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What are you doing today, II

LOL!

My wife lost her sense of smell to COVID. She says it is not so bad. The tradeoff is worth it. Because,,,, I am now more tolerable.
Howdy,
well, when I make burgers now days, I just use Charmin!! Of course I use the extra strong!!!
 
Spent the weekend with the St louis Crossfire club paddling a riverboat on the Hussah river.

Got to drive the Crossfire in the Ozarks as well.
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Happy 4th to everyone, prime rib in the oven and later we are going to shoot an antique flintlock rifle that was around at the time of the war. I will post it.
 
Hardly any fireworks in liberalville. (Why ?) Your rules..
I still havn't figured out how a grease gun works, but it works now after I took it apart.
Did yard work and now I'm having a cold one.
PS, not ONE firecracker went off today <chuckle> They used to move the house.
One year I had bottle rockets and shot them toward the open area.
One circled back and landed on the roof of our grouch.
She said if you do that one more time, I'm calling the law.
I lowered the rocket more toward the ground the other way.
It circled around and landed on her roof again.
We headed out to the farm.
 
With the wife's help we finished putting TREX on the deck. Sitting on it now with a couple of Sam Adams beers.

Half the neighbors are popping off fireworks.

Cats and the dog are apeplexic. Me, I caught the wife's head cold.
 
I'll be laying low tomorrow since I worked today. Perfect day for it - rain is in the forecast. Luckily, we've had showers and thunderstorms pass through with a good soaking for the past two or three days now when we're normally bone dry. The rain I appreciate. Not so much when it was nearly 80 degrees at 8 this morning with 93% humidity.
 
We've been bouncing back and forth between home and camp the past couple weeks. This week was crazy as we stayed last weekend from Thursday to Monday at camp then came back home for a few days. I blew a belt last weekend on the cfmoto side by side. So on Monday I sent my wife and kids home early and stayed at camp to stain the deck with Thompsons water seal. Then drove home and immediately tore into the side by side to change the belt. It was completely shredded and tangled up in the clutch. In the process it broke a small plastic part on the clutch. So while waiting for parts to arrive, I turned my attention to my son's car as there's a bit of work to do on it for the safety. I had to change a rear wheel bearing, some swaybar links, and a forward control arm. The test is smaller stuff. But it's ready and going to the shop. I worked on it for 3 days then came back out to camp Thursday with my youngest son. My wife is down in Minneapolis this weekend with our girls going to a shawn mendes concert. (No thanks, not my thing. Lol).

The whole country experienced a cellular outage yesterday for the Rogers network. No texting. No phone calls. No internet. No atm. No debit machines. Mine came back at 2:47am after being off for almost 24hrs. Not a huge deal for me as we're at camp anyways. But it kinda sucked not being able to communicate with my wife who was driving 8hrs and in another country not knowing if they made it or if they were laying in a ditch somewhere.

Here's the deck at camp before and after.
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Changing the belt on the side by side is a royal pain as I had to remove the seat and a storage box underneath to access the clutches.
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The belt was a shredded mess tangled up in the clutch.
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Here's the rear wheel bearing. It was rusted solid. I pounded on it for 2 days with a hammer trying to break it free from the mount. Then I picked up a can of liquid wrench penetrating spray and soaked it for a couple hours. It dissolved the rust and allowed it to break free.

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Hooked up with a pretty young lady and went to the races.
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I spent the day sweating my butt off dropping dead trees at mom's place. My 83 yr old great uncle stopped by for a visit. Being a logger all his life, he grabbed the saw and dropped a 100ft tall balsam before the wind took it down on the shop. There's a 40x80ft new metal shop on the property.

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Four years ago, I put a concrete floor in the 24' X 6' Shed annex to our garage. Wired everything and then the project stalled.

Plans were to make 8 feet of it accessible to the back yard for tool storage. Shovels, rakes, Mowers and stuff. Instead, it filled with lumber, cushions and junk.

Today I tore into the mess. Some insulation and paneling yet to put on the walls and ceiling. With luck, I could have this 6'X8" room ready Thursday night.

Just outside of the shed is an old wooden deck that goes across the back of the garage. Frame is OK but the 5/4 treated pine decking is shot. I have just enough 8 foot "TREX" to cover it. It will match the big deck I just finished.

Next, I cut in a doublewide entry to the back of the garage. It will allow one grab a beer from the garage frig and step right out onto the new deck.
 
PAINTING THE HOUSE

More. Again. Still.

Not much got done for a while, I had hurt my hip (bad bruise, lots of pain, nothing broken), and with a 2 year old here 1/2 time it is a struggle to get outside to make any real progress for the past several weeks. So the whole project stalled out for about a month.

I'm in pain this morning. Painted all day yesterday. Had my friend come over to help. He brought 2 of his older kids. They were very helpful. But we are now making progress on the upper floor of the house. New two tone paint scheme on the left side of photo, original monochrome in the central part and partially started with the new trim paint on the right side of the photo. Originally the house was very monochromatic, sort of a beige/tan color. New paint is a vanilla for the clapboards and a milk chocolate brown for the trim. You can also see the original brick color on the chimney, but the new brick color on the left and right sides of the photo. Back wall is 3 stories tall, so maybe the scaffolding guy will arrive today? Garage/apartment is 2 stories tall, front side will be easy, but the back side poses more of a challenge. On the bright side, the pool bar/shed can all be reached from the ground!

There are 4 sets of floodlight that hang from the eve of that hexagonal upper roof on the far right side of the photo, those will also be replaced during this project with new LED floodlights. Might as well get double duty out of the scaffolding.

To put any of this into some sort of scale, the brick pillars on the right side of the photo are approximately 14' tall. Not seen in the photo is the slope that drops off to the right and the rear. The house is built on a ridgeline, we are 60 feet in elevation above the river behind the house, most of that 60' of drop happens within 100' of the house.

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PAINTING THE HOUSE

More. Again. Still.

Not much got done for a while, I had hurt my hip (bad bruise, lots of pain, nothing broken), and with a 2 year old here 1/2 time it is a struggle to get outside to make any real progress for the past several weeks. So the whole project stalled out for about a month.

I'm in pain this morning. Painted all day yesterday. Had my friend come over to help. He brought 2 of his older kids. They were very helpful. But we are now making progress on the upper floor of the house. New two tone paint scheme on the left side of photo, original monochrome in the central part and partially started with the new trim paint on the right side of the photo. Originally the house was very monochromatic, sort of a beige/tan color. New paint is a vanilla for the clapboards and a milk chocolate brown for the trim. You can also see the original brick color on the chimney, but the new brick color on the left and right sides of the photo. Back wall is 3 stories tall, so maybe the scaffolding guy will arrive today? Garage/apartment is 2 stories tall, front side will be easy, but the back side poses more of a challenge. On the bright side, the pool bar/shed can all be reached from the ground!

There are 4 sets of floodlight that hang from the eve of that hexagonal upper roof on the far right side of the photo, those will also be replaced during this project with new LED floodlights. Might as well get double duty out of the scaffolding.

To put any of this into some sort of scale, the brick pillars on the right side of the photo are approximately 14' tall. Not seen in the photo is the slope that drops off to the right and the rear. The house is built on a ridgeline, we are 60 feet in elevation above the river behind the house, most of that 60' of drop happens within 100' of the house.

View attachment 152452
I love doing construction but, I really hate painting the house. It is slow, backbreaking work and IT NEVER ENDS!
 
I love doing construction but, I really hate painting the house. It is slow, backbreaking work and IT NEVER ENDS!
YUP

This is the 3rd coat. 28 years ago it got the original coat of stain. About 15 years later we painted it again, same color, with a (at the time) very high quality stain. This time we are using Olympic Elite stain. Supposedly this product will outlive me so I will never have to do it again.

The biggest regret I have with this house is the roof. I got talked out of a steel roof about 15 years ago. So this roof will need to be replaced again, sometime during my lifetime. Maybe I'll get lucky and we will have a horrible hail storm soon and I can get an insurance claim?
 
We're lucky in that regard Bob. Our entire house is brick. No painting or staining required. The roof is roughly 6 yrs old now. I'm 45. So sometime in my 60s I should be doing it again. Then it'll be the kids problem. Lol
 
We're lucky in that regard Bob. Our entire house is brick. No painting or staining required. The roof is roughly 6 yrs old now. I'm 45. So sometime in my 60s I should be doing it again. Then it'll be the kids problem. Lol
Brick just didn't give us the design options we wanted when we were building this home. But I do love the low maintenance of brick. Most 'prairie style' homes are a mix of brick and stucco or brick and wood. Mine is obviously brick and wood. We would have preferred the look of stucco, but it is just a maintenance nightmare and doesn't seem to hold up in the climate. Some have pretty good luck with it, but I'm not convinced it holds up well enough long term.
 
Brick is low maintenance but I'll say that after a hot day and the outside temperature cools down, I can go outside and touch the bricks at 12am and they'll still be radiating heat.

I headed to the city first thing in search of a large gear puller to pull the clutch from the side by side. I ended up renting one for the day. The side by side is back together after blowing a belt last week. Now packing up to head to camp till Sunday.
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Did some rearranging on the farm my daughter lives on. My Mother planted 6 conifer trees 25 years ago that my Daughter didn't like, and they were to close to the house anyway.
I did not want stumps and since the trees were not that big, we used the Caterpillar and some chains hooked up high to tip, then pull them out. I did not even cut them up. Just used the loader and grapple bucket and put them in a ditch to burn at a later date.
Daughter wants a patio on that side of the house, so out came the sidewalk, the landing and the wooden deck that was there.
The best thing I have bought in recent times has to be the Vermeer stand on tacked skid loader. I really don't know what I would do
now with out it. Best thing for any tree work clean up.
Now on to deciding the final plans of how we will build the new patio....
 
Did some rearranging on the farm my daughter lives on. My Mother planted 6 conifer trees 25 years ago that my Daughter didn't like, and they were to close to the house anyway.
I did not want stumps and since the trees were not that big, we used the Caterpillar and some chains hooked up high to tip, then pull them out. I did not even cut them up. Just used the loader and grapple bucket and put them in a ditch to burn at a later date.
Daughter wants a patio on that side of the house, so out came the sidewalk, the landing and the wooden deck that was there.
The best thing I have bought in recent times has to be the Vermeer stand on tacked skid loader. I really don't know what I would do
now with out it. Best thing for any tree work clean up.
Now on to deciding the final plans of how we will build the new patio....
Good plan. I pull out anything that the 5 ton can pull, much easier than cutting it down and digging out.
 
More painting. Seems like that is all we do lately.

On the bright side my friend who is helping called in a favor and a guy showed up yesterday with scaffolding and 2 laborers. I paid for them. But they were worth every penny. That wall in the photo below is 50' long and 3 stories tall, most of it is over concrete. No freaking way I was going to get up on that sketchy ass scaffolding.

I had met that friend at a party a couple years ago. We had a nice cookout for lunch. Nobody drank any beer!?! I think it was too damn hot.

At least 3 of us got bit by wasps over the past 36 hours. At 7am this morning I was at the hardware store and then I took out revenge with 4 cans of wasp spray. My sting was yesterday, today my wrist is swollen and itches like crazy.

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We've been at camp since Thursday. Yesterday, I went to get a load of crushed rock from a nearby forgotten gravel pit. I plan on making another trip to get more later. Always something to do at camp. Last weekend I installed another fence post then took the reciprocating saw to the fence, installed a couple hinges and a latch and created another gate to make it easier to load the wood shed with firewood without having to either chuck it over the fence or carry it 20ft around the fence to pile. 2 weeks ago, I stained the deck with Thompsons water seal.
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Today, the plan is to get another load of gravel for my buddy for his site. Then haul the boat out to bring it back to the dealership for work.
 
We've been at camp since Thursday. Yesterday, I went to get a load of crushed rock from a nearby forgotten gravel pit. I plan on making another trip to get more later. Always something to do at camp. Last weekend I installed another fence post then took the reciprocating saw to the fence, installed a couple hinges and a latch and created another gate to make it easier to load the wood shed with firewood without having to either chuck it over the fence or carry it 20ft around the fence to pile. 2 weeks ago, I stained the deck with Thompsons water seal. View attachment 152556 Today, the plan is to get another load of gravel for my buddy for his site. Then haul the boat out to bring it back to the dealership for work.
You're always up to something Brian.:ThumbsUp:
Sometimes I get tired just reading you posts. :ROFLMAO:
 
You're always up to something Brian.:ThumbsUp:
Sometimes I get tired just reading you posts. :ROFLMAO:

Not as tired as I am after doing everything I post. Lmao.

Actually, since my accident, I find if I hit the ground running and don't stop moving, I don't stiffen up or hurt as much.

We came back from camp this morning. I pulled the boat this weekend to bring it in for an electrical issue. When we got home I immediately went to work washing it as it gets quite scummy sitting in the water all summer.

Here's the before
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Here's the after
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My secret cleaning product for tough stains? SPRAY 9. Just spray it on liberally, let it set a few seconds but not long enough to dry. Then quickly grab a soapy soft scrub brush and scrub the area then rinse clean. Sometimes I may have to spray scrub and rinse a second time but it works. It also works for cleaning black streaks on rvs, tough baked on bug splatter on vehicles.
 
Well, I didn't get to the tractor part. Too many other little projects the "she who must be obeyed" would like to be done.

Installed a 10 X 5' deck in front of the camper. Plans are to add 3 mor feet to make it ten X eight. Just enough so we don't have to walk on the gravel in bare feet.

Had to unload two 7'X7' plastic shed kits. Four huge boxes that weighed about 250 lbs each. Covered them with a tarp 'cause we ain't erecting them until this fall. Had to buy them now because this fall SAM's won't have them in stock.

Temperature was 104 F so a lot of Sam Adams and plain water breaks every hour. Sat in the airconditioned camper to recover but the power company kept doing brown outs. At least the beer stayed cold.

It was 11:30 when my head hit the pillow back in St Louis.
Today I am beat but work must go on. So, I showed up expecting 6 people and got three.
 
We have one of those 7x7 sheds at camp. Very handy.

I hit the ground running again today. (You better sit down for this one) First, I hauled the boat to the dealership for an electrical issue. Then came back and hooked up to the flat deck and went over to moms place to cut down a few more trees. I loaded them along with the brush and came home to unload and start a burn pile. While it burned, I jumped on the mower and did the lawn.



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S_T_I_L_L painting. Always painting?!? When will it be done? Crew of 5. WTF. It has been 1 full week. And on 2 of those days we had a crew of 8. (OK only 7.5 because I’m pretty inept). Workshop/back garage/guest apartment is 90% done. House is 75% done. Pool house is 90% done. Probably 2 more days of hell, uh, I mean, painting.

Oh and the lovely Mrs_Bob hasn’t even picked out a color for the garage doors yet.


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