Author: peterb51

20th September 2022

Thunder storms were expected, which curtailed our outside working. Kelli had the finishing touches to do to the twin headboards, but we decided to take pictures ahead of the rain.

As the storm started we moved all the pieces inside the garage including the bed frames themselves. I was struggling with them, no matter how I stood them up they kept falling over, at one point I thought they were going to hit me. I shouted oaths, Kelli heard them and came to the rescue. She just placed them in the same place as I did, and they stayed there.

She posted them on Marketplace and they were soon snapped up, not bad for a roadside find and a bit of paint.

I drove the the landscape suppliers to order some rocks, but first stopped at the bank to draw out some cash. I needed petrol so I pulled in to the pump, handed my money over and started to dispense the fuel. Suddenly this car pulled up on the other side of the pump with music blasting out.

Yes it was a tall black dude, and the music, or should I say, sound, was aggressive rap. He left his car, and the noise, as he strutted into the kiosk. Now I like music, but not this type, I tried to pump the fuel faster just to get finished and away before my ears started bleeding.

I’m not sure why he believed the world deserved to hear his playlist, but Kelli remarked that it was stereotypical of the black community, therefore it was accepted.

I drove off from the petrol station and made my way to the landscaping supplier.

I ordered a cubic yard of river rocks, large enough not to fall through the holes in the gabions, that’s being delivered on Friday.

Later the buyer for the headboards turned up just as another storm hit. It didn’t deter the loading, with good humour, both headboards fitted perfectly into their truck. This was a quick turnaround, from free to finish was three days.

We also packed the pool away. As we still have the original box it came it, I can’t believe it could ever have fitted in it. It must have taken some well trained children and an elephant to packed it. We ended up putting it into a large plastic crate, but it’s gone for another year, and the space looks empty without it.

19th September 2022

I watched part of the Queen’s funeral, like all royal celebrations it is done with precision and magnificence. If feels strange that this person will no longer be on the TV at Christmas, it is all that I’ve known.

The elderberry bush growing in the back garden has been provided us with enough berries to make a syrup that has heathy attributes.

Kelli found a recipe, and my job was stripping the berries from the stalks. With a fork in hand I sat on the sofa mindlessly watching as the berries fell into the bowl. I had a lot of practice doing this in my wine making days, but it is so easy to end up with stained fingers that last for days.

18th September 2022

Off I went to see if the tailboard was still there.

Even before breakfast, with my hair untidy and hidden by a cap I set off. There had been a heavy rain storm during the night, so it would have got a good soaking.

As I approached the turning, I couldn’t see it, my heart sank.

A lot of the pieces had been taken, the large bench was still there and also a few chipboard panels, but there, my heart stopped, the tailboard was there, laying on the ground.

I swung the truck around and threw it into the back and headed home.

It was a funny day, I was supposed to work on the garden, but the pool had to be emptied, so I had to set the pump up and attach hoses and drain the water.

I had to apply some lawn food to the front grass, and I noticed that my reseeded area was sprouting.

I had fun working on the tail board, the turned section was made from three pieces glued together then turned, all I had to do was split the glue joint. I used a heat gun to soften the glue and metal scrapers to force the piece apart. It could have gone horribly wrong, but it didn’t. Armed with the small wooden piece I glued it into position on the headboard, now it was complete.

I started digging out the new flower beds on the raised garden, there is a lot of turf to remove, with the sun beating down on my slightly burning head I made a start.

I loaded up the wheely bin with as much spoil as I thought the container could safely manage, and called it a day.

17th September 2022

Kelli’s peripheral vision struck again. The inertia reel seatbelts saved me head butting the dashboard as she made a u-turn.

She had spotted a collection of items outside a paint storage wear house and we were speeding back to the location.

And she was right, there were a couple of headboards, a couple of chairs, a brand new double glazed window, a tatty melamine cupboard and a home computer table.

Well, the bed bits and the window went straight into the back of the truck, then we headed off to lunch.

It was an odd series of events that led us to be in the area. It was my idea to have lunch at our favourite cafe, and Kelli’s that we took the road that the furniture was on, so we could have been guided by the universe to have these items.

I assembled the carcass of the kitchen cabinet, the front rails were tenoned and bonded in with epoxy, the back rails were screwed, these would be hidden by the back panel.

Kelli couldn’t wait to start on the headboards having them primed before the end of the day.

I did notice that one of the legs had part of the turned section missing, this would typically be against the wall, so no big deal.

Later that night whilst sitting in bed, I had a thought about the tail board that we didn’t take, because there was only one. If it hadn’t been grabbed by someone else, and was still there I could cannibalise it to repair the headboard.

Now we were thinking about getting out of bed and driving over to the place to see if it was still there, but we decided to wait until morning, but it didn’t stop us from thinking about it all night.

16th September 2022

We had someone who was interested in the sarcophagus, the joy was in my face.

I had my own challenges like cutting the tenons for the front rails of the kitchen unit.

There was a rebate that I had to machine for the back panel, a simple job some might say, but not for me. I could have used the table mounted router, but the bed is small and trying to hold a wide panel would be tricky.

I decided to use a clamp fence and run the router alone it. Everything was set up, I double checked the dimensions and switched the machine on. It was going well, then I noticed the fence had slipped about a millimetre, meaning my rebate was wider at one end.

Now I was in recovery mode, I had to correct the other end to make a parallel cut. All this faffing around took time, but eventually the rebates, and the tenons were complete.

Kelli on the other hand had a wild hair and repainted the tall dress because she thought the original colour was the reason it hadn’t sold. Off she went in a cloud of white paint, within a short time it was transformed, pictures taken and posted. Minutes later it was sold, I have learned never to question Kelli’s instincts.

15th September 2022

I finally went to the landscaping store to get some rocks to fill the gabions.

The ones I had at the cottage I filled with stones I found and scavenged, but round here there is none to be found in the wild. My only option was to see what they had available.

I ended up with some grey Mexican beach pebbles ranging from two to four inches. They were quite expensive, but I bought four bags to try out.

Once I was back home I tried the pebbles in one of the gabions building a wall around the perimeter hoping to fill the middle with smaller rocked, but it was difficult to do as the pebbles were odd shape and didn’t lend themselves to being stacked, so that idea failed. The pebbles would have to fill the gabions , but that would cost two hundred dollars for each, a bit much, I need to rethink.

Keli finished painting the sarcophagus, it was too heavy to carry into the house, it would have required six pole barers to lift that bugger.

We took pictures outside, and even lifting it off the trolley nearly strained my greens, I hope whoever buys it has strong floors.

14th September 2022

It was my first visit to Holland’s Farmers market. We rode on our bikes, just a short distance from the park, our frequent destination.

It consists of stalls either side of a short road, each lined with vegetables and fruit. It occurs on Wednesdays and Saturdays and may become a popular excursion for us.

We filled our bags with plumbs, potatoes and a string of sprouts that stuck out from my saddle bag like an alien spine.

I stripped the second small table, I thought was in worst condition than the first, but after removing the old finish and giving it a dose of oxalic acid the veneer looked great, so just the large one to go.

Kelli painted the sarcophagus, it is a big bigger, and received new knobs from Amazon, it should look great.

I made a start on the kitchen cabinet cutting the end panels to size, I had fun chasing the squareness around, but I got there in the end.

13th September 2022

What a difference a day makes, today I was full of energy and wanting to get started on the backlog.

I lifted one of the “Lane” style tables from the store room. I removed the screws holding the top on and started scraping off the surface. There was a dark stain in the middle that I treated with oxalic acid. In between that I sanded the drawer fronts from the sarcophagus.

Earlier we went for a ride to the park. On the way we were overtaken by a lady on a racing bike all dressed up in cycling gear. I didn’t think anything of it as we plodded on with the wine of Kelli’s electric motor in my right ear.

The lady shot ahead, then after a while she slowed, or we speeded up. Very soon we we right on her tail, now there was a decision to make, should we sail past with a smug look on our faces, or stay behind, Kelli took that decision and shot off like a rocket sailing past the lady like she was standing still. I tried to follow at the same pace, but not using the assistance it was a little more difficult.

I made up the distance eventually as Kelli switched down the level of assistance.

The lady cyclist disappeared in our dust as we continued on to the park. You could tell that autumn was just around the corner, a few golden maple leaves lay on the grass, where did the year go? It used to last for ages.

Kelli was determined to prime the sarcophagus, so that was the goal.

I had fixed two trollies together as the piece was nearly six foot long, this made it easier to move about.

Whilst she was doing the painting I wanted to draw out the kitchen cabinet full size on a board to check all the dimensions. The client wants to put a micro wave in the top part, so I needed to check out the clearances they gave me.

I finished the day watering the areas I had reseeded. The dog resistant grass was growing well, the tiny shoots had sprouted and filling the space nicely. Out the front there was no activity, but it’s early days, maybe next week things might happen.

12th September 2022

One important job to do was to remove the dresser from the truck. I have called the piece The sarcophagus. While Kelli was cleaning the beast I did some lawn-dressing and re-seeding on the front lawn. Knowing my luck with seeding I don’t expect much, although, there are signs of life in the area I seeded with the piss resistant grass. There is stuff called Dog Rocks that is added to their drinking water to reduce the nitrogen in the urine, that might be option B.

Both of us didn’t sleep very well last night, it might have something to do with it being a full moon.

The day was a non day, a bit of cleaning, moving stuff around, we both were not energised at all.

11th September 2022

We were up early to collect the mother of all dressers. The last time I carried something that heavy it had a body inside.

Three of us struggled to load it into the truck, it’s suspension groaned under the weight. Even taking the drawers out made little difference, I can’t wait when it’s time to extract it from our vehicle.

We were expecting a person to view, and hopefully buy the dresser, but the agreed time came and went with no sigh of anyone.

Now it just so happened that a coffee table that I had been repairing was due to be collected late afternoon, the customer had also showed interest in the dresser, so it could work out anyway.

And that’s what happened, we sold the dresser and got paid for the coffee table.

The original person that wanted the dresser had forgotten all about it, tough luck lady, you snooze, you lose.