Well, we made it through last week’s trip and home again.
While away husband came across something that he has wanted for decades. It is a small loom that makes tape. No, not sticky tape, this makes a long thin strip of fabric. In earlier centuries (before the 20th ) it was used to make fabric tapes for clothing and other purposes. As an example, in the 18th century ladies’ petticoats (skirts) had a casing or hollow waistband at the top and one of these tape would go through the casing - well actually two of them as the petticoat were not attached front to back at the top/casing. At the two sides the tapes would be tied together to bring the sides of the petticoats together to the fit of the woman/girl wearing it, tight enough to hold it together and up, but not so tight that one was uncomfortable. (No, really, this works fine.) Why were the two sides open? Well, women had a garment called a pocket or a pair of pockets that were large tearshaped bags with a slit on the side facing away from the body. Since the sides of the petticoat were open, one could reach through the slits formed by the opening and waist ties and reach into the pocket(s) easily. Oh, the pockets were sewn to/hanging from - tape and were tied around the waist (under the petticoat).
The tape loom is around 24 inches tall, 24 inches front to back and around 9 inches across. Well, at least the one husband found last week is. In the past the tape looms he has found has been too expensive for us to buy. He even bought a book on how to make the looms - but decided that he would end up cutting off two many fingers trying to do so. The one he found last week was made by another craftsperson (always good to support a craftsperson) and was 1/4 of what is usually being charged for them - oh, and since it was a museum shop, we were supporting the museum also. He was unsure. I knew we could not let the loom get away from him. He was about to agree to buy it when the big question hit him. Remember how small the RV is, he decided it would not fit in the RV (securely to keep it intact). I had to go out to the RV and measure where I thought I could fit it to make sure - it did fit there. Then again, I told him that he was buying it, if it had to ride around the rest of the day and the next day until we got home - in my lap!
How did I fit it? We have one of those boxes intended to go in a trunk. It has 2 sections and collapses down for storage. I keep the box under the bed to make it easy to pull out and store laptop computers and what we call the last minute bag - huh? Well, we prepack the RV, but there are always the items that have to be used the night before we leave or the morning we are leaving, so we have a bag that we put those items in when we travel. It goes under the bed in this box. I pulled the box out from under the bed. I then wrapped the loom in several large laundry bags. (I keep the bedding in them when the beds are not made up - so they are large enough to hold 2 pillows each.) I laid the loom on its side - the flat side, not the one with the mechanism on it, in the bags, at the back end of the under bed space - one of the flat sides against the back wall of the space. The space is carpeted so it helps protect whatever is there and keeps it from moving as easily. I then put 2 tension curtain rods in front of the loom (I stuffed a large plastic bag into an open area where the loom forms an “L” shape and the curtain rods). Why do I have curtain tension rods? I use them in front of the box mentioned to help hold it in place under the bed. I used two of them to keep the loom in place. I collapsed one side of the box and put the box into place in front of the loom and stood the laptops standing next to the box and then put my last curtain rod in front of the box to keep it and the laptops in place.
It worked! Nothing moved out of place (and roads around here are pretty bad and there is much bouncing of the stuff in the RV) and the loom was in perfect condition when we arrived home. As I mentioned last week - it is amazing what one can fit into the small space that is this RV. Now, short of it traveling on a bed or in the walking aisle of the RV, this was the only space the right shape to hold the loom and hold it safely.
When we get home and unpack the RV we have to be organized also. The first things that are unpacked are the refrigerated items. I put them into a fabric bag and husband will run back and forth to the house with the items. When the refrigerator is empty I shut it off and put a folded towel under the freezer compartment. (There is no separate freezer, just a colder freezer section and if there is any condensation, it will drip in the refrigerator, so the towel will catch any drips.)
I have to remember what has to go into the house. Normally the next thing to go into the house would be “the last minute bag” with items such as medications and the like packed back into it from the trip, but this last trip the next thing that went into the house was the loom! It made the trip in perfect condition. Then onto the last minute bag.
I pack the clean clothes that we did not wear into the second regular laundry bag - we always bring clothes for a day or two longer than we will be away “in case” - case something happens to what one or both of is wearing (such as the time we had to step over a small section of water, but I was too short and stepped down into what looked like a thin layer of water, only to find out that there was a drain system under it that I stepped into up to my knee, barely managing not to get hurt) or something happens and we need to or decide to stay a day longer than we planned. When we pack we put our clean clothes into 2 laundry bags - one for each us - and then put them into the shelves in the “closet” (a small cabinet) and put one laundry bag (the one the clean clothes go into at the end of the trip) away with the last minute bag, and we use the other laundry bag for - well, our laundry that accumulates during the trip. When I put for husband to take into the house, I add the towels (hand and dish) that we used - it will get tossed down the stairs to the basement for washing when it goes into the house).
Little by little it all goes back into the house. The food that was not in the refrigerator (stored in small locking plastic boxes in the RV “kitchen cabinet” - a shelf with a door on it) is taken into the house in another fabric shopping bag. The shoes come out of the cubby they are stored in and are put into plastic shopping bags. The laptops come out from under the bed. Magazines and such come back into the house. I then go to the front of the RV and pack eyeglasses and such that were in the front. I have an manila envelope a little larger than a regular envelope for each of the regular trips we take to accumulate reservations, coupons, etc. for that trip and I take the envelope with me in the map pocket - it has to come back into the house. Almost forgot - jackets and sweatshirts have to come back into the house.
The next to last thing I do before I leave inside the RV is I walk around the inside in a circle and touch each area that we put things into and have to take things out of and put back in the house to remind myself and make sure that I remembered to empty each area. The last thing I do is shut off the lights and then the RV battery - and as I do I say out loud to myself - lights are off, battery IS off. This way I will remember that I shut them off.
We also unload anything we stored in the back of the RV through the back door that we brought or bought - there is a laundry basket there to hold the items.
Oddly, I was greatly short on time to write this post tonight. Husband decided to set up his new loom tonight. “It will only take 5 minutes.” Famous last words. Two hours later it was set up. Two hours that I had other plans for. But that is life and life is more important.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
If you do something over and over again develop a plan to follow to make sure that all of it is done and follow it. I find that when doing something such as checking the kitchen (in our house) at night, locking the door when I go out, or finishing unloading the RV to say something out loud.
When I close up the kitchen for the night (we watch TV in same at night - such as right now while I am writing and posting this) I lock the back door. I then check the back door and say “door locked”. I then look at the 6 knobs on the stove next to the door and count one to six out loud and say “all off”. I then look at the electric outlet box next to the stove, check it and say “nothing plugged in”. (This is the electric outlets which are used for small appliances and we don’t leave them plugged in when they are not being used.)
When I go out I lock the door. As I do so I say to myself “door LOCKED” so I remember.
As mentioned I touch each area in the RV and say that it is emptied before leaving it when the trip is over. I also say out loud that the refrigerator door is open (it is propped open to prevent odors forming) and that the lights are out and then that the battery is turned off.
By saying and doing each of these things it registers on my brain and I do not go running downstairs - or outside to the RV - or back to the door - to check that the chore is done.
I want to offer hopes that anyone living in the areas which are being flooded in the heavy storms are safe and dry.
Thursday, July 26, 2018
Saturday, July 21, 2018
THIRD TIME'S A CHARM - I HOPE
This post is 2 days late. We have been on a short trip. I wrote the post on Wednesday night the normal time for me to do so. Wednesday night was also the first night of our trip. We have been at this campground many times. For some reason there were Internet problems this trip (and totally unrelated we could not get TV with our antenna either) and while I could do some things, the Internet connection did not like gmail so I was able to check some email - but only one email out on one night, other than that I could not post and this was my second item to post. (First was to tell my family we were away as I had forgotten to do so.)
So I could not post the first night - or the second. Now we are back home and I am hoping that this post goes through on the “lucky” third night of trying -
A quick post this week as we finally made it away for a trip - only 2 nights, not the 5 nights we started with planning - and 2 weeks late, but we are away.
Anyone going on a trip has to plan in advance - Where will we go? When will we go? Where will we stay? and - most importantly - What do we need to bring?
I have a check list in my computer that I print out each time we are going away to make sure we bring everything. Now, remember we are traveling in an RV so what we need to bring is different than someone going to a hotel. Remember that this is not a huge RV as you see on TV - next time you see a Chevy van - think of me. The check list is divided into sections -
What to do ahead of time - check the tires for air, make sure that items we keep in the RV are there and ones that get used up are replenished - soap, disposable dishes and cups, hand soap, dish soap, toothpaste, toilet paper, tissues, paper towels and such. Are there clean hand and dish towels in the RV? I generally have to make up the bed - which involves assembling it as I put on the mattress cover, sheets and blankets. If we are away for a very short time - as we are now - I may not strip the bed afterwards and will leave the bed made up.
Then as we get close to the trip (day or two before) I have other items to do - I do the clothing laundry 2 days before we go away so we have clothes for the trip and clothes for when we get home. This way I can pack them the day before we go. Since we are traveling in an RV I use laundry bags to carry the clothes out to same and then store them in the “closet” This is a small cabinet that is called the closet. It will hold maybe a dozen hangers. We put in one of those sweater shelves things that hang in a closet and instead of hanging clothes in it, we each get 2 shelves for our clothes - yes, 2 of those tiny shelves for our clothes. I can fit up to a week’s worth of clothes for each of us shirts, underwear, socks and spare pair of jeans in those tiny sections. The rare times we go away longer - for 2 weeks - the second week’s clothing will be in a laundry bag in a section under the bed - at the start of the second week I will climb under the bed and get out the laundry bag and put the clothing in the shelves. As we use the clothes we put the dirty clothes back in a laundry bag - so if we are way for more than a week, the dirty clothes will go back where the clean clothes were. We do carry more than a set of clothes for each day “just in case”. We bring extra of everything. We fit in sweaters and jackets in various places in the RV. Spare shoes go into a cubby over the bed.
We fill the water tanks which hold 25 gallons of water.
I have a list of food items to bring - we have a “dorm size” fridge in the RV. The list is inclusive fo what we might want/need to bring - so not all items are brought on every trip. I bring water in bottles that I have filled and put it in the fridge. The water in the tanks will get warm (sitting under a “tin can” in plastic tanks) and this way we have cold water to drink. Food items are put in plastic boxes that “lock” seal closed. Generally all we are bringing is snacks with us. On longer trips I may bring canned soup, peanut butter and bread. So far we have had only one occasion while traveling in which we came close to cooking and eating in the RV - but then the rain storm ended and we were able to go for lunch.
Medications have to come. I have to bring eyeglasses - several different pairs for each of us. And of course, electronics. We each bring laptops with us. Maybe a camera. And cell phones and cords for them. We actually keep duplicate cords in the RV for convenience.
When items are stored they must be stored in such a way that they will not shift around and make noise or break anything. Everything has an assigned place so we know where it will be and it will be safe. We use plastic shopping bags around items to keep them from shifting - and then they are used for garbage or shopping, etc.
What amazes me is that when we were buying this RV we kept wondering how we would get everything we need into it. I have pulled out items never used when I realize that we will not need them and now have too much empty space that needs to be packed with the bags mentioned to fill the space so things do not shift. Well, I did keep the small vacuum cleaner, We may not have used it in the 7 years we have had the RV, but I know some day we will really, really need it.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Think about if you had one room 20 ft by 6 ft to live in and had to fit everything you needed in it. The bed takes up about 1/3 of the room, but you do have 3 cubbies over the bed. There are people who live in this type of RV full time - think about having to get your possessions to down to a space this small.
So I could not post the first night - or the second. Now we are back home and I am hoping that this post goes through on the “lucky” third night of trying -
A quick post this week as we finally made it away for a trip - only 2 nights, not the 5 nights we started with planning - and 2 weeks late, but we are away.
Anyone going on a trip has to plan in advance - Where will we go? When will we go? Where will we stay? and - most importantly - What do we need to bring?
I have a check list in my computer that I print out each time we are going away to make sure we bring everything. Now, remember we are traveling in an RV so what we need to bring is different than someone going to a hotel. Remember that this is not a huge RV as you see on TV - next time you see a Chevy van - think of me. The check list is divided into sections -
What to do ahead of time - check the tires for air, make sure that items we keep in the RV are there and ones that get used up are replenished - soap, disposable dishes and cups, hand soap, dish soap, toothpaste, toilet paper, tissues, paper towels and such. Are there clean hand and dish towels in the RV? I generally have to make up the bed - which involves assembling it as I put on the mattress cover, sheets and blankets. If we are away for a very short time - as we are now - I may not strip the bed afterwards and will leave the bed made up.
Then as we get close to the trip (day or two before) I have other items to do - I do the clothing laundry 2 days before we go away so we have clothes for the trip and clothes for when we get home. This way I can pack them the day before we go. Since we are traveling in an RV I use laundry bags to carry the clothes out to same and then store them in the “closet” This is a small cabinet that is called the closet. It will hold maybe a dozen hangers. We put in one of those sweater shelves things that hang in a closet and instead of hanging clothes in it, we each get 2 shelves for our clothes - yes, 2 of those tiny shelves for our clothes. I can fit up to a week’s worth of clothes for each of us shirts, underwear, socks and spare pair of jeans in those tiny sections. The rare times we go away longer - for 2 weeks - the second week’s clothing will be in a laundry bag in a section under the bed - at the start of the second week I will climb under the bed and get out the laundry bag and put the clothing in the shelves. As we use the clothes we put the dirty clothes back in a laundry bag - so if we are way for more than a week, the dirty clothes will go back where the clean clothes were. We do carry more than a set of clothes for each day “just in case”. We bring extra of everything. We fit in sweaters and jackets in various places in the RV. Spare shoes go into a cubby over the bed.
We fill the water tanks which hold 25 gallons of water.
I have a list of food items to bring - we have a “dorm size” fridge in the RV. The list is inclusive fo what we might want/need to bring - so not all items are brought on every trip. I bring water in bottles that I have filled and put it in the fridge. The water in the tanks will get warm (sitting under a “tin can” in plastic tanks) and this way we have cold water to drink. Food items are put in plastic boxes that “lock” seal closed. Generally all we are bringing is snacks with us. On longer trips I may bring canned soup, peanut butter and bread. So far we have had only one occasion while traveling in which we came close to cooking and eating in the RV - but then the rain storm ended and we were able to go for lunch.
Medications have to come. I have to bring eyeglasses - several different pairs for each of us. And of course, electronics. We each bring laptops with us. Maybe a camera. And cell phones and cords for them. We actually keep duplicate cords in the RV for convenience.
When items are stored they must be stored in such a way that they will not shift around and make noise or break anything. Everything has an assigned place so we know where it will be and it will be safe. We use plastic shopping bags around items to keep them from shifting - and then they are used for garbage or shopping, etc.
What amazes me is that when we were buying this RV we kept wondering how we would get everything we need into it. I have pulled out items never used when I realize that we will not need them and now have too much empty space that needs to be packed with the bags mentioned to fill the space so things do not shift. Well, I did keep the small vacuum cleaner, We may not have used it in the 7 years we have had the RV, but I know some day we will really, really need it.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Think about if you had one room 20 ft by 6 ft to live in and had to fit everything you needed in it. The bed takes up about 1/3 of the room, but you do have 3 cubbies over the bed. There are people who live in this type of RV full time - think about having to get your possessions to down to a space this small.
Thursday, July 12, 2018
PAYING BILLS
Well, the smoke smell finally left the house.
It occurred to me in looking at last week’s post that it makes no sense to someone reading it that I have to be home to pay a bill. It was not the writing of the check (yes, I still pay my bills by check) or the need to mail out the bill and payment (yes, I still pay my bills by mail), but the fact that money needed to pay the bill would not be credited to our bank account until today, the 11th. It would go into our savings account and I had to be here to transfer the money needed to pay the bill into our checking account. I like to do this so I know that the money is actually in the checking account and did not for some reason go awry. If something did happen the savings account would be short funds and I would not be able to transfer the money - but at least I would know of the problem and would be able to cover the checks I needed to send out in another way, while I tracked down where the money owed to us was.
We did drive down to Pennsylvania last Saturday and had a very nice day. The weather was sunny and warm - but not the hot weather that had been there during last week and there was no rain. We did lose an hour locally in transit as there was roving road repairs being done - and the GPS did not know that how long the delay was or did not care.
Since we had to stay home to transfer money to pay a bill, I thought I would talk about paying bills today. I deal with bills for a living, you probably only deal with yours or maybe yours and your business’s bills. The idea for personal or business bills are basically the same - make sure the amount you were billed is right and pay them - on time.
I admit to probably being older than most of you and grew up with paper bills and paper checks. Therefore I am more comfortable using them than paying bills online. It is not that I am new to computers or a “late adaptor”. I learned to program computers when they were huge mechanical devices. The one I learned to program, in Fortran II, was the size of a good sized office desk (which were also larger back then than they are now) and there was a second device the same size to compile the program. Today the compiler is software, not hardware. Heck, even the keyboard setup to punch the software and/or data into cards was larger than even my desktop computer is today. My problem is that having learned to work with computers so long ago I have learned the concept that no computer is secure (and we did not have the computers connected to the Internet back then). When I am not using a computer it is turned off and unplugged - the exception being that if a laptop needs charging it may be off and charging.
So, I am more comfortable paying my bills by check. I have written abit about this before - http://wheredidileavethat.blogspot.com/2017/04/last-October-10-26-16-i-posted-on.html
We don’t like to be in debt. We pay our credit card in full every month.
Well, except one month. When husband was working full time he would receive any unused sick pay when the new company year started in September. (They operated on a school year as they were partly a school.) We would take our vacation in August as I could take time off then and the place he worked would close for 2 weeks in August. So the unused sick pay was rather convenient to cover the charge card bills from vacation. One year the sick pay was delayed a month. Our choice was to take money out of savings and pay the bill in full, or pay part and pay the balance the following month when the money came in. It was one of those odd periods in which the interest rates on debt and the interest rates on savings were about the same. We decided to pay half the bill and then pay the other half, plus any new charges in full, the following month and that is what we did.
We have taken out some loans over the decades. We only do so for large items - house, car, RV. Everyone of them has had every payment made on time - with some of them we have paid them off in less time than originally scheduled by making extra principal payments. (More on this next week.)
Medical insurance and bills - have also been paid in full, although we have been lucky enough to have our medical insurance covered by his employer while husband was working. In addition the largest medical bills we had were when husband had cataract surgeries. We had the sort of insurance that covers more of the bills for “providers” in their plan and less, although still most, of the bills for providers not in their plan. Our doctor was the latter. We paid our share of about $4000 on the two surgeries in full to the doctor.
Oh, a thought here - make sure you know what is covered on your medical insurance - if you can use a provider who is covered it will save you money - expenses might not even be covered if your doctor, pharmacy, etc. is not on their list and you will be stuck for the full cost. In addition make sure that you check your bills for accuracy and if there is a question or problem don’t just accept it. When husband had his first surgery (each eye was done separately) the insurance company rejected the claim. The doctor’s office assure me that it was not my problem, they would have to “eat” the costs. I did not let it go. I telephoned the insurance company and asked what had happened - I had followed all of the rules for an out of the plan doctor, etc. I was told some stupidity that the claim was not submitted in time. Turned out that the doctor’s office had a O for a 0 or a 0 for an O and it was rejected. When it was fixed and they went to resubmit it, they were told that it was too late to do so and there was no record of the original, rejected submission. I called the insurance company again and started, politely complaining. Not much was happening. I told them that my husband decides which policies everyone at work will have (this was true). I suddenly had a phone call from the insurance company that there had been an error - the surgery had been preapproved (which it had been) and therefore was covered. (We were extremely popular at the doctor’s office after that.) So know what has to be done and do it to make sure that your claims are covered - follow up with the doctor’s staff to make sure they do what they need to do and make sure you do what you need to do. If you need to have a referral, have it - and make a photocopy for yourself in case it “gets lost”.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Basically we try to live within our income and waste as little as possible of our money paying interest charges and not paying other fees. We live comfortably but not over the top. We don’t eat at expensive restaurants. We find discounted movie theaters or discounted tickets to same. We drive Chevys not Cadillacs, BMWs or Mercedes Benz. (You do know that Chevy and Cadillacs have “twin cars” don’t you - as do Ford and Lincoln.) We sleep better at night not worrying about huge bills or mounting interest charges.
Other posts will follow on related financial matters including some of the things we have done to “find” money for bills and for savings.
It occurred to me in looking at last week’s post that it makes no sense to someone reading it that I have to be home to pay a bill. It was not the writing of the check (yes, I still pay my bills by check) or the need to mail out the bill and payment (yes, I still pay my bills by mail), but the fact that money needed to pay the bill would not be credited to our bank account until today, the 11th. It would go into our savings account and I had to be here to transfer the money needed to pay the bill into our checking account. I like to do this so I know that the money is actually in the checking account and did not for some reason go awry. If something did happen the savings account would be short funds and I would not be able to transfer the money - but at least I would know of the problem and would be able to cover the checks I needed to send out in another way, while I tracked down where the money owed to us was.
We did drive down to Pennsylvania last Saturday and had a very nice day. The weather was sunny and warm - but not the hot weather that had been there during last week and there was no rain. We did lose an hour locally in transit as there was roving road repairs being done - and the GPS did not know that how long the delay was or did not care.
Since we had to stay home to transfer money to pay a bill, I thought I would talk about paying bills today. I deal with bills for a living, you probably only deal with yours or maybe yours and your business’s bills. The idea for personal or business bills are basically the same - make sure the amount you were billed is right and pay them - on time.
I admit to probably being older than most of you and grew up with paper bills and paper checks. Therefore I am more comfortable using them than paying bills online. It is not that I am new to computers or a “late adaptor”. I learned to program computers when they were huge mechanical devices. The one I learned to program, in Fortran II, was the size of a good sized office desk (which were also larger back then than they are now) and there was a second device the same size to compile the program. Today the compiler is software, not hardware. Heck, even the keyboard setup to punch the software and/or data into cards was larger than even my desktop computer is today. My problem is that having learned to work with computers so long ago I have learned the concept that no computer is secure (and we did not have the computers connected to the Internet back then). When I am not using a computer it is turned off and unplugged - the exception being that if a laptop needs charging it may be off and charging.
So, I am more comfortable paying my bills by check. I have written abit about this before - http://wheredidileavethat.blogspot.com/2017/04/last-October-10-26-16-i-posted-on.html
We don’t like to be in debt. We pay our credit card in full every month.
Well, except one month. When husband was working full time he would receive any unused sick pay when the new company year started in September. (They operated on a school year as they were partly a school.) We would take our vacation in August as I could take time off then and the place he worked would close for 2 weeks in August. So the unused sick pay was rather convenient to cover the charge card bills from vacation. One year the sick pay was delayed a month. Our choice was to take money out of savings and pay the bill in full, or pay part and pay the balance the following month when the money came in. It was one of those odd periods in which the interest rates on debt and the interest rates on savings were about the same. We decided to pay half the bill and then pay the other half, plus any new charges in full, the following month and that is what we did.
We have taken out some loans over the decades. We only do so for large items - house, car, RV. Everyone of them has had every payment made on time - with some of them we have paid them off in less time than originally scheduled by making extra principal payments. (More on this next week.)
Medical insurance and bills - have also been paid in full, although we have been lucky enough to have our medical insurance covered by his employer while husband was working. In addition the largest medical bills we had were when husband had cataract surgeries. We had the sort of insurance that covers more of the bills for “providers” in their plan and less, although still most, of the bills for providers not in their plan. Our doctor was the latter. We paid our share of about $4000 on the two surgeries in full to the doctor.
Oh, a thought here - make sure you know what is covered on your medical insurance - if you can use a provider who is covered it will save you money - expenses might not even be covered if your doctor, pharmacy, etc. is not on their list and you will be stuck for the full cost. In addition make sure that you check your bills for accuracy and if there is a question or problem don’t just accept it. When husband had his first surgery (each eye was done separately) the insurance company rejected the claim. The doctor’s office assure me that it was not my problem, they would have to “eat” the costs. I did not let it go. I telephoned the insurance company and asked what had happened - I had followed all of the rules for an out of the plan doctor, etc. I was told some stupidity that the claim was not submitted in time. Turned out that the doctor’s office had a O for a 0 or a 0 for an O and it was rejected. When it was fixed and they went to resubmit it, they were told that it was too late to do so and there was no record of the original, rejected submission. I called the insurance company again and started, politely complaining. Not much was happening. I told them that my husband decides which policies everyone at work will have (this was true). I suddenly had a phone call from the insurance company that there had been an error - the surgery had been preapproved (which it had been) and therefore was covered. (We were extremely popular at the doctor’s office after that.) So know what has to be done and do it to make sure that your claims are covered - follow up with the doctor’s staff to make sure they do what they need to do and make sure you do what you need to do. If you need to have a referral, have it - and make a photocopy for yourself in case it “gets lost”.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Basically we try to live within our income and waste as little as possible of our money paying interest charges and not paying other fees. We live comfortably but not over the top. We don’t eat at expensive restaurants. We find discounted movie theaters or discounted tickets to same. We drive Chevys not Cadillacs, BMWs or Mercedes Benz. (You do know that Chevy and Cadillacs have “twin cars” don’t you - as do Ford and Lincoln.) We sleep better at night not worrying about huge bills or mounting interest charges.
Other posts will follow on related financial matters including some of the things we have done to “find” money for bills and for savings.
Thursday, July 5, 2018
NOT IN PENNSYLVANIA
Remember over the past few weeks before I told you that we were going away this week and the work involved in preparing our RV for the trip? Well, we’re home - not away. Why?
I printed out my list of what has to be done to set up and pack the RV. We put the mattresses (actually pieces of the mattresses as each half of the mattress is made up of 3 pieces) in the RV. I pulled out stuff that was in the RV for the winter that is needed to pack it - food storage boxes, fabric shopping bags to carry stuff out to and back from the RV, and so on. I also have some stuff to do because it has not been used since last year - such as change the refrigerator baking powder holder (to keep it from smelling - same as a box of same in one’s home fridge - but I get the one that goes on inside the fridge with a suction cup as the box would probably fall over as we traveled around and make a mess). I checked that we had hand and dish soap and shampoo. You know -the sort of stuff you have at home and never think about needing on a trip - unless you have an RV.
Last Thursday we plugged the RV into the house electricity to make sure the batteries were fully charged. They are old and we should have replaced them, but that has not been in the budget, so we have to make sure they are charged, so that the fridge in it will keep working when the car engine is off when we are parked somewhere. (It does also recharge while we are driving and while it is plugged in at night in the RV park.)
On Friday I suggested to husband that I would makeup the bed while the RV was plugged in so I could run the air conditioner as it was soooo hot out - and inside is like being in a car that has not had ac on and even hotter. He reminded me that it could not be put on if the ac was plugged in at the house as the amperage was not enough, but - he had wanted to turn on the generator and make sure it was working.
So we turned on the generator - horrors, it turned on fine - but the microwave clock did not come on. You may be thinking - who cares about the microwave clock of all things. There are two things that will not work in the RV unless it is plugged in at full amperage - the ac and the, yes, the microwave. If the microwave light was not on - the generator was not transferring electricity to the RV. We turned the generator off and husband climbed under - again - and found that the fellow who worked on it had turned and left the connection switch off. We turned on the generator and this time the it was connected and working. I started making up the bed - a 45 minute minimum process as I have described before and husband walked out to let me work.
He was back shortly. There was oil coming out of the generator. Whether something was broken, or the plug was loose, or the fact that too much oil had been put in it - something was wrong. He ran inside and called the shop that had changed the oil. Well, 4:30 pm Friday - they would be glad to help on - Monday morning, when we scheduled to be on our trip. Husband made the appointment.
I suggested that we could set up the RV except for the last minute things, take the RV to the shop, come home, add the list minute things (or we would have to wake up even earlier to put them in and secure them in place) and go on our trip. Husband was not happy with this idea, as it is very hard to back the darn thing off our driveway - I have to stand in traffic and tell him when to back out and he has to do it quickly - and he did not want to do it twice in one day. I went back in the RV and did a quick set up of the bed as the generator was running and oil was still coming out of it. I only did the mattress set up, then we stopped the generator - I brought the pillows into the house to deal with them. It will be a lumpy set up in mattress as I was not able to smooth out the sheets properly - I will deal with it when we travel in it.
The more husband thought about it, the more he did not want to leave after going to the shop again. But - if we cancel the reservation we have to pay for it any way. In addition as the weekend went along, the weather became extremely hot and thunderstorms while we would be there. He panicked even more.
I decided to suggest that we go one day during the week - whichever day seemed to be the best weather - for us to go to the annual folk festival (crafts) that we want to go to (we can go there and home the same day, we have done so in the past) and try to move the reservations to next week. He agreed.
As I was about to do so I realized that there was problem with going next week - we had money coming in this week and it had to be transferred to checking to pay our “big” credit card bill which has to be mailed out the 10th. Darn!!!!!
I then suggested the week after - which seemed okay all around - we have a reenactment the weekend after it, but would be home Friday night and the reenactment is Sunday.
So this past Saturday I telephoned the RV park and explained that we had a reservation for Monday and we have had a problem with the RV and it could not be worked on until Monday. Could we please change the reservation to 2 weeks later - and I was told it was okay - the same space was even available. Now, I may find that they are not applying our deposit to the changed trip, but if so, well that is how it is. Hopefully we will get credit for the deposit.
So now we are home for July 4th. Something which I do not think has happened since we were married - and maybe before. With nothing to do. For “excitement” we went to Barnes and Nobles today.
Earlier in the week I was trying to think how to make today more July 4th ish. He has hot dogs for dinner around once a week so I moved them to today. We don’t have an outdoor grill. I have not been able to eat hot dogs for a few years, so I figured I would make my Thursday night turkey burger in an elongated shape so it would fit in the brat rolls we had in the house and I figured he would use for the hot dogs. We had some frozen fries I would make for him. When I went to make dinner I suggested that I use a cast iron pan with a grill that I had not used in awhile to cook my burger and his hot dogs to make them more like being grilled outside. (Normally he has me boil his hot dogs.) He told me to do one that way to try it.
I put the grill pan on the stove to heat up. I started making (canned) soup. I checked how much fries there were. Suddenly the kitchen was full of smoke and the smoke detector was going off. The grill pan - with no food added - was burning whatever was on it and the smoke was heading through the house. I turned off the burner, opened the back door (next to the stove) and fanned the smoke a bit with the door - this usually will direct smoke out the door if something like this happens. I turned off the ceiling fan - same. I turned off the soup. The alarm kept going off. I would push the button, it would stop, and then start again. I am 5'1" and have to stand on my toes on a chair to reach the button. I stayed up there pushing the button over and over. In between I would jump off the chair and try putting the ceiling fan on or off. After 10 minutes of this I texted husband upstairs for help. Between his hearing not being what it was and the fact that he was in a room on the other side of the house - which is not that far as the house is small, but he had the air conditioner on and the room door closed so he did not hear the alarm going off.
He came down and took over the spot on the chair, pushing the button over and over. We could not clear the smoke from the air. This is one of the new alarms with a permanent battery, so we could not pull the battery or the alarm would have to be thrown away. We tried covering it with a shower cap. (The RV is small and if one cooks in it the smoke alarm goes off and people put a shower cap over it to keep the smoke out of it when cooking - and it works, as cooked in it after a couple of hurricanes when we had no electricity in the house for the electric stove there.)
Finally about 45 minutes later the alarm stopped. The house still reeked of smoke. The pan was on the floor in the porch. Dinner should have been cooked and ready.
I turned the soup back on. I boiled his hot dogs. The fried potatoes had been cooking during all this in the toaster oven. But what about my dinner? I was not going to try to cook my burger in any of my pans and add more smoke to the house. I ended up cooking frozen vegetables for me for dinner - vegan for tonight. My burger is wrapped in plastic wrap for dinner tomorrow night. I have the grill pan soaking water to try to clean it.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
No matter what one’s plans are they may go awry. One just has to be able to think and deal with the problems so that they are in some manner resolved.
We will go on the trip later than we figured - but this will probably be good as it will not be as crowded then - and husband hates crowds. Hopefully we will have a day that is nice to go for the one day trip - and as husband scowled over the cost of the tolls - I reminded him that when we go that way the tolls are much, much lower as we are going to a different area - maybe 1/3 of when we go to where we usually go.
Dinner was late (and we missed the start of the PBS “Capitol Fourth” on TV), but we had dinner and the show was rerun after its showing so we saw the start afterwards.
None of this is earth shattering - just an annoyance - and I had two stories about trying to be organized to tell you this week.
I printed out my list of what has to be done to set up and pack the RV. We put the mattresses (actually pieces of the mattresses as each half of the mattress is made up of 3 pieces) in the RV. I pulled out stuff that was in the RV for the winter that is needed to pack it - food storage boxes, fabric shopping bags to carry stuff out to and back from the RV, and so on. I also have some stuff to do because it has not been used since last year - such as change the refrigerator baking powder holder (to keep it from smelling - same as a box of same in one’s home fridge - but I get the one that goes on inside the fridge with a suction cup as the box would probably fall over as we traveled around and make a mess). I checked that we had hand and dish soap and shampoo. You know -the sort of stuff you have at home and never think about needing on a trip - unless you have an RV.
Last Thursday we plugged the RV into the house electricity to make sure the batteries were fully charged. They are old and we should have replaced them, but that has not been in the budget, so we have to make sure they are charged, so that the fridge in it will keep working when the car engine is off when we are parked somewhere. (It does also recharge while we are driving and while it is plugged in at night in the RV park.)
On Friday I suggested to husband that I would makeup the bed while the RV was plugged in so I could run the air conditioner as it was soooo hot out - and inside is like being in a car that has not had ac on and even hotter. He reminded me that it could not be put on if the ac was plugged in at the house as the amperage was not enough, but - he had wanted to turn on the generator and make sure it was working.
So we turned on the generator - horrors, it turned on fine - but the microwave clock did not come on. You may be thinking - who cares about the microwave clock of all things. There are two things that will not work in the RV unless it is plugged in at full amperage - the ac and the, yes, the microwave. If the microwave light was not on - the generator was not transferring electricity to the RV. We turned the generator off and husband climbed under - again - and found that the fellow who worked on it had turned and left the connection switch off. We turned on the generator and this time the it was connected and working. I started making up the bed - a 45 minute minimum process as I have described before and husband walked out to let me work.
He was back shortly. There was oil coming out of the generator. Whether something was broken, or the plug was loose, or the fact that too much oil had been put in it - something was wrong. He ran inside and called the shop that had changed the oil. Well, 4:30 pm Friday - they would be glad to help on - Monday morning, when we scheduled to be on our trip. Husband made the appointment.
I suggested that we could set up the RV except for the last minute things, take the RV to the shop, come home, add the list minute things (or we would have to wake up even earlier to put them in and secure them in place) and go on our trip. Husband was not happy with this idea, as it is very hard to back the darn thing off our driveway - I have to stand in traffic and tell him when to back out and he has to do it quickly - and he did not want to do it twice in one day. I went back in the RV and did a quick set up of the bed as the generator was running and oil was still coming out of it. I only did the mattress set up, then we stopped the generator - I brought the pillows into the house to deal with them. It will be a lumpy set up in mattress as I was not able to smooth out the sheets properly - I will deal with it when we travel in it.
The more husband thought about it, the more he did not want to leave after going to the shop again. But - if we cancel the reservation we have to pay for it any way. In addition as the weekend went along, the weather became extremely hot and thunderstorms while we would be there. He panicked even more.
I decided to suggest that we go one day during the week - whichever day seemed to be the best weather - for us to go to the annual folk festival (crafts) that we want to go to (we can go there and home the same day, we have done so in the past) and try to move the reservations to next week. He agreed.
As I was about to do so I realized that there was problem with going next week - we had money coming in this week and it had to be transferred to checking to pay our “big” credit card bill which has to be mailed out the 10th. Darn!!!!!
I then suggested the week after - which seemed okay all around - we have a reenactment the weekend after it, but would be home Friday night and the reenactment is Sunday.
So this past Saturday I telephoned the RV park and explained that we had a reservation for Monday and we have had a problem with the RV and it could not be worked on until Monday. Could we please change the reservation to 2 weeks later - and I was told it was okay - the same space was even available. Now, I may find that they are not applying our deposit to the changed trip, but if so, well that is how it is. Hopefully we will get credit for the deposit.
So now we are home for July 4th. Something which I do not think has happened since we were married - and maybe before. With nothing to do. For “excitement” we went to Barnes and Nobles today.
Earlier in the week I was trying to think how to make today more July 4th ish. He has hot dogs for dinner around once a week so I moved them to today. We don’t have an outdoor grill. I have not been able to eat hot dogs for a few years, so I figured I would make my Thursday night turkey burger in an elongated shape so it would fit in the brat rolls we had in the house and I figured he would use for the hot dogs. We had some frozen fries I would make for him. When I went to make dinner I suggested that I use a cast iron pan with a grill that I had not used in awhile to cook my burger and his hot dogs to make them more like being grilled outside. (Normally he has me boil his hot dogs.) He told me to do one that way to try it.
I put the grill pan on the stove to heat up. I started making (canned) soup. I checked how much fries there were. Suddenly the kitchen was full of smoke and the smoke detector was going off. The grill pan - with no food added - was burning whatever was on it and the smoke was heading through the house. I turned off the burner, opened the back door (next to the stove) and fanned the smoke a bit with the door - this usually will direct smoke out the door if something like this happens. I turned off the ceiling fan - same. I turned off the soup. The alarm kept going off. I would push the button, it would stop, and then start again. I am 5'1" and have to stand on my toes on a chair to reach the button. I stayed up there pushing the button over and over. In between I would jump off the chair and try putting the ceiling fan on or off. After 10 minutes of this I texted husband upstairs for help. Between his hearing not being what it was and the fact that he was in a room on the other side of the house - which is not that far as the house is small, but he had the air conditioner on and the room door closed so he did not hear the alarm going off.
He came down and took over the spot on the chair, pushing the button over and over. We could not clear the smoke from the air. This is one of the new alarms with a permanent battery, so we could not pull the battery or the alarm would have to be thrown away. We tried covering it with a shower cap. (The RV is small and if one cooks in it the smoke alarm goes off and people put a shower cap over it to keep the smoke out of it when cooking - and it works, as cooked in it after a couple of hurricanes when we had no electricity in the house for the electric stove there.)
Finally about 45 minutes later the alarm stopped. The house still reeked of smoke. The pan was on the floor in the porch. Dinner should have been cooked and ready.
I turned the soup back on. I boiled his hot dogs. The fried potatoes had been cooking during all this in the toaster oven. But what about my dinner? I was not going to try to cook my burger in any of my pans and add more smoke to the house. I ended up cooking frozen vegetables for me for dinner - vegan for tonight. My burger is wrapped in plastic wrap for dinner tomorrow night. I have the grill pan soaking water to try to clean it.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
No matter what one’s plans are they may go awry. One just has to be able to think and deal with the problems so that they are in some manner resolved.
We will go on the trip later than we figured - but this will probably be good as it will not be as crowded then - and husband hates crowds. Hopefully we will have a day that is nice to go for the one day trip - and as husband scowled over the cost of the tolls - I reminded him that when we go that way the tolls are much, much lower as we are going to a different area - maybe 1/3 of when we go to where we usually go.
Dinner was late (and we missed the start of the PBS “Capitol Fourth” on TV), but we had dinner and the show was rerun after its showing so we saw the start afterwards.
None of this is earth shattering - just an annoyance - and I had two stories about trying to be organized to tell you this week.
Thursday, June 28, 2018
A WEEKEND IN THE 18TH CENTURY
Well, as I mentioned last week this has been a busy week of rising about 4 hours earlier than usual - and I don’t fall asleep earlier as a result - sometimes even later, so I am down around the equivalent of 2 nights worth of sleep.
The biggest chunk of this is a reenactment last weekend. For those of you who might not know what this is, my husband has always been interested in the American Revolution and I have always been interested in British history. In reenacting portrays a person (either real or imagined) from a different time period and/or place. In our case we reenact in the general American Revolution period - the 1770s- 1780s. We portray a fictious couple in the period of the “middling sort” - meaning middle class. We are members of a local unit of same which is a civilian (not military) unit. For some time the unit members have wanted to do a specific event and our new commander managed to set it up.
Normally when we do an event it is on Saturday or Sunday for 5 to 7 hours. This event was Saturday and Sunday with setup on Friday night and we were the “lead group” for several other ones that our commander convinced to join us as they were needed for this event. - No, wait, this does involve organizing, I promise.
On a personal level, we had to plan what we would do at the event - normally he talks to people as someone who prints and sells pamphlets (soft cover books) as someone from “then” and I portray his wife and demonstrate embroidery. If an event is at our headquarters we will generally end up giving tours of the house at some point during the day. For this event which involved the British army being an occupying force, neither was appropriate so we had to figure what to do instead. He would just talk to people about “the situation”. I decided to get some actual sewing that has been sitting about done. Mending was the perfect thing for the event. I was going to work on a waistcoat (vest) that no longer fit him. I had previously split the right and left sides apart and stitched the lining and front of each half together (into 2 half vest pieces). I had planned to stitch what are basically buttonholes to the back edges where the pieces should be sewn together. I managed to put all this together. As I did so I found 2 small drawstring bags (drawstring bags in all sizes can hide just about anything modern or carry anything “period” ) so I figured I would bring them along also. In addition to this we were bringing two folding reproduction stools to sit on and plate, cup and silverware each (called a mess kit it is period looking items for when eating at an event). Rather than our 2 good sized bench boxes that we use to bring lots of stuff to and store the stuff in at events we had just the folding stools and the one drawstring bag - much planning went into what went into the bag and fitting it in. The first day was to maybe raining on and off, so I put a small plastic garbage bag inside the large drawstring bag this all went into, so the stuff in the bag would not get wet if it did rain. Our stuff we brought with us on Saturday and again on Sunday.
Setup for our unit was a bit more taxing - but it was a group effort to set up and was done late Friday afternoon. We had to setup a number of tents such as lower soldiers would have - it takes 2-3 people to set up each one. Then we put up all of our “flys”. These are large tents that are only tops - we use them to have shade. Part of all of these tents were put in “our” area and the others were put in the adjacent “British army camp” to make it look like there were more of them than there would be. Where to place each component of our area and their camp had to be carefully figured and laid out. Towards the back of the area there is a barn which we had the use of (it actually dates all the way back to the 1700s) for storage and in case of rain. It was decided that the cooking fire would be near it along with two of the small tents to hide modern things in for the cooking. One of our fellows had planned out the cooking - he was cooking for all 3 areas - ahead of time and then had to have the food cooked and ready at the times set for eating. The third area mentioned was a second camp area which was near us, but hidden by trees as it was the “colonial” men who would be fighting the “British army” during the event.
During the week before our “commander” and the restoration village we were in had planned out where the “battles” were to be and worked with heavy moving equipment in a field to have it set up as it needed to be. Our commander gets the credit for much of the organization and getting the event done. Due to the possibility of rain he also had worked with restoration to have a plan in case of same. We were to go to various restored houses in the “village” and would be doing our impressions in same - he even had figured out who would go where.
We were lucky and the weather held straight through. Somehow due to the organization which had been done everything went off on schedule - people being hassled, soldiers drilling, houses being ransacked, etc. all on schedule - with some more of same not scheduled and being done impromptu. One great idea that someone had for organization was that we wanted the public who came through to participate, but did not want to scare off anyone who did not want to. Those who wanted to participate (and most apparently did) were given big red dot stickers to wear. A great idea as even without my eyeglasses (reproduction ones of course) that I had to take off to sew, I could see the dots in the distance.
On Sunday in the morning husband was told, err, asked to give a talk on the lives of loyalists (colonists who did not want to separate from Britain and were loyal to same). He put together some thoughts on same. We have not been to that end of the restoration in some years - decades(?) so I took a walk down there ahead of time so we would know where we going. When the time came for us to meander over a bit ahead of time we were amazed that as we walked past the “tavern” in the middle of the village one of the employees walked out of same with the keys needed for the house we were going to - not sure how she knew we were the ones or how she timed it so well - that is organization. She showed let us into the house and showed us how to lock it up it when we left. Some household type items had been left inside the front door to be “confiscated” (stolen) from us for being loyalists. People showed up on time to hear husband speak on the subject. Just as he was finishing the fellows who would be bothering us showed up with guns aimed at us - lectured us and were nasty to us, confiscated the items and were gone. The public followed them off to the next fight and we locked up the building - taking time to have a nice look around at what was in it. When we walked back towards the tavern I walked in with the keys and the fellow there knew which keys I was about to hand him.
At the end of the day Sunday - exhausted but happy all took down the “camps” and packed their personal and unit stuff away. Everything had been organized well and nothing had been overlooked - what a wonderful thing and it was only the first time we organized something this big - our commander was in contact in advance with the other commanders and individuals who came.
Just when we thought there had been no problems - we could not lock the house we were in front of, had use of and had given tours of as we did not have the key. The key sits in special place in the house (good organization idea) so it does not get lost and all who work in it know where it is. For some reason someone had given the key to someone, who had given it to someone else who, apparently, had given it in at the office - and the office had closed a couple of hours before. We managed to get someone there for security from the county public safety (restoration is county owned) to come and he was going to try to find the key or contact someone who would know where it was - so we had done the responsible thing and not just gone off and left the house unlocked.
I am still tired on Wednesday night - but thanks to the organization of everyone involved it was a great event and there has already been a decision to do it again next year.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
When something big has to be organized it helps to have a group of people working on it. Planning should start enough in advance to not have to rush at the end. Different (reliable) people should be put in charge of different parts of what needs to be done (such as one person in charge of the food and cooking). The possible problems that may arise should be considered (in our case - what if it rained and we could not be outside). And then one needs to keep one’s head if something arises - such as the missing house key.
Due to how well the event was planned it not only was great fun for us, but the public liked it, the village/county was pleased enough to invite us back to do it again, and in the case of something like this - no one got hurt and nothing was damaged.
Next week is a holiday here in the U.S. which is sort of related to all this - our Independence Day which started the fighting. In case I don’t get a chance to post - although I plan to - a happy holiday to those here in the U.S.
The biggest chunk of this is a reenactment last weekend. For those of you who might not know what this is, my husband has always been interested in the American Revolution and I have always been interested in British history. In reenacting portrays a person (either real or imagined) from a different time period and/or place. In our case we reenact in the general American Revolution period - the 1770s- 1780s. We portray a fictious couple in the period of the “middling sort” - meaning middle class. We are members of a local unit of same which is a civilian (not military) unit. For some time the unit members have wanted to do a specific event and our new commander managed to set it up.
Normally when we do an event it is on Saturday or Sunday for 5 to 7 hours. This event was Saturday and Sunday with setup on Friday night and we were the “lead group” for several other ones that our commander convinced to join us as they were needed for this event. - No, wait, this does involve organizing, I promise.
On a personal level, we had to plan what we would do at the event - normally he talks to people as someone who prints and sells pamphlets (soft cover books) as someone from “then” and I portray his wife and demonstrate embroidery. If an event is at our headquarters we will generally end up giving tours of the house at some point during the day. For this event which involved the British army being an occupying force, neither was appropriate so we had to figure what to do instead. He would just talk to people about “the situation”. I decided to get some actual sewing that has been sitting about done. Mending was the perfect thing for the event. I was going to work on a waistcoat (vest) that no longer fit him. I had previously split the right and left sides apart and stitched the lining and front of each half together (into 2 half vest pieces). I had planned to stitch what are basically buttonholes to the back edges where the pieces should be sewn together. I managed to put all this together. As I did so I found 2 small drawstring bags (drawstring bags in all sizes can hide just about anything modern or carry anything “period” ) so I figured I would bring them along also. In addition to this we were bringing two folding reproduction stools to sit on and plate, cup and silverware each (called a mess kit it is period looking items for when eating at an event). Rather than our 2 good sized bench boxes that we use to bring lots of stuff to and store the stuff in at events we had just the folding stools and the one drawstring bag - much planning went into what went into the bag and fitting it in. The first day was to maybe raining on and off, so I put a small plastic garbage bag inside the large drawstring bag this all went into, so the stuff in the bag would not get wet if it did rain. Our stuff we brought with us on Saturday and again on Sunday.
Setup for our unit was a bit more taxing - but it was a group effort to set up and was done late Friday afternoon. We had to setup a number of tents such as lower soldiers would have - it takes 2-3 people to set up each one. Then we put up all of our “flys”. These are large tents that are only tops - we use them to have shade. Part of all of these tents were put in “our” area and the others were put in the adjacent “British army camp” to make it look like there were more of them than there would be. Where to place each component of our area and their camp had to be carefully figured and laid out. Towards the back of the area there is a barn which we had the use of (it actually dates all the way back to the 1700s) for storage and in case of rain. It was decided that the cooking fire would be near it along with two of the small tents to hide modern things in for the cooking. One of our fellows had planned out the cooking - he was cooking for all 3 areas - ahead of time and then had to have the food cooked and ready at the times set for eating. The third area mentioned was a second camp area which was near us, but hidden by trees as it was the “colonial” men who would be fighting the “British army” during the event.
During the week before our “commander” and the restoration village we were in had planned out where the “battles” were to be and worked with heavy moving equipment in a field to have it set up as it needed to be. Our commander gets the credit for much of the organization and getting the event done. Due to the possibility of rain he also had worked with restoration to have a plan in case of same. We were to go to various restored houses in the “village” and would be doing our impressions in same - he even had figured out who would go where.
We were lucky and the weather held straight through. Somehow due to the organization which had been done everything went off on schedule - people being hassled, soldiers drilling, houses being ransacked, etc. all on schedule - with some more of same not scheduled and being done impromptu. One great idea that someone had for organization was that we wanted the public who came through to participate, but did not want to scare off anyone who did not want to. Those who wanted to participate (and most apparently did) were given big red dot stickers to wear. A great idea as even without my eyeglasses (reproduction ones of course) that I had to take off to sew, I could see the dots in the distance.
On Sunday in the morning husband was told, err, asked to give a talk on the lives of loyalists (colonists who did not want to separate from Britain and were loyal to same). He put together some thoughts on same. We have not been to that end of the restoration in some years - decades(?) so I took a walk down there ahead of time so we would know where we going. When the time came for us to meander over a bit ahead of time we were amazed that as we walked past the “tavern” in the middle of the village one of the employees walked out of same with the keys needed for the house we were going to - not sure how she knew we were the ones or how she timed it so well - that is organization. She showed let us into the house and showed us how to lock it up it when we left. Some household type items had been left inside the front door to be “confiscated” (stolen) from us for being loyalists. People showed up on time to hear husband speak on the subject. Just as he was finishing the fellows who would be bothering us showed up with guns aimed at us - lectured us and were nasty to us, confiscated the items and were gone. The public followed them off to the next fight and we locked up the building - taking time to have a nice look around at what was in it. When we walked back towards the tavern I walked in with the keys and the fellow there knew which keys I was about to hand him.
At the end of the day Sunday - exhausted but happy all took down the “camps” and packed their personal and unit stuff away. Everything had been organized well and nothing had been overlooked - what a wonderful thing and it was only the first time we organized something this big - our commander was in contact in advance with the other commanders and individuals who came.
Just when we thought there had been no problems - we could not lock the house we were in front of, had use of and had given tours of as we did not have the key. The key sits in special place in the house (good organization idea) so it does not get lost and all who work in it know where it is. For some reason someone had given the key to someone, who had given it to someone else who, apparently, had given it in at the office - and the office had closed a couple of hours before. We managed to get someone there for security from the county public safety (restoration is county owned) to come and he was going to try to find the key or contact someone who would know where it was - so we had done the responsible thing and not just gone off and left the house unlocked.
I am still tired on Wednesday night - but thanks to the organization of everyone involved it was a great event and there has already been a decision to do it again next year.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
When something big has to be organized it helps to have a group of people working on it. Planning should start enough in advance to not have to rush at the end. Different (reliable) people should be put in charge of different parts of what needs to be done (such as one person in charge of the food and cooking). The possible problems that may arise should be considered (in our case - what if it rained and we could not be outside). And then one needs to keep one’s head if something arises - such as the missing house key.
Due to how well the event was planned it not only was great fun for us, but the public liked it, the village/county was pleased enough to invite us back to do it again, and in the case of something like this - no one got hurt and nothing was damaged.
Next week is a holiday here in the U.S. which is sort of related to all this - our Independence Day which started the fighting. In case I don’t get a chance to post - although I plan to - a happy holiday to those here in the U.S.
Thursday, June 21, 2018
TRAPPED IN A WHIRLWIND
Okay - I am now so disorganized that I have no idea of what to write for you. So this will be a bit off the cuff and probably ramble even more than usual. I had my time planned out a bit better, but you know what happens.
This week I had planned to go to a client on Tuesday or Wednesday - the one in Manhattan. Due to the severe thunderstorms predicted for Tuesday, I asked her to come there on Wednesday and she could not make the appointment for that day. Which freed up the middle of this week a bit.
Monday night we had our reenactment unit meeting - this is when we get together in modern clothes and discuss recent past events and how they went and what can be done to make them better in the future, upcoming events - the logistics of when and where to be, what we will be doing, who is doing to come to the event, who will cook, what the unit needs to bring - what members need to bring, etc. We also have a presentation by one of the members about something related to the period, the event coming up, or how to improve our presentations. Our next event is a new one, two days long, and in need of more planning than usual as we are the lead group of several groups with the event spread out over a good sized period village and such logistics as what we will do and where we will be if it rains, arrangements for people who are camping overnight at the site (many of the units will be doing so, our unit most will go home overnight), set up, break down, etc. Husband did the program for the meeting on how to do first person (being a person of the past who knows nothing past the specific day in the past) as many of our members are new to this and it is integral to the event. So, most of Monday night was gone - we were not home to eat dinner until after 11 pm.
Monday afternoon husband had tried to start our RV’s generator - it has to be run once a month if it has not been used. It would not start. Not the usual it almost started, but different - maybe it will start tomorrow, but dead silence. The generator is under the back of the RV. Husband gets sick if he is a variety of positions, so I climbed under - all the switches were set correctly. He finally did climb under as we tried to find and see the fuse for it - which we could not do. He telephoned the generator shop we have used in the past - we have to have the oil changed annually and needed to do it for this year (we had run the generator for a whopping 24 hours total over the year) - so that will done also. We are hoping it will not be a huge bill - people talk about generator repair bills being more than a new one would cost. We had figured it would be awhile before they can take us, but they can take us this coming Monday - at 9 am.
Yesterday we went to the bank for the week as we needed to cover some checks and figured if this was out of the way, it would be easier to get ready later in the week for the reenactment event mentioned. I also managed to finish cleaning the inside of the bucket to the dehumidifier in the basement. It has dividers that don’t come out and even my tiny hands could not reach everywhere. Husband came up with the idea of using a stiff, thin artist’s paint brush which worked.
Today we went and cleared out the RV as they will need to go inside and the mattresses, and other items will be in their way. We don’t want anyone near the mattresses any way, and we also took out the wood support pieces for the mattresses. We put them in plastic mattress bags in our living room - on a table husband uses for his weaving - every time I walk past it looks like there is a body laid out in there - ugh. I also caught up on paying bills - with the money we put in yesterday. I then recalculated how much we need to pay bills next week - before we, hopefully, go on a trip the week after. We could pay the bills, but not have any cash for the trip - or pay another bill I anticipate. So tomorrow, the only free day left for a while, we will go and get money from my IRA account - no available money in husband’s until August.
Friday will be the setup day for the event so we will be there a good deal of the day. Saturday and Sunday will be the event - and it now looks like rain, possibly both days. Monday we will be taking the RV to the generator shop. Either Tuesday or Wednesday I have to get to that client. Then Thursday the board of my embroidery chapter is having its annual meeting to plan next year’s meeting programs. The Monday after we are going away for a week - no, really this time, we made the reservations last year and have to pay even if we don’t go, so weather be darned, we will be going.
I am pretty sure I have mentioned that we are not morning people - me in particular. One advantage to being self employed is that I don’t have to get up early. Each of my clients figures that I am at a different one in the morning when I go there in the afternoon. I used to get up at 9-10 am - yes, you can call me a slug-a-bed, but since husband has retired we - again, especially me- have gotten worse. We go to bed at 3 am. It usually takes me until 5 am to fall asleep and we start getting up - very slowly - at 11 am. When we need to, we get up earlier.
But in the coming weeks we will be getting up early (for us) almost every day.
We have to get up early Friday to be out and ready for the setup, Saturday and Sunday we have to be there by 9 am - and getting dressed in the period clothing takes longer than throwing on our regular clothes, plus the drive there.
But I wasn’t worried as I knew I could sleep to normal time on Monday - but no longer can as we have to get up and out even earlier on Monday to be at the generator place by 9 am - it is further away.
Then if I am lucky I will be able to sleep to normal time on Tuesday - but either Tuesday or Wednesday I will need to get up just as early to get to the client in the city - even though I am going there for noon, the trip lately has been taking almost 2 hours. So I will have one of the two days to sleep in to normal time.
Then Thursday I have to get up and out to the board meeting.
Thank goodness for next Friday, Saturday and Sunday and a chance to sleep a bit. But we will have to be setting up the RV for the trip - even more work to be done than normal, as we have to put back everything we took out, plus the stuff we normally put in it for a trip - and make that darn bed - that takes 45 minutes if I am lucky, over an hour if I do something out of order and have to redo it. (Remember, this is the bed that can only be accessed from a 2 foot wide opening at the foot of the bed, so it mostly has to be made while in the bed.)
Then we will be off for a “relaxing” trip. Up early every morning. Pack the inside of the RV so nothing will shift during the day. Unplug the electric and cable. Run around all day and then at night - find the right spot in the RV space that the RV is level and plug in the electric and cable - did it once in a heavy rain storm that was so bad that there were “get inside” for safety purposes. Set up the inside of the RV - invariably we forget to shut the rear curtain while outside and have to go back out to do it. And the last morning we have to make sure to get up early enough to “dump tanks” and be out by 11 am.
So, it has and will be a rather hectic and tiring 2 weeks, especially since all the normal things still have to be done - right now - in less than 7 minutes - I have to run downstairs and switch laundry loads.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
It seems that we go through periods where time is easy - no appointments, just get things done as we can. Then we hit a period of craziness where almost every day is planned and there is little or no time to think. Somehow we always get through it.
So, if I don’t post next week - or the one after - although I certainly plan to, you will know why.
Do other people go through crazy periods like this too?
This week I had planned to go to a client on Tuesday or Wednesday - the one in Manhattan. Due to the severe thunderstorms predicted for Tuesday, I asked her to come there on Wednesday and she could not make the appointment for that day. Which freed up the middle of this week a bit.
Monday night we had our reenactment unit meeting - this is when we get together in modern clothes and discuss recent past events and how they went and what can be done to make them better in the future, upcoming events - the logistics of when and where to be, what we will be doing, who is doing to come to the event, who will cook, what the unit needs to bring - what members need to bring, etc. We also have a presentation by one of the members about something related to the period, the event coming up, or how to improve our presentations. Our next event is a new one, two days long, and in need of more planning than usual as we are the lead group of several groups with the event spread out over a good sized period village and such logistics as what we will do and where we will be if it rains, arrangements for people who are camping overnight at the site (many of the units will be doing so, our unit most will go home overnight), set up, break down, etc. Husband did the program for the meeting on how to do first person (being a person of the past who knows nothing past the specific day in the past) as many of our members are new to this and it is integral to the event. So, most of Monday night was gone - we were not home to eat dinner until after 11 pm.
Monday afternoon husband had tried to start our RV’s generator - it has to be run once a month if it has not been used. It would not start. Not the usual it almost started, but different - maybe it will start tomorrow, but dead silence. The generator is under the back of the RV. Husband gets sick if he is a variety of positions, so I climbed under - all the switches were set correctly. He finally did climb under as we tried to find and see the fuse for it - which we could not do. He telephoned the generator shop we have used in the past - we have to have the oil changed annually and needed to do it for this year (we had run the generator for a whopping 24 hours total over the year) - so that will done also. We are hoping it will not be a huge bill - people talk about generator repair bills being more than a new one would cost. We had figured it would be awhile before they can take us, but they can take us this coming Monday - at 9 am.
Yesterday we went to the bank for the week as we needed to cover some checks and figured if this was out of the way, it would be easier to get ready later in the week for the reenactment event mentioned. I also managed to finish cleaning the inside of the bucket to the dehumidifier in the basement. It has dividers that don’t come out and even my tiny hands could not reach everywhere. Husband came up with the idea of using a stiff, thin artist’s paint brush which worked.
Today we went and cleared out the RV as they will need to go inside and the mattresses, and other items will be in their way. We don’t want anyone near the mattresses any way, and we also took out the wood support pieces for the mattresses. We put them in plastic mattress bags in our living room - on a table husband uses for his weaving - every time I walk past it looks like there is a body laid out in there - ugh. I also caught up on paying bills - with the money we put in yesterday. I then recalculated how much we need to pay bills next week - before we, hopefully, go on a trip the week after. We could pay the bills, but not have any cash for the trip - or pay another bill I anticipate. So tomorrow, the only free day left for a while, we will go and get money from my IRA account - no available money in husband’s until August.
Friday will be the setup day for the event so we will be there a good deal of the day. Saturday and Sunday will be the event - and it now looks like rain, possibly both days. Monday we will be taking the RV to the generator shop. Either Tuesday or Wednesday I have to get to that client. Then Thursday the board of my embroidery chapter is having its annual meeting to plan next year’s meeting programs. The Monday after we are going away for a week - no, really this time, we made the reservations last year and have to pay even if we don’t go, so weather be darned, we will be going.
I am pretty sure I have mentioned that we are not morning people - me in particular. One advantage to being self employed is that I don’t have to get up early. Each of my clients figures that I am at a different one in the morning when I go there in the afternoon. I used to get up at 9-10 am - yes, you can call me a slug-a-bed, but since husband has retired we - again, especially me- have gotten worse. We go to bed at 3 am. It usually takes me until 5 am to fall asleep and we start getting up - very slowly - at 11 am. When we need to, we get up earlier.
But in the coming weeks we will be getting up early (for us) almost every day.
We have to get up early Friday to be out and ready for the setup, Saturday and Sunday we have to be there by 9 am - and getting dressed in the period clothing takes longer than throwing on our regular clothes, plus the drive there.
But I wasn’t worried as I knew I could sleep to normal time on Monday - but no longer can as we have to get up and out even earlier on Monday to be at the generator place by 9 am - it is further away.
Then if I am lucky I will be able to sleep to normal time on Tuesday - but either Tuesday or Wednesday I will need to get up just as early to get to the client in the city - even though I am going there for noon, the trip lately has been taking almost 2 hours. So I will have one of the two days to sleep in to normal time.
Then Thursday I have to get up and out to the board meeting.
Thank goodness for next Friday, Saturday and Sunday and a chance to sleep a bit. But we will have to be setting up the RV for the trip - even more work to be done than normal, as we have to put back everything we took out, plus the stuff we normally put in it for a trip - and make that darn bed - that takes 45 minutes if I am lucky, over an hour if I do something out of order and have to redo it. (Remember, this is the bed that can only be accessed from a 2 foot wide opening at the foot of the bed, so it mostly has to be made while in the bed.)
Then we will be off for a “relaxing” trip. Up early every morning. Pack the inside of the RV so nothing will shift during the day. Unplug the electric and cable. Run around all day and then at night - find the right spot in the RV space that the RV is level and plug in the electric and cable - did it once in a heavy rain storm that was so bad that there were “get inside” for safety purposes. Set up the inside of the RV - invariably we forget to shut the rear curtain while outside and have to go back out to do it. And the last morning we have to make sure to get up early enough to “dump tanks” and be out by 11 am.
So, it has and will be a rather hectic and tiring 2 weeks, especially since all the normal things still have to be done - right now - in less than 7 minutes - I have to run downstairs and switch laundry loads.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
It seems that we go through periods where time is easy - no appointments, just get things done as we can. Then we hit a period of craziness where almost every day is planned and there is little or no time to think. Somehow we always get through it.
So, if I don’t post next week - or the one after - although I certainly plan to, you will know why.
Do other people go through crazy periods like this too?
Thursday, June 14, 2018
OUTSIDE ORGANIZING
Well, after talking about our tiny bathrooms last week, I thought I would go more expansive this week - outside our house.
As you may be able to figure since our house is small, the property it is on is also small. Technically since the minimum land size to build on has increased since this house was built in the late 1940s/early 1950s we could not build on the land now as it is too small. It is the sort of property that makes us very close (in distance at least) to our neighbors as their property is the same sixe. It is maybe 25 feet from our driveway to the door of the house on one side. The house on the other side is the same distance from us, but it feels like there is more room as neither of us has a driveway on that side. Their family room starts about 5 feet from our property line.
The house came with a detached one and a half car garage and we added a shed behind it while we have been in the half. We live on a main road - 2 lanes plus a parking lane in each direction. The first year we were in the house we found out not to park my compact car (or anything else) in the street - we had to replace the driver’s side mirror twice. As a result we had a semi-circular driveway put in - that takes up almost all of our front lawn space. In the early years we made the mistake of planting grapes - we have not really had grapes from it (enough to make a cup of very strange, brown, grape jam), but it has taken over that side of the backyard and between that and the bushes and trees that were planted by the former owner we have a jungle on that side. We also have for a few years now, poison ivy on that side that husband has to kill every summer - several times.
When we first moved in husband would cut the grass, but his allergies made it very hard for him. We were both working full time so we decided to hire someone to cut grass and trim the bushes, get rid of leaves, etc. I contacted 4 companies who work at various other houses in the area - one responded. He had a problem with our property. The side of the house (left) with no driveway had no access to the back yard. The side with the garage did not have a wide enough entry to the back yard for his mowers. So, we went out and cut a gate into the fence on the left side of the house. This company took care of our property for some years - doing (and charging us for) much more than we wanted done. When husband quit his job, we switched to the brother in law of his secretary and were much happier with him, but he “sold” us to someone else. The new fellow was okay at first. Since a time when we were almost “snowed out” of our house (we were away on a trip - back then staying in hotels - when an unexpected huge storm hit at home and we were not sure we would be able to up our driveway) we had the each of the three of them clear our snow in winter for us. (Well worth the money.) While the last fellow was cutting our grass, we had major storm one winter. I mean MAJOR - we had not seen that much snow in one storm since we were children - if then. No one came to clear it. We tried to reach him. His phone was discontinued. We called the fellow who sold us to this one - he managed to find out that the fellow had gone home to South America for the winter - leaving us hanging. I won’t go into the saga of trying to get someone to deal with the snow that winter - but the next winter the same happened after he said it would not and the following year he did not even come to mow, so we are back to doing the work ourselves. I posted last winter of our adventures with snow about as big as just mentioned - maybe even deeper.
So, allergies or no allergies, husband went back to cutting our grass. Over the years it has gotten harder and harder for him as he does not have enough energy and I have been helping. Now remember, we basically have no front lawn due to our driveway. We have the grass at the curb and the semi circle of the driveway (now our van is parked there) and the grass on the side of the house without a driveway - at the street end the grass is maybe a foot across, so basically it is our backyard.
Last year he took stuff to kill weeds and killed the grass (and weeds) along the curb and in the semi circle so we don’t have to mow it. One year we will get the semi circle paved and that will help in more ways than one.
This year to make it easier we bought an electric mower. It is lighter and we don’t have to deal with gas for it. We have used it twice. It has a piece hanging that one is suppose to feed the electric cord through to hold it in place - to help not run over it when mowing. But, it is too small for the size cord one is suppose to use, so husband has made an adjustment to it, even so it is a problem with the cord hanging. So I walk a distance away from where he is working and hold the cord, so it is not on the ground.
Our garage is actually husband’s wood workshop. It being a small space for same, we have all of the larger power tools on wheels. They sit along the perimeter of the garage walls and pull out to be used. It is a mess in there right now - has been for a few years. We really need to take time to get it cleaned up and back to where it was when we set it up - nice and organized. When we first set it up we bought a through the wall air conditioner for it - or husband would not be able to work in there when it is hot. When the fellow came to install it he was surprised and said that he had never installed an air conditioner in a garage before. We also had a door put in. A door put in - huh? Well it had the large door for cars, but no other door. We used to store all of the Christmas stuff on boards attached to the rafters. We would bring the boxes into the house and set up the decorations and put the boxes back in the garage. One winter it was very wet and very cold - the large rolling garage door froze to the ground and we were not able to store the Christmas decorations until spring - and did not take them down as they would have taken up more room lying about. So we had a door put in where the window used to be and had a better window put in. We also had to put in electricity and walls. (Perhaps that misadventure in construction another time.) We bought hanging space heaters to heat it winter.
The shed holds stuff for our craft business for when we used to do shows - tables, tents, etc. It has the middle seat of our van (we don’t need it in the van). It has our outdoor Christmas decorations, although lately we have used new ones which are in basement - along with the other Christmas stuff these days. (It became harder and harder for him to climb up and take it all down. Just our lights are in the garage these days.) Garden tools - mostly that we no longer use - are in it. It also has husband’s toys that he took when his mother died and her house was sold - mostly he planned to sell them, but his electric trains are in there too.
We have a small shed next to our garage. It was intended to hold our bicycles. It does - although we really should sell them. It also holds our old and new mowers and trimmer.
Our latest addition is a small shed next to the house in front of the side door. It holds our snowblower - or else we would have to shovel our way to the garage to get it out when needed. It also has two gas cans (currently empty as it is warm out) and for now, the snow shovels.
That leaves a small enclosed area at our side door of the house that we call “the porch”. It is used for storage of various items for gardening, items for our RV, items for taking care of the vehicles, snow shovels (although new place for them these days) and large garden shovels. It has a small square garbage pail (the sort one would find inside the house) for our soda bottles for recycling next to the door to the house. It also has husband’s boyhood work bench. This has a box in it to collect cans and bottles for recycling and the newspapers are stacked on the top. I keep cardboard boxes in it to throw out and use same to put out the cans and bottles - and then they take the box also. It has a large plastic storage piece with doors on the bottom 2 shelves and 2 open shelves above. This is where the all the small items are kept for the chores mentioned above. We have a couple of bags of salt for snow. There is also a large garbage bag. This sounds organized, but is actually a giant mess. I keep planning to clear it out and organize it - but it is either too hot or too cold to work in it.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Where items outside the house are stored is as important as where items are stored inside the house. One needs to figure out what one needs - or wants - to have and make arrangements for them to be stored and as easily accessible as possible.
It is easier to set up a plastic shed in warm weather than cold as the plastic is more pliable. (We had to wait a year for the shed for the snow blower as we waited too long and, per the manufacturer, it was too cold to set it up.) Think ahead if you will plan to store winter items in a shed and get it set up before it is too cold.
As you may be able to figure since our house is small, the property it is on is also small. Technically since the minimum land size to build on has increased since this house was built in the late 1940s/early 1950s we could not build on the land now as it is too small. It is the sort of property that makes us very close (in distance at least) to our neighbors as their property is the same sixe. It is maybe 25 feet from our driveway to the door of the house on one side. The house on the other side is the same distance from us, but it feels like there is more room as neither of us has a driveway on that side. Their family room starts about 5 feet from our property line.
The house came with a detached one and a half car garage and we added a shed behind it while we have been in the half. We live on a main road - 2 lanes plus a parking lane in each direction. The first year we were in the house we found out not to park my compact car (or anything else) in the street - we had to replace the driver’s side mirror twice. As a result we had a semi-circular driveway put in - that takes up almost all of our front lawn space. In the early years we made the mistake of planting grapes - we have not really had grapes from it (enough to make a cup of very strange, brown, grape jam), but it has taken over that side of the backyard and between that and the bushes and trees that were planted by the former owner we have a jungle on that side. We also have for a few years now, poison ivy on that side that husband has to kill every summer - several times.
When we first moved in husband would cut the grass, but his allergies made it very hard for him. We were both working full time so we decided to hire someone to cut grass and trim the bushes, get rid of leaves, etc. I contacted 4 companies who work at various other houses in the area - one responded. He had a problem with our property. The side of the house (left) with no driveway had no access to the back yard. The side with the garage did not have a wide enough entry to the back yard for his mowers. So, we went out and cut a gate into the fence on the left side of the house. This company took care of our property for some years - doing (and charging us for) much more than we wanted done. When husband quit his job, we switched to the brother in law of his secretary and were much happier with him, but he “sold” us to someone else. The new fellow was okay at first. Since a time when we were almost “snowed out” of our house (we were away on a trip - back then staying in hotels - when an unexpected huge storm hit at home and we were not sure we would be able to up our driveway) we had the each of the three of them clear our snow in winter for us. (Well worth the money.) While the last fellow was cutting our grass, we had major storm one winter. I mean MAJOR - we had not seen that much snow in one storm since we were children - if then. No one came to clear it. We tried to reach him. His phone was discontinued. We called the fellow who sold us to this one - he managed to find out that the fellow had gone home to South America for the winter - leaving us hanging. I won’t go into the saga of trying to get someone to deal with the snow that winter - but the next winter the same happened after he said it would not and the following year he did not even come to mow, so we are back to doing the work ourselves. I posted last winter of our adventures with snow about as big as just mentioned - maybe even deeper.
So, allergies or no allergies, husband went back to cutting our grass. Over the years it has gotten harder and harder for him as he does not have enough energy and I have been helping. Now remember, we basically have no front lawn due to our driveway. We have the grass at the curb and the semi circle of the driveway (now our van is parked there) and the grass on the side of the house without a driveway - at the street end the grass is maybe a foot across, so basically it is our backyard.
Last year he took stuff to kill weeds and killed the grass (and weeds) along the curb and in the semi circle so we don’t have to mow it. One year we will get the semi circle paved and that will help in more ways than one.
This year to make it easier we bought an electric mower. It is lighter and we don’t have to deal with gas for it. We have used it twice. It has a piece hanging that one is suppose to feed the electric cord through to hold it in place - to help not run over it when mowing. But, it is too small for the size cord one is suppose to use, so husband has made an adjustment to it, even so it is a problem with the cord hanging. So I walk a distance away from where he is working and hold the cord, so it is not on the ground.
Our garage is actually husband’s wood workshop. It being a small space for same, we have all of the larger power tools on wheels. They sit along the perimeter of the garage walls and pull out to be used. It is a mess in there right now - has been for a few years. We really need to take time to get it cleaned up and back to where it was when we set it up - nice and organized. When we first set it up we bought a through the wall air conditioner for it - or husband would not be able to work in there when it is hot. When the fellow came to install it he was surprised and said that he had never installed an air conditioner in a garage before. We also had a door put in. A door put in - huh? Well it had the large door for cars, but no other door. We used to store all of the Christmas stuff on boards attached to the rafters. We would bring the boxes into the house and set up the decorations and put the boxes back in the garage. One winter it was very wet and very cold - the large rolling garage door froze to the ground and we were not able to store the Christmas decorations until spring - and did not take them down as they would have taken up more room lying about. So we had a door put in where the window used to be and had a better window put in. We also had to put in electricity and walls. (Perhaps that misadventure in construction another time.) We bought hanging space heaters to heat it winter.
The shed holds stuff for our craft business for when we used to do shows - tables, tents, etc. It has the middle seat of our van (we don’t need it in the van). It has our outdoor Christmas decorations, although lately we have used new ones which are in basement - along with the other Christmas stuff these days. (It became harder and harder for him to climb up and take it all down. Just our lights are in the garage these days.) Garden tools - mostly that we no longer use - are in it. It also has husband’s toys that he took when his mother died and her house was sold - mostly he planned to sell them, but his electric trains are in there too.
We have a small shed next to our garage. It was intended to hold our bicycles. It does - although we really should sell them. It also holds our old and new mowers and trimmer.
Our latest addition is a small shed next to the house in front of the side door. It holds our snowblower - or else we would have to shovel our way to the garage to get it out when needed. It also has two gas cans (currently empty as it is warm out) and for now, the snow shovels.
That leaves a small enclosed area at our side door of the house that we call “the porch”. It is used for storage of various items for gardening, items for our RV, items for taking care of the vehicles, snow shovels (although new place for them these days) and large garden shovels. It has a small square garbage pail (the sort one would find inside the house) for our soda bottles for recycling next to the door to the house. It also has husband’s boyhood work bench. This has a box in it to collect cans and bottles for recycling and the newspapers are stacked on the top. I keep cardboard boxes in it to throw out and use same to put out the cans and bottles - and then they take the box also. It has a large plastic storage piece with doors on the bottom 2 shelves and 2 open shelves above. This is where the all the small items are kept for the chores mentioned above. We have a couple of bags of salt for snow. There is also a large garbage bag. This sounds organized, but is actually a giant mess. I keep planning to clear it out and organize it - but it is either too hot or too cold to work in it.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Where items outside the house are stored is as important as where items are stored inside the house. One needs to figure out what one needs - or wants - to have and make arrangements for them to be stored and as easily accessible as possible.
It is easier to set up a plastic shed in warm weather than cold as the plastic is more pliable. (We had to wait a year for the shed for the snow blower as we waited too long and, per the manufacturer, it was too cold to set it up.) Think ahead if you will plan to store winter items in a shed and get it set up before it is too cold.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)