26 May 2017

Updating...

When last we met I had just started on the shower. I am pleased to report that the work is now done, it was a long hard pull but it all came together in the end.

 The last post talked about the drain and the floor board that had to be replaced, much to my surprise I managed to measure everything just right and it came out perfectly. So, starting from there, we continue.

 Here is the shower pan installed. If I were going to do it again I would cut the bottom 2 or 3 inches off of that back wall so the pan would be against the studs. I would have taken the paneling off, but it is glued to the wall board (and the wall board is glued to the studs) and I didn't feel like replacing the wall boards. Maybe I should have. I did use a mortar bed, but I could have done a better job leveling it. It isn't bad, but it's not perfect.


With the purple board up it was now time to install some corrugated metal. Notice the beam at the top, it is there to stabilize the new wall. We opted not to go all the way to the ceiling with that wall because of the vent fan right there, it will get a new fan with a light because it is somewhat dark in that corner with the new cabinet installed.


And the finished product, with the shower doors installed., the woodwork stained (I'm going to try to convince milady that the 2x4 stud there in the middle should be painted; the beam got stained, too, and it looks great) and the cabinet painted. Everything is leak-free and it works pretty good.

The train room is also coming along well, there are no pictures but I did get the linoleum floor cut and put in. Unfortunately I missed two of the old carpet staples, so there are two small holes in the linoleum. They are small enough that they shouldn't be noticed and they will be under the train tables anyway. Next in there is to get the door trim painted and put on, and I really should have painted the baseboards before I put them back in, too. Now I'll have to paint them in place.

And last but not least, I must sadly announce the end of the Redhead of the Month. It's getting harder and harder to find the time to update the blog as I should, not to mention more and more difficult to find pictures that I like well enough to use that I haven't used already. So, as a final offering, the last ROTM will not be a picture, but a painting.

Love and Pain by Edward Munch

Much love to you.

12 March 2017

What I've Been Up To

M wants a new shower. She doesn't like the old one because it's too small. So we have ordered a shower pan and the old tub has been removed. I built a wall to enclose the new shower and got the pieces for the plumbing.

The drain for the tub was nestled inside a huge hole cut into the floor, so I had to cut the huge hole out to put in a piece of plywood from floor joist to floor joist. But wait...for that I must have tools!


OK, that was too many tools, so I ended up just getting the set that had the circular saw and the drill. The collecting of tools and materials took up my Saturday, so the drain and floor work was scheduled for Sunday. But lo and behold, Sunday brought this:



Fortunately it was only a light dusting, and by noon the sun had come out and it was gone. So, under the house I went to change out the water filter and install the drain. Once the drain had been assembled and tied in it was time to install the patch on the floor.

With that being done we are now ready to mix and spread mortar to bed in the shower pan and then we can start putting the surround up. She wants to go with corrugated metal for the surround, so I will have a fun time figuring out how to poke the faucet handles through the wavy metal without creating a channel for water to get in behind it.

But that will wait for another day.

08 March 2017

Busy

Have a redhead.


13 February 2017

That Was Nice

Valentines Day will mark the second anniversary of Mrs Hades foolish decision to hang out with me for a while.

Of course I'm working on Valentines Day this year. But, since it's on a Tuesday (that's tomorrow guys, you have only one day to get your flower shopping in) she has to work as well. So instead of celebrating on Valentines Day we took the weekend off and drove the convertible to Myrtle Beach. It was an absolutely fantastic weekend.

Although Friday's temperatures never climbed out of the fifties, both Saturday and Sunday were in the mid to upper 70's (and in fact I saw 80 very briefly on my dashboard thermometer Sunday afternoon). Cruising Myrtle Beach, ragtop down, with my lady by my side...yeah, life just doesn't get any better than that.

This week will see temperatures back in the "seasonal" range (meaning highs in the 50's and lows in the 30's). Oh well, back to the daily grind I suppose, but it was nice while it lasted.

07 February 2017

Oh, My Neglected Blog

Welcome back to what is becoming my seldom visited corner of the internet. It's been almost a month since I last posted. In that time we have inaugurated a new President, endured a flood of protesters as a result, and watched a stunning Super Bowl comeback.

Closer to home Eldest Son has finally moved out again, this time for the last time. That leaves only Youngest Son at home. We are finally moving forward with getting him tested and maybe we can get him some help on the learning front. I think he has come to grips with the fact that Occupy Dads House is not going to be a lifetime option, so he's showing proper enthusiasm for the project.

Today is a special anniversary for me personally as well. For the seventh of February 2015 I posted about my new Z scale model trains showing up at the Refuge. I took a few pictures of them, went out for the night with a Meetup group to hear a local band, returned home and went to bed.

It was a largely unremarkable evening overall, but a pretty girl smiled at me and laughed when I  attempted to be funny, and at the end of the evening she said she liked my car. We drove away, in separate cars but going the same direction. I found out she lived in the next town over from me, only 7 miles away or so. I hoped she would show up at the next event so that I could see her smile again.

This was, of course, the day I discovered that the lovely Mrs Hades and I occupied the same planet, and although I was blissfully unaware at the time my world would never again be the same.

Also two years ago I had not yet posted the February RotM, and then as now GFA had not showed up to give me a hard time about it. So once more, before that happens, I bring to you the next Last Refuge of a Scoundrel Redhead of the Month:

Redhead Girl by Ajsena
Enjoy!

10 January 2017

Fraud

Old NFO had a bit of an issue with a credit card lately.

It must be the season. Just before departing on Christmas vacation...and I mean the DAY before...I got a call from Navy Federal Credit Union asking me if I was in Utah...because my bank card was. Fortunately for me they are always right on top of things so it didn't cost me anything but frustration. (Today it cost me an extra $25 because my insurance payment didn't go through, but that was my own fault for not changing the account numbers.)

As near as I can figure I ran into a card skimmer. I went to the gas station to fill up and used the card reader at the pump. It asked me for my PIN and then asked me to re-enter it. Note to the unwary, NEVER DO THIS! If it asks you for your PIN twice, cancel the transaction and go elsewhere.

Using the information off of my card they were able to duplicate it, but without the PIN they are limited to credit transactions. The bank caught it and declined the transaction, but this meant the card got canceled and they would have to issue a new one.

Did I mention I was getting ready to leave town for two weeks to go on vacation?

While I was on the phone with them I logged into the bank website to find the entirety of my savings account had been transferred to checking, something that I did not do. I asked the nice lady on the phone about it and she tracked it down to an online transaction originating from a computer in...Northern Virginia. So, they immediately put a hold on my online transactions as well.

Did I mention I was getting ready to leave town for two weeks to go on vacation?

So while I was ranting and raving about not being able to access my accounts they helpfully informed me that my wife's card would still work, as well as her online access. Mrs Hades of course found this very humorous and called it "wife insurance" (as if she needs it).

My only recourse was to go to a Navy Federal Credit Union branch office and they would be able to close my existing accounts, open new ones, transfer the funds and issue me a new card on the spot. The only problem is, the nearest NFCU branch to the Refuge is an hour and a half in the opposite direction from where we were going.

But wait, her brother lives in NoVa, and there are lots of branches there!

So, a little change in plans, a detour through NoVa (which actually didn't add any travel time to the trip; we just went north and then west instead of west and then north), a quick stop by the bank and lunch with Brother In Law and all was as it should be.

I then spent a few hours on the laptop changing all my direct deposits (you can do this with DFAS but it takes some hoop-jumping; I had to call my place of employment to do the same) and online accounts (Amazon, Paypal, etc) to the new numbers. Unfortunately I forgot USAA and ended up paying a bounced check charge from them, but that is all squared away now, too.

I am also now in the habit of checking my bank accounts, if not daily then every other day, to catch anything that may be wrong. Probably something I should have been doing all along, but had not been. It's a good thing for me that Navy Fed has such a sharp anti-fraud division.

The upside to all this technology is it makes things convenient. The down side to all this technology is...it makes things convenient. We have always had scammers of one sort or another, the digital world just gives them another outlet to perpetuate their fraud. This one is just immediate and more convenient since they never have to leave their mother's basements in order to scam you out of all your hard earned life savings, as well as your good name.

So far I've been lucky, but I will pay double rates for the guy who invents software that makes the computers of hackers and online scammers to self destruct any time they try to ply their trade...and triple rates if said destruction immolates the scammers as well.

Yes, that's right. I said it. Scammers and hackers must die in a fire. Horribly. On Christmas. In front of their relatives.

But since it looks like we will always have them with us, it is up to us to safeguard ourselves.

New Year Catch Up

December brought a lot of travel for the holidays. As we did last year, Mrs Hades and I made a multi-state visit of friends and relatives...mostly relatives. Eleven states in as many days, although most of them were simple drive-throughs with stops only for gas and essentials. With her parents in Pennsylvania and mine in Iowa, that makes for a long time in a car together. It's a good thing we're so well matched.

With December done we came home to resume our normal schedule, only to be greeted with, what is for this area, a major snow storm last Friday that has pretty much shut the whole area down all weekend. The temperatures are supposed to be climbing above freezing today for the first time since Friday, so the snow will be melting off starting today and continuing through the week. By Friday it is supposed to be in the 70's before dropping back down to our seasonally appropriate 50's.

Seasons of the South. Gotta love 'em.

And of course once again I am delayed in putting up the ROTM. I hope it was worth the wait.

Happy New Year everyone!