Thursday, June 18, 2009

Should be doing a stage race.... american dream. ...

Tour of Ohio? nope.
Giro di Jersey nope.

Anyway, here is the backyard. It was listed on some blog called "Design Sponge"

To the left is the actual garden. Tomatoes, hot peppers, sweet peppers, cucumbers, zucchini, blackberries, raspberries. Then the compost heap. Then the sunflowers are starting to pop up.

To the right is the chiminea that we have, but have not used yet. It is begging for a party.

In the foreground you can see the edge of the perennial garden. The 25' flagpole is not pictured.

The bottom picture shows the walkway after Tom and Amy made a stencil of one of Amys shirt designs.




Monday, June 15, 2009

Its America... just throw it away.

Long time no post. Nothing too exciting. When pics are uploaded they will include:
Somali Wedding.
Garden.
One might be thinking "Why dont you just upload them now?" and the answer is that this fine blog is published from an ancient desktop taken from a dead guy and doesnt have the capacity to download massive amounts of things.

Anyway.

I had a long going battle with Dr. Stubna about whether his joe blow pro or my Silca Pista was superior.

My argument was this: they are both the same until failure. When the Joe Blow failed, it is then disposable. When the Silca Pista failed, it is able to be rebuilt.

So after several years, the silca was hurting. I had replaced the rubber valve ring a few times at 3-4 dollars a time, and I figured it was this again. I ordered 3-4 more (figuring this would last me many more years). I install them, and its not the case.

I order a leather plunger, install it. Not the case.

I finally realize that the freaking gauge is leaking air out as it goes from the barrel to the hose. Great. The price on a new gauge was that of a joe blow sport. Game over, I lose. Welcome to America where everything is freaking disposable. I order the Joe Blow Sport and put the silca in the basement full of broken bike junk.

REDEMPTION:
Amy had mentioned needing to buy a new dehumidifier for the basement. The hot hazy humid summer is upon us and it is starting to get wet down there. The old dehumidifier crapped out. Not sure if you know this, but Dehumidifiers are expensive. Finding a used one is like hitting the lottery. "Dehumidifier" is a key term put in newspaper ads in describing a yard sale to bring more people. Seriously.

So today I took the 70's Kenmore apart. I cleaned all the moving parts super well, they were totally nasty with decades of dust and grossness. I cleaned all the coils front and back, and I figured out the switch that had been not working properly. Old stuff is pretty simple. The proof was that I am pretty simple and I figured it out. I put it all back together and plugged it in. It is humming like new.