Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)

Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-14-19 Saturday


I took my truck to firestone. I got there at about eight. They said they were very busy and it would be likely ready at noon. I was going to sit, but mom called at about 9:30 and asked if I wanted to run around with her. 
We went to find a place that was supposed to shred old pills. It was cancelled. We then picked up some herbal diet pills mom ordered from Save A Lot Nutritional. They had come in this weekend. 
We were going to go to the Festival Flea Market which was on the way back, but I got a call from Firestone. They suggested a bunch of work and asked if I wanted to do it. I told them I would hold off. About five minutes later, they called again and my truck was ready. 
Mom dropped me off and went to a fire station to see if they would take the old pills. They used to do it but she found out that laws changed and they cannot do it any more. Pharmacies can take them though. Over time, pills accumulate and it is good to get rid of them if they cannot be used.
Mom and I went to see a Clyde Butcher photogaphic display https://clydebutcher.com/ she had met them years ago when he talked to a photo club she was a member of. He was not there. The pictures he showed were excellent. All taken with a 8x10 camera in black and white. They were over a thousand dollars each. He had books and calendars also for sale. Mom left a note for him to let him know she appreciated meeting him years ago. 

There is another storm out over the ocean near the Bahamas. That new storm won’t come anywhere near us now. The big difference in which direction is on where the eye is going to form. It had a low level circulation on the south of the weather patch and a high level circulation farther North. Each location would dictate where the storm was going to go. The high level circulation became the center and that is causing it to miss nearly everything. If the low level had become the center, it would have come right over us. 

We also stopped at Ace Hardware and I got a hundred of the shutter wing-nuts. I did not need that many but I now have enough for a long time of losing them. I need to get some epoxy or super glue and glue every fixed bolt in the panel mount so they do not turn in place. Then I will be ready for the next storm. I still have not taken down any shutters. I might do that soon. Not all will come down, but some will. 

At Firestone, I was working on a dish cloth. I am doing a post stitch every other row so one side has scrubbing ribs while the other is flat. I think I did five rows while waiting. 


Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-15-19 Sunday

I put the plants back into the front yard. I changed the arrangement so trees that don’t spread out as far are near where people walk. I adjusted the stepping stones. The grass under them where they were was already turning yellow. Eventually, I will dig up the grass under them and set them somewhat level with the ground so the mower can go over them. For now this will have to do. It is a toe stub at the ends but it is better than not having them.

I dug some on that palm tree in back. I am able to rock it back and forth now but have to go a little deeper or get down on the ground and cut the roots out from under it. I will see what happens.

I found a yard sale and got three metal folding chairs and a folding card table. I also got another one of those folding end coffee tables. There are some things that you never have enough of, until you have too many...

The surface of one of my tablet covers was coming off in little pieces. I had picked up some cloth at a yard sale a while back. I grabbed a red one and glued it to the surface of the cover. I used a water resistant yellow glue. I did not quite get it centered but it is less than an eighth inch off. I folded the tops to the inside and glued them there. Not a perfect job but better than it was.

I cannot find the bag with my rocking horse ornaments and other recent projects. Eventually they will suddenly appear out of nowhere later. 
I cut some wood and started carving some more steam engines. I had three partially carved and now have two more, plus two more sticks prepared to carve. I decided some saw cuts would make the carving job easier, and it does. 

I made some chocolate and strawberry ice cream today using banana as the base rather than cream. I’ve enjoyed these which is why I made more.  I used my little loaf pans (used for my bread and lasagna) lined with plastic wrap and got two pans of each. Each loaf pans holds two bananas worth of ice cream. I used about six oz of strawberry jam for the strawberry ice cream. 
I used half a Lindt chocolate bar and also added semi sweet chocolate morsels and melted or softened them together. When I was about done, I added the rest of the semi sweet chocolate morsels and chopped them into the ice cream. There will be little bits all through them. What I tasted at room temperature tasted great.  Tomorrow I will cut them into chunks.
The week of the storm, I had planned on getting more bananas and making more ice cream but I was not sure about the power and decided against it.

I will see what happens next week.
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(note, I got busy during my days and am posting these very very late from when they happened)

steam engines with roughed out blanks

the tablet with the repaired cover open

the tablet with the repaired cover closed

Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)

Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-07-19 Saturday

The first thing after breakfast was to mow the front yard of mom’s neighbor. The potted plants are off the grass so I can mow where they sit. When I put them back, I will put them in a different arrangement. The end plants won’t be the ones with lots of hangover. Palm fronds tend to stretch out and get in your way. I will space them with the mower in mind.

I went to Lowes. I got one item I was after, another cost more than I was wanting to spend at the moment, and I could not remember what the third thing was that I was after. Forgot my note in the memory book because I could not find what I did with my memory book.... I need a memory book for that.....
I remembered what it was later and realized I was just going to see what was available and what they went for. I had walked much of the store. 
I then went to get groceries and walked side to side a couple times, and up and down a few isles. Nothing like walking the whole store. 
I drove the southern part of the yard sale route. I saw one sign with an arrow but could not find a second sign or any evidence of a sale. I went back past the sign and decided it was not worth the effort to read the address and find it. 

I started bringing the equipment to the back yard. The main stuff is out there but needs some moving around. There is a bunch of small stuff that has to be put back. Between mowing and walking, I had to put some effort to stand up to do something. Mom had me cut up a couple plants. She likes her trees small and these were ones that were getting too big for her good.

Naggings attacked my legs but I did get some sleep during my nap. right now my legs are acting nice. 

Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-08-19 Sunday

I started the morning by mowing more of the back lawn. When I mow again, I will have to re-mow the area I just did as a lot of the tall stuff laid down. There were some “rocks” in the way and I moved them onto the concrete patio. There were four patio stones buried in the grass. They were two sided. One side had “chattahoochee” imbedded in the concrete. Chattahoochee is a small river rock that are embedded in concrete. That was popular in the 60s and 70s, and went out of favor in the early 90s when the gravel pit of the best rocks was played out. The other side was flat concrete. I mowed a good section of the lawn I did not mow before but still have more to do and then put the mower away. I got the handcart and moved the patio stones out front between the houses where we cross from mom’s house to the neighbors. As my brother was leaving, I laid them down between the two pavements, three in a row and a spare. What I really intended to do was to remove the grass in that area and stick them in a place that has bare dirt, and then set the stones down somewhat level. Instead I just dropped them in place. I noticed that with the plants in their pots, the grass beneath them die and the pots settle down a tiny bit more. I figure that will happen with these stones. I have to relocate the plants and put them where they need to be for now. I figure I might do that next time I am over. I need to stop at a couple stores on the way home.

I brought some more stuff out back and put a bunch of it away. I replaced the sanding disk on the disk sander and then shaped the feet for the cane I use when I go with mom. This was the cane I use when I ride with Mom.  The pipes that make up the legs go out straight out on an angle out so I tapered the feet close at the top and wide at the bottom. I then rounded the bottom. Just a little bit of the feet touch the ground. They will wear a flat spot over time.

I brought over some hamburger patties to mom and got her to fry some of it up in the Spanish Rice sauce she was making. She usually uses beef broth in it but decided that the hamburger would give it the flavor it needed.  She gave me a big bowl of her sauce to take home before she let it just sit and simmer till time to fix lunch. I put six tablespoons of sauce in sandwich baggies and stuck them in the freezer. I think I got five baggies of sauce.  I never fully fill the baggies, but instead try to keep them thin to where I can break it apart and use just some in the baggy if my recipe only needs a little, especially when cooking for one.

My brother and I sat out back and I “whittled” on a few carvings, but mostly sat and talked about videos he was watching. This time a lot about cars, heavy machinery, and truck repair projects. 

I still have a lot of stuff that has to go out back, but there is no rush on that. These are mostly stuff that ends up getting stored out there.

I found the missing window panels on the neighbor’s house. The neighbor and I had brought them inside earlier this year and was using the bathroom window panels to locate and measure the bookshelves he wants to put in the back room. They bathroom panels are the same size as the standard book shelf base. The other panels were in the corner next to the closet door. We had forgotten we had brought them in. Now I need to get a whole bunch of the wing nuts as we are very short of them. 

A couple days ago, they set up donation sites for the Bahamas. I was watching the news and one could tell that most of the people were delivering hurricane supplies they bought for the storm and won’t need until the next storm. Water mostly, can goods, and generators.
I did not drive my truck today. My yard sale runs is about a gallon long. I saved a gallon. I did not gas up this weekend and I usually gas up every weekend. I have just over a half tank of gas so it will carry me through to next weekend if I don’t do some extra driving. 

I can see that mom really appreciates me being around. I am someone to talk to that does not pass on what she says. I am there to help her. She gets to do things with me. We get along really well. 
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Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)

Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
08-31-19 Saturday

I stopped at the nearest gas station and gassed up, then went to Mom’s for breakfast.
The Labor Day BBQ was cancelled. We have to get ready for the storm instead. I started some multi grain bread. I had taken the dough out of the freezer and set it out to thaw. I had also ran some grain through my coffee grinder and then cooked it up. When we got back from breakfast, I mixed the grain into the bread and kneaded it quite a bit, and set it to rise. 
I worked outside for a bit and then came back in and punched it down, folded the corners in and flipped it over. Later I came back and it had risen nicely and I cut it in four pieces, then put the pairs of pieces back together as that was not enough in the larger pans. I then spread cooked grain bits on top of them and let them rise. 
When I got back, they rose really high and I stuck them in the oven with the lasagna. I took them out, had to fight them out of the pan, then put them back in the over for ten more minutes. 
I cut one up after it cooled a tiny bit. I tasted it as I was cutting it and it was good. I did not need to add grain on top. The dough had over rose as I did not get in soon enough so the top slumped. I don’t care. It came out good. Mom ended up what was left of one I had cut up. I have the other one still whole. I also have the small still whole loaf I had made last week. 
The place smelled so good for most of the day. The previous times I made bread, I never seemed to get the good scent. Today It really smelled good. 


We determined that the storm was coming here and decided now was a good time to start getting the houses ready. An agreement with mom’s neighbor is that we can store our stuff in his garage in exchange that we ready his house for the storm.
I then started on wooden feet for my big cane. I drilled the holes for the legs and cut the corners off the pieces. A bit later in the day, I sat down and tried to fit them using the dremmel and found they have to be a lot deeper. The legs on this cane has a lot of straight, not bending for quite a while. On the small four footed canes, they can be shallow as the bend stops them and helps hold them in place. I will drill these deeper and then try to fit them. I will have to shape them properly later. I am just fitting them for now. 

My brother and nephew arrived to take down the awning and do some other work. My brother and I got the equipment into the garage and my nephew made a shutter for mom’s  back door. We picked up most of the tools. We then decided to wait till tomorrow to do more. The storm, even now is in question how bad it will be here. Farther away from the coast the storm is, the weaker the winds will be here. Our awning can handle up to 40 mph winds, which we get sometimes from thunderstorm down bursts, but don’t want to chance higher speed winds the storm could give us. 

Later in the day, I mowed the neighbor’s back lawn where I had mowed it before, and then got into the stuff I missed last time. The grass was wet and did not want to cut. I stopped on the long stuff when an elephant came out of the jungle and nearly stepped on the mower. I will try to do more next time.

Tomorrow I will likely start putting up shutters and bringing the rest of the stuff inside or put where they won’t become missiles.  My brother is supposed to come tomorrow for Lunch (steaks I supply) and we will decide whether the awning comes down or stays up.

Last night after work, I had dropped by and moved all mom’s neighbor’s potted plants into the planter next to the front door so they are protected from falling over. It also holds the garbage cans in place. He put the garbage cans there as workers who were on the place kept filling the recycling can with garbage and the recyclers won’t take that type of stuff. He put the recycling bin up against the wall so it was hard to get garbage into it.




Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-01-19 Sunday


I started the morning putting up shutters. I first put them up on the far side of the neighbor’s house and down the back. I took a long break, then started moving more stuff from under the awning. I did more shutters. 
My brother and niece came and after a steak lunch, we removed the awning panels where I did the woodworking. I put up more shutter panels and found I did not have enough panels, nor enough wing-nuts. I did not know that. I was never involved with the panels before as I had never put them up before today. Had I known this, I would have tried to get more panels and wing nuts. Of course some screws needed to be super-glued in place. I did some but my packet of super glue disappeared mid day. 
I put stuff away and packed stuff up. I had to take many rest periods. Other than a few minor things, we basically got everything done. 

The feet for my cane was too shallow. I dug out the drill press which is a hand-held power drill in a frame, and drilled them much deeper. I drove the legs in. They look stupid right now as they are angular and not round. I have to do a lot of shaping and sanding on them. These legs are on an angle so only an edge of the blocks are on the ground. I had forgotten about that. What I need to do is round them, then let scraping from use to flatten them. Either that, get some new rubber feet for it.... The lathe is deep in the garage, the disk sander needs a new sanding disk and I am not quite sure where the extra disks are right now. It could be something I do tomorrow when I get a break. 

We had the eye of loin steaks I got last week and it was pretty good. Mom liked them. They are more tender than a chuck steak. It is not the higher quality cuts but it was good. We don’t have beef steaks too often. Mom had her mixed veggies and a salad with it. Nice lunch. I came home with some cooked steaks. 

As for the storm, we will get some very strong squalls with strong winds, but not the eye. It is suggested that at three tonight will be some squalls, but at six tomorrow is when it will be at its worst. 
Even without the eye there could be some tree damage and things blown around.  70 mph squall is a tropical storm wind. Hurricane winds are anything above 75mph. The question is whether the power or water will go out. The weather people are still waiting for things to fall into place, a slight bit off can make a big difference in what damage the storm does. I’ve seen vids from the Bahamas. Ouch!!!!
We were blessed with having several days to prepare. We’ve done it before with just a day or so warning. Because of how we are arranged, that ends up being a lot of work. Today, the hard part was putting up the shutters. The project is not really hard, but there is a lot of pieces and a lot of standing and walking and bending over. 

Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-02-19 Monday (labor day, storm day)

I accomplished very little today. After breakfast, I went out and moved the panels on mom’s neighbor’s house from the front bathroom window and put them on the master bathroom window. That is in an Ell in back and things have a lot more room to fly. 

I spent most of my time at Mom’s house, talking, watching different programs, playing on my tablet. I had brought the leftovers from yesterday and we had that for dinner. I had sliced up the two loaves of bread I made and we each ate a couple slices of that. 
I did go out to the corner and took pictures down each of the streets from different angles. I figured that if there was any damage, it would be nice to have before and after pictures. 

The storm is stalled, not able to make a decision so everything is waiting. I could well go to work tomorrow but I likely  won’t. I figure it likely will be much like today.

At about one I napped for a couple hours. Last night, I had a hard time getting to sleep. My legs were filled with “bothersomes” caused by the work I did yesterday and it took a while to get them worked out so I could go to sleep. After I got to sleep, I basically slept the whole night. 
This morning and today has been pretty good. 

We are getting slapped by the wires of the storm like a weed eater. They whip around, shower on us as they rush by, blast a little bit of wind and then go. There is a good breeze all day long. The tropical storm area is just off the coast. It would not take much for the storm to “wobble” and get us under it. 
At the time of this writing, this is the second time the eye has been replaced. The feeder bands sometimes wrap all the way around the eye. That becomes the wall of the new eye and the old one fades out. The storm loses strength for a while (spreads out also). Before today, the storm was drawing up warm water to feed it. Now it is drawing up cold water, its food is used up so it has weakened a bit. A trough is working its way across the states and when it reaches the right point, the storm will start moving north and east. For now it is absolutely stationary. I had never heard of a storm doing that. 

Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-03-19 Tuesday


I accomplished next to nothing today. Early morning it looked like things would be bad. Later in the day, things looked a lot better.  Mom decided to get a small TV. When they changed out the dish system electronics, and she lost use of one of her cd/dvd players. We went to Best Buy and picked up a small TV and I helped her getting it working. I was able to get the HD channels over the air. 
I had forgotten that one of my favorite channels was CREATE (pbs channel). It is craft /travel /remodeling /cooking channel. There are a bunch of other channels. She found that changing the antenna (rabbit ears) effects the station she gets. She wanted 7 and 10 for the news so she set the antenna so Create does not come in well.

After a nap, I talked with mom before leaving and she thanked me several times for being with her and helping her. I actually got a hug, which I don’t get a lot of. She liked having me around and her not being alone. 

The storm is almost all gone, except for some feeder bands sweeping by. The tail feeder band might come over us for a bit while it leaves. I really need to mow the lawns before I put my neighbor’s plants out again. It is good to mow the grass where the potted plants stand as it is hard to get to the grass with the pots in place.
The house across the street had a canvas roof up and the wind tore it up a bit. They never took it down. That is the only damage I’ve seen around here. I once considered getting one of those canvas car awning/roof things. Considering the work it took to get ready for this storm, and we had several days, I can see that might be more work than I could handle if we only had a day warning. 

I will be going to work tomorrow. It will be interesting to see how long it will take for them to retrain me to do my work...  I will say that it feels like I was off a week already. I will say that I did a year’s worth of work this weekend. 
Since I stayed at Mom’s all weekend, I used no gas this weekend.

Will see what happens next weekend.
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Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)

Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
08-24-19 Saturday

I made bread today. The recipe is designed to make two one-pound loaves. I took a quarter of it after I kneaded it the first time and made two balls which I stuck it into the freezer.  I can honestly say that I FOLLOWED (most of) THE INSTRUCTIONS on raising the dough for once. 
I let it rise, punched it down (literally pushing my fist into the center and heard a sign of escaping gas), folded the corners over, flipped it upside down and rose it again. That is close to how you punch down the risen loaf.  I then cut it into four pieces and I then filled four small loaf pans. One was smaller than the others. After they rose again, I baked them. 
For the normal sized large loaves, they would bake for 40 minutes at 400. I did it first for 20 minutes. They did not want to come out of the loaf pans so I baked them another ten minutes. I had to run a knife around the outside of the pans and a couple I had to pry them out. I used oil rather than shortening on the pans. That appears to make a difference 
When making it, I found I was out of white sugar, so I used brown sugar instead. It worked nicely. There is a hint of flavor the brown sugar flavor in the bread but you might not notice it. I made this batch with no milk in it, and I didn’t miss it. The milk is mainly to make it rise a bit more when baked. I learned something here. I was testing the recipe for someone Jewish who would come for a meal. They are not allow to have meat and dairy in the same meal.
I’ve sliced up the three “large” loaves and will take them with me to a gathering of friends. The small loaf is to be saved for later. I definitely will make more. It is not really hard. 
I used my mixer with the dough hooks. As the dough came together they pulled the dough up into the base of the machine. They really needed to be twisted the other way. I watched for the dough to pull up, and before they got to the top of the beaters, I would stop to allow the dough to drop down again while I manually mixed the stuff at the side of the bowl, then ran them again. 
This recipe is from a 1949 cook book. Over time I have made some changes in the basic recipe and still worked. This is best batch of bread I have made.  One thing I have found with bread, is it is hard to make it unpalatable. They might end up being as solid as a brick-bat, but they will still taste good.
The few minor mistakes I made did not effect the actual bread. These are about the size of the fleshy part of your palm. It is great for snack sandwiches.  

A few weeks back, a friend dropped off a mirrored end table with marble top and asked if I could fix it. Today mom and I tackled it. We removed many parts, started the repairs. It will be saved. I have some more work to do on it but it will come out fairly good. It the whole back is made of press-board, not the best material for furniture but we are saving it. I should finish it tomorrow. It is too good to toss. This is easier than I expected.

I roughed out some more of my rocking  horses. I now have eight completed blanks. Mom said to use the drill with a big bit to remove the wood between the legs. I was trying to be abstinent but gave in. The horses are much farther along now. The last couple, I cut the space between rockers as a V rather than more squarish and it is easier to remove the wood. I will have to re-cut a couple of the others. 
I’ve decided they will not be as a detailed horse with all the bumps and curves, but more toy like. I think they will be pretty good. Six months more time and I could do them in more detail.


My nephew and his wife are going to have their new baby dedicated tomorrow.  Mom and I will go to that. 

Dorian is moving in our direction, moving really slow. The center of the storm is about level with us. We got a few of the circling outer bands this morning but most of them have missed us. That is going to be a strong storm once it hits the ocean again. 

Year 19, Week 33, Day One (week 1033)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
08-25-19 Sunday

I had mom bring three loaves of sliced fresh bread to a meeting last night and she brought back about a third of what we took. They seemed to like it. We had some during lunch and my niece liked the bread too. 

We had the dedication of my grand niece. My other niece told mom on the phone that they were shocked at how many children there were. I did not count but it was a couple dozen children at the dedication. The church could hold about 2000 people by the look of it and there was a quarter less than that by the seats in front of me.

I picked up some steaks and burgers during the week. I sliced the steaks, and burgers, and now have the brats in the freezer for next week’s BBQ. I have about 42 burgers and about 26 steaks (guessing now on the amount).  I had two packs of 18 brats. I had two bags of dogs (maybe nine each) from last time. I have a package of 40 dogs in the fridge. 
Before I started slicing the meat, I emptied my freezer and re-packed it. I always do that when I am stocking up. It is good to be reminded about what I have. For example, I found out that I have 3 small lasagna in there. That was a surprise. I expected only one. These lasagna are in foil baking pans the same size as what I used for the bread. When Mom and I share, it is enough for both of us. I like to fix up the lasagna, and freeze it uncooked. Since you have to take the time to thaw the cooked lasagna, you are really only saving a little bit of time (actually, these tend to require 2 hours to cook when frozen because of how I made them). I also re-packed my freezer to make more room.
My freezer is full, so I am ready for a multi day power out now.....

There was a little palm tree in the back yard of mom’s neighbor. It is a messy tree, more like a weed than anything. He and mom decided it needed to come out since it was about 18 inches from the new fence. 
Each time I visit, I would dig some of the dirt out. I got it what I considered low enough and  cut the top off that little palm tree. I am not totally sure if I cut it low enough. I may have to dig deeper and do it again. Will see. I don’t have a good ground game. I had to bring out a chair to help me get down on the ground and then use it to get up. 
That end table I am fixing is coming along. I  used brown felt pens to color the damaged feet to something close to the stain color it was done in. Not a great job and it killed the felt pen, but it looks a lot better than it did. I will give everything a good washing and then give them a couple coats of varnish. It will be nice then.  It will still look old, but it won’t look damaged.

Having been in cold air conditioning most of the day, It felt good being outside (not in the sun but in the shade was nice). My brother decided he wanted to go in. He is outside all week long as part of his job. We watched TV and talked a bit. I was on my tablet he was looking at a book. My niece and Mom went and got a new Television for their house. The TV my brother has developed a problem that model had where when they get old, they start turning on and off on its own. Makes watching TV a royal problem. They thought they were out of this sales special, but they did find one. The stores hate selling the specials.

I will see what happens next week. Our Labor Day BBQ is being planned. I have the meats ready and have made sure other stuff is available.
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