Slow Week between Christmas and New Year's Day

<--OSHA Babe's next conquest
View from the East with no pecan leaves

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Visitor showing Big Red Support

FOR THE WEEK ENDING December 31, 2006

HIGHLIGHTS

1. Despite good intentions, the plumbing work planned for Saturday, Dec. 30, had to be delayed. My neighbors were ready to go and showed up early Saturday morning with the news that the supply house was closed for the New Year's weekend. We're tentatively on for next weekend.

2. Electrical work is winding down. Jimmy has the lights on, new outlets in, switches relocated. It is a pleasure to have him work around the house. He is in his mid 60's and has an interesting story about how hard work and determination over the course of a lifetime has paid off.

3. Window repair was a major effort this week. (Glass is more expensive than I thought - $3-4 per sq ft for normal single pane glass vs. $11 per sq ft for "restoration" glass.) One window in the master bedroom now has a full pane of glass in it for the first time in who knows how many years. A window pane in the kitchen was also replaced. Additionally, our visitor this week, Bill Dranselka, helped replace some window weight ropes in one of the front upstairs rooms. We worked on two sets of windows. The first one took us 2.5 hours. The second one took us 45 minutes. Who says experience isn't worth much?

4. OSHA Babe has started a new area of focus. The interior door in the picture above is 9 ft. tall and has 18 panes. One pane has a wood panel in it and the other 17 have glass panes that have been painted over. The ever so lovely OSHA Babe has tackled the paint removal and was encouraged to find a surface that finally worked well for chemical paint strippers. After cleaning the glass panes and replacing the one, we'll paint the door the same color as the trim, clean up the hardware, and have a great addition to the entry way.

5. I cleared out a hackberry tree in the front yard this week. In the tree picture above, you can see a V-shaped trunk that was crowding the base of the 50" ft. tall pecan tree. That was the target. Speaking of trees, the orange harvest continues. We may have 2 more weeks of fresh oranges.

6. Visitor Report - Bill Dranselka made another visit to the house. (This time, we got his picture.) Bill and Dale are Katy's (our San Antonio daughter-in-law) parents. Bill is a native Nebraskan and does support the Big Red throughout the entire football season. Bill, thanks for the help with the windows.

NEXT STEPS

1. Plumbing is critical to moving the kitchen forward as well as having indoor plumbing that works. Hopefully, this coming Saturday, we'll make good progress.

2. Jimmy thinks that he can finish the electrical with only a few more visits. He has done a good job.

3. There is some prep work needed in the kitchen before the cabinets can be installed. I need to check with the cabinet guys about where they are in the construction.

4. Sheetrock is still dependent on having the plumbing completed. However, there is some that can be done but I'll probably have to be directly involved since this is just "piece work" as long a plumbing remains unfinished.

5. As always, scrape, sand, paint, repeat.