22 March 2007

There was an oakum smell...

56-year-old oakum smells good. Is that strange? Mildly remniscent of the smell of Robertson's Real Beef Jerky -- the stuff they sell at the Love's truckstops! My very favorite!

http://www.robertsons-hams.com/store.htm?mode=shop&cid=7

Anyway, I spent a good 1.5 hours pulling lead and oakum from a 4-inch hub in my main DWV stack. I figure I removed a good 4/5 of the stuff before the toilet arm even budged.

No pictures today. I'm cameraless.

What's worse? No camera...or drilling/picking/pulling lead and oakum from an old, stinky hub?

My vote is with "no camera".

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12 March 2007

Spring Garden

The weather was too wonderful this past weekend not to be working ouside on the garden. Here are a few pics...

Alyssum...smells sooo good:
A cool sprout...Mallow maybe? Sedum!

I planted many new sedum, hot peppers (habernero, jaloro and mariachi), horsetail reed, some salvia, germander, thai basil, greek oregano and cucumbers. Also, my angel trumpets (datura) are both sprouting like mad and returning from the root.

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07 March 2007

"Eat Mor Chikinwire"

Here is what I started with today:
The above is actually how I finished last night. I usually take pictures at the start of the next day's work...after the dust has settled.

My goal today was to remove the 2+ inches of concrete/mortar/whatever, tile and chickenwire:

Mission accomplished! Not nearly as difficult as the tile surround. I really did like this tile...sad to see it go. I retained a small box of these domino-like tiles. In addition, I kept a few unbroken chunks of concrete/tile to use as stepping stones in some corner of the garden.

The floor demo uncovered some good stuff. I've seen this from the crawlspace, but the fact that the toilet and/or my wife or I never fell through this hole is testimony to the strength of chickenwire-reinforced concrete. I managed to get all of the rubble cleared out...a very productive day, indeed.

And finally:

"cohhhh...cehhhhh...cohhhhh...cehhhhh..."
"Luke..."

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05 March 2007

John Spartan Would Be Proud!

I started gutting the guest bathroom on Saturday. To ease into things I removed all of the shelving and door trim from the closet. Then, I limbered up with a few swings of my 4-pound "mini-sledge" on the drywall. PUNCH...easy enough. Finally, feeling pretty tough, I took a shot at the tile that surrounds the bathroom and shower... CLINK!

Nothing.

Whoa...this stuff is tough. Talk about "built to last". Basically the tile rests in 1-2 inches of concrete spread on a thick metal lathe that is nailed to the studs. No suprise in a house of this age.


Of course, there is no insulation -- this partly explains my A/C over-usage during the hot Texas summers. Not to worry, I'll get that fixed when we replace the siding later this year.

After much pounding, day two of demolition ended with the shower surround reluctantly coming down:


As you can see, this bathroom originally had a window. A big window. It was easy to punch out the siding since these pieces were cut to fill the window space. So far proving very useful for ventilation and for clearing out trash and old-timey fixtures.

I definitely plan to re-frame this "opening" to include an awning window in the upper part. We need the light in this part of the house...textured or frosted glass, of course.

Tomorrow, I'll evaluate the tub and begin to tackle the floor and it's 2+ inches of concrete and chickenwire lathe. Yea!

***High-quality respirator and earplugs...priceless!***

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