Attic Entrance

In order for Cold Snap to get our new heater up through the attic entrance they had to cut off the half inch of drywall on all sides. This was the part that held the attic entrance cover so when they were done they screwed the drywall pieces back in place. But not all of it survived so there were gaps which didn't create a very good seal. Putting my hand up there I could feel cold air coming through so I knew I had to fix it. I got around to doing that the day that we left for Thanksgiving break while Treese was still at work. I started in the morning and was able to finish before we had to leave.

I went to Lowes and got two 1"x3" 6' whitewood boards as their actual dimensions (0.5"x2.5") were approximate the same as the drywall. I measured out the sections I needed and used the Black+Decker Matrix Trim Saw Attachment that mom had gotten me for my birthday to do the cutting. That attachment is so convenient for small jobs! Then I got the pieces lined up, drilled some pilot holes, and attached them using leftover deck screws I had bought to fix our garage ceiling. The attic entrance cover sits nice and level with no wobbling and I can no longer feel any cold air escaping so I'm happy with it. Later on down the line I may paint the wood and pick up some kind of drywall tape to hide the seams, but there's no rush on that.

Thanksgiving Break: Hike and Wall Climb

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving. We visited my parents for the holiday which was nice. My sister, Julia, flew in as well from Colorado and it was great getting to hang out with her. Thanksgiving dinner was a bit smaller than usual with only my grandmothers and Uncle Billy coming. It was still nice, though, as that made it more intimate. And the food was delicious thanks to Treese and Mom.

On the day after Thanksgiving we did a 2.7 mile hike to work off some of that food. Unfortunately Treese had homework to do so she couldn't come. It was cold out but a clear day. The hiking trail was a bit muddy from the previous day's rain but not bad enough to turn around. I thought the cold air really helped as I think if it had been warm out I probably would have been all hot and sweaty by the end.

Then the next day Julia took me to a indoor climbing gym. She was a regular but this was my first time and it sure was a lot of fun. Definitely showed that I need to work on my upper body strength. I made it to the top on my first couple climbs but after that it became much more difficult. By the end I could only make it half way up an easy climb before my arms refused to pull my body up any further. Dad came along to take pictures. Afterwards the three of us went out to lunch. Mom and Treese came to join us after we texted them our plans. We were trying to go to an Indian restaurant but when we got there we found it was permanently closed so we went to the Mexican place next door. It was a good meal and a great holiday break.

New Shut-Off Valve & TV Wall Mount

A while back I discovered that the hot water shut-off valve under the kitchen sink wouldn't shut off all the way. It was a multi-turn valve which just wore out as they tend to do. It is a dual outlet valve which feeds both the sink and the dishwasher and since the lines coming into it from both are a not-very-flexible metal that I'm sure would have broken if I tried to bend them into a different position I needed the dual-outlets to be positioned at a 90 degree angle to each other just like the original valve. Additionally, I wanted the replacement to be a quarter-turn valve so it would last. I couldn't find what I needed at the local hardware stores but of course Amazon had it. Not only that, but they had one which can shut off the water to the dual outputs independently, so I can just shut off the dishwasher or just the sink if I so desired. I spent a couple hours getting that installed yesterday. It really shouldn't have taken so long but there is just so little room to maneuver under there with the garbage disposal and all the pipes in the way.

The day before that we installed a wall mount for our flat screen TV in the living room. That went surprisingly smooth. We already had the studs marked from when we tried to do it several years ago only to find the wall mount we had bought didn't fit our 24" studs. Stud finders can be such a pain so it was nice not to have to do that again. I didn't install an electrical outlet or low-voltage wire pass-through to hide the wires. That'll have to come later. For right now we just put a plant in front of the wires along with a few action figures.

Mr. Fix-it

Last Sunday when I was over at my grandparents' house to wash their windows my grandma told me that their kitchen faucet was leaking under the counter whenever they turned on the water. I checked it out expecting to find a loose connection or a worn washer but found that the hose in the pull-down faucet had split open. Home Depot didn't have a replacement so I ordered one on Amazon.

The next day my grandpa called saying that his toilet was broken, so I walked over to check it out. Sure enough, both the fill valve and flush valve assemblies were broken. Old plastic that just wore out over time. On top of that, the metal shutoff valve was also broken as it was an old multi-turn valve that wouldn't shut off all the way. I headed to Home Depot and got a quarter turn valve but they didn't have the other parts so I ordered those on Amazon. I installed the shutoff valve that day which didn't take long. I've replaced a couple of these compression fittings at my house so I knew what to do.

The other replacement parts arrived yesterday so I went over and installed them. I had completely replaced both of our toilets not too long ago so I knew how to install these parts. Still, it all went surprisingly smooth. Usually something ends up going wrong. The biggest problem I had was that the chain that attaches from the flush assembly to the flush handle lever was too short. There was an extra link included on the chain to make it longer, the problem was disconnecting the hook from the handle lever. The hook is so small and you have to keep that one part pressed in while trying to maneuver it out of the hole with very little light and very little space to work in. I think it took me like 10 minutes to get that sucker off so I could re-adjust it. At any rate, they were happy to have everything working again and to not have shelled out a fortune for a plumber.

When I came over I had also brought with me a hearing aid that I recently got to give to grandma because even though she knows her hearing has gotten bad she always refused to go to the doctor to get one. This wasn't one of the tiny bluetooth ones my mom has, this was a larger one that fits over the ear which I think would be easier for her to use. She tried it out and said it definitely helped, so we'll see if she'll continue to use it.

Visiting the grandparents

This afternoon walked over my grandparents house for a visit. Grandpa and I watched a movie that was playing on TV called A Face in the Crowd from 1957 starring Andy Griffith. It was quite good and I was surprised by how relevant it still is even today. There is a scene near the end which is very reminiscent of a scene near the end of UHF, which I'm sure was done on purpose seeing as how UHF parodied a ton of different movies. While I was there grandpa gave me a wrist watch of his that he has had for a long, long time, since he was in the service. It's a wind-up watch with no battery that still works. It means a lot to him and therefore it means a lot to me, so I need to find something nice that I can store it in, preferably something that I can hang on my wall as a display. Do they make picture frames for wrist watches?

Freddy vs Jason

We went to a Halloween party yesterday dressed as Freddy Kruger and Jason Vorhees. There were a lot of other great costumes there. My favorite was the Black Widow and Fat Thor couples costume. We all hung out in the back yard snacking and talking until the power went out and the wind got furious, forcing us to move inside the house.

CleanTalk Anti-Spam

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