Author: peterb51

7th February 2025

With more news of spectacular funding wastage rattling around the independent media, we sat in the sunroom to eat breakfast. Even with the snow, now frozen solid, there were still birds flocking to the feed box. It is also a place where the squirrels congregate. Kelli has even coated the posts with grease, and although that foxes them for a while they now jump from the ground four feet in the air to grasp the seeds.

It is an effort to go out into the garage, the heaters we have aren’t that effective unless you sit on them, but after a while I get used to the temperature. 

I’m not sure if I’ve become clumsy in my old age, or there’s too much crap everywhere. I am forever tripping on stuff or knocking things over.

I blame my large feet, but Kelli is always concerned that she would find me dead under a pile of lumber. That necessitated the need for a clean up. Within a short time we moved stuff, threw stuff away and generally organised things a little better, now, at least there is a bit more space for me to move about.

Now there is little risk in me being killed by falling material, it’s just the cold that will get me.

Which was just as well as I wanted to prime a couple of pieces ready for painting tomorrow.

A quick walk around the block with the dogs rounded the day off. The pavements were covered with ice, that is something that Kelli hates, sage has a fear of slipping and hurting the knee that got stitched after our biking accident, personally I blame her micro feet. I’m used to the surface, in fact I had to run into the back garden in my tee shirt, shorts and slippers last night to rescue a metal Buddha that was blowing in the wind. Now that was cold, I think I floated over the snow because I moved so fast. The things I do.

6th February 2025

There was a sprinkling of snow last night, when will it end?

Kelli had places to go, so on with the old gits music and plenty of things to do.

First, was the work on the side table. What I hate is finishing one side of the piece and finding that the other side is even worse. This renovation is taking a long time, it should be a lesson to learn that stripping down a desk is not that simple.

I also started on the long dresser that we got from Goodwill earlier in the week. It turned out to be a piece of shite. There was very little real wood in it, and in addition, the top was bowed.

That is thing I hate, a bowed top.  To me it’s an illustration of a crap piece, and I wasn’t going to stick my name of that. As I sipped my afternoon tea, I pondered solutions.

To solve the bowing top I planned to fix a stiffener in the middle, I had a strip of plywood that I would glue and screw down the centre of the top. That worked well, so one problem down, the next prepping the drawer fronts. 

By the end of the day I had done bits on three pieces, ready for Kelli to start her finishing process to begin.

There has been continued coverage of Elon Musk’s efforts to save millions of dollars on streamlining the government agencies.

The one that has got the most media attention is the United States Agency for International Development. What has come out of that had brought sharp intakes of breath from all the independent media. Apparently it was also a slush fund for the CIA. There was a list released of some funding that was unusual,

1.5 million to advance DEI in Serbia workplaces

– $70,000 for the production of a DEI musical in Ireland

– $47,000 for a trans opera in Colombia.

There was also a payment to the BBC to censor certain news material regarding Hunter Binden’s laptop. That was a shock, I still pay my licence fee to them, they have no business censoring the British public. 

So that, plus the bollocks over the pandemic, I guess you can’t trust the British media as well.

5th February 2025

My wife did it again. Last night she found a tall dresser and matching nightstand on Marketplace for fifty dollars. We do not usually spend that much, which is why we end up with crap that we have to fix. This time the pieces looked in, as new condition, so we had a discussion about it.

Her gut feel suggested that all we would have to do is clean them up, take pictures, post it and wait for the buyers to respond.

Well that’s exactly what we did. The house was being cleared because the person who lived there was now living in a protected community.

The house itself was in the historical area of Holland. It had amazing interior features including massive pocket doors that divided the space, it was a time capsule of details from a time when craftsmanship was present in all buildings constructed, when the township was growing, it was fantastic.

The two pieces were in great condition, we quickly loaded them into the truck, paid the money, and drove home.

We quickly took pictures and Kelli posted them, within a couple of hours we had a sale, and by the evening they were collected, not a bad days work. At a hundred and eighty five dollars, it wasn’t a bad profit, I wish we could do that every day.

4th February 2025

Kelli had put a hold on a dresser at Goodwill which meant that we had to collect it. It’s not a quality piece, but once repainted should be quick sale. These long dressers do go faster than standard pieces, so let’s hope that holds.

Of course whilst we were there she saw a side table that could be made to match the dresser, so we picked that up as well. Now Goodwill have a policy of not helping to load furniture into buyers vehicles, so when we drove into the collection area our pieces were already outside waiting for us.

After a few grunts and groans, mainly from Kelli, we successfully managed to load the pieces into the truck.

Then we had to do our weekly shopping run.

There were no surprises, we tend to get the same stuff every week.

I wanted to get more progress on the pieces in the garage, I have two things going at the moment not counting the two new items still in the truck.

I often dream about the hot summers, with warm air brushing my cheeks as we cycle to the beach, but then the reality of runny noses and numb fingers kicks back in, and I have to suck it up.

3rd February 2025

I had a long list of jobs that I wanted to get done. I have always measured success by the number of tick on my work list.

The work on the last remaining side table is arduous. The plywood side panels have blistered at the point where they fit into the corner posts making it difficult to get glue into. The only way I can possibly do it was cutting out the blistered ply and then applying glue then reinserting the piece and clamping it down flat. I had done an area last night and was keen to see how it worked. I was happy with the result, just a bit of filler and a good sand and it will be ready for priming.

The next job was fitting scoop handles to the heavy long dresser, there were ten drawers on this baby. I had my trusty jig for marking the holes, so it was quick once I got the centres correct.

Then we took pictures of it, and Kelli posted it. We had a lot of interest in it and sold it for full price, that’s the way I like it.

I started taking the pantry unit apart, discovering all the crappy areas. It wasn’t as good as I thought. The shelves need a complete overhaul, they were as rough as a badger arse, they will go through the thicknesser to clean them up.

I’m actually feeling good about things at the moment,  the garage needs a good clean, but with new pieces arriving it’s hard to keep up. I need a magic cleaning fairy to come in every night to sort it out.

It’s a far cry from some of the ladies I watch on YouTube who refinish furniture,  they have immaculate workshops, and get sponsorships deals for all the top end equipment, bah! It’s not fair.

2nd February 2025

We sold both dresser pieces today. One was the oak cabinet that I patched and rebuilt, the other was a fairly bland three drawer dresser that had few redeemable features other than new scoop handles. What I didn’t like was that they were heavily discounted. Now I have this argument with Kelli all the time, because it devalues the work we put into it, but often I have to concede that we have to move stock just to give us room for new pieces. There was a time when items were sold as we finished them, and the profit margin was good, that has changed, we often are sitting on them for up to a week, which is not good for morale or the business. 

I have suggested that we get pieces that can just be cleaned, repainted, and doesn’t require extensive work.

That is fine in principle, but then I pulled out a side table that I had set aside, that requires intensive care.

We took a trip to Zeeland, well actually it was a township that I call Death, it’s actually Drenthe, but I like my pronunciation better, it suits the place.

We collected a larder cabinet, well that’s what we are going to turn it into.

All that action meant that we didn’t go for ice cream and be attacked by the two puppies that Matt and Brenda have, we’ll save that for next week.

1st February 2025

I’m sitting staring at a blank page trying to to get inspired, it’s one of those days when there is nothing going on, but then things changed.

I did book my flight back to the UK, that was a torturous experience. I was trying to find a flight that left Grand Rapids at a reasonable time in the early evening, and get to Chicago to catch the main flight from there, but I couldn’t find one.

I don’t know what has happened to the schedules, but a lot of flights involve two stops, I ended up booking one to Charlotte, the airport I never wanted to use again. Not only that, but I had to book a return through the same bloody place. My main reasons are the flying times, it’s a longer time from Heathrow and then a two hour flight to Grand Rapids, I think last time I was worn out at the end of it, but it’s done and I’ll have to suck it up.

Of course I had to choose a time when there were two air accidents, that were all over the news and internet, Kelli was freaking out, she’s not happy that I fly at all, but it’s even more stressful for her when these things happen.

There was a bit of work in the garage, I primed a long heavy oak ten drawer dresser, getting it ready for Kelli to do the painting.

Just before she started, I noticed that the spray gun trigger was sticking, I had to spend a bit of time trying to free it up. I made the mistake of pulling out the trigger pivot pin thinking that I could pull out the jet pin. When that didn’t happen, I tried to put it back only I had moved the jet so the holes didn’t line up. If ever there was a time when I’d wished that I’d left it alone it was now. Kelli was getting impatient, I was getting annoyed and there was a bit of panic, but with the aid of a torch, and a tapered rod, I managed to align everything, and she could do her spraying.

That was enough for me, I was exhausted.

31st January 2025

I had a lousy night, but it had nothing to do with Kelli.

I was just wrapping up things ready to turn in, but I couldn’t find my American phone.

I was searching everywhere I could think of . I had it in my bag when I met with Lloyd at the pub, did it drop out and I didn’t notice? Kelli called the phone, but there was no ringing, I was getting desperate.

I didn’t go anywhere else when I could have lost it. My head was spinning trying to retrace my steps, I even went outside to check if it had fallen out on the passenger seat, but it hadn’t.

In the meantime Kelli tried to phone the pub, but nobody answered it.

I had to resign myself to go to bed without a conclusion to my conundrum, but that was just the start of my restless night.

It was bloody awful, over and over I went over all possibilities, I even concluded that it got stolen from the truck when I dropped off the repaired chair to Lloyd and Nancy’s home. That then raised the question of whether my wallet still had money in it. That rolled around my skull for quite a while until I finally dropped off to sleep.

Having a nature call at 4.30am I was able to check to see if my wallet had money had, and it had, a sigh of relief left my lips.

When I finally awoke the problem rose with me.

I looked at my bag again, especially the place when I store my phone, and I noticed something.

In with my phone I kept a Menards voucher, that wasn’t there, now I was really pissed off.

In my investigative brain, I figured that my phone could have slid out of my bag using the voucher as a skid, mmm, rubbing my chin, I had a thought.

I went out to the truck again and opened the passenger door, there was my phone and the Menards voucher laying in the foot well.

I was elated, relieved and happy to have found it.

I then recalled an incident on the way to deliver the chair, a lady in a minivan pulled straight out from a petrol station without looking causing me to brake sharply, that is when it must have been propelled out of my bag.

I rushed in to the house, I wanted to call Kelli and pretend that I found the phone and was calling from the pub, but she walked out of the bathroom too soon, and spoiled my plan.

“ I’ve found my phone and the voucher” I shouted.

I don’t know why the voucher was so important, it only had four dollars on it, but I played that up a bit, just for a laugh.

Throughout the rest of the day I would shout out “I’ve found my voucher” until Kelli had enough, then I stopped shouting, and just whispered it instead.

So the moral of the story is, take care of your Menards voucher and it will look after your phone.

30th January 2025

Wow! The end of the month is looming, this means I must start organising my trip back to old Blighty.

The temperature rose considerably today, starting a rapid thaw. Each day I have to scour the back garden looking for the dog poo that has been frozen in time, rising to the surface like a dead Everest climber.

Maybe that is not a good comparison, but there must be a ton out there.

I met up with Lloyd for our beer and winge session. He was on a time crunch, this time. I was a little late, he was sitting at our usual table with a quarter of his glass empty. I had some catching up to do.

After covering a bit of history and current affairs we hit politics. With the cabinet nomination meetings going on, there is a mountain of things to talk about.

The democrats were screaming at the appointees because they fear the change. They cannot bear to have their cosy sponsorship deals disrupted, and it’s bloody obvious that is what’s going on. These people are the lawmakers, the largest collection of corrupt scumbags in the country. There is evidence of insider trading that have boosted the fortunes of these politicians by millions of dollars, and they get away with it.

Today there was an aircraft crash involving a small jet and an army helicopter in Washington.

The plane was cut in half and landed in the river with no survivors, a tragedy.

I’m not sure that Trump’s comments about DEI  in the airline industry was pertinent.

We finished the maple top coffee table, took pictures and it was posted, now we wait.

29th January 2025

Thank goodness it was a good night, both of us slept well, because we had a lot to do.

Kelli had clothes to take to Plato’s plus the weekly shop.

There were only two bags of stuff this time, I don’t ask where it comes from, I believe there is a secret door leading to another dimension, set within her closet, a clothing Tardis.

Once that bit was done we headed off to do our shopping. Kelli had her list of meals that she wanted to make for the week, so buying the ingredients didn’t take up much time.

Then it was back to Plato’s to get the money and any garments they didn’t want.

I waited in the car whilst she went inside.

I was busy looking at my phone when I became aware that a young black dude was trying to attract my attention. I open the door and this chap started on his tale of woe about having to meet his mother and needed money for the fare, and on. Now I thought this could get violent, so I reached for the only possible weapon in the truck, the snow brush and ice scraper. I’m was sure that could do a bit of damage or, at least restyle his hair.

I then used my next secret weapon, I told him I was a tourist from England. He then said, did I have any English money that he could change at the bank. When I told him I didn’t, he shrugged his shoulders and walked off, my hand loosened on the snow brush, no activity today.

Once back home we took pictures of the two pieces we had finished, including the oak unit that I reconstructed, turned out nice.