The journey continues...

Brian Bilbrey January 28, 2023

28 January 2023

We're in the midst of the season where mornings aren't very ... welcoming. Some days, I'd rather just stay in bed until Spring. For example, in the days to come, we're due for highs in the low single digits (F), and lows in the negative teens. That's proper cold. When it does warm just a bit, it actually just screws things up further - the other day, two days after 15" of snow... ... We had a further 3" of snow over night ... but then it warmed up enough to deliver a bit of rain, then a bit of…

Brian Bilbrey January 19, 2023

19 January 2023

On Monday, this was supposed to be ~12" of snow: But instead we got a bit over an inch of mixed sleet and ice. Tuesday is trash/recycle day, so I chopped a path to the street (and cleared the boardwalk to the front door), and got the important bits out by the road. Later in the day, after Mr. Feeble Sun got a chance to lukewarm the surface, I cleared the rest of the driveway, making it safe for anyone visiting (and safe for our garage doors should someone have been unable to stop their vehicle on an icy driveway).

Brian Bilbrey December 17, 2022

17 December 2022

Winter days are ... often busier than summer days around here. But before we get to that level of fun, Marcia wanted our rescue dog Georgia in her winter coat, as most days around here struggle to get up to 0°centigrade. Georgia did fine in the coat, and then went to find Wolverine to put paid to the winter coat: As I noted above, winter days are busy. Yesterday, I took off "work" early... so I could spend some quality afternoon time turning big pieces of fire wood into smaller pieces of firewood. The basement wood stove is a Jøtul…

Brian Bilbrey December 4, 2022

4 December 2022

I'm continuing to slowly put the woodshop together, cleaning up stuff and building infrastructure and storage. The first "big" project was to build a new workbench, replacing the one I left behind in Maryland. This one incorporates the vise that Marcia got me for Christmas a good many years ago. The work surface is just about a quarter inch lower than the table saw, so it works well as a drop zone for longer outfeed work. Stainless steel bolts set at the bottom of the six legs are the leveling feet. The next thing I built was a pegboard wall…

Brian Bilbrey November 20, 2022

20 November 2022

Such as it is. It's a busy time of year. The last of the outdoor maintenance is getting done. Leaves are all up and composted ... well, they were, then a new batch blew in from across the street, argh! Friday I took off a few hours early to get some maintenance done on the propane-powered home generator, an 11KW Generac. I did all the normal maintenance stuff, and ended up having to reset the controller to make everything work right again (remove battery connections, unplug controller, plug controller back in, restore battery connections, then redo all the setup wizard…