Labor Day 2009

I have been bad lately about getting posts out on time.

Some of it is that its the end of the summer and I’m enjoying every last minute of the beautiful weather, and I can’t seem to find time to sit down and get a blog entry written.

We took the Friday before Labor Day weekend off and that gave us a 4 day weekend at the lake to get some jobs done, as well as get a head start on the end of year tasks. It takes about 4 full days to close up the lake for the year so it usually has to be done over a couple of weekends.

Traffic wasn’t too bad on the way to the lake, mostly because it was Thursday night and the holiday weekend doesn't really start until Friday night. The weather man has forecast one of the most beautiful weekends of the summer.

Friday morning was breakfast out. Usually once a year we go have breakfast at a restaurant in the little village of Dorset. Dorset is an interesting city. It’s only a couple of blocks long and has mostly restaurants and bars. The mayor of Dorset is elected every year by drawing names in a raffle. The restaurant we have breakfast at is not much to look at, but it has great food especially breakfast.

After breakfast it was off to Park Rapids to pick up some food and a few parts for the chores this weekend.

The first half of this weekend is all about things that need to be done on the coach. The first thing on the list was to change the oil in the massive Cat 350 engine that powers the coach. After checking what it cost to have a service place change the oil (roughly $300) I decided to do it myself. ( no brainer there) Oil, filter and grease cost $125

The engine takes five gallons of oil and and a very large oil filter. Other than the volume of oil it is much like changing the oil in a normal car.

After the oil was changed it was time to wash the beast! You really can’t understand how big a 38ft coach is until you have to wash it!

It took almost 2 hours just to pressure wash the fiberglass roof. While I was cleaning the outside Margaret worked on cleaning the inside.

Once the roof was cleaned I moved onto the sidewalls with a long handled washing brush.

It took all afternoon, but the coach sure looked nice ,shiny and clean when it was done.

The Mystery of Trashed Deck

When we woke up Saturday morning the deck was littered with tree branched and broken acorn shells form the oak tree that overhangs our deck. From time to time we have seen this and attributed it to a squirrel in the tree, but we have never seen so much before.

To be continued:

Saturday was the day that I was going to install the tow bar in the jeep.

Tow Bar for the coach

I had checked a couple of places and gotten quotes to install a tow bar and base plate on the coach and jeep and both places I checked said about $1,700-$2,000 without a brake system. It looks like I can buy the parts on the internet for about $1,200 so I planned on doing it myself and pocketing the extra money.

After doing the research on tow bars, it appears that most people think that Blue OX is one of the best products out there, so we purchased a Blue OX Acclaim 10,000lb tow bar and a base plate for our 2008 Jeep Liberty. We purchased them on the internet and paid a fair price for the tow bar and base plate. They arrived promptly and had good installation instructions. The instruction indicated that an experienced installer could do it in 4 hours. I have read blogs of people that have done it themselves and they indicated that it is a full day job, so I set aside the whole day for the job.

The job is really 2 parts. First putting on the base plate, then wiring the taillights. First thing in the morning I pulled the jeep into the garage at the lake and started removing the bumper shroud according to the instructions. It was a bit of a task but nothing terrible and soon the bumper shroud was out on the lawn and we were ready to install the new Blue Ox base plate.

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Here is the base plate ready to go onto the frame.

Bolted down tight with “Loctite Red” to hold the bolts in place, the base plate is now installed.

Now the bumper shroud just need to go back on for a completed base plate job.

After two tries ( The first time I forgot an important part.) the jeep is whole again, and true to the advertising from Blue Ox you can not even tell it is on unless you look really close.

It took about 3 hours to put the base plate on, so right after lunch it was on to getting the tail lights hooked up. At first this seems like it should be a fairly simple task, but as it turns out finding a safe path to run the wiring harness from the front of the jeep to that back was a big job on our 2008 Liberty. It ended up taking several hours just to pull the wire through the convoluted path and wire wrap it tightly to the frame.

Finally as the afternoon was about over the job was complete, with only a few swear words and a couple of scraped knuckles.

A celebration ensued with wine and a barbequed steak dinner on the deck of the Garden House.

After dinner the party adjourned to the hot tub for a much deserved relaxing soak after a hard days work crawling under the vehicles.

The Mystery of Trashed Deck ……Continued

Somewhere around midnight I woke up and couldn’t go back to sleep.

Since it was such a nice weekend it was still quit warm out. The moon was shining brightly and I decided to step outside to see if I could get any moonlight pictures. Margaret’s solar lights were shinning brightly and looked beautiful, but I couldn't get the pictures to come out. On the way back to the coach I heard acorns being dropped on the deck! The mysterious squirrel bandit was at work! I though to myself maybe if I shined a light up in the tree I could see him. Sure enough! I shined a small flashlight up into the tree and I could see a pair of beady yellow squirrel eyes reflected in the light looking back at me! So holding the light in one hand and Margaret’s little camera in the other I was able to document the existence of the vicious little criminal!

Hold on! A moment latter another set of beady yellow eyes appeared!

There is two of them up there throwing acorn refuse down on our deck!

Wait a minute! a few seconds later another set of eyes appears. There is at least three of them!

The mystery is solved! Now we know how we get so much junk on our deck! There is an entire “herd of squirrels” living and feeding in our oak tree discarding their leftovers on our deck and yard!

Sunday morning

With the coach cleaned, the rest of the weekend was for starting to close up the lake for the winter. This is always a sad time. However with the warm sunshine and 80 degree temperatures it made for a pleasant task down on the lakeshore cleaning the boat and getting the boatlift ready to remove from the water.

Getting the lift out by myself requires taking the canvas and the aluminum ribs off the top before floating it to shore with a couple of large plastic jugs tied to the feet for floatation. Once it’s up to the shoreline a couple of strategically places ramps allows me to pull it up onto the bank for the winter.

With the boatlift now out of the water the poor boat has to sit tied to the dock overnight.

That is exactly where we had happy hour Sunday night. We plunked down into the boat lounging in the front seats of the boat in the sunshine tied to the dock, while Margaret tryed to avoid having here picture taken!

After supper we took the boat for a last cruise around the lake. There is a campground on the lake we live on and of course the campground is always interesting to cruise past on the holidays.

A couple of campers were on the raft at the beach doing back flips into the still wonderfully warm lake waters.

as I said there is always something interesting going on at the campground. This contraption is a homemade jury rigged hot tub! They have a child’s pool that they have pumped water into out of the lake and they are heating the water in a 55 gallon drum with a propane burner. (It looks like it may be a turkey cooker) Campers are endlessly inventive!

With the wonderfully warm weather it seemed like we should take a swim while we were out in the lake.

After the boat ride the with the sun setting in the west the moon was shinning right over top of the campgrounds.

This is why we hang out at the lake in the summer!

We ended our last summer evening at the lake with a “Margaret built fire” made out of white birch! (Fire tended by the Stumpman!)

Monday morning while I was taking the dock out and putting it away in for the winter an Eagle landed in the tall pine trees along our lakeshore. He sat there a while and I watched him for a minute or two. When I went back to moving the dock he took off leaving behind a tail feather floating down from the treetops in the breeze. I went over to the base of the tree and sure enough I found the eagle feather in the brush. I saved the feather and it now has a place of honor in the Garden House.

The rest of the morning we wrapped up a few of the other chores that had to get done for the winter closing of the lake.

The afternoon we spent lounging around in the sunshine.

Deep summer is when laziness finds respectability. ~Sam Keen

The Birthday Weekend

It was my birthday at the end of August. I'm another year older. How does that make me feel?

Not really any different…….. It seems like that if the birthday doesn't have an special significance like

16 : you get your drivers license

21: you get to drink liquor

62: you can collect Soc sec

What’s the point? Nothings any different.

Now that doesn't mean you shouldn’t celebrate and take advantage of the fact that its your birthday. That’s what I did! My parents came to town with a birthday cake and we had made plans to go to the Horse races.

But first I had to do some work. My mother was looking for a new camera, and I got to provide consulting service in the purchase of the new device.

Off we go to Best Buy to review the new cameras. We are looking for a camera similar to Margaret’s with a sliding front closure, and that means it will likely be a SONY to meet those requirements. We managed to find a Cool 12 megapixel SONY camera that meets the needs along with a case and a new memory chip to hold all the pictures. Then its back to the apartment to charge the batteries in the new camera and of course test it it out.

What do you think? Does it take good pictures? That certain is a clear picture of that bottle of Fat Tire!

At the Race track we had lunch and beer on the deck while the new camera makes its debut and performs admirably.

Pictures at the races from the new camera:

Photos by Mom and the new camera: Oh and more Beer!

Looks to me like the new camera does a pretty good job!

After lunch the races started at 1:30 and we were in our seats in the grandstand for post time. I was ready to bet big on the ponies this time with it being my birthday and all. Going all out I set aside $5.00 for the 8 horse races that were going to run today( I’m truly a big spender when it comes to gambling) as you can see!

The first race was up and I bet on the horse called Irish Rose. A lot of thought went into the pick. Margaret's from Ireland the horse was called Irish Rose … this must be a sign…… Right?

Guess what I won who knew!

Now I’m up almost 10 dollars! I can almost retire now!

The next few races didn’t pan out quite so well as the first race and I ended up the day with $6.50 up $1.50 Not what you would call a huge win but, not bad for a relaxing day in the sun watching the horses!

I’m now considering quitting my day job to earn my living betting on the horses!

Summer Lunch in the Park

Often on a summer day for lunch when both Margaret and I are working in Arden Hills you will find us at a small park on the north shore of Lake Johanna with a sandwich. Tony Schmidt regional park is not large, but situated on a small urban lake its a great place to spend and hour on a nice summer day.

While I was unable to get a picture there is a white (albino) squirrel that hangs out by our picnic tables and from time to time he shows up for a handout. (The squirrel prefers Subway sandwiches)

From the picnic tables at the boat landing you get a nice view of the Lake, and on hot summer days there is always a cool breeze blowing across the lake.

The park follows the Lake shore around with a nice walking path that leads from the boat landing to the swimming beach a little further down

Usually after our sandwich we will take a walk along the lake.

On warm days there is always a crowd at the beach enjoying the sunshine and sand.

But then of course just as we are really starting to enjoy ourselves we have to go back to the office (bummer!)

GNC Project Final weeks

Its been a couple of weeks since I’ve posted anything about the GNC (Garden House).

A couple of those weekends we stayed in the city so we didn’t go up north to the lake. The last time we went up to the lake I was working on the building and some other things, but the pace has slowed down considerably. Mostly there are little things left, and while they have to be finished they really are not obvious to see by looking at a picture.

Some of the little things I worked on two weekends ago are: The deck required more screws. When I put down the deck boards I didn’t put in all the screws so I could go faster. Well now all the screws are in and its ready for a Minnesota winter. Caulking and bits of staining and 2nd coats occupied some of the time as well. I was going over all the staining twice, and making sure that everything was sealed and caulked to keep out moisture and insects.

The garage was a mess from the building process. As we worked on the garden house we just piled stuff in the garage. Part of our weekend was cleaning up the garage so it was livable again. Sorting out the lumber scraps that are left and getting them in a pile to burn. Margaret will have a good fire burning in the next couple of weeks.

One thing we discovered is that the hot tub is really high. Poor Margaret’s legs are short and she can’t step over the tub wall from the floor, so we will have to make a step. Here you see me building a small step from some of the scrap wood so Margaret doesn't fall getting in or out of the tub.

Here is the step finished and sanded, but not yet stained as we check out the function and height of the step next to the tub. The first try was a little unstable. I had to widen the feet, but all is well now.

After solving the stability problem stain is now applied and the step matches the tub and the building.

Saturday ended with happy hour down on the dock. A quick picture snapped one handed by me results in a strange smile from Margaret.

With the pressure off and the building mostly complete a few otherwise ignored and put off jobs usually accomplished in the summer were taken care of between details on the garden shed. Such as disposing of the dead trees here and there in the woods on our property.

Of course dead trees require the “Great Stumpman”

Normally I would edit the movies so you don’t see all the miss queued stuff and trash, but the end of the previous video has a bit of a story. You see the world famous videographer that was taking the video of the tree cutting wasn’t paying a lot of attention to where the tree was going to fall and all the action at the end was the videographer (Margaret) running to get out of the way before the tree falls on her. My she sure can move fast when she wants to..

Back on the topic of the pressure is off, and taking care of details here and there leaves time for… Well lets just say all the time lately hasn’t been spent on working.

The Next Weekend

One of the things we learned making the room for the hot tub was that it is really nice having windows looking out over the woods in the back of the Garden House. So after a brief discussion over the week while in the city at work, we decided to put one more window in the back of the original shed before calling the project done.

During the week I procured a few supplies from Menards and we arrived a the lake this weekend with the parts we need to put in a new window in the back corner of the Garden House.

Friday night after arriving in 90 degree weather I pulled the inside panels off the wall where the window was going to go to see if there was any issues such as wiring to deal with.

It looks like everything will be good. I just need a few pieces of wood from the lumber company in Park Rapids in the morning and we are good to go. No drive to Bemidji on Saturday morning to Home Depot will be required.

Saturday morning after a few 2x4’s were acquired locally the roughed in frame it is ready to go.

Now we only need to cut the half log siding and sheeting on the outside for the window to fit into.

Margaret the world famous videographer braves the flying sawdust, the noise and the danger to record for history the opening of the window into the garden house.

The roughed in opening is now ready for the window,

The finished window a couple of hours later with trim and accompanying stained glass hanging.

That still leaves another piece of stained glass to hang in the sliding door of the hot tub room. So up it goes. It seems like it has found a permanent home.

On one of my trips to the lumber company a few weeks ago I bought a couple of solar garden lights for Margaret as a present. Well that turns out to be a mistake because now Margaret has discovered solar lighting in a big way!

Solar lights are now popping up all over our lot, like mushrooms growing after a spring rain!

There here in the garden now!

On both sides of the deck, out front by the driveway, and in front of the Garden House

For a few hours after sundown you can wander around our yard and its almost like downtown

An update on our problems with paddle boats crashing on the rocks! I’m happy to report that since Margaret placed the light house on our waterfront we have not had a single water craft crash! (Come to think about it we didn't before either.)

Enjoy your Summer they are such sweet things!