bird struggling in the grass.  I didn’t see any blood but it seemed like the falcon damaged it’s wing.  It was a small turtle dove, a very common bird on our property.

As we got close the little bird jumped and carried on, afraid we were yet another predator.  Cindy and I had a very brief discussion about what to do.  Cindy asked if we should just let nature take it’s course.  I of course did not like that option and said we should try to do something.  Although the bird was injured it didn’t seem like a fatal injury.  Cindy carefully picked up and held the bird as I put some shavings in a rubbermaid bin to hold it temporarily.  The little guy carried on a little bit but seemed to settle down once he realized we weren’t trying to harm it.

Cindy called the local animal conservancy and found out she could still drop the bird off today.  We pulled out one of the small bird animal carriers in the shed to put the baby in.  Cindy drove the bird there while I finished clean up from the projects.  I really appreciated Cindy going out of her way to take the little bird in.  The good news was the people at the conservancy said they think he will recover from his injury.

Speaking of birds we had been noticing some weird behavior from one of our black hens, Cupcake.  She had been spending tons of time in the nesting box.  A couple times we found her in the nesting box at night even.  In addition Cindy noticed she was missing some feathers on her belly.  We were worried she had some sort of health problem so we looked up the symptoms online.  What we discovered was she was healthy but was exhibiting “broody” behavior.

When a hen becomes broody that means they are wanting to hatch baby chicks.  As a result they will sit on eggs, even unfertilized ones endlessly, hoping they will hatch.  We read that the hen will actually pull it’s own feathers off it’s belly to expose skin to facilitate more heat transfer to the eggs.  When chickens get broody they can become more ill tempered and will sometimes stop laying eggs.  Their broodiness can also become somewhat contagious, making other hens become broody as well.

Typically a broody chicken will snap out of it after 3 weeks.  You can try to shorten that time span by removing the hen from the nesting box which we have been doing when we see her camping out there.  In addition over the weekend we have been putting Cupcake in the old chicken tractor and run to isolate her from the other hens while giving her plenty of room to roam around if she chooses.  Even in the tractor she has been spending most of the time up top in the boxes, trying to hatch babies that will never come.  It is a bit sad in a way but hopefully she will snap out of it sooner rather than later.

On Saturday we had our second day of mostly hard labor.  Cindy and I swapped places, she worked on doing the finish work on the new door, sanding and painting it.  I was on my knees leveling the castle stones.  After looking at how the stone was sitting currently, taking note of any forward or side lean I would pull it out and then throw down some paver base.  I would then use my level to make sure the front and back of the stone was more or less even with the previous stone.  It didn’t take real long for each stone but when you have to do it 60 times it added up to a nice tedious session of work.  When I was done Cindy and I both were glad we went with the same style stone we used for the pool area.  It just looked good.  Now that we have solid barriers in place we can get more rock/rubber mulch to even out the area the chickens have excavated.

On Saturday night we were both beat from two days of yard work.  We stayed home and watched our latest Netflix rental, “Burnt”.  It seemed like it was almost a Gordon Ramsey biography, complete with a a loud mouth chef that threw things and swears a lot.  It just had nothing all that interesting going on.  I’d give it a B- rating.  Cindy rated it lower.

On Sunday I was determined to not have the last day of my three day weekend be another labor intensive workfest.  The temperatures Sunday morning were surprisingly cool, in the mid-50’s to start.  Despite us both feeling sore, I pushed for us to do a bike ride, the shorter 20 mile back and forth to Dunkin Donuts.

I mounted my GoPro to the drops on my handlebar to capture the ride from a unique 1080P perspective.  When I reversed the camera direction for part of the return ride I got a lot more crotch and a lot less of Cindy than I intended.  As is normally the case with this route, on the way there we enjoyed getting pushed by a tailwind and on the way back we fought against the same wind in our face.  With the cool temperatures it made the ride more or less enjoyable overall, way better than the 30+ mile hot and humid Ave Maria ride when Randall visited a couple weeks ago.  Even with the modifications I made to my Trek, raising the handle bars and adding aero bars, my $300 Dawes still is more comfortable for me to log miles on, despite it’s much heavier weight.

During Sunday afternoon we did actually get to chill out a little bit.  I hung the hammock I bought Cindy for Christmas and pulled over a chair next to it.  I read a little bit while Cindy was on the iPad.  It was such a beautiful day.  A couple times Cindy and I looked upon the various fruits of our labor with pride.  We really have done a lot.

We had our first Tarpons game of the year on Sunday.  The 5:30 start time was a bit odd but it worked out well as far as the chicken bedtime goes, we would be home shortly after they go into the coop for the night.   This is my 4th year as a Tarpons season ticket holder.  I was hoping that perhaps this was the year that fan attendance finally picked up.  When we sat down we quickly saw that was not the case.  We were literally the ONLY two people in our entire section.  If I were to estimate, maybe 300-400 people total were there.

Things really hadn’t changed much in other areas either.  They had the same silly contests, the same low rent small cheerleading squad, and a product on the field that was less than exciting.  The Tarpons did not really play that well.  Their QB Chris Wallace looked fatter than ever and made a bunch of bad throws, repeatedly missing open receivers.  Despite this they still crushed their opposition, 65-22.  Hopefully this isn’t another season of lopsided blowouts.  I find it to hard to believe that the team has made it to a 4th year.  They HAVE to be bleeding money at this point. Somehow after going to see the Tarpons for going on 4 years I still underdressed for the game.  I was frozen due to the ice rink being under the football field.  I will be wearing long pants from now on.

The big highlight of the game for us came very early.  The Central Florida Jaguars QB overthrew his receiver, sending the ball into the floor area just over the wall.  One of the Tarpons DB had half flipped over the wall trying to defend the pass.  He stretched far to reach the ball and then flipped it to me since we were literally the only fans in the area which was cool.  I am now the owner of TWO game balls after catching another a couple years ago.  I am sure they will be collector items someday, not. We got home around 8:15, leaving mid 4th quarter when the game outcome was already decided.

It was obviously a very busy three day weekend.  Maybe sometime in the future I will actually feel caught up on home projects.  I just don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel anytime soon.

On Saturday morning Cindy was coaching at her first track meet, leaving me alone to run wild at the house.  I did a number of chores around the house including having all four of my cleaning robots running simultaneously scrubbing/vacuuming all of the flooring.  I then decided I was going to head out to Home Depot.

Cindy and I decided we were going to add an extra level of castle stone to the landscaped border around the pool.  We are both sick and tired of the chickens going into the area and kicking the rubber mulch out into the grass.  It has become a constant see saw of work.  So our thought was adding the second layer of stone would be enough of a wall to deflect their shrapnel back into the bed where it belongs.

Cindy had counted and we needed a little more than 90 of the 12 inch stones to do the second layer (we already had bought a few).  I had bought these stones in bulk once before and just had them bring them out on a pallet which I requested once again.  The immense weight immediately bottomed out the Tacoma’s suspension.  I am sure I was well over the posted maximum payload of 1700 pounds.  I drove very conservatively on the way home.

On the drive home my cell phone rang from an Oregon number.  It was a guy named Al that was calling about the SSR.  He had not seen the ad on Craigslist.  In fact he didn’t see any ads at all.  He was called about it from one of the main guys from SSR Fanatics.  On Friday I decided to also post my truck on their forum for sale.  I didn’t expect a lot from the posting but obviously I was wrong.  Al was called because the SSRF guy (Dick) knew he was looking for a 6 speed truck.    So anyway Al said he could leave Cape Coral right away to come see the truck so I told him to come on down.

When he showed up I was a bit shocked to see ANOTHER SSR parked in the driveway.  I had no idea he already had an SSR, a 2004 with a slick custom paint job.  He actually has owned his truck for 4 or 5 years but he was interested in a 6 speed.  Since Dick has met me and worked on my truck at a few of the meet ups he personally vouched for my truck, letting Al know it was nice.

Al was like the vast majority of SSR owners I have met, of retirement age and very nice.  Of course I didn’t have to give him a walk through of the truck like I did last week since he was already very familiar with the vehicles obviously.  When I told him some of the upgrades I had done like the LS7 Corvette clutch swap he knew exactly what it was and why it was a good thing.  We went on a decent test drive and he confirmed he liked the truck, just like Dick said he would.  Unlike last week where the buyer was all about lowballing, Al was fine paying my asking price, his background as a SSR owner made my price fair to him when compared to other trucks out there.

After the test drive Al hung at the house for quite awhile talking with Cindy and I.  Most of the conversation was not SSR related at all, just exchanging snippets of our background.  Al has been retired since he was 55 and spends 3 months out of the year living on his boat in Oregon.  It sounded like he was very fortunate the way things fell in place for him when retirement came around and he was grateful for it.  So we got around to making plans for the sale.  He left me a check for a deposit and said to call him Sunday after he checked his calendar to see when we could do the sale.

We worked it out that I am leaving work early today to get it all done.  I brought the SSR to work and will be driving it to Al’s house with Cindy following me in the Tacoma.  We will then leave the truck there and head to the bank and DMV office to finalize the paperwork.  It will feel weird for sure to walk away from the R but it is offset by getting much more money for it than I was willing to accept a few days prior.  It’s funny how things work out.  It’s also funny that Al will have two SSR’s in his driveway until he manages to sell his 2004. 🙂

After Al left I wasted little time heading outside to work on the 2nd level of our castle stone border.  Cindy and I first unloaded all of the stones, putting them in place on the wall where they would go.  It was only temporary as I needed to go stone by stone and reset both the first and second layer.  When I originally put the castle stone in place I just used the sandy soil as the base under the wall.  Over time areas of the wall have shifted as a result.  A good number of the stones had a slight downward facing angle which looked shitty.

Along with the pallet of stone I also bought 6 bags of substrate normally used under a paver installation.  The substance was basically very small stones, designed to give a firm base to support the blocks.  I began a very arduous process of pulling up each and every stone and re-leveling it, using the stone base to provide support.  It was not enjoyable as you can imagine.  Most of the work required me to be on my knees which gets painful very quickly.  I just kept my blinders on and focused on getting done.  Before I called it quits for the day I had about 75% of the wall complete which was cool.

We cleaned up and headed out to Germain arena for an Everblades game.  We had not gone to see the local minor league hockey team for a couple years.  I saw it was Star Wars night so I thought it would be fun to go.  When we got there the parking lot was pretty full, something we arent used to with the sparsely attended Tarpons games we are used to.

As we walked up to the ticket window I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw signs on the window saying SOLD OUT. WTF?  Germain seats between 5000-6000 people I could hardly believe the game would be sold out.  Cindy and I looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders.

Just as we were ready to start walking back to the parking lot a couple behind us stopped us.  The man said he had spare tickets and we could have a couple of them.  I told him I would gladly pay for them.  He said to not worry about it they were already paid for by his business.  Cindy and I could hardly believe our good fortune.  When we got inside I tried to repay their kindness to at least a small degree by buying the guy a beer.  It’s always nice to confirm that not all people are assholes.

Now I am the farthest thing from a hockey fan you can get but it was still fun to be at a live game.  I downed a couple large Shocktop drafts to help up the fun level.  We also enjoyed chowing down on our standard arena menu of pizza, a soft pretzel and roasted nuts.  At the end of the second period Cindy wasn’t feeling great after downing her alcoholic cider.  The home team was down 2-0 at that point.  I told Cindy I was fine heading out and although she didn’t want to be the impetus to leave I could tell she liked the idea.  After thanking the couple once again for their generosity we headed out.  I saw later the Everblades wound up losing 2-1.

On Sunday morning there was no way I felt like running/riding after the block work Saturday afternoon.  Plus I wanted to take advantage of the cooler morning temperatures to finish up the wall.  Of course I was just a little short of what I needed to finish so Cindy and headed out for yet another Home Depot trip.  We grabbed more castle stone as well as 12 more border stones that looked like smaller cousins of castle stone.  We wanted to lay them down as a test in the rock border area to see how they look.  Unfortunately the chickens have no problems kicking small river rock out of a landscape bed either.  Cindy has been putting the displaced stones back in place several times a week.  Surprisingly the chickens don’t listen when we ask them to stop scratching in those areas. 🙂

When we got back I finished up the main wall.  Both Cindy and I liked the finished product and we have not seen any projectile mulch clear the wall since it was extended.  We laid down the smaller stone border on a small section of the river rock bed and it looked good.  Although it is significantly smaller than castle stone in height we are thinking it should be high enough to block the stones since they won’t fly as far as mulch.

I was pooped from the labor that covered portions of both days of the weekend.  Late in the afternoon I decided to finally get to making a video that told the story regarding my drone prosecution.  Although I kept the video pretty in the middle, not trash talking the NPS tactics as much as I could have, I wanted to get a video out there shining a light on what happened.  Perhaps the same ranger that thought it was fair game to ruin my Xmas holiday will stumble across this video as well.  Hopefully it makes him sleep better at night.

The video is about 15 minutes long.  I don’t believe I have ever talked at that length on film at one shot.  As expected there are some stumbles along the way but all in all I give a pretty clear outline of what went down and why I feel it was handled poorly.

I am a big fan of the spring time change which allows me to get stuff done after work outside during the week instead of having to stuff it all into the weekend.  Last night I took advantage of the extra time and headed outside to weed whack the property, something that hasn’t been done in well over a month.  Cindy had just mowed the property during the afternoon so capping it off with proper weed whacking left the yard looking nicely manicured and added to my “get stuff done” quota for the day.

Yesterday I managed to complete the migration of my old emails, some dating all the way back to 2000 to my Office 365 email account.  Basically the way I made it work was to configure my local mail client, in my case Outlook 2013 to connect to both my old and new accounts and then move emails/folders between the two accounts.  This should also be able to be accomplished by backing up your old emails to a PST file and then importing it into your new account but for some odd reason the PST export would fail on my old stuff.  Regardless, duf.net email is up and running on Office 365 and all is well.

So you may recall that I have not one but TWO Ring smart doorbells in my household, one at the front door and another on the chicken coop.  Well now down the road I can see the potential for adding a 3rd.  Ring just introduced a new model, the Ring Pro which is smaller, has higher resolution video (1080P vs 720p), 5G wireless band support for faster network connection, and custom motion zones where you can literally draw what areas you want monitored instead of the more vague zones it utilizes now.  The only negative is the device does not have an internal battery so it must be hard wired to power, unlike the current model of Ring.

In addition to the new model, they are introducing a new feature for all Rings where you can click into a live video feed whenever you want, instead of just when someone presses the button or when motion is detected.  It will be a cool way to check in whenever I feel like it. I am a big Ring fan.

Today is St Patricks Day and thanks to the effort of Cindy I actually wore green to work.  Ironically most years I make no effort to wear green on the holiday despite my very Irish name.  It’s actually hard for me to not wear green as it is the color that dominates my shirt collection.  I will however continue my tradition of not drinking any alcohol on a holiday that is all about inebriation.   It’s just the contrarian in me teaming up with my inner hermit.