When we replaced our deck with composite boards on the surface, we could no longer use that surface for our extension ladder, which we need to do to wash the outside of the upstairs windows.
Continue readingCategory Archives: Home List
All Decked Out
For years I’ve been patching our deck by swapping out surface boards as they rotted. The original builders hadn’t used treated boards, and the previous owners hadn’t painted it, either. So it had slowly deteriorated. I put in treated 2x6s, so it was increasingly sturdy. But I stepped right through it on an old but sound-looking board in the fall, and then the lower structure started to give way as some of the joist ends rotted. All winter I kept thinking about what it would be like if a moose walked onto it and broke a leg. So we made plans to get it replaced in spring.
Continue readingIdiot’s Catch
How many PhDs does it take to change a light bulb?
Two, at our house.
Continue reading
Oh, What a Life We’ve LED
I hope everyone else is reveling in the cost savings that LED bulbs have meant. The light emitting diode (LED) is such a cool invention. Once the bulbs were being manufactured in huge numbers and their prices dropped, it made definite economic sense to replace our other bulbs with them. We swapped out our incandescents for compact fluorescents (CFLs) several years ago, but as those die we’re putting in LEDs. That time has also finally arrived with fluorescent tubes, too. The per-bulb cost for an LED retrofit lamp is now on par with a standard four-foot fluorescent tube, and the LEDs come with a five-year warranty. What’s not to love?
Continue reading
The Quasimodo Pile Goes Down—Son of a Birch!
I’ve been taking advantage of our cold weather to split the most ugly, cantankerous, gnarly, and twisted pieces of wood that you can imagine.
Boy, have there been some tough ones. I wrote about the glory of winning in battle over these mean, twisted, miserable chunks of firewood last winter. It’s still one of the truly wonderful parts of our -30 to -40 F cold snaps. The added brittleness of the wood usually makes these stubborn pieces of firewood split fairly easily.
But this year I have one tree that is just killing me. Every damned piece of this thing has been a fight.
Continue reading