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Friday 03-29-24

Last day of my spring break. The world has become colorized again, the pastures and hay fields greened up this week. I love that change. Hauling a steer tomorrow to sale barn. He was an extra and is pushing the 4H calves around and being a pest when CJ catches and ties the others up. Have cut and split a bunch of firewood this week. Didn't get all I wanted done, but given the weather, did alright. Lou, CJ and I are going to town today to look through the Habitat/Restore shop and 3 other "junk" stores just for the heck of it and get ideas for recycling and other 4H projects. Jon got a pair of Peterbuilt taillights when they went to the truck show in KY a weekend or two ago. So am looking for a metal two door wall hanging cabinet that he can transform into the back end of a semi van trailer. A transformer and more lights as well as tires, mudflaps and a rear bumper, think he will have an eye catching recycling project that he can use for a long long time. Be safe and stay healthy all.

Edited to add, Peter was typing while I was typing, "great minds think alike Peter!!!" And yes, HAPPY EASTER!!
 
Winging it. Gotta get some seeds started (better late than never) and on the heat mats under lights. The tops of the table saw and band saw need a good cleaning. Still lots of weeding to do and old blackberry canes to remove. Need a few yards of mulch to keep the weeds at bay. Probably have to mow the lawn. Also need to rearrange my smoker set up to fit in a stainless steel topped prep table I picked up on FB Marketplace. They were so nice we bought two, one for the deck and one for the smokers. I added a set of casters from Amazon to the one on the deck and cut the legs down to compensate. Not bad for a hundred bucks. Stay safe and healthy all.
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Supposedly we had four inches of rain over the past two days. I don't know because we didn't empty our rain gauge. It is very squishy out so we most definitely had a bit of rain.

Lining up blanks for future projects. It takes longer than you would imagine when you have so much wood to look at. I enjoy looking at my wood hoard as much as I enjoy turning it. I think I have a wood fetish but there are worse things.

It is supposed to be warm for the next few days so I hope to borrow a friend's portable propane forge. I have my kukri blade ready for heat treatment. This is the largest blade that I have made so I am a bit anxious about messing it up. I don't plan on heating up the handle as much as the blade which reminds me that I need to make sure my canola oil quenching can has enough oil in it to adequately submerge the blade. I also need to buy some tongs one of these days for holding this hot steel. Currently I am using a pair of old needle nose vise grips.

Any of you guys ever used any vise grip pliers like those pictured below? They are 15 inches long. I thought they might make a good way to hold hot steel. They are only $12 so I thought I might give them a try. The heat coming off the forge and then the quenching process gets uncomfortable even with gloves on.
 

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We have my wife's sister and family visiting. I might have the nephews load up the trailer with scrap this afternoon and might try to take it to the scrapper by the end of the day. We may go explore the woods looking for morel mushrooms later too. My BIL also want to learn to mud and tape drywall, so will get that project started again. Other than that just some fishing, shooting, and enjoying the time with them.
 
Darren Wright said:
My BIL also want to learn to mud and tape drywall, so will get that project started again.
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Let me guess Tom Sawyer, you told him you were having so much fun mudding these past months but felt guilty knowing he was coming for a visit that you saved some for him. I wish I had a BIL like that. If I did, I would share all my fun chores with him.
 
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I'm continuing to explore the drawers in my shop, looking for more cans of wd-40. I feel like I'm making progress out there, but it's slow and I have to constantly fight that Hoarding instinct.

Theres's a certain feeling I get when I toss out an almost completely used up container of something, but then keep looking back at it like 'what a waste', then I look at the counter and there's multiple other versions of it, lol.

I haven't even really started going through the pile of old electric cords, wall warts and transformers, the boxes of 'misc bolts and screws', odd electronic projects, piles of scrap ply and other wood. But at least most of those are in dedicated piles just waiting for me to go through one pile at a time.
 
Brent Dowell said:
I'm continuing to explore the drawers in my shop, looking for more cans of wd-40. I feel like I'm making progress out there, but it's slow and I have to constantly fight that Hoarding instinct.

Theres's a certain feeling I get when I toss out an almost completely used up container of something, but then keep looking back at it like 'what a waste', then I look at the counter and there's multiple other versions of it, lol.

I haven't even really started going through the pile of old electric cords, wall warts and transformers, the boxes of 'misc bolts and screws', odd electronic projects, piles of scrap ply and other wood. But at least most of those are in dedicated piles just waiting for me to go through one pile at a time.
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Just remember to save all the good stuff that you will need later.

Advice like that is what stuffed my shop.
 
Nice weather here for the weekend (although a bit breezy). I Tom Sawyered my BIL into coming over today to help me get started butchering the tree that blew over a couple of weeks ago. (Chain saws are fun, Jim! You should try it!.) :D Probably won't do any dump runs with the remains until sometime next week, though. Weekends at the transfer station can get busy. There will also be a couple or three firewood delivery runs at some point as well.

And as usual, I have some music stuff to work on this weekend...songs to learn and practice, adjustments to my gear, and maintenance on a guitar or two.
 
I still haven't gotten much done around here lately - meds still bothering me. Had a fall last night - got disoriented and unstable after taking some gabapentin late last night to help settle some serious neuropathy discomfort in my feet. Fortunately, I was able to brace myself a bit and only got bruises on my right hip and shoulder.

We got about 4" of rain this week - most in a while. Everything is greening up nice! Had our lawn guy do our mowing, etc., today so things looks real nice. The rain was from a system of storms that kept coming through with lots of lightning. Unfortunately, we never lost power so our new Generac still hasn't had to work hard for us yet! :dunno::huh:

I have an appointment with an eye surgeon on Monday. We had a routine appointment with our optometrist recently and he found some hemorrhaging near the macula in my right eye. Vision is real messy in that eye, but left has always been dominant and good.

Aging ain't for wimps!!!
 
The Son and family and daughter and family will arrive tomorrow and drive me nuts with the noise. But I'll love every minute of it. Checked out the BBQ and cleaned it up for hamburgers and hotdogs and stuff for tomorrow. Also for the season. Do a boneless Boston butt in the near future. That will last a while.
Arm was bothering me something terrible this past week. Kept me awake all night. Tried Tylenol and nothing. Then It occured to me Crestor had the same effect so stopped taking that and things are clearing up. Now convince my doctor why I hurt. It is a statin and I have had bad reactions with all the rest. So back to drawing board and see what else I can take to keep cholesterol in check. See heart doctor next week to check on possiblities of Watchman procedure. Maybe get off several meds.
Every have a safe and healthy weekend and more.
Happy Easter to all and think of the reason for the season.

David
 
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