June 20 to 26, 2010
Well, the weather has finally begun to improve. Finally … it’s almost summer weather ! Almost as warm as Yuma, Arizona in January ! ! ! This week we worked on stripping, sanding, and varnishing the dinette table and sofa table. YIKES … too many layers of varnish over too many years ! The dinette table looks amazing after having had all those layers of varnish stripped off, right down to bare wood, and then lightly refinished. I had hoped that this Saturday ( June 26 ) would have been my first day of work delivering rental RV’s, but there weren’t enough rental bookings for this weekend for me to be required. I understand … I’m low man on the RV delivery driver totem pole. Joanne finished waxing and polishing the trailer, a difficult, tedious, annual chore.
DSK
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Sunday, June 20, 2010
June 13 to 19, 2010
June 13 to 19. 2010
Sunday was a nice, sunny, hot day. Haven’t had many of those yet this year ! I spent most of the day doing outside chores. I drilled a multitude of holes in the ground around our big Douglas Fir tree. Joanne filled the holes with evergreen fertilizer, then watered it. We’re fertilizing our big tree in an attempt to rejuvenate it. It’s looking a little “tired”. The consensus seems to be either winter damage or Tussock Moth damage. I wouldn’t know a Tussock Moth if it stood up and bit my ass ! I washed my bicycle. I washed the truck. I waxed and polished the front of the trailer. Where was Joanne while I was doing all that, you might ask ? Well … she was sleeping ! She laid down after lunch with me and Sully, and fell asleep until supper time ! ! !
Monday was our shopping in Penticton day. When we arrived home around supper time, we immediately dumped some bags of soil that we bought today into our new little garden beside the gazebo, and planted the bedding plants we bought on Saturday. I don’t think they’re going to survive. They looked fine in the greenhouse on Saturday morning, but after sitting in our yard for 2½ days, I think they’re dead !
On Wednesday … before the heavy rain began … I “finished” the gazebo, installing the last few pieces of hardware I purchased on Monday in Penticton. Joanne defrosted the fridge, which allowed me to clean out the fridge’s external drain hose. I repaired a leaky kitchen faucet. I repaired the bedroom’s folding door … that I broke on Tuesday while we were flipping and rotating the bed mattress.
Friday was June 18th, the sixth anniversary of starting our full time RV lifestyle. WOW … six years with no other home than Harvey the fifth wheel trailer. One hundred and ninety thousand kilometres / one hundred and seventeen thousand miles, ten Canadian provinces, forty-one American states, seventeen Mexican states ! ! ! That’s a lot of exploration ! ! ! We feel very privileged to already have experienced a longer retirement than many people, and with good health and a lot of adventure. We certainly have had more “retirement” than any of our parents did ! Yeah … as odd as it was, we made the right decision when we “retired” at age 49 ( me ) / 50 ( Joanne ). Our first day on the road, June 18, 2004, was a perfect weather day. I have always measured the quality of any given day’s weather by comparing it to that day. Well today was somewhat less than a “June 18” day. We had planned to celebrate this anniversary by preparing a picnic supper of barbecued pollo asado and potato salad, then driving to Yellow Lake to have a picnic and take advantage of BC’s once per year free fishing weekend, when fishing is allowed without a fishing license. While I was barbecuing the chicken, it began to rain heavily. That put an end to our picnic and fishing plans. We spent the evening playing Scrabble, something we haven’t done in a long time. HMPH … I lost !
Saturday was a bit of a wasted day … sort of … maybe … ! This morning Joanne encouraged me to go fishing at Yellow Lake since the weather seemed fairly decent … a bit of a rarity around here lately. I wanted to go in the evening, but she pointed out that the weather might not be so nice by the evening. And as it turned out … she was quite right ! Yet again ! She prepared a picnic lunch and we set off for an afternoon of fishing at Yellow Lake. Well, the weather was nice all afternoon, and we had a pleasant time sitting by the lake. But I didn’t catch any fish. Yellow Lake has Rainbow Trout and Brook Trout. I don’t really have the right fishing gear to fish for trout. And I don’t really have the right knowledge and / or skill either. So it was pretty much a wasted afternoon. And a waste of five bucks worth of worms ! In hindsight, maybe I should have stayed home and accomplished my list of planned chores and errands for today.
DSK
Sunday was a nice, sunny, hot day. Haven’t had many of those yet this year ! I spent most of the day doing outside chores. I drilled a multitude of holes in the ground around our big Douglas Fir tree. Joanne filled the holes with evergreen fertilizer, then watered it. We’re fertilizing our big tree in an attempt to rejuvenate it. It’s looking a little “tired”. The consensus seems to be either winter damage or Tussock Moth damage. I wouldn’t know a Tussock Moth if it stood up and bit my ass ! I washed my bicycle. I washed the truck. I waxed and polished the front of the trailer. Where was Joanne while I was doing all that, you might ask ? Well … she was sleeping ! She laid down after lunch with me and Sully, and fell asleep until supper time ! ! !
Monday was our shopping in Penticton day. When we arrived home around supper time, we immediately dumped some bags of soil that we bought today into our new little garden beside the gazebo, and planted the bedding plants we bought on Saturday. I don’t think they’re going to survive. They looked fine in the greenhouse on Saturday morning, but after sitting in our yard for 2½ days, I think they’re dead !
On Wednesday … before the heavy rain began … I “finished” the gazebo, installing the last few pieces of hardware I purchased on Monday in Penticton. Joanne defrosted the fridge, which allowed me to clean out the fridge’s external drain hose. I repaired a leaky kitchen faucet. I repaired the bedroom’s folding door … that I broke on Tuesday while we were flipping and rotating the bed mattress.
Friday was June 18th, the sixth anniversary of starting our full time RV lifestyle. WOW … six years with no other home than Harvey the fifth wheel trailer. One hundred and ninety thousand kilometres / one hundred and seventeen thousand miles, ten Canadian provinces, forty-one American states, seventeen Mexican states ! ! ! That’s a lot of exploration ! ! ! We feel very privileged to already have experienced a longer retirement than many people, and with good health and a lot of adventure. We certainly have had more “retirement” than any of our parents did ! Yeah … as odd as it was, we made the right decision when we “retired” at age 49 ( me ) / 50 ( Joanne ). Our first day on the road, June 18, 2004, was a perfect weather day. I have always measured the quality of any given day’s weather by comparing it to that day. Well today was somewhat less than a “June 18” day. We had planned to celebrate this anniversary by preparing a picnic supper of barbecued pollo asado and potato salad, then driving to Yellow Lake to have a picnic and take advantage of BC’s once per year free fishing weekend, when fishing is allowed without a fishing license. While I was barbecuing the chicken, it began to rain heavily. That put an end to our picnic and fishing plans. We spent the evening playing Scrabble, something we haven’t done in a long time. HMPH … I lost !
Saturday was a bit of a wasted day … sort of … maybe … ! This morning Joanne encouraged me to go fishing at Yellow Lake since the weather seemed fairly decent … a bit of a rarity around here lately. I wanted to go in the evening, but she pointed out that the weather might not be so nice by the evening. And as it turned out … she was quite right ! Yet again ! She prepared a picnic lunch and we set off for an afternoon of fishing at Yellow Lake. Well, the weather was nice all afternoon, and we had a pleasant time sitting by the lake. But I didn’t catch any fish. Yellow Lake has Rainbow Trout and Brook Trout. I don’t really have the right fishing gear to fish for trout. And I don’t really have the right knowledge and / or skill either. So it was pretty much a wasted afternoon. And a waste of five bucks worth of worms ! In hindsight, maybe I should have stayed home and accomplished my list of planned chores and errands for today.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
June 6 to 12, 2010
June 6 to 12, 2010
Sunday was cloudy and cool with intermittent light rain ( sigh ). So what else is new ? ! ? Joanne cleaned the truck interior. Really cleaned it ! I dismantled the crate that the gazebo doors and windows came in, then hauled the scrap lumber to our park’s burn pile.
Monday was another long, hard day of shopping in Penticton, mostly running around to a lot of different places looking for materials I needed to finish the gazebo.
On Tuesday … I finished “building” the gazebo ! ! ! I didn’t “finish” the gazebo, but I finished “building” it. In the morning I cut the pieces of cedar I bought yesterday to be the inside and outside door astragals. While I worked on installing door hardware Joanne stained the wood. After lunch we replaced the screening in one upper wall section. And finally, we installed the door astragals. I declared the building of the gazebo to be complete ! Then I began to work on “enhancements”. I installed door threshold sweeps. And … ( sigh ) … cut one of them to the wrong length ! Will have to buy another section of door threshold sweep. I installed some weatherstripping around the doors in a few spots where I thought it might be possible for mosquitoes to sneak in. I drank a beer to celebrate my accomplishment. Congratulations, Daniel, you’ve built a gazebo. It still needs caulking, weatherstripping, and some minor hardware to be “finished”.
On Wednesday I finished sealing around the bottom perimeter of the gazebo with silicone sealant to keep out bugs like ants and spiders. We have pretty deadly spiders around here. It’s become quite common for us to see Black Widow Spiders and Brown Recluse Spiders. I had to shoo away a Brown Recluse Spider today while I was sitting on the ground caulking the bottom of the gazebo. And I intend to move my after lunch naps with Sully out to the gazebo soon. If the weather ever gets better !
HA HA HA HA HA … bring it on, you miserable little bugs ! You can’t get me now that I have a gazebo ! Thursday was the first day of mosquito season. I applied foam tape weatherstripping around the upper screens of the gazebo, sealing any and all little gaps between the screen frames and the wood. HA HA HA HA HA … bring it on, you miserable little bugs ! Finishing the gazebo one day before the mosquitoes hatch reminds me of studying the Japanese industrial strategy of Just In Time manufacturing in the early 1970’s. We gave Bo a bath today.
On Friday we built a very small garden beside the gazebo using a garden frame kit we bought in Oregon. We hauled a couple of wheelbarrow loads of soil from the burn pile. That soil was fairly poor. We’re going to have to buy quite a bit of good soil to put on top of that.
Saturday was the first really warm day of this summer season … but windy. In the morning we drove to Cawston to buy some bedding plants at a small greenhouse business. In the afternoon I tried to nap in the gazebo with Sully, but it was a bit too windy to be comfortable. Joanne started working on waxing and polishing the trailer, but it was a bit too windy for that as well.
DSK
Sunday was cloudy and cool with intermittent light rain ( sigh ). So what else is new ? ! ? Joanne cleaned the truck interior. Really cleaned it ! I dismantled the crate that the gazebo doors and windows came in, then hauled the scrap lumber to our park’s burn pile.
Monday was another long, hard day of shopping in Penticton, mostly running around to a lot of different places looking for materials I needed to finish the gazebo.
On Tuesday … I finished “building” the gazebo ! ! ! I didn’t “finish” the gazebo, but I finished “building” it. In the morning I cut the pieces of cedar I bought yesterday to be the inside and outside door astragals. While I worked on installing door hardware Joanne stained the wood. After lunch we replaced the screening in one upper wall section. And finally, we installed the door astragals. I declared the building of the gazebo to be complete ! Then I began to work on “enhancements”. I installed door threshold sweeps. And … ( sigh ) … cut one of them to the wrong length ! Will have to buy another section of door threshold sweep. I installed some weatherstripping around the doors in a few spots where I thought it might be possible for mosquitoes to sneak in. I drank a beer to celebrate my accomplishment. Congratulations, Daniel, you’ve built a gazebo. It still needs caulking, weatherstripping, and some minor hardware to be “finished”.
HA HA HA HA HA … bring it on, you miserable little bugs ! You can’t get me now that I have a gazebo ! Thursday was the first day of mosquito season. I applied foam tape weatherstripping around the upper screens of the gazebo, sealing any and all little gaps between the screen frames and the wood. HA HA HA HA HA … bring it on, you miserable little bugs ! Finishing the gazebo one day before the mosquitoes hatch reminds me of studying the Japanese industrial strategy of Just In Time manufacturing in the early 1970’s. We gave Bo a bath today.
On Friday we built a very small garden beside the gazebo using a garden frame kit we bought in Oregon. We hauled a couple of wheelbarrow loads of soil from the burn pile. That soil was fairly poor. We’re going to have to buy quite a bit of good soil to put on top of that.
Saturday was the first really warm day of this summer season … but windy. In the morning we drove to Cawston to buy some bedding plants at a small greenhouse business. In the afternoon I tried to nap in the gazebo with Sully, but it was a bit too windy to be comfortable. Joanne started working on waxing and polishing the trailer, but it was a bit too windy for that as well.
DSK
Sunday, June 6, 2010
May 30 to June 5, 2010
May 30 to June 5, 2010
As I drove through Cawston recently, on a rainy day, with a tractor trailer behind me, up ahead a quail crossed the road. A few seconds later, as I got closer to where she had crossed, YIKES … zip, zip, zip ! A long string of teensy little baby quail began to run across the road. There were so many of them they stretched from one side of the road right across to the other. I couldn’t slam on the brakes, the road was wet and there was a big truck right behind me. I twitched the wheel to swerve a bit, but they were stretched right across the road from one side to the other. I glanced in my rear view mirror, and in the brief second before the truck reached the same spot, I could see at least a few of the little spots were no longer running across the road. DAMN ! I don’t know how many baby quail I killed, but probably not even as many as the truck right behind me would have. DAMN ! This is the third spring in a row that I have killed wildlife with the truck. First a baby Osprey, then a rare Flammulated Owl, and now a bunch of baby quail.
The first few days of this week the weather was still bad. Mid-week it finally cleared and warmed a bit. On Tuesday afternoon the gazebo doors and screens arrived. We spent Tuesday afternoon uncrating them. As before, the crate was wrapped with a tarp, stapled to the wood with hundreds of staples. Then we began dismantling the crate just enough to get at the contents. As before, lots and lots of nails, shot in with a nail gun.
There were no assembly / installation instructions for the doors and screens. I sent an e-mail to Alliance Woodcraft asking for instructions. They didn’t reply. On Wednesday morning we installed the screens on the lower half of the walls. The screen installation procedures were fairly simple to figure out. On Wednesday afternoon we installed the screens on the upper half of the walls. One of the upper wall screen sections arrived damaged, with a big puncture through the screen. On Thursday morning we installed the screens on the angled corners of the gazebo. After lunch I drove into Keremeos to buy some screening to replace the damaged section while Joanne phoned Alliance Woodcraft to get instructions for installing the doors. Neither the hardware store nor the building supply store in Keremeos had black screening, only grey. I didn’t want one section of the screening to look different than the others, so the repair / replacement of the damaged section will have to wait until after we go to Penticton next week. In the meantime, and with considerable effort, Joanne finally was able to get the door installation instructions from Alliance sent by e-mail, no thanks to the buck passing and run around they gave her !
I downloaded and printed the door installation instructions. And … ( sigh ) … because the assembly instructions for the gazebo without doors and screens are different than the instructions for the gazebo with doors and screens, step eight of twenty-five of the instructions I received did not specify / emphasize a couple of critical dimensions necessary to ensure that the doors would fit precisely ! So, when I began to fit the doors, I discovered that a critical dimension or two were slightly off ! ! ! That angered and frustrated me. Because some moron in Alliance Woodcraft’s shipping department sent the wrong kit initially, the negative ramifications have just continued and continued ! And I lack the wood working skills to easily overcome this door fitting problem ! By the time I called it a day on Thursday at supper time I had installed one of the two door main sections.
On Friday morning I installed the second door. It fit poorly, and rubbed the door frame at the top. In the afternoon I helped a neighbour trim a tree behind and above us. The lot behind and above us has a fir tree right at the edge of the rock wall. It’s on the neighbour’s lot, but hangs over our gazebo. I asked the neighbour to trim off some dead branches, and helped him do it. Joanne and I hauled the dead branches to the park’s burn pile, then I continued working on the gazebo doors. I installed door stop trim pieces. And that’s as far as I could go with the gazebo for now. It’s about 99% done.
I need to replace the screening on one section of upper wall screen. It arrived with a puncture in the screen. I need to seal around the entire bottom edge of the perimeter with silicone sealant to keep moisture and bugs out. I want to weatherstrip the upper wall screen sections to completely eliminate any gaps that might allow mosquitoes to enter. And most importantly I need to buy hardware … and wood … to finish the doors. The doors came with no hardware except for the hinges. There is no latch ! How do they expect these double doors to stay closed ? ! ? I want threshold sweeps on the door bottoms to keep bugs out. And … ( sigh ) … the two pieces of wood that are supposed to be the door astragals are unacceptable to me. They’re an inch wide. I want astragals that are two to three inches wide, for both function and aesthetics. Regardless, Alliance Woodcraft sent two inside astragals instead of one inside and one outside, as required. Since I have to buy one piece of wood for the outside astragal anyway, I decided I might as well buy two pieces, and wider than Alliance provided. And it’s not worthwhile trying to make a claim with Alliance Woodcraft for one damaged screen section and one incorrect piece of wood.
On Saturday I borrowed a belt sander from a neighbour and sanded the top of the door that was rubbing the frame. It didn’t need much sanding to solve the problem. And I caulked around two sides of the bottom perimeter, until I ran out of silicone sealant. I have a fairly lengthy list of hardware and materials I need to buy in Penticton on Monday to finish the gazebo, despite how close to complete it is !
DSK
As I drove through Cawston recently, on a rainy day, with a tractor trailer behind me, up ahead a quail crossed the road. A few seconds later, as I got closer to where she had crossed, YIKES … zip, zip, zip ! A long string of teensy little baby quail began to run across the road. There were so many of them they stretched from one side of the road right across to the other. I couldn’t slam on the brakes, the road was wet and there was a big truck right behind me. I twitched the wheel to swerve a bit, but they were stretched right across the road from one side to the other. I glanced in my rear view mirror, and in the brief second before the truck reached the same spot, I could see at least a few of the little spots were no longer running across the road. DAMN ! I don’t know how many baby quail I killed, but probably not even as many as the truck right behind me would have. DAMN ! This is the third spring in a row that I have killed wildlife with the truck. First a baby Osprey, then a rare Flammulated Owl, and now a bunch of baby quail.
The first few days of this week the weather was still bad. Mid-week it finally cleared and warmed a bit. On Tuesday afternoon the gazebo doors and screens arrived. We spent Tuesday afternoon uncrating them. As before, the crate was wrapped with a tarp, stapled to the wood with hundreds of staples. Then we began dismantling the crate just enough to get at the contents. As before, lots and lots of nails, shot in with a nail gun.
There were no assembly / installation instructions for the doors and screens. I sent an e-mail to Alliance Woodcraft asking for instructions. They didn’t reply. On Wednesday morning we installed the screens on the lower half of the walls. The screen installation procedures were fairly simple to figure out. On Wednesday afternoon we installed the screens on the upper half of the walls. One of the upper wall screen sections arrived damaged, with a big puncture through the screen. On Thursday morning we installed the screens on the angled corners of the gazebo. After lunch I drove into Keremeos to buy some screening to replace the damaged section while Joanne phoned Alliance Woodcraft to get instructions for installing the doors. Neither the hardware store nor the building supply store in Keremeos had black screening, only grey. I didn’t want one section of the screening to look different than the others, so the repair / replacement of the damaged section will have to wait until after we go to Penticton next week. In the meantime, and with considerable effort, Joanne finally was able to get the door installation instructions from Alliance sent by e-mail, no thanks to the buck passing and run around they gave her !
I downloaded and printed the door installation instructions. And … ( sigh ) … because the assembly instructions for the gazebo without doors and screens are different than the instructions for the gazebo with doors and screens, step eight of twenty-five of the instructions I received did not specify / emphasize a couple of critical dimensions necessary to ensure that the doors would fit precisely ! So, when I began to fit the doors, I discovered that a critical dimension or two were slightly off ! ! ! That angered and frustrated me. Because some moron in Alliance Woodcraft’s shipping department sent the wrong kit initially, the negative ramifications have just continued and continued ! And I lack the wood working skills to easily overcome this door fitting problem ! By the time I called it a day on Thursday at supper time I had installed one of the two door main sections.
On Friday morning I installed the second door. It fit poorly, and rubbed the door frame at the top. In the afternoon I helped a neighbour trim a tree behind and above us. The lot behind and above us has a fir tree right at the edge of the rock wall. It’s on the neighbour’s lot, but hangs over our gazebo. I asked the neighbour to trim off some dead branches, and helped him do it. Joanne and I hauled the dead branches to the park’s burn pile, then I continued working on the gazebo doors. I installed door stop trim pieces. And that’s as far as I could go with the gazebo for now. It’s about 99% done.
I need to replace the screening on one section of upper wall screen. It arrived with a puncture in the screen. I need to seal around the entire bottom edge of the perimeter with silicone sealant to keep moisture and bugs out. I want to weatherstrip the upper wall screen sections to completely eliminate any gaps that might allow mosquitoes to enter. And most importantly I need to buy hardware … and wood … to finish the doors. The doors came with no hardware except for the hinges. There is no latch ! How do they expect these double doors to stay closed ? ! ? I want threshold sweeps on the door bottoms to keep bugs out. And … ( sigh ) … the two pieces of wood that are supposed to be the door astragals are unacceptable to me. They’re an inch wide. I want astragals that are two to three inches wide, for both function and aesthetics. Regardless, Alliance Woodcraft sent two inside astragals instead of one inside and one outside, as required. Since I have to buy one piece of wood for the outside astragal anyway, I decided I might as well buy two pieces, and wider than Alliance provided. And it’s not worthwhile trying to make a claim with Alliance Woodcraft for one damaged screen section and one incorrect piece of wood.
On Saturday I borrowed a belt sander from a neighbour and sanded the top of the door that was rubbing the frame. It didn’t need much sanding to solve the problem. And I caulked around two sides of the bottom perimeter, until I ran out of silicone sealant. I have a fairly lengthy list of hardware and materials I need to buy in Penticton on Monday to finish the gazebo, despite how close to complete it is !
DSK
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