My happiest times

I usually hang my "yardwork clothes" on hooks on the laundry room door.  The specific contents vary -- but its an old shirt (either a retired [stained!] dress shirt or a cheap t-shirt), pants (either a certain denim pair of shorts, short sweatpants, or long sweatpants), and a hat (the floppy cloth hat [pictured], or a straw hat) -- plus my "tool belt" (pouch for pruning shears; pouch for my keys (shed keys, house keys); pouch for my cell phone (if The Lady phones during her errands, plus for taking snapshots of projects); and a pouch for my utility knife.

A few days prior, I had read a quote in a magazine (wish I could give a proper citation, but I looked, and couldn't find the quote again), where someoneone's mother (or grandmother?) had said that the secret to happiness is to find three things that you like doing -- and then try to do them a lot.

I took the photo because I realized:  some of my happiest moments are when I'm wearing those clothes -- puttering around doing yardwork, or doing some woodworking project -- or wandering back and forth between the two.


--GG

Compost bin patch

This is me knocking off a project that has been kicking around for a year -- maybe longer.

I have one of those "tumbler barrel" composters -- and a few years ago some critter chewed a hole in one of the corners.  The hole is about one and a half finger widths (an approximation; my fingers, at least), and about as long as my finger.  This means that whenever I rotate the barrel -- you're supposed to turn it three times whenever you add more scraps, just to mix everything -- some of the good stuff falls out the hole.

The difficulty was that I figured I'd have to use a sheet metal patch, and use some bolts (probably six, maybe eight), bend the metal around the corner, get the holes to all line up:  urgh.  I avoid using metal, for a variety of reasons --  and therefore I don't have a good stash of metal scraps.  And non-square pieces can be a nuisance to work with.  In hindsight, probably could've used the sides of an aluminum can (which would've been easier to work with than standard sheet metal).

Anyhow, a few days ago I suddenly realized that I could just use a section of branch:  I have tons of those -- and it's woodworking, not having to cut, then drill through, metal.

It's for function, not being pretty, so I didn't have to worry about cutting it precisely:  I just wanted to crank it out and cover (most of) the hole.


Here's the concept:  emergency patches on inflatable lifeboats use a similar approach.  Plate on the top; plate on the bottom; pull them together through the hole.

I didn't have the forethought to take a "before" photo -- and I couldn't be bothered to disassemble everything.  But here's one "after" view:  you can get a sense of how large the hole is.

Basically, just take a section of branch from the kindling pile; split it more-or-less in half; decide that the smaller "half" should go on the inside; clamp the two halves back together while you drill pilot holes all the way through; separate them and drill larger holes only through the top half (so that the threads of the screws can slide when passing through the top, but still grab the bottom portion); countersink the holes in the top; put in place and screw together.


Another view.  There's a little bit on the end that appears to not be covered -- but actually the end of the stick that's inside the hole mostly blocks it.

And here's a better-lit shot (and from a different angle), about a week later.

A design component is that the left end of the interior piece butts up against a piece of plastic on the inside -- and the right-hand screw (in the orientation as shown) butts up against the right-side end of the hole.  This means that there is no movement end-to-end.  And because the wooden patch is on a corner of the octagonal barrel, there's no side-to-side movement either:  it's wedged into the "V" of the interior corner.  So, it's pretty snug.

Oh:  and I soaked it in some Danish oil before mounting it, just to seal off the pores a bit.  It's hardwood, and because it's near the top of the barrel, it will be able to dry out (rather than rot, which it might do if it was on the underside, with wet compost constantly lying on it).  So, I don't expect it to rot.


It's functional (does the job); didn't take a lot of time; and has (I think) a certain rustic charm.

Most important:  it's finished.  :)


--GG

How to tighten an adze head

Well, my vacation is nearly done. But here's one of the mini-projects that I accomplished.

I started working on this on Monday, Sept 19th. I finished it today, Sunday the 25th. Some of the intervening time was just spent waiting for the glue to dry -- as you'll see below.

This adze-ish tool -- with a pickaxe at the other end -- is one of the tools I picked up at an estate sale maybe half a year ago.  It's one of the tools that I cleaned up during this vacation, as described in another blog entry.

The metal portion was loose on the handle:  not enough to fall off, but certainly enough to make it annoying when trying to use the tool.


The first photo shows the tool in my workbench's vice.  I've used a chisel to create a groove to receive a wooden wedge, which will spread the end of the wooden handle and jam it against the inside of the "eye" of the tool's head.


The next photo shows the wedge that I created, and the branch that I created it from.  Next to my workbench I keep a bucket of hardwood branch sections, collected from my yard, just for making small dowels and pegs and such.

The wedge is probably about 15 degrees.  I didn't measure it; I just eyeballed it -- and it looked like about half of 30 degrees, so...


Here's a shot of me using sandpaper to smooth the surface of the wedge, so that it won't bind on the way in.  Because the piece is so small, it's actually easier to hold the sheet of sandpaper on a flat piece of wood, and rub the wedge back and forth across it.

Here's the tool, back in the vice.  The green towel isn't part of this process:  it's just there to make the photo clearer, by obscuring some of the clutter on the workbench.

Unfortunately, you can't tell -- but I made the tip of the wedge at a coarser angle than the rest of the wedge:  that's for strength; I figured that a very thin tip would be fragile, break off, and ruin the process.


Another shot, prior to my driving it in with a wooden mallet.  Lookit the glue!!!

And:  a few days later, after the glue has dried.  I've cut off the excess from the wedge; sanded it a little; used the bench grinder's wire wheel to clean the rust off the metal; WD-40'd the metal; and oiled the handle (including the "eye") with a a 50-50 mixture of boiled linseed oil and methyl alcohol (as a thinner). 

The handle is now quite snug in the eye of the tool.  However, if it becomes loose, I can tighten it up by driving a metal "hammer head" wedge into the eye, as indicated by the red line. Because the initial wedge is made of wood, I can drive the subsequent metal wedge through the initial wedge.

And if it loosens again, I can drive another metal wedge where the green line is.


--GG

Trick for sprouting avocado pits

I'm near the end of a week's vacation, so I'm logging all the little projects that I manage to knock off.

This is one that I've been thinking about for a few days.  Over the last few weeks I've accumulated five or six avocado pits.  I wanted to plant them, but wasn't sure how to keep them moist so that they would sprout.

My solution was to wrap each one in a single layer of newspaper, kind of like a Hershey's Kiss, and place them in holes around the perimeter of a large pot.  I then twisted additional sheets of newspaper to each "stem", and placed the other end in an empty yogurt tub.

These long "ropes" serve as wicks to keep the avocado pits moist:  when I fill the yogurt tub with water, the water slowly gets wicked down to the newspaper surrounding the pits.

It takes about a day for the water in the yogurt tub to get fully drained -- and the soil seems to be consistently moist.

The single layer of (wet!) paper seems like it should be thin enough for the sprouts and roots to break through.


Of course, this is all theoretical:  in principle it should work.  We'll see if anything actually sprouts.

I should note that I'm in the southern hemisphere (Australia), so it's actually springtime here.


I presume that I'll know in a few weeks whether this works.


--GG


Update:  6 Oct 2016 -- Nothing yet. 

Update:  11 Oct 2016 -- It's late spring for us, so during the day the paper "wicks" dry out midway through their length, rather than carrying the water to the dirt.  However, when I come out in the morning the wicks are wet all the way to the dirt, and the dirt is indeed damp. // If I did this again, I would roll the wicks so that they' have a thicker cross-section, so that the core would stay damp (and transmit the moisture all day):  at the moment they're flat, folded-over strips, which doesn't seem to be thick enough.  // No sprouting yet.
 
--

A coworker gave me worms

After wanting one for about eight years, I finally spring for a tumbling composter (Aldi had them on sale).

Even though worms aren't necessary for proper composting, I thought it might help the process.  But the local mega-hardware store wants $28 for 500 worms -- and I don't need 500 worms -- just a handful, and they will grow and multiply.

I sent around an e-mail at work to all the people I chat with, no one had any composting worms for me.  I wanted the hearty, red worms -- not the generic garden earthworms.

But then!  A co-worker who I rarely talk to (and thus, I didn't include in my e-mail) offered me some from her "worm farm" tower.  Brought it in today, and I took 'em home.

Happy little fellers.  They seem contented in their new home.


--GG

Composting from work

My environmentalism has reached a new level.

For the last few months I'd been troubled whenever I walked past a waste bin at co-workers' desks and seen apple cores and banana peels.  It seemed like a waste.

So, each day I now bring in two plastic containers.  The smaller one is for apple cores and pieces of tomato -- for the chickens.  The larger one is for orange peels and banana peels -- for the compost.

My co-workers now "donate" their food waste to me, and I take it home every day.  I'm going through a banana phase, so most days I eat 3-5 bananas -- and a co-worker who is a weightlifter eats 3-5 apples a day.  So, between the two of us we're generating a decent volume.

UPDATE:  This has been so successful that I've had to upgrade my sizes:  the "compost" container is now a red plastic cookie "tin", and the "chicken" container is the blue-lidded one in the photo.  

UPDATE #2:  Ah!  I **already** posted a blog entry about this.  Ah well.


--GG

Kerbside treasures

So, last weekend I was thinking that I really ought to mount the grinding wheel that I received for Christmas onto some sort of stand or mini-workbench -- I need some lumber.

And also that I have some plants that need re-potting.


Luckily, it was ''put your weird oversized junk out on the curb" week!


Scored a batch of lumber (see photo); the table it's on...



...and a bunch of pots, a laundry basket (will use it in my workshop to hold scrap lumber), and a pink frisbee...














...a pair of deck chairs (it's a pretty simple fix: just buy some canvas, hem the edges, and nail them to the end-bars of the chairs)...









...and a pair of large stereo speakers that I will cannibalize and turn into speakers for a guitar amplifier.



Free stuff!!!


--GG

Maybe I should garden

Had an interesting dream last night: Dreamed I had an office job for some misc. company. Came in to work one morning, to find that someone had removed all of the documents I had on my desk.

I told my supervisor that either I was being given a whole new project, and someone had taken over my old one -- or else I was being fired. My supervisor told me that it was being fired. Ah.

Decided, in my dream, that I needed a new career. Decided I'd be a landscape maintenance person: mowing the lawn, edging the lawn, raking beauty bark, pruning trees. Sounded like a pretty decent job. Wouldn't get paid as much -- but probably not a lot of deadlines, either: just day in, day out.

Woke up, and realized that, yeah, that **would** be a pretty o.k. job. I wouldn't have thought so at 25 -- but now that I'm in my 40s, having a job that's just doing yardwork all day sounds pretty good.


--GG

Herby

I like herbs, I've decided. Not for cooking -- although that's a good idea, too.

Mostly, though, I like walking past them, stopping, and rubbing their leaves while smelling them. Kinda like a real-life Scratch 'N' Sniff experience.

We had a few in Seattle, but we had to leave them behind: trying to import plants is a pain. So, even though we've lived here for about six years, we didn't have any herbs.


But, about two weeks ago our local Aldi store had a few different types of potted herbs (in the teeny little "starter pots") for $2.50 each, so we picked up a few (I think three). Then the next day, while at Ikea, we picked up another flavor. I planted them in larger pots (I've discovered that pots need to have a certain minimum volume, or else they dry out too easily), after dividing the little bunches to "fluff them out" a bit.

The next week, I noticed that Aldi had discounted the herbs from $2.50 to $1.50. So I bought two more flavors. And a few days later, I bought one more flavor again.

In the photo, I've grouped the various flavors together. I think there's a total of nine edible types of herbs -- plus lavender, which probably isn't edible and which we already had, but needed re-potting.


It's nearby the workshop/storage shed: every time I go out there, I give a few of them a sniff.


--GG