More windows and a door

The ugly door. Note the gap filled with
foam insulation on the left side.

The new door clamped to
the saw horses.

First, the door. When we first bought our home, we had this nasty old door to our back porch/pantry that wouldn't properly close, or even be locked. My temporary solution, was to use wood screws to secure the door from intruders. Well, here we are nearly 2 years later and we still have the same door, screwed shut. It's ugly. So, the obvious solution is to replace the door. I got my hands on a nice replacement door from a friend that no longer needed it. It was to big for the opening (better than too small) so it needed to be cut to fit. I called upon my handy Uncle Ed to help. He has more tools, better tools, and frankly more common sense and experience than I do and is good to have around when making critical cuts and decisions on things that really matter. After much consideration, including a phone-a-friend to a professional carpenter, we determined how much we needed to cut off the new door to make it fit, while allowing for a threshold and weatherstripping. After several careful measurements, we cut the door. We test fit it in the frame and it just needed to be planed then the door fit perfectly, despite the crooked frame. One problem: I forgot to take into consideration the thickness of the door. Essentially, the door was thicker than the previous door and when properly standing in the frame, it stuck out a bout a quarter of an inch. This necessitates a complete rebuild of the frame and door jam. So, I screwed the new door in place and considered my options.

The pretty door.

After discussion with Cindy, and weighing the amount of reconstruction needed, we decided to refurbish the old door, then add a screen door to increase security and air flow through the kitchen. So, a couple days later I took down the "new" door, and rescued the old ugly door from the side of the garage and screwed it back into place. Oof.  I went ahead and sanded, repaired and repainted the outside of the old door and frame. The outside frame was off by about a quarter inch so I needed to add a piece of molding to cover the gap. It actually looks pretty good now and it awaits new door hardware and return to operation.

Windows. Back in February I wrote a blog about out new storm windows. They were needed on many of the first floor windows. Before installing them, I scraped and repainted the window frames, which were in really bad shape, especially on the south and west side of the house. The second floor already had storm windows, but that didn't mean that the window frames were in any better shape. In fact, they were worse. I was able to do the attic windows, essentially on the third floor, by leaning out one and working on the other. The second floor, needed a longer ladder than I owned. After some shopping around, I purchased a 28 foot ladder from Home Depot and then had no choice then to climb, scrape and paint.

It's higher than it looks. Finished window
below. Second floor looks tired. 

My experience as a volunteer firefighter has given me both respect and a good working knowledge of ladders. This makes me confident in climbing them, and I have no real fear of heights, but is still tiresome and a bit nerve racking at times. Plus. I have no idea how much the ladder weighs, but moving it multiple times, to different windows, is exhausting. Of course, there's the climbing and descending the ladder multiple times as your bring tools and paint up and down. One of the bigger issues was painting around the already installed windows without smearing the paint. Bees were an issue, as the warm fall days seem to bring out the honey bees and they seemed very interested in my work. It's not pleasant to deal with bees when you're up a 28 foot ladder with tools, paint, and bees buzzing you.  Anyway, it took almost two full days of ladder work, scraping, and painting to get the window work "done". Done is in quotes because I actually did not get to the two front bedroom windows. It was just too hot and standing on the porch roof in that heat was just not an appealing thought. I will wait for a cloudy and cool day to finish the job. In any event I'm really happy with the work and how the windows came out.

Upcoming work: Chimney inspection, glazing windows, a huge pile of firewood, and plants where they shouldn't be.

Rains, trains, and automobiles

I miss my blog. More importantly, I hope someone else has. I find writing the blog to be relaxing and a good way to chart and stimulate progress, and I'm gratified when people read it. Anyway, a couple of weeks after I wrote my last blog, we went on vacation and I just haven't found the time to write, and I miss it.  That does not mean I've gotten a lot of work done on the house, but we have been busy.

All aboard! Cindy is ready to go.

Relaxing in our roomette*.
 * - train speak for tiny room 

I had a bachelor party to attend in the Florida Keys, so we decided to combine that with our annual beach vacation. Flying would have been cheap and fast, but we wanted to spend a few nights in Myrtle Beach on the return trip, which would have been logistically difficult, so we decided to take the Amtrak Auto Train. The Auto Train runs from outside of Washington DC to near Orlando, 7 days a week. They load your car on train and you sit back, relax, and about 16 hours later, you're in Florida. They unload the cars and you are on your way. The real advantage is avoiding the traffic, frustration, and  general ugliness of 700 miles of I-95. The train leaves around 3 pm and arrives around 9 am so we opted for a sleeper, a nominal charge but gives you a private room for the entire trip, and a real bed in which to sleep.

After the train got going, we headed to the lounge car for a drink. We had a very attentive bartender and grabbed a table with a big picture window. They sold Amtrak playing cards (very cool) so we bought a pack and played for a couple hours. Dinner was at 5 (included in your ticket price) and was actually quite good. I had a filet mignon with veggies and a baked potato, Cindy a pork chop. After dinner,  we returned to our room to watch a movie on my laptop. By 10, we were tired enough to have the steward unfold the beds and we went to sleep. We arrived pretty much on time in Sanford the next morning.

A soggy yet beautiful pool area at Margaritaville Resort.

Then the rain started. As we headed south to the Margaritaville Beach Resort, we drove into a tropical wave which would plague us for the rest of the trip. The resort and immediate area of the beach front was beautiful, and rather empty since it was off season (go figure), but the weather was not conducive to relaxing by the pool. So, the next day we headed to the Aventura Mall, a monument to excess and where Macy's is considered low end shopping. The good news is that Cindy was able to find a dress she needed for an upcoming wedding, and I was able to find a Chili's hidden in a far flung parking lot. They were NOT selling $10 beers. The bigger takeaway though was the traffic. Horrific. Especially when you throw in the rain. Multiple lanes of traffic at speeds completely disregarding the posted limit, tailgating, and various other traffic laws. I just don't know how people put up with this day after day. It was far worse, in my opinion, than New York City.  I'm really spoiled living in a small town.

Lunch at the wharf in Islamorada.

On Saturday I headed down to the Keys to golf with the bachelor party while Cindy stayed back. If you've ever have the chance to drive the overseas highway, I highly recommend it. It is just spectacular and so different, even from the rest of Florida. I met the rest of the party for lunch that day, and then we went golfing on Sunday. I was actually surprised there is a golf course on the Keys. These are tiny islands, most of them and land is very expensive, but sure enough a 9 hole course is out there. While Cindy stayed in the rain, it was very hot and sunny on the course and by about the 15th hole I had enough.

I drove back to Hollywood and Cindy after the golf and the next morning we headed out on the full day of driving to Myrtle Beach and the North Beach Plantation. Unfortunately, the rain followed us. The wave was now a depression and there was a watch up for a tropical storm. Ugh. Luckily, the system started to pick up speed and moved out Wednesday leaving us a couple days of good weather before we headed home Friday.

As I write this now the entire area of Florida that we visited in threatened by Irma. I fear we are on the verge of a terrible tragedy. Settling and living in paradise does come with a price, and millions of people are about to have their lives completely changed, perhaps forever. I hope those who can, have listened to the authorities and evacuated and will wait out the storm in safe areas. Good luck to all in Irma's path. My thoughts will be with you.

I did manage to get some work done when we got home. I finished the electrical rewire of the garage, and I do keep thinking about when I might start to stack that huge pile of wood in the backyard. Then there's the saga of the replacement door, but that's a story for the next blog.