On Tuesday I was chatting with Mariel to wish her happy birthday. She said maybe we will have a white Christmas. I responded that that was not likely as the weather forecast had no precipitation and temps in the high 30’s, low 40’s. Well the forecast and I were totally wrong. We got about 3 inches of fairly wet snow last night and this morning, and I don’t think it will all melt by Saturday. So…
It's snow dusting.
Can you say White Christmas?
Art and I have been talking about trimming the arborvitaes between our fences. I planted two of them several years after the first bunch and they are now about 8-10 feet shorter than all the others. Well, Art thought of a way we can even them off.
Job done - what's next honey?
Well looks like my plan B is the one that will win out. I had been checking the water level by looking in the skimmers but it turns out that once the water gets below the skimmer on the outside, there is still water in the skimmer since I have the drain plugged.
The water is down to the level of the bottom of the shallow end. This probably means that the leak (s) are on the ledge around the deep end.
We had a wonderful 12 day visit from the West Coast Cornells and all who came up from NY/NJ and over from Lancaster to enjoy them.
Link to pics
It has been a long time comng but after 2 years of watching news reports after days of heavy rain followed by high winds followed by big trees falling on houses and cars and people, the huge trees between us and the Claytons came down. The Claytons were so inspired they are taking down the remaining ones that were on their property in the next week.
These were 80-100 ft pines. The crane and the bucket truck and the chipper were awesome as were the workers. I did catch most of the more memorable moments on video.
We hit a new low for trick or treaters this year, tying the all time low: 1 group of 2 kids.
Lot of candy left over.
The good news is that I got a lot of leaves raked Saturday and Sunday. There is an impressive leaf jumping pile in front of the cabana already.
Also the Media center migrated to its winter location:
Saturday we went over to Borders for Adam Tocci’s book signing. Here’s Betsy with the slightly larger than life sized Adam that Kim surprised him with:
Back in July we had a dead oak come half way down. Starting in mid-August, it took me a few days here and there to complete cutting down the tree and then cut it up, along with a few other trash trees I had been meaning to get rid of. After talking with Art about renting a splitter for a weekend to take care of his stock of downed loggage too, I decided to embrace Thoreau’s observation that splitting wood warms us twice.
I sharpened up my splitter (and my machete so I could get some hacking licks in trimming the downed wood), and started spending an hour or two every few days. I have about 1/3 of a cord done already and it has been fun as well as good exercise. Great way to work out aggression.
(link for the flash-challenged)
And as you can see from the last few pictures, burning season is going to be exciting.
After more than 25 years of sleeping on a waterbed, our new Stearns & Foster Market Street Ultra Firm mattress was delivered today. It has a coil density of 825×2, and a long list of features. Some interesting ones to me are:
And it has Smart Latex and Memory foam. Now my mattress and my computer are smarter and have more memory than I do.
The new non-waterbed mattress.
Stearns & Foster
Old waterbed mattress dumped over the deck railing
Yep – the pool is still leaking. So my options are:
1 – spend another $225 at least to have the diver come back to try and find more pin holes. No guarantee.
2 – let the water drain, forget about closing the pool and just keep the bulk of the leaves out. In the spring, drain it all the way and see if I can find/patch the holes.
3 – If 2 or 1 didn’t work, the big hammer would be to replace the liner. It is only 12 years old and is supposedly a 25 year liner. I think it was around 3K when it was done in 1998.
Cars
The Sebring has had the oil light on for several months. Hopefully all it needs is a new oil sending switch. George noted that it was leaking a little oil last time.
Tyler brought the Focus back last week and it turns out the Check Engine light has been on for a while.
The Olds’ steering started acting funny on Friday and then it was making creaking noises at low speed. Took this to George first. Turns out I was a good bump in the road away from losing the whole engine/transmission.
Here is a picture of the bottom of the frame. The back is usually connected to the rest of the frame with 4 bolts that have a rubber cup around them that acts as a vibration damper. All 4 cups rotted away. The hole the bolt goes through rusted out on the 2 left side bolts and basically the frame dropped on that side. In the picture you can see that the support arm dropped about 4 or 5 inches. George is saving it though so it should be all better by tomorrow.
Engine/Transmission support separated from the frame
What it looks like fixed
OK – I gave it the old college try but just could not get a good patch on the hole in the pool. So I called in Mike Barry who is a diver for the Hudson http://nygoodhealth.com Fire Department.
Diver down - hole patched
