23
Apr 08

Freebies and slack

Yep, I’m slacking again.  And once again it’s not that I don’t have anything to blog about, just that I haven’t had time to sit down and do it.  Believe it or not it’s not even that I don’t enjoy this – I do, typing is quite cathartic for me.  Which is kind of the problem.  I enjoy it too much and tend to zone out while writing.  As a result I end up spending more time than I planed on it and instead of feeling unburdened when I’m done I end up feeling guilty that I spent so much time at it when I have so much more I should be doing.  It also doesn’t help that WordPress 2.5 broke the smugmug and lightbox plugins I was using so posting photos is a bit more arduous than I really care to deal with.   The new built in gallery in WP 2.5 is excellent, but I really have little interest in using it as I prefer to keep my photos on my smugmug site, uploading them twice annoys me.

But Amy’s most recent duet of posts on her blog seem worth of mention.  So read on for my thoughts about the fickleness of freebies and whatever else I manage to bang out before accepting I’ve spent enough time and need to get back to using the keyboard for something more productive!

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14
Mar 08

New Carport Tarp

Last sunday while we were recovering from the previous nights party, Amy and I remembered about the Yuma Bargain Warehouse and decided to go see if we could find a new tarp for the carport. I had guestimated that it would be a 20′ x 20′ tarp…and after measuring the tattered rempains of the original that was looking about right. At the warehouse we found a good selection of tarps, of course the one we liked best (green mesh) they were out of in 20′ x 20′. But they had black mesh, heavy duty white and silver in that size. The black mesh was tempting…but being a mesh we weren’t sure if it would give as much shade as we wanted – and it was over double the cost of a silver or white tarp. The silver we didn’t like the looks of so at $37 the white tarp won out. We also picked up 2 – $2 bundles of nylon rope and headed home. Last night we finally put the tarp up, took a little over 30 minutes. Continue reading →


07
Mar 08

So the winds are gone…

Well, the winds are gone…and so is half of our carport tarp. As I mentioned in my last post the high winds on sunday really did a number on our carport. Here are some better photos of the destruction in action:

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02
Mar 08

Wind sucks today

Better photos to follow later but I wanted to test posting from my phone. As the title says the wind here sucks today. The front half of our carport tarp has been destroyed…it’s actually gotten worse since I snapped this photo and is now torn all the way to the very top – right through the double stitched anti-rip sections 🙁

I kind of knew it was going to happen. I was never very happy with the choice of material the previous owner used for the carport, he claims it was UV rated but it’s only a few years old and already it’s badly faded and I could tell it was getting weak. In fact just yesterday I was looking at some tears that had started around the grommets in it so I knew it wouldn’t be lasting forever.

I’d like to go out and take it down before it gets any worse…but with 45MPH gusts predicted (Though I think they’re bigger based on how much our trees are swaying!) I don’t think it would be a wise idea for me to go outside and play with a large sail in high winds on top of a ladder. Since it’s a total loss at this point anyway I’ll just let the wind have it’s way and start thinking about how to deal with it.

I’d love to make something that could be rolled back for occasions where we want some sun…or when the wind gets like this 😀 But for now I’m just hoping we can find something we can afford as a replacement. I’m hoping my old boss Gwyn at Racecraft can help me get some vinyl impregnated awning fabric like she uses and help me sew it up to be the right size. Going to have to make some phone calls this week it looks like!


24
Feb 08

Nefarious skills put to positive use

Amy and I have known it was coming. From the day we moved in we dreaded it but we knew it was unavoidable…sooner or later we were going to lock ourselves out of the house. The issue is the style of lock. On the house we were renting they were pop-locks where they would unlock anytime you opened them from the inside. On this house they’re twist locks that stay the way they were last set. So whereas before we knew that the act of stepping out of the house would unlock it – now if we step out while it’s locked it stays locked.

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