Mo’ Flo’ Sandin’ (and other stuff)

Friday night floor sanding!

Since Oceana wasn’t able to come with me this weekend, I prepacked and headed straight up to the house from work on Friday night. I got there early enough to get right into sanding the floors. Yay…… Although this week I brought a few goodies with me. I picked up a new sanding pad and a dust shroud for the grinder to help keep the dust under control. Also, I brought my proknee knee pads that I was finally able to reacquire after 4 long years without them. Working on my knees for long hours the prior weekend without them was all bad. It inflamed my steel reinforced ankle and caused the top of my foot and half of my calf to go numb for the better part of the week. Strange.

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I got the grinder and dust shroud set up and got to grinding on the bedroom floor. The new backer pad I got was a little softer than the disc that I had been using the previous weekend. Also, the hook and loop sanding discs overhang the edges of the backer pad. This wouldn’t matter if the floors weren’t full of termite damage. But they are, and the overhanging portion of the disc kept getting torn when it hit the termite damage. Bummer. After being careful and still tearing up a bunch of the sanding discs as well as the backer pad, I decided to call it quits with the setup. Back to the no dust collection setup as the sanding discs from the prior don’t work with the dust shroud. Bummer. I put on the respirator, took off the dust shroud, and got after it. Hey, at least I have my proknee knee pads.

I got a little time in sanding on Friday night and then spent the better part of Saturday grinding down the floors. They look so much nicer as raw wood versus the painted gray. Also, note to self, don’t set the spinning grinder with 50 grit paper down on your thigh. It will put a hole in your shorts…and your thigh….

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A little dock bling

Next up was adding some solar powered dock lights. I picked these up on Amazon. A pair of screws each and they’re all set. At night, they really make the dock look much nicer than it actually is!

Snakes and Septic Tanks

Remember the old septic tank in the side yard? Yup, time to fill it in. I smashed all of the old concrete lid to eliminate any hollow spaces and backfilled the hole with the sand. While backfilling I came across this black snake that wasn’t too happy with me relocating her. I say her because I found a few hatched egg shells in her nest area.

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Snakes and drains

Next up, plumbing. Last weekend the toiled kept running and ended up starting to overflow. I had previously located a fernco connection in the side yard where the cast iron converts to PVC on its way to the newer septic tank. This connection ended up being a two ferncos tying in a short piece of pipe. Because of the fernco fittins, I was able to take this small section out to snake out the drain. Downstream was clear. I found a little junk in one of the fernco joints because the pipes weren’t well lined up as well as a few roots starting to creep into the cast iron pipes. I remedied these and put it all back together.

Kitchen sink drains again

While I was being a plumber, I decided to diagnose the kitchen sink. It didn’t drain. Period. Snake the line. Solid filled with rust and debris. Trace the line. It went back out to the old septic tank. Quick fix – cut the line and let drain it into the side yard at the old septic tank. Easy enough. I then reconnected all of the fittings below the sink and water tested. Back in business for the time being.

Cozy coffee spot

Sunday morning was cold. Mid 40s. I started my morning with some cowboy coffee next to the faux fireplace. At first light I started off the work by taking out some 4×4 posts that were set in the ground with a bag of concrete each. Lots of digging and sawing. I left the concrete in the ground and removed the posts.

Floating the floating dock

Next project up was a big one – re-float the sunken floating dock. This dock is maybe 10′ x 10′ and had 5 barrels underneath it. 2 of the 5 had sunk and drifted out from under it. I drug the dock to shallower water and used my high lift jack to lift up a corner of the dock so I could slide a sunken barrel under. Once the barrel was in place, I used a drill powered pump to pump the water out and to refloat it. It worked. I repeated for the second barrel. It floats, although it sat for so long in its half sunken state that the whole dock got warped. Oh well, at least it matches the fixed dock!

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The newest thing in the old house

Time to make the old house high tech. I installed a smart lock on the kitchen doors to make unlocking the door remotely easier for when it comes time to AirBnB it. It’s neat, it unlocks with a finger print, or a pin code, or a key fob, or with your phone. It also has a gateway to allow it to connect to the internet to allow remote unlocking.

New temporary screen door

Last up for the weekend was installing a screen door. Easy, right? Not so much. I had to add a layer of molding to mount the screen door frame to as well as replace some rotted moldings. With a bit of fussing, I got the screen door in place and the hardware installed. As you can see, the door racks just from the tension of the closer. Yeah, its a pretty crappy door. Crappy, inexpensive, and in stock. Oh well, I’ll make a proper wooden screen door for it one day. Until then, at least the new door looks pretty.

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