Are we falling or flying …

I’m back in the Great Northwet - and no, that wasn’t a typo, it’s raining here. 

While it’s nice to be back in my house, it’s also really nice to be able to reconnect with friends.

Leslie and I didn’t make it up to the cabin after all; but Plan B was possibly even better - we bummed around the SF for a bit, headed back to the South Bay for a bit shopping, then spent the rest of the time at back at the Ranch and enjoyed several hours of house renovation as well as technology discussions with Ben.

I know - imagine me having any interest at all in either of those topics.  Surprise…!

Eventually we piled into Ben’s car to drive to Willow Glen to pick up dinner from a sort of dive restaurant there; I’ll ping Leslie for the name and will then post here - since they serve really awesome Mediteranean food you might want to try yourself.

Willow Glen was new to me, but I was taken in by its charm.  I was surprised to discover that interesting of a neighborhood within the San Jose city limits.  Occasionally I toy with the idea of moving to the Bay area but never really seriously consider doing so due to housing prices, etc. - but I’m going to really check out Willow Glen again during my next trip south.

Leslie and I then spent more hours on their deck, watching the stars and talking through life and all the pieces that go with it.  Ben popped in and out in several times in between his trips to his new office building since he couldn’t wait until Monday to set up his workstation, etc. However, the construction crew was still hard at work Saturday night… go figure.

Eventually, we headed into the den to watch a couple of movies on dvd while also doing fun art projects (yes, really!).   Leslie is really getting into scrapbooking; and I’m finally ready to get back into making traditional miniature quilts, which combine my interest in history and design; and the smaller size and scope allow me to see progress/success quickly enough to keep me motivated for more…

 “Days up and down they come
Like rain on a conga drum
Forget most, remember some
But don’t turn none away
Everything is not enough,
And nothing is too much to bear
Where you’ve been is good and gone
All you keep is the getting there
Well, to live’s to fly, both low and high
So shake the dust off of your wings
And the sleep out of your eyes.”

                    - Townes van Zandt 

I realized I left out another key aspect of the joys of gardening - the odd and strange things you might find while you dig.

Some of the treasures which were unearthed either in the front or back yard:

Rocks - lots’o'rocks;

Hardpan/glacial till;

Pieces of broken glass from bottles, windows, and who knows what else;

Concrete fill; and occasionally, lots’o'concrete fill;

An old drawer pull;

Pieces of an auto nameplate -  when I first found only the “Sa”  I thought it was from a Dodge Satellite, but  I l soon dug up a corresponding “Le” and realized it was from a Buick LeSabre.  I actually did some web searches to try to identify the approximate model year(s) based on the lettering - I think this nameplate is from the 70’s - and possibly from the first homeowner’s car, but I doubt I’ll ever know;

Lots of rusty nails and other building materials, including two red bricks which based on their location most likely were leftovers from the builders of my next door neighbor’s chimney, since my chimney is on the other side of the house;

A large rusted out tin can which some time in the past someone filled with silica or mica, then buried three feet deep and which unfortunately was eventually discovered by my Lab/Golden Retreiver mix, Geordi, approximately 3 years before i finally discovered the pieces he didn’t find.   My much later discovery of this solidified rusty rock like thing was unfortunate because Geordi’s discovery/digging of the item resulted in him getting a repeated toe nail injury/infection which eventually became an incurable bone infection; and he’s minus that toe;

A pair of old nylon pantyhose;

An old metal stake and tattered nylon chord which most likely was a tie out for a dog

Assorted plastic pieces from children’s toys;

And, assorted pieces of metal of varying shapes and sizes.

Probably two summers from now I’ll have my sloping back yard leveled out, but by a professional landscaper, and not by me. 

I’ve already gotten a few estimates and between that, landscaping, and splitting the cost with my neighbors to replace all three sides the backyard fence, it’s guaranteed to be expensive.  (and that’s without ripping out the concrete patio upon which the deck was built, by the previous owners from whom I bought the house; as with the now defunct minibar, the patio was built to survive a nuclear war - and was built with way too much concrete).

I keep hoping something really valuable will finally be dug up during that excavation … but suspect some environmental hazard will be found instead.

I hope I can survive the suspense.

I was never much of a gardener until maybe 4 years ago, I became possessed with filling my back yard with cherry trees which required me to dig six big holes through several feet of non-porous glacial till while trying to recover from a bad case of whiplash incurred when my Jeep was rear ended while waiting out a red stop light.

Most people would have rented a rototiller or maybe an electric post hole digger, or if really determined to do it manually, used a pick axe to break through the hardpan, rocks, compacted grass roots. and lots o’ left over tree roots from several 70 foot pine trees taken out three years before since they were hazards waiting to happen during a windstorm.

Not many people with a bad, lingering case of whiplash would choose to dig those holes with only a shovel.  But - I did (think The Goo Goo Dolls in “Iris“ …. “Yeah you  bleed just to know you’re alive…”).

I learned some key life lessons from - and while - digging those holes for the Rainier, Lapin and Montmorency cherry trees I planted that spring, which stay with me year round, long past gardening season:

Digging through glacial till and hardpan is pretty miserable but at the same time, oddly fulfilling since results literally pile up in front of you;

Whenever you hit clay soil or rock you can’t dislodge, go at it from a different angle; eventually you will win;

Sometimes while gardening I think about life, work, today, and tomorrow; but sometimes I just mindlessly garden; but I usually get more done when I think while gardening, mainly because if I garden while thinking things through, it causes me to move at a quicker pace.

Four summers later - the trees are doing well.  The Rainiers need to be polinated by the Montmorency’s but the bees who do that didn’t show up until late July so this wasn’t a great summer for cherries at my house.  Last summer was great.  Rainier cherries are my favorite,  and my dogs love the Montmorencys - go figure.

That same summer I also planted a peach tree - which is doing amazingly well - so please do ping me in the next few days if you want some home grown organic peaches… ;)

And - in case you’re interested - here are several covers of the Goo Goo Doll’s song, Iris:

Matchbox Twenty Iris (Goo Goo Dolls Cover)

New Found Glory Iris (Goo Goo Dolls Cover) 

I’ve slowly been replacing the furniture from my former life with pieces mostly bought at Costco Home, including a very simple platform bed which is much easier for my now 16 year old English Setter mix to jump onto than was the much higher,  oak bed frame. 

Replacing the old mattress/box spring combo is Costco’s version of the Tempurpedic mattress, both because I like a bargain, and because I have an occasionally re-occuring back injury from a long ago day when I was in a which car rolled over twice in a snowy ditch but landed on all four wheels, facing the wrong direction with part of the roof caved in… but more about that another time…).

The mattress comes in a box with wheels, since according to the box, the mattress weighs a whopping 185 pounds.

A friend and I wrestled the mattress out of the box onto the platform bed frame - which had a few challenges along the way.

Once we finally got it onto the frame, I used a box cutter to very carefully cut the vacuum packed seal, at which point the mattress started to unfold… and unfold… a la an old “I Love Lucy”  slapstick mode… 

Eventually unfolding to look like this (and your eyes are fine, the bottom picture was taken with a cell phone camera; the top two were not):

And - about 24 hours after that - really awesome, uniform mattress finally appears…

I own a ranch style house on on a block of Brady-bunch style bi-levels, all of which were built in 1966 on what had been a been a strawberry farm.  

It has some nice features and ten years later i’m finally learning to appreciate many aspects of “Mid Century Modern” when all around me is Craftsman style renovations and new construction. 

The house is an area alternately known as “South Rose Hill” or “North Bridal Trails” even though horse acre-sized properties have a hard stop at the other side of 70th St.   Still the many builders doing infill construction (large houses on small, subdivided lots) keep naming their developments  ”Bridal Trails XXXXXXX.”

My house is old enough to need some serious remodeling and not yet old enough to be vintage or charming. and came with a rather large (approx. 700 square foot) one story addition completed in 1972.

The addition was part garage conversion but also added on a large bedroom, a not so large walk in closet, and master bath, together which encompass approximately 450 or so of those square feet.

Shortly after buying the house, I obtained a copy of the original permit for that addition from my local zoning office; which said the project cost was $4,000.  Even factoring in the value of 1972 dollars versus our post inflation dollars today, it’s pretty obvious the first owner who did that addition cut corners, some for unfathomable reasons.

For example: they cut through the siding to run a drain for their 1972 garage conversion mini bar, rather than paying the same plumber who put the new master bath somewhere under $50 to run that drain into the main plumbing system, which is what 99.999% of rest of the world would do - myself included.

The house is now 42 years old.  None of the three previous owners ever fixed that plumbing faux pas/potential hazard.  

My solution: sawzall out the naughahyde covered mini bar out since it was an eyeseore anyway and now  - no need to worry about joining the drain to the main plumbing system.  But - because remodeling is always about suprises:  underneath the naughahyde, that mini bar was built from cedar plywood that was destined to survive a nuclear war… and took me *weeks* to pry apart.  I wish the rest of this house was as well built and sturdy as that bar.

And - there’s still that <lovely> hole through the siding, which is temporarily patched but looks like hell.  I’m re-siding the entire house within the next two years, which should fully solve that problem.  Or, at least that’s my hope… who knows what will turn up then, since that project will also include replacing all the windows; the sliding glass door from the dining room to the deck; the front door;  and while the siding is off,  reinsulate the house since insulation was apparently optional under the 1966 building codes :-/

Besides the sometimes <unusual> plumbing, over the years my now-ex and I unearthed enough other kluged home repair solutions I’m very sure more than one of the previous owners either hired horrible contractors, or perhaps like me liked to play Builder Bob on the weekends. 

Past excursions of playing Builder Bob have resulted in days of excruciating pain from us having spent days with a mallet and chisle, digging out red fireplace bricks which had been set by the original builder in 2x the normal amount of concrete. 

Since that was one of my first “how hard can this be?” projects, it never occurred to me to wear a mask.  Not only could I barely walk for a couple of days afterwards, I coughed up concrete chunks and dust for one week afterwards.  Ouch.

Undaunted, I’ve soldiered on to other smaller but still not always well thought home renovation projects with varying levels of success; and which always take longer than I estimate.

My house projects just for this weekend:

• Trim neighbor’s tree branches resting on my roof.  Done; project and clean up time: 2 hours.
• Cut back overgrown plants in front yard rock garden. Done; 1.5 hours.
• Trim 3 cherry trees.  I did this today; and trimming only took20 minutes; but stripping the thin green branches to be able to compost: 65 minutes.
• Replace shingle on corner of roof. To do tomorrow; happily I already purchased the supplies at Home Depot yesterday.
• Cut grass in front and back yards. Tomorrow.  I promise.
• Finish installing temporary hardwood floor in hallway of master bedroom.  Mostly done today; will be fully done tomorrow (have to clear a path in the garage to my table saw, which is behind several sheets of 3/4″ 4×8 plywood sheets).  (and in this case temporary is actually a misnomer - I’m probably about a year out of renovating the master bath; and can’t install the new permanent terrazo floor until after that’s completed….)
• The usual cleaning and vacuuming, etc. which comes with having dogs - one of whom has an amazing work ethic for herding the vacuum cleaner.  Tomorrow.
• Pressure wash the deck.   Tomorrow.  Maybe.  More likely will be one night this week (damn).  Then next weekend I have to swap out the four deck boards I didn’t get around to replacing last summer; paint the railings; and touch up the deck floor … again.

Or:  it … just … never … ends…

Oh well.  My awesome contractor, Victor Bello, did an amazing job laying the permanent floor in the main part of the bedroom.  While my craftsmanship and results don’t yet match Victor’s; I really enjoyed piecing together hardwood flooring for the bedroom hallway.

Since it is only “temporary” I used some of the leftover floor boards which didn’t make it past Victor’s inspection, so it’s not as pretty as Victor’s work - but it’s stilll very satisfying to see results where none existed just a few hours ago. 

(And, at the risk of him being too booked up to tackle my next remodeling project, Victor does amazing work and if you’re remodeling, you should talk with him about your project.   Besides installing my new floor, which also required some HVAC upgrades, Victor also remodeled two of my three bathrooms from the studs up; and built a new closet in one of the bedrooms, too.  And - he is also a trusted friend… :) )

In any case, I’m definitely ready for a new and different career; so if building the next generation of internet search doesn’t pan out, I’m seriously considering going back to school to really learn to how to be Builder Bob.

Stay tuned.