Monthly Archives: April 2016

Doberman Cyclops

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Over the years I have brought home various stuffed animals for Leah, which we keep on a cedar chest in our bedroom.

Sam likes to chew on things.

I think you can see where this is going.

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We have left Sam in the house many times since he came to live with us, and he has caused only minimal damage. He has chewed up several socks and a couple of Leah’s bedroom slippers, usually early in the morning when he gets up before us. He tore up a stuffed hedgehog dog toy, and he chewed on a little stuffed gorilla. No big deal. Then on Wednesday when we went for our weekly huevos ranchers lunch, he chewed up the face of the Valentine’s Day doberman I gave Leah, as well as Minnie Mouse’s foot and ear.

There’s not much we can do about it other than try to remember to keep chew-attractive items out of his reach.

Sly in the Mule

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sly in the mule

This is Sylvester’s favorite place to crash when he’s outside. Leah put some towels down as a pad, but it still can’t be as soft as the pet beds that are on the garage floor just out of the picture. But cats make their own rules about this kind of thing.

Sylvester has been having urinary tract problems, so he has decided to make his problem our problem, too. He has taken to spraying in various places around the house, including in the garage. “In the garage” includes the windshield and back window of our car. It’s not an endearing trait. Leah says she really likes Sylvester, aside from that little problem, and the fact that he and Smokey make Dusty’s life a living hell.

But I have to admit that he’s a cool character.

Inspection passed!

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The building inspector came back for a re-inspection on Tuesday. We passed.

He basically took my word for everything that wasn’t easily visible, like the framing repairs. He had noted several plumbing issues, which I told him had been corrected. He suggested that we add some metal tie straps to the side framing of the garage doors, to help prevent the garage from blowing away in a strong wind (assuming we had left the garage doors open, which we won’t). We needed four angle brackets specially designed for that purpose at a cost of $20 each. That’s a lot for metal brackets, but not so much in the context of a cost of the whole house.

I bought the brackets and spent an hour and a half drilling holes in the concrete pad of the garage, installing concrete anchors and bolts, and hammering 25 nails into each bracket.

The inspector said we can start drywalling. The drywall contractor said he can start pretty much when I call. Several things have to be done first. I have to complete the insulation, which I think I can do in a couple of days, or one if I’m really diligent. On second thought, make that two days. The heating and air-conditioning contractor is going to install a duct we’ll use to blow warm air from the wood-burning stove back into our bedroom. That should happen this week. The chimney man will install all the wood stove fittings from the ceiling through the cap on the chimney. That should happen early next week. I want to install a walkway in the attic that will give us access to the whole-house fan and the warm-air blower when the attic insulation is done. That should happen by the end of the weekend.

And then drywall. And then paint. And then electricity. And then the heating/air conditioning contractor can complete the HVAC system. That will allow us to condition the air in the house, which will allow our wood flooring to get used to the conditions that it will experience when we move in. And then wood floors in the living room, hall, and bedrooms, and maybe kitchen. And tile in the bathrooms, and maybe the kitchen. There are several things that may have lead times of several weeks, so we need to pick them out now and possibly order them within a week or so. That includes wood flooring, bathroom vanities, and possibly some light fixtures.

And, of course, I have to finish up the basement in our current house, hopefully before the end of May.

We need to get busy.

Game cam captures

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A couple of months ago I found tire tracks up at our new house, along with some new garbage in the driveway. And then I found an old dishwasher dumped on the driveway. We decided we needed to keep track of what goes on when I’m not working at the house, so we got a game camera. I mounted it about 10 feet up in a tree, aimed at the cable we keep across the driveway. I hoped I could capture an image of anyone who came to the house since they would have to stop to take the cable down.

Most of what I got is me coming and going.

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I feel bad about driving my truck to the new house when it’s just about a two minute walk from our current house, but I can’t carry everything I need by hand. I checked the back seat Sunday when I left the new house. I had my circular saw, sawzall, jigsaw, grinder, cordless drill, cordless driver, stapler and a bunch of odds and ends (like tape measure, pencil, drill bits and so on). I also had two long extension cords and my eight-foot stepladder in the bed of the truck. So I pretty much have to drive.

We occasionally walk over with the dogs to take a look.

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I’m wearing a cap because the angle of the camera view emphasizes my receding hairline.

Over the month or so that the camera has been up, we have seen the buyers of our old house visit the new house a couple of times. That’s OK, since we told them they were welcome to take a look. They are probably disappointed in the progress; I know I am.

We have also caught some unknown vehicles. Here’s a visitor from Alabama.

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This worked just like I hoped it would. The driver stopped close to the cable so the camera got the license plate. This person apparently stopped, looked, and then backed down the driveway without getting out.

This one stopped short, so the camera didn’t get the tag.

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I don’t recognize this person, or this truck. The camera timed its pictures so it didn’t catch the person’s face.

This one drove up after dark.

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The camera has an IR flash that’s supposed to be invisible to the human eye. The tag reflects it so well that it’s illegible, but I would probably recognize the truck if I ever saw it again.

But, wait, isn’t this a game cam? Why, yes, it is.

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These are no surprise. We see deer fairly often, especially at night.

I’m not sure what this is. We have foxes, of course, but it could be a coyote.

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Probably a fox, although the tail does’t look as full. This fox visited the previous day, almost exactly 12 hours earlier.

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I was afraid the camera would have lots of empty frames because of limbs moving in the motion detector field of view, but that turns out not to be a problem. Of the 800 or so images it has taken, most by far are of me. It has caught several contractor vehicles, and also the truck that services the portable toilet on the site. The resolution is reasonable, although there was just starting to be some pixilization on the images of the deer as I cropped it. The night shots are just OK, but that’s probably because the camera is too far from the subject.

I’m thinking about putting another one where it can catch anyone actually entering the garage. Right now the house is completely open, since we don’t have drywall between the garage and the kitchen, and we can’t put up garage doors until we have drywall.

 

Cat TV

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Sometimes the cats come up on the front walk or the back deck and stare into the house.

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Leah usually thinks they want to come in, but sometimes all they want to do is take a shortcut from one side of the house to the other. They come in the front door and walk directly to the sliding glass door on the deck. Or the other way around. Other times when Leah opens the door they turn and run away. I think a lot of the time they’re doing the feline equivalent of couch surfing. They just like to stare into the house like humans stare at the TV.

I wonder if they find our lives as boring as we find most TV.