Sunday, February 15th, 2009
Valentine’s day was here. I wanted to wash the car and have it nice and clean, so my lady and I could drive down to Foxwoods in style. It was pretty dirty and needed a good wash.
On my way back from tennis yesterday morning, I dreaded the idea of going downstairs, turning the water valve to “on” and then going back outside to hook up the hose on the water spigot at the front of the house. I think the part I hate the most is hooking up the hose outside and then having to unhook it to put it back in the garage. The reason I would have to go downstairs to turn the valve on is because of freezing in the winter. No valve downstairs, frozen and broken water spigot upstairs come spring.
I had a great idea. Why not install a water spigot inside the garage? This way, I can keep a hose hooked up all the time and not have to worry about the spigot freezing over the winter. I could use the spigots that are outside for watering and things like that over the summer, but for washing the car and things like that, I could use the inside one. I thought it would be very handy.
Since the area I wanted the spigot located in the garage was right on the other side of the washing machine hookups down in the basement, I figured it would be a pretty easy job. Somehow, I would just tap into the cold water feed for the washing machine. I really look forward to these types of projects because I have to get imaginative. I enjoy standing in the pluming aisle at Home Depot trying to figure things out. I really do.
Before I left for the Depot to get all the parts, I decided to drill a hole through the 2×10 that the floor was resting on. This 2×10 is up in the ceiling of the laundry room and down towards knee level in the garage. I would drill a 7/8 inch hole to see what I would find.
I drilled the hole from the basement and saw daylight. Lucky me. I went upstairs to the garage and saw a hole right where I wanted the spigot to be. Really lucky me. I started getting my thoughts together and made a little list. Then, I hopped in the car and drove over to Home Depot.
I am not going to give you the list of parts I bought here because I forget what they are. Hopefully you can see them in the pictures I will show you. As I post the pics, I will probably remember what they were. Take a look at the finished product.
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Water hose splitter and on-off switch on cold water laundry feed
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125 psi hose going through 2×10 from laundry room to the garage upstairs
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Water spigot mounted to 2×4s in garage
Let me do a little explaining. I know the proper way to do this is with copper piping. I may change that some day. For this application, I used hose. Since I am aware that this is not a permanent thing, I put an on/off valve down near the splitter in the laundry room. I saw the hose in the store and couldn’t pass it up. When I am not using the spigot, I can just go downstairs to turn the valve off.
Also, the reason the spigot is mounted to 2×4s is because I wanted it really solid on the wall. I am probably going to tug on the hose as I pull it outside and I didn’t feel like having the spigot tear off the wall. It’s not the prettiest thing, but you should try to give it a wiggle. Nope. I know there is a 2×10 on the other side of the sheetrock, but the hole I drilled was a bit too big and the mounting screws weren’t sitting right.
After everything was all set up, I hooked up a nice brand new no-kink garden hose I bought last autumn to the spigot in the garage. I went downstairs to turn on the easily accessible on/off valve and then came back upstairs to drag the hose out into the driveway. I turned the spigot on and…well, that’s for the next post.
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Wednesday, January 28th, 2009
Throughout this winter, I have been putting together a short mental list of things I am going to tackle once the good weather arrives. I thought I might share that list with you, partly to entertain you and partly to remind me what in the world I had on my mental list once I have the urge to do some of these things.
EXTERIOR:
1. Order tons of pine trees from ArborDay.org and plant them all over the place.
2. Get the lawn in order.
3. Begin work on Laura’s garden. Need fencing and shrubs.
4. Clean out under porch. Take nails out of 2×4s and stack somewhere else so they are hidden. Throw out vinyl lattice (unless of course you want it).
5. Order more pellets to restock basement for next year.
6. Repair driveway again from this winter’s damage.
7. Admire mailbox.
8. Order 30 yards of mulch.
9. Mulch front garden and top off last year’s mulch.
10. Enlarge garden in front to include those 3 large rocks. Mulch that too.
INTERIOR:
1. Finish painting upstairs bedroom.
2. Remove carpet and tile from downstairs (main floor) and install tile over the whole area.
3. Paint downstairs (main floor).
4. Continue wondering how difficult it would be to replace suspended ceiling in basement with sheetrock.
5. Continue fantasizing about turning the laundry room into a giant bathroom with a giant bathtub and a giant shower.
6. Finish painting upstairs.
Wow, that’s quite a list. Am I going to get all these things done this spring? Heck no. I think I might be able to get those pine trees though. I am getting tired just looking at that list.
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Wednesday, December 31st, 2008
Many of you may have noticed that it’s winter. Yes, the good ‘ol freezing cold air is back. If you aren’t enjoying the air, maybe you’ll get a kick out of clothes that almost electrify you. I’m talking about static, folks. Yes, static.
I have these long Nike warm-up pants that I sometimes wear when I am playing tennis. They are pretty cool and crazy comfortable. I used to wear them in the summer sometimes until I realized that while they were cool looking, they weren’t all too cool on my legs. My legs are at the pinnacle of muscular perfection and insist on being able to breathe.
Since it started getting colder outside, I have been wearing my warm-up pants more often. I would wear them every time I play tennis, but I am being inhibited by one issue – static electricity.
I am not kidding when I tell you that I have shown up to the tennis club with these stupid pants completely stuck to my legs. I stand there laughing while I try to pull them away from me like that lady on the static commercial on TV. You know the one…she is grabbing at her skirt, trying to get it straight. Yeah, right. Good luck with that.
It gets even worse when I actually start playing tennis. For those of you who haven’t been to an indoor tennis facility, I’ll tell you that there is a very fine layer of “tennis ball dust” covering almost the entire floor. This dust is really the neon yellow fibers that come off the tennis ball when it is hit by a racquet. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that all that tennis ball dust is eventually going to find its way onto my magnetic pants. It’s a wonder I still wear them at all. By the time I am finished playing, my pants are covered with yellow from my knees down.
Needless to say, I hate static.
I’ll tell you one more story before I get to the point.
I have this nice black zipper up fleece that I bought from L.L. Bean a few weeks ago. It’s a very handsome fleece and I really like it. Actually, I did like it until I washed it. You should have seen my eyes when I pulled this thing out of the dryer. Forget about the lint catcher, my fleece caught all the lint. The fleece is pretty much unwearable now. I don’t know what I am going to do about it.
To deal with this problem, I started looking at anti-static remedies online. I went through the traditional fabric softener and dryer sheet thing, but I didn’t think that would really work. There were a bunch of people out there that said they had no luck with dryer sheets on fleece. They said that nothing works. Not cool when you have three cats adding to the problem.
I also came across those reusable dryer balls. I think they are made of rubber or something. People said they had mixed emotions about them, but there was a consensus about putting tennis balls in the dryer with your clothes to reduce wrinkles and static. Since I have an ample supply of tennis balls, I decided to give it a shot.
Tennis balls in dryer
I did a few washes and dried the clothes with the tennis balls. Of course, Laura didn’t try this home remedy with her clothes. She lost faith in my laundry capabilities (and tips) long, long ago. Let’s just say there have been some issues. I believe I don’t need to explain any further, because anyone out there who lives with someone, surely knows of the damage one can cause in the laundry room. Especially, when that someone has an imagination like mine. Just look at me trying to blow snow with a backpack blower in the next post.
I have some good news and some bad news, and I’ll give you the bad news first. My fleece still has visable lint all over it, even when I washed it with only dark stuff. The good news is, the rest of the laundry is almost static free and virtually has no wrinkles. I used to have a wrinkle problem, but since I started using the tennis balls, no more wrinkles. I think that’s fabulous. Also, the rest of the clothes seem to be really lint free.
So, my conclusion is that tennis balls work in the dryer to help out with static reduction, wrinkle reduction and lint reduction. What works on a handsome black fleece? Who knows. If you know, trust me, my ears are open.
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Saturday, May 3rd, 2008
Yes, I know, this is probably one of my more boring posts. Actually, maybe not…I have a lot of boring posts.
Well, we had our new washer and dryer delivered today. We left our old ones back in NY. We were going to bring them, but I thought it would be a good selling point for the other house if we left them, especially since they are almost brand new. Also, I really wanted to get one of these new types of washers. They are Energy Star® and use much less water. Also, the spin cycle spins the drum at 1,100 RPM, so the clothes really get a lot of the water spun out of them before they hit the dryer. That equals less dryer time.
The washer is very quiet. I was sitting right next to it, while talking on the phone and could hardly hear it operating. I like the way I can watch the clothes flop around in there. We got the “LG Electronics 4.0 Cu. Ft. Energy Star® Front Load Washer in White” from Home Dept. I think the Energy Star®, along with the reduced usage of water was worth the few extra bucks.
The dryer is a regular old dryer. It is the “GE 7.0 Cu. Ft. Super Capacity Electric Dryer” also from Home Depot. When we went in to pick them out, I really wanted the stainless steel drum. The sales girl told us that she went to a class just the day before and was told that the stainless steel did virtually nothing for performance. I thought this was a little odd because the stainless costs more and she would probably want to make a bigger sale. Since we really don’t need any fancy features for a dryer, we got this one.
The first wash is going right now. I am going to get the dryer going and start finishing up the pile was already have down in the laundry room.
Peace out.
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