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Showing posts from July, 2006

Biscotti

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Spent the last couple of days painting the top portion of the main house. Not making any money on this job. It's been very windy, with the occasional rain shower so I have to pick my times carefully. I am using an acrylic latex and have to make sure that the weather stays above 11 degrees for a couple of days. I know when I used the same type of paint and primer on the windows last year I didn't pay attention to that and now I have to scrape them off and start again. I will be using an oil based paint on them this time. The "shingles" are actually aluminum siding and the roof of course is metal with baked on finish. I guess someone had a big sale on siding about thirty years ago. I have to treat the roof with muriatic acid and pressure wash first to get rid of any rust and chalking. It will sure look a lot better. We've been having a debate on which colour to paint the lower gable roofs - same as the siding or green like the roof will be. Jo coloured in

Cow Whisperer

Sermon on the mou-ooooo-nt..... Now Brethren, I know the way is hard but salvation commeth. You can steak your faith in these words. Any time these cows see a truck they come a running, just in case the farmer is delivering some goodies. In this case I was delivering some culverts to do some road repairs. And a piece of pipe for the new pond. Later we saw them moodling all over the pipes like some bovine civil inspectors. Who say's just cats are curious. Actually I think cows are some of the best Civil engineers on the planet. Just have a look at some of the Cow ways on the property. Arrow straight, low grades, and the shortest distance between point "hay" and where they want to be..

Heat Wave

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We're sitting on the veranda enjoying the shade and breeze. Ostensibly I am taking a break from setting up the front of the house for painting. Tying off ladders getting the extension ready for my power washer. In reality I am futzing about. I haven't been making a lot of time to do that lately as I have been painting a commercial space in Fraser Lake. So I am really enjoying this. Jo-Ann too. Drinking some peach tea. Doing an experiment, really, on what cools you down faster in hot weather - a hot cup of tea or an ice cold glass of lemonade. Lots of theorys out there. Stir-fried a head of lettuce and a zuchinni from the tire patch it was wonderful. Needed some oyster sauce, some chicken and a tablespoon of honey. I have this fantasy where I can do that and only have to buy the Oyster sauce. ( unless I can figure out how to grow fresh water oysters..) Twice a week I go to a meeting in a Church in town. We get pretty cheap rent and the place was starting to look a li

Gettin' up in the World

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I am painting a place in town. It has a 12' ceiling which is just to high for my extended arm and spraygun. So I tried out these drywall stilts. Great Idea, but takes a bit of practice. My brother Tom is an expert on them. I have even seen him doing the twist on him. I will need a bit of practice, but a great way to be Nine feet tall. Got up this morning and perused the garden and look at this radish! It was pretty good - nice and crisp, kinda hot. My lettuce tastes like dandelion greens, a bit bitter. Don't know what that's all about. I think it's their attitude. And their gonna have to want to change. Might try some tommorrow cooked with oyster sauce. Had a great day rockhounding this Sunday. We visited some nice country, and made a major find. A couple of huge seams of common opal. Dark brown to white. A lot of it is fractured which is a thing with common opal, but a lot of the small pieces would make some nice cabochons. The big white piece is about 3

How's it goin' Mate?

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Guess who's birthday it is today ...... MINE !!! My daughter Sara sent me this very cool hat, along with a new toy for Xena. I love my new hat and Xena loves her new toy! She's already christened it in the only mud puddle in our driveway. Thanks, Sara and Kevin! Of course, the box got a good working over on the way home from the post office. I guess Xena couldn't wait for me to open it myself. She was just helping, I know.

Somethings on my Mind

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When I was a kid I always wanted a Davey Crocket coonskin hat. Here I decided to settle for second best. Yesterday was a doozey. The deck stain still wasn't dry so it'll have to wait untill the guests depart from the great Rockhound barbeque before doing coat number two. Did add a bunch more flashing on the front. Big improvement. Also got the shed trim finished. Today just finish painting the house jacks - the metal posts at the front that helped adjust the house as the logs settled. They will eventually be replaced with Burls or Logs. And doing some Ikibana, if I can find my frogs.. Oh, and relax with some friends. I'm sure I know how to do that.

Watching Paint Dry

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Well, stain actually. Yesterday I finished staining the burls and then put a coat of ceder oil based transparent stain on the new deck. When I went out this morning it was still tacky in places. I was planning on putting on another coat today. Scratch that Idea. Supposed to take 16 hours to recoat. But I guess that would be with normal temperatures. It's 6:30 am now and just twelve degrees. Oh well, progress not perfection. Maybe I will try and get some trim painting done on the Storage shed. And cut the grass. I have this vision of spending the day on my new deck and just--well relaxing.

What List?

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Well scratch that list. My Brother Tom showed up again and decided to sculpt the veranda logs so that you can see over the top while sitting in a lawn chair. And for good measure we finished off the burls on the deck. Added one at the entry and one more on the West end. He's a Maestro with a chain saw. Well he's been building log cabins (Tiny's Log homes) since the Seventies. With the new deck the place is starting to look pretty spiffy. Just intime for the Rockhound Barbeque this weekend. Today I am going to treat the wood so that I can stain it tommorrow. I had to do some crack filling with wood putty and one log had a narrow strip of dry rot when we lowered it. I have some pretty neat stuff from Perma Chink that turns rotton wood into solid stuff. Pretty handy on a log home. I will build it back up now that it's stabilized with a type of wood plasticine from the same company. Patience was never one of my virtues. But with a project this size you either have i

Deck the Halls

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Well, actually its deck the Veranda. Yesterday was Deck Day. One of the last "Big" projects was the outside veranda decking on the main house. It was just 1/2 inch rough plywood on 2 X 10 joists with 16" centres. The final straw was when I found myself stepping in the "right" places to avoid the parts that felt spongy. I don't think it would have made another winter without haveing to be totally ripped up and replaced. I gave it a coat of waterproofing first. It sucked up about three gallons of preservative. Then my brother showed up at 5:00 a.m. yesterday and we started laying down 2 X 6 tongue and groove pine decking. The early start was to avoid the heat of the day. Like all 29 degrees of it. I don't think people here are used to any kind of heat. We're at 3000 feet and 54 degrees latitude which tends to keep things fairly cool in my books. It's been overcast also. A lot of Forest Fires burning in the Area from here to Tumbler ri