Things I would have thought would have been fixed by now

We are now entering the second half of our first year at the house and I'm finding myself a bit surprised at what's done, and what is not. Why should I be surprised, right? I am the "lead contractor" in the project so I should be where I want to be. Well, uh, I underestimated somethings, overestimated others. And as I said here, there has been some time issues.

The broken garage door back in November.
It still looks this way. 

My biggest disappointment is the lack of progress on the garage door, which remains permanently open. The biggest obstacle is the lack of a clear path mainly due to being overwhelmed by opinions on what can/should be done. To recap, the door is broken, and likely not salvageable, I've been told by several that repairing a garage door is no place for an amateur to tread so I've called in some friends and that's where the opinions start. The issue is with the attic access which sits in the middle of  ceiling causing the installation of an opener difficult. An opener is probably needed since the door is so massive but the practical, cheapskate side of me figured that Cindy could open a lightweight aluminum door herself. If I mention that I get a weird look from people, although Cindy, being the good sport that she is trusts my judgement on that. I was just recently advised that you CAN install an offset garage door opener so I guess the next step is to call in a reputable garage door company and get an estimate. Yikes!

Little things keep getting delayed too. I purchased new LED security lighting to replace the old incandescent motion detector flood lights on the garage (see picture above, in the upper left). The old lights seem to come on randomly, day and night with motion only occasionally being the cause. It's a simple job but I tend to work on things like this when I'm home alone and I have no one available to help me turn the proper breaker off in the basement. Of course, nothing in our electrical box is labeled and I'm way too lazy to throw a switch, climb the stairs and look to see if the lights have gone off. I realize this is an extremely poor excuse, even more so now that I've written it, but at the moment I always manage to find something else to do.

I would have thought I would have the kitchen painted by now. I repaired the huge holes in  one wall and painted the ceiling back before the appliances showed up, but have made no further progress. Part of it was I got discouraged when we had a bathroom leak that damaged the ceiling and decided to hold off until I was sure I had fixed the leak. Well, after caulking everything in sight apparently I have fixed it but I have since moved on. Cindy has given me a pass on that and prefers I work on the den next.

A recent Sunday morning.

One thing we have managed to do is enjoy our porch. Like the fireplace we enjoyed last winter, the porch was a big selling point for the house. If it were up to Cindy, we would eat our dinner out there every evening. I prefer the mornings, with a cool breeze and a much quieter neighborhood, often just the birds keeping us company. Very relaxing.

Time 2 (to) (too)

Sometimes, time works to your advantage. Other times, not so much. In owning a home, time can be an advantage in that over time, you build equity and worth, through decreasing principal and increasing value (you hope). Of course, time works against you as well as paint peels, furnaces break down and grass grows. Time also takes us on, and takes it's toll. I've had a bum knee since Junior High School and it has been biding it's time deciding that a good time to flair up would be as we move and begin to work on our new home. The good news is that time has not affected my head or my heart and I still believe I can do anything I need, bum knee and all.

Geno and I enjoying dinner at Oaks Inn. 

Time however, has cost us, taking First Father In Law and #1 house painter Geno. Cindy's dad waged and epic struggle against the rare disease that infected him, steadily improving, defying the odds and those who said he would not improve. Sadly, he could not fight time and his age caught up to him. A secondary infection overwhelmed him and he could not fight on. His desire to help and gentle honor came from another era, a rare commodity today. I should never grumble about work after watching him climb ladders, carry branches and haul equipment well into his 80s without complaint. He was a good man and will be missed by many.

All set up for the baby shower.

Time has become a rarity and precious commodity. While the care for and tragic passing of Geno has taken time from us (especially Cindy), joyous family events have also pushed the house to the back burner. A baby shower brought my side of the family together at my volunteer fire house last weekend. Niece Susan and her husband Colt are having their first baby soon and a wonderful celebration of this event was hosted by my sister Karen. It was great seeing friends and family come together. I enjoyed myself thoroughly cooking spiedies and sausages at the grill. Next up at the end of the month is a wedding outside of Syracuse as Cindy's cousin gets married. Then, another big wedding in Montana over Labor Day. As time passes, it brings us both joy and sorrow.

Using my pick mattock to remove roots and stumps.

There has been some time to work on the house. Latest accomplishment was to finish removing the old bushes from the north lawn, and to remove some of the stumps and roots in front of the porch. I'm happy to say the grass is growing nicely there and will need to be mowed soon, so all final obstructions must go. A spell of dry weather has made outdoor work easier, but necessitated the purchase of a sprinkler for my newly seeded areas.

It will be interesting to see what summer brings. I look forward to the simple pleasure of getting dirty and sweating outdoors. There's plenty of painting and minor repairs, and we still need to clean the windows after the power washing spattered them. At the end of the day we love sitting on the porch with a cool drink watching day turn to night. Time slows.

Time

I've been surprised how easy it has been for me to write this blog. Once I get started on a topic, the ideas and words just kind of flow and I'm done before I know it. This blog entry, about the passage of time, has been different as I don't know quite where to start. It would be easy, you would think, when writing about time, that you would start at the beginning. But which beginning? I suppose I'll go back to my beginning.

Right from my beginning, I've been fascinated by maps and weather. I still pour over maps, especially road maps, and could probably talk you to, or at least get you near any location in the U.S. by listing the routes you would need to arrive. As for weather, I had all kinds of weather books and pamphlets growing up. I was particularly fascinated by a weather almanac insert that was included in a Sunday issue of the NY Daily News around 1970. It had New York City weather stories, pictures and statistics for over a hundred years. For one Christmas, I got an anemometer and wind vane which my dad and I installed on the roof. I was clearly desperate for information and weather forecasts in those days, were hard to come by. The newspaper has stale information, collected the day before and published overnight. There was no weather radio, no Weather Channel, and weather was a few minutes at the end of the evening news. There was one way to talk to a live weather expert and to get the latest forecast: RAymond 9-1597. The number of the Weather Bureau at the airport. I got to be friends with the (usually) friendly men that answered the phone.

Move forward in time to 1986. After graduating from SUNY Oswego with a bachelors degree in Meteorology I'm selling appliances at Kmart in Binghamton. A year earlier I had applied for a Meteorologist Intern position at Kennedy airport in NYC and was not selected. The phone rang at Kmart and my understandably excited father told me that I had gotten a call from the servicing personnel office and had been offered the same job, but at LaGuardia airport. So began my weather career.

A couple years later, the LaGuardia office was closed and I was given the opportunity to go to the office in Binghamton, which allowed me to work with some of the same men I had spoken to on the phone all those years ago. Time passes...

National Weather Service Binghamton

It's 2016 and I've been at this for 30 years. I'm now the old man who answers the phone. Incredibly, the number has not changed, we just don't use the RAymond and it's 729-1597, and we answer it 24 hours a day. The phone though, doesn't ring all that much. The weather nerds of today have the internet, Facebook, and Twitter along with 24 hour coverage on The Weather Channel (now owned by IBM - more irony).

The future of the National Weather Service is murky. Another push is on in Congress to privatize much of what we do, and modeling is getting to the point that forecasts are being pushed from computer to the public untouched by human hands. My future is more clear. As of today I am eligible for full retirement and could leave my job at any time. I plan to hang around for a bit longer as I still love my job and the people I work with, but I'm thinking my time here is probably short.

Oh yeah,  the house. A couple quick updates. I have finished painting the vestibule and installed a new light fixture that Cindy and I picked out. I need to install the molding and will finally be done. The grass I planted in front of the porch is coming in pretty nicely with favorable weather and generous watering. Cindy has announced that the next room project should be the den. The room has no wallpaper so I'm happy to comply.