so today . . . my dad initiated a video chat with me on facebook :)
i have the best parents. i think they can pretty much do anything. but all this new technology can be confusing! just ask me how many times i've been at the "genius bar" in the apple store during the last three months!! but as each new thing comes along, they figure it out. here's how it works...
usually, either rollie or i get a new electronic gadget. ok, usually rollie gets a new electronic gadget, then after listening to him tell me all the amazing things his new electronic gadget will do, i get one. then i convince my mom that she needs one. and my dad sees her playing with her new toy, and after a while, he decides that maybe he would like one too. this process takes a few months, but eventually, we are all playing with the same electronic gadgets.
a side effect of this progression is that since my dad is usually the last one on the train, it takes him longer to figure out how to make his new toy do all the things that we do with ours. luckily, my mom is there to help him out...
this is the way it has always worked. until today. today my dad initiated a video chat on facebook with me. my dad.
last night, while we were farming, he hit the video chat button. i don't know if he did it on purpose or accidentally. since he doesn't touch type, he sometimes inadvertently hits the wrong key, which sometimes causes him big problems. but this time it turned out to be a good thing...
so i was farming along, when i got the message that he was "calling" me. this has never happened to me on facebook before, so i wasn't quite sure what to do. so i hit the video chat button, but then i realized that i was "calling" him. all that this accomplished was to confuse everything! i got another message that i had missed his call, and he had missed mine. now i really didn't know what to do. i didn't know whether to try to call again, or wait for him, or message him, or just turn off the computer and go to bed. and then i got a second message that said he was "calling" me. and then my mom's face appeared, and suddenly we were looking at each other and talking!
isn't technology wonderful :)
so we talked for a while, and she showed my dad the results of his experimentation. but you know how it is when you accidentally do something wonderful and then can't remember how you did it? that's kind of what happened. so we disconnected and my mom showed him how to initiate the video chat if he wanted to. i figured he would never want to. when he is farming, my dad is a man of few words...
and then tonight he did it again. on purpose! and my mom was nowhere in sight!! he just wanted to tell me to move some of my trees so that he could harvest a few hidden crops. he could have typed me a message, but he didn't. he video chatted with me!! all by himself!!!
i'm so impressed. and while my farm didn't function all that well while we were chatting, it was ok, because i could see his face. and it had a big smile on it. i think maybe he was kind of impressed with himself, too! and he should be!!
my electronics confound and frustrate me quite often, but i am so glad for the technologies that we have. remember when video phone calls were so futuristic that we only saw them on the jetson's?? and now they are a reality for anyone with wi-fi and a webcam! and as our families and friends spread out (diandra lives clear across town from me now, you know,) it is nice to be able to see their faces (even if they are kind of pixelated,) and hear their voices (even if the audio is a little bit behind the video,) no matter where we are...
now if someone could just perfect that whole robot maid and instantly cooked meal thing that the jetson's had...
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Monday, February 20, 2012
adventures in building...
so today . . . i built a dresser and two nightstands. from IKEA (i used caps to spell IKEA, because apparently that is the only spelling they recognize. when i was looking for dressers, i googled ikea and got the response "did you mean IKEA?" so, i guess it isn't the same if it isn't in caps...)
we needed new dressers. the dressers we had were the ones we bought when we were first married, which was a long time ago. we originally just bought the chest of drawers, because that was what we needed and it was all we could afford. but i finally talked rollie into getting the big dresser with the mirror that matched. my rationale was that if we didn't get both dressers while they were available, we were going to end up with mismatched furniture, because eventually we would need a second dresser. so we figured out how to pay for it and brought it home. i loved the look of those dressers, but over time, my love waned... they were made of wood "products" and plastic, and although they still looked good, they just didn't say "grown-up" furniture to me...
when we moved into our new house, i decided we didn't need any dressers at all! we had this "huge" walk-in closet and i was sure we would be able to get all our clothes and shoes and stuff into the closet! i was wrong. in case you didn't know it, walk-in closets look much, much bigger when they are empty than when you start filling them up with your stuff...
so i went on a search for "the perfect dresser." you know where this story goes... i went to furniture stores. i searched online. i went back to furniture stores and took pictures. i watched for sales. the problem was, i only wanted ONE dresser, and all the furniture stores wanted to sell me a whole bedroom set! plus, i didn't really know what i wanted... and while i love to shop online, when it comes to furniture, i want to see it and touch it and open and shut the drawers, so the online thing wasn't really working for me.
and then we got a sale flyer in the mail from IKEA, and i saw a dresser that i really liked. so one friday after school (while rollie was sick,) i went to IKEA. alone.
if you have never been to IKEA, my advice to you is don't go alone, and don't be fooled into thinking it will be a quick trip. because IKEA stores are like a rat's maze for furniture shoppers! i'm serious!! they don't have rows and aisles which allow you to choose where you are going to go--you just have to follow the path. there are no short cuts. you go around and around and around. and don't even try to go backwards unless you want to feel like a salmon swimming upstream... i did not take my own advice. i went alone, because i was looking for one specific thing--the dresser i had seen in the ad--so i knew it would be a quick trip.
it wasn't. and the worst thing was, that while i was trying to find the dresser and then figure out how to get out, i saw so many cute and wonderful things... which i am sure is the reason for the maze-like layout to their stores. those IKEA people... they are evil geniuses...
anyway, i found the dresser i had seen in the ad, but once i found it, i also found all the matching companion pieces. and boy, were there matching companion pieces!! open bookcases, bookcases with glass doors, double wide bookcases, tv stands, 3 drawer dressers, 5 drawer dressers, 8 drawer dressers, nightstands, wardrobes, desk units... it was mind boggling. and there i was, alone, with my tiny car...
which was ok, because there was no way i could make a decision surrounded by all those choices! so i battled the friday afternoon traffic on the 405 (another HUGE mistake,) and headed home.
i spent the next few weeks mulling and measuring and checking online and printing out specs and looking at colors and checking the checkbook, until i finally made a decision. of course, i was spurred on by rollie's exasperated (yet patient) voice saying, "JUST PICK A DRESSER!!!" (he spoke in caps, because his socks and underwear had been folded on a high shelf in the closet for the last seven months and the stacks kept threatening to fall over. there are just some things that need to be in a drawer...)
the dresser and two nightstands were delivered this weekend. furniture from IKEA comes in large flat boxes. unassembled. that's probably one way they keep their prices down, but if you are not good at following picture directions, do NOT buy anything from IKEA! there are no words AT ALL in their instruction booklets, and even the pictures have minimal detail. let's just say that getting the correct piece of hardware into the correct hole and having all the holes line up properly is about as easy as juggling on a unicycle--it can be done, but not by just anyone...
fortunately, i am quite good at following picture directions. and i LOVE to build things from a kit. i decided to start with a nightstand. i figured it was smaller and would be quick to put together while familiarizing me with how the directions worked. i was very careful. i had to be, because one time, about 20 years ago, rollie put a small video cabinet together (by himself,) and he put the bottom piece on it upside down. did it make a difference in the functionality of the cabinet? no, but it was wrong, and it tweaked my ocd tendencies, and so now i build the furniture. (there have been times when i wondered if he did it that way just so that he would never have to build another piece of furniture, but i don't think so. he was just putting all the nice, wood grained pieces on the outside where they would show. the problem was, you can't see the outside of the bottom piece--it's on the floor! that's the problem with picture directions--sometimes they leave out little details like which side should be up!) since i have teased him about this error mercilessly over the last 20 years, i can't afford to make a mistake...
i got both nightstands put together without incident. and then i started on the big dresser. it was more complicated than the nightstands, and i had some trouble with the hardware. rollie was letting me use his power screwdriver, but i found there was a bit of a learning curve to using it without stripping the screws. rollie's knowledge of tools and how to use them helped me solve some assembly difficulties, but since we don't build well together, he pretty much stayed out of my way.
and then it was time to put the top on. i had the whole framework together and everything was lining up nicely. i lined up the holes in the front and got them secured. i lined up the first two holes in the back and got them secured. and then i ran into trouble...
... because those last two holes were not lining up with the holes in the top. i tried everything i could think of, but it just wasn't working! finally i called to rollie for help. he came in and managed to muscle the pieces close enough that we got one more giant screw into place. but that last one was just not working. after several attempts, we decided to leave it until later...
i spent the next several hours assembling the eight drawers. after the frustration of dealing with the top piece, the drawers were a lot of fun to put together. everything lined up just right!
and while everything feels nice and sturdy, i may be living on borrowed time, because i finally decided the top of the dresser was plenty secure with just seven screws in place. but don't tell rollie. i will never hear the end of it...
:)
we needed new dressers. the dressers we had were the ones we bought when we were first married, which was a long time ago. we originally just bought the chest of drawers, because that was what we needed and it was all we could afford. but i finally talked rollie into getting the big dresser with the mirror that matched. my rationale was that if we didn't get both dressers while they were available, we were going to end up with mismatched furniture, because eventually we would need a second dresser. so we figured out how to pay for it and brought it home. i loved the look of those dressers, but over time, my love waned... they were made of wood "products" and plastic, and although they still looked good, they just didn't say "grown-up" furniture to me...
when we moved into our new house, i decided we didn't need any dressers at all! we had this "huge" walk-in closet and i was sure we would be able to get all our clothes and shoes and stuff into the closet! i was wrong. in case you didn't know it, walk-in closets look much, much bigger when they are empty than when you start filling them up with your stuff...
so i went on a search for "the perfect dresser." you know where this story goes... i went to furniture stores. i searched online. i went back to furniture stores and took pictures. i watched for sales. the problem was, i only wanted ONE dresser, and all the furniture stores wanted to sell me a whole bedroom set! plus, i didn't really know what i wanted... and while i love to shop online, when it comes to furniture, i want to see it and touch it and open and shut the drawers, so the online thing wasn't really working for me.
and then we got a sale flyer in the mail from IKEA, and i saw a dresser that i really liked. so one friday after school (while rollie was sick,) i went to IKEA. alone.
if you have never been to IKEA, my advice to you is don't go alone, and don't be fooled into thinking it will be a quick trip. because IKEA stores are like a rat's maze for furniture shoppers! i'm serious!! they don't have rows and aisles which allow you to choose where you are going to go--you just have to follow the path. there are no short cuts. you go around and around and around. and don't even try to go backwards unless you want to feel like a salmon swimming upstream... i did not take my own advice. i went alone, because i was looking for one specific thing--the dresser i had seen in the ad--so i knew it would be a quick trip.
it wasn't. and the worst thing was, that while i was trying to find the dresser and then figure out how to get out, i saw so many cute and wonderful things... which i am sure is the reason for the maze-like layout to their stores. those IKEA people... they are evil geniuses...
anyway, i found the dresser i had seen in the ad, but once i found it, i also found all the matching companion pieces. and boy, were there matching companion pieces!! open bookcases, bookcases with glass doors, double wide bookcases, tv stands, 3 drawer dressers, 5 drawer dressers, 8 drawer dressers, nightstands, wardrobes, desk units... it was mind boggling. and there i was, alone, with my tiny car...
which was ok, because there was no way i could make a decision surrounded by all those choices! so i battled the friday afternoon traffic on the 405 (another HUGE mistake,) and headed home.
i spent the next few weeks mulling and measuring and checking online and printing out specs and looking at colors and checking the checkbook, until i finally made a decision. of course, i was spurred on by rollie's exasperated (yet patient) voice saying, "JUST PICK A DRESSER!!!" (he spoke in caps, because his socks and underwear had been folded on a high shelf in the closet for the last seven months and the stacks kept threatening to fall over. there are just some things that need to be in a drawer...)
the dresser and two nightstands were delivered this weekend. furniture from IKEA comes in large flat boxes. unassembled. that's probably one way they keep their prices down, but if you are not good at following picture directions, do NOT buy anything from IKEA! there are no words AT ALL in their instruction booklets, and even the pictures have minimal detail. let's just say that getting the correct piece of hardware into the correct hole and having all the holes line up properly is about as easy as juggling on a unicycle--it can be done, but not by just anyone...
fortunately, i am quite good at following picture directions. and i LOVE to build things from a kit. i decided to start with a nightstand. i figured it was smaller and would be quick to put together while familiarizing me with how the directions worked. i was very careful. i had to be, because one time, about 20 years ago, rollie put a small video cabinet together (by himself,) and he put the bottom piece on it upside down. did it make a difference in the functionality of the cabinet? no, but it was wrong, and it tweaked my ocd tendencies, and so now i build the furniture. (there have been times when i wondered if he did it that way just so that he would never have to build another piece of furniture, but i don't think so. he was just putting all the nice, wood grained pieces on the outside where they would show. the problem was, you can't see the outside of the bottom piece--it's on the floor! that's the problem with picture directions--sometimes they leave out little details like which side should be up!) since i have teased him about this error mercilessly over the last 20 years, i can't afford to make a mistake...
i got both nightstands put together without incident. and then i started on the big dresser. it was more complicated than the nightstands, and i had some trouble with the hardware. rollie was letting me use his power screwdriver, but i found there was a bit of a learning curve to using it without stripping the screws. rollie's knowledge of tools and how to use them helped me solve some assembly difficulties, but since we don't build well together, he pretty much stayed out of my way.
and then it was time to put the top on. i had the whole framework together and everything was lining up nicely. i lined up the holes in the front and got them secured. i lined up the first two holes in the back and got them secured. and then i ran into trouble...
... because those last two holes were not lining up with the holes in the top. i tried everything i could think of, but it just wasn't working! finally i called to rollie for help. he came in and managed to muscle the pieces close enough that we got one more giant screw into place. but that last one was just not working. after several attempts, we decided to leave it until later...
i spent the next several hours assembling the eight drawers. after the frustration of dealing with the top piece, the drawers were a lot of fun to put together. everything lined up just right!
and while everything feels nice and sturdy, i may be living on borrowed time, because i finally decided the top of the dresser was plenty secure with just seven screws in place. but don't tell rollie. i will never hear the end of it...
:)
Saturday, January 7, 2012
mrs. fix it, part 2
**i took pictures to go with this blog, but i am having issues getting them from my phone into the blog, which is why this blog is being posted a few days later than it actually happened. eventually i hope to resolve my problem and add pictures...
so today . . . i planned to spend the day at home. in my pajamas. doing a few small projects, but mostly huddled up with my computer and new slippers. this was my plan. of course, it was thwarted...
my problems today actually started yesterday. with cleaning the sink. and fixing the plumbing. because during those moments when i couldn't work on the sink, i decided to recover our dining room chairs.
we got our dining room set from rollie's parents a long time ago. i love family heirlooms. they complete me :) this dining room set belonged to rollie's maternal grandmother, who i never met. we got the set from his mom, who got it from her mom. i feel lucky that we got it, because it probably should have gone to rollie's sister--you know, from mom to daughter to granddaughter--but since rollie's sister already had a dining room set, this one found its way to our house.
i love this dining room set. i love the reddish color of the wood. i love the curvy cut out chair backs. i love the way the ends of the table drop down so that it can be really small, (even though i never use it that way.) but when we got it, what i didn't love was the color of the seats. the seats were a rose colored tapestry with little blue accents. they were pretty, but they were pink. sort of. and at the time we got the set, pink was not on my list of decorating colors. i was into black and white and red! i wanted a fabric that would sort of go with the style, but not look dated. and what i found had a sort of black stripe with rows of reddish roses in between.
i loved that fabric, and it has been on those chairs for a lot of years. but over time it has faded. and i was just not loving it in this house. but i left it, because i had told diandra that when she got into her own house, she could have the dining room set. of course, i told her that before we bought this house, when i thought that we were going to downsize and not have enough room for it. but now it is in our new dining room, and it looks so good with the wood floors and the paint... so i talked to diandra and we struck a deal, and i'll be keeping the dining room set. for now. i think.
so, it was time to recover the seats! i remembered this as being a quick and easy project. i looked at my pile of fabric and found a piece that i thought would be perfect! so last night after rollie went to bed, i took the old fabric off one of the chair seats and got it ready to recover. but then i got tired and went to bed.
those chair seats were going to be my first project this morning, because rollie was playing basketball which meant i had to put the sink project off until later in the day. and doing the chair seats first had the added benefit of letting me stay in my pajamas. (in case you are wondering about my sudden attachment to wearing my pajamas around the house, i asked for flannel pajama pants for christmas. and i got some! and adorable "hello, kitty" slippers!! and now, that is all i want to wear. they are comfy, cozy, and cute.) so i unfolded the fabric... only to discover that it wasn't one big piece. it was several smaller pieces, none of which were big enough to cover the chair cushions. this was not a good start to my saturday...
i was bummed. i slouched on the couch for a while, but i finally got dressed and announced to rollie that i was going to do some errands. i had decided to go to lowe's to ask someone about my plumbing issues, but the bigger problem was going to be finding fabric. there are just not a lot of fabric stores around anymore. i had seen one storefront across from the mall that said "rugs! fabrics!" but most days they have a "going out of business" sign outside, which i figured meant a limited selection. but i was desperate, so i went in...
... and the angels sang! there were rolls of fabric everywhere! in every color! but you know how i am about making decisions... i knew i was in trouble. and it got even worse, because as i was walking around i remembered that i had been looking for a shower curtain for the downstairs bathroom, and i needed to recover the headboard on our bed... i was like a rat in a maze--a rat who couldn't make a decision. i put rolls of fabric into my cart. i took rolls of fabric out of my cart. i sent pictures to rollie--which is what saved me! after over an hour, i finally found my way out into the parking lot, with fabric for my dining room chairs AND a shower curtain :) the decision about fabric for our headboard will just have to wait for another day.
then i went to lowe's. i don't go to lowe's very often, because home depot is just around the corner from our house. and lowe's is at the long beach town center, AND the parking lot at the long beach town center is like the seventh level of hell--especially on a saturday. but that one last plumbing fixture was bugging me, so i decided to brave the parking lot in hopes of finding an answer to my problem.
i found the plumbing section and a guy in a red vest. whose name was NOT steve! i showed him the picture i had taken of the underside of my plumbing fixtures and he said, "oh sure! you just have to twist this piece here to tighten your fixture."
now. was that hard? no, it was not. i guess if you know what you are talking about, the solution is easy. and now i had a solution! i made a quick detour through lighting to get a new glass globe for the old ceiling fan that manuel had installed in our downstairs bedroom, and rushed home. i had a solution, and i was anxious to finish up my plumbing project. but when i got home, i was once again thwarted, because rollie was taking a nap. rollie often takes a nap on saturday after playing basketball all morning, which is fine, but today his nap was interfering with my projects!
you know how patient i am (not!) but i tried to wait. first i distracted myself by playing with my new fabrics, but i didn't want to get started on a project and then have to drop it when rollie woke up. so next i decided to change the glass part of the ceiling fan with the new one i had just bought. i took the old one off and tried to put the new one up, only to discover that it was too big. this did not make me happy! now i am going to have to brave the long beach town center parking lot again to return the stupid, non-fitting glass part of the ceiling fan!
unless it accidentally breaks first...
i finally decided i could fix the faucet by myself. i mean, i knew what to do, i just had to figure out how to do it all by myself. i poked around rollie's workbench until i found the spray stuff that would loosen the rust. because of course there was rust! the faucet had been loose which meant water was dripping underneath it sometimes. i squiggled underneath the sink and tried to maneuver the spray into position... and managed to knock the long pointy part off. which meant i had to squiggle out from under the sink to retrieve it, reattach it, and try again. which i did.
(can i just say here that it is no easy task to get positioned under our kitchen sink! there is no room to turn over or around, which means you have to go in on your back. which kills so many muscles that i can't even list them all! and then your torso is elevated about six inches from where your legs are trying to just stay out of the way, which is torturous to your back! and THEN to get out, you have to hold your torso up off the floor while trying to get your head clear of the sink, garbage disposal, and all that tubing, which makes your abdomen scream like an angry toddler. now that i think about it, it is probably pretty good exercise...)
after spraying the loosening goo, i waited a few minutes, grabbed my pliers and tried to twist the tightening piece. it wouldn't budge. but the pliers fell out of my hand and landed on my face. fortunately they didn't hit my eyes. unfortunately, they did hit my expensive glasses. i decided maybe i shouldn't be wearing my expensive glasses while laying under the sink holding a pair of pliers in my hand. so i took them off and attempted to twist the tightening piece again. and again, i dropped the pliers. fortunately this time they didn't hit my face--they hit my shoulder, which was a little too close to my unprotected face for my comfort.
i decided i needed safety glasses.
but i didn't have safety glasses! i know rollie has safety glasses, but he was asleep. so i used my sunglasses instead. i have a pair of those fit-over sunglasses that i can wear over my regular glasses. they are big and ugly, but i have customized them with swarovsky crystals, which makes them cuter... they are still pretty big, though... i was really hoping i wouldn't drop the pliers on them, since the only other pair of sunglasses i have do not have swarovsky crystals on them, and since we live in the land of eternal sunshine, i kind of need sunglasses. but i figured if i was going to drop those pliers again, better to wreck my sunglasses than my eyes...
i worked under that sink for about half an hour. i was getting nowhere fast. it finally became clear to me that this was not a one woman project--i was going to have to wait until rollie woke up. which he finally did. and no sooner did his groggy little head move his recliner into the upright position, than i was right there telling him about my morning... the fabric store... lowe's... the plumbing stuff... how we still needed to hang the bathroom mirror (oh there is a story there too, but i think i will save that for another day.) all the poor man wanted to do was watch a little basketball and let his brain wake up, but he could see that i was in "let's get it done" mode. so he came downstairs, gathered a few tools, and watched me head back under the sink.
we finally got that thing tightened! finally! i was the muscle under the sink, but rollie knew which tools would get the job done. if he hadn't handed me some sort of socket wrench with a bendy handle, and firmly held the faucet in place while i used that tool to tighten it, we would still probably be dealing with a wiggly faucet. or paying someone $500 to replace it!
i came out from under that sink today, and i felt powerful!! i felt awesome! i made rollie high five me, and i said, "WE ROCK!" (yes, to diandra's chagrin, i actually say things like that...) and so, now our kitchen sink is clean and shiny AND the faucets work properly...
...and it looks so good, that now i hate to use it.
so today . . . i planned to spend the day at home. in my pajamas. doing a few small projects, but mostly huddled up with my computer and new slippers. this was my plan. of course, it was thwarted...
my problems today actually started yesterday. with cleaning the sink. and fixing the plumbing. because during those moments when i couldn't work on the sink, i decided to recover our dining room chairs.
we got our dining room set from rollie's parents a long time ago. i love family heirlooms. they complete me :) this dining room set belonged to rollie's maternal grandmother, who i never met. we got the set from his mom, who got it from her mom. i feel lucky that we got it, because it probably should have gone to rollie's sister--you know, from mom to daughter to granddaughter--but since rollie's sister already had a dining room set, this one found its way to our house.
i love this dining room set. i love the reddish color of the wood. i love the curvy cut out chair backs. i love the way the ends of the table drop down so that it can be really small, (even though i never use it that way.) but when we got it, what i didn't love was the color of the seats. the seats were a rose colored tapestry with little blue accents. they were pretty, but they were pink. sort of. and at the time we got the set, pink was not on my list of decorating colors. i was into black and white and red! i wanted a fabric that would sort of go with the style, but not look dated. and what i found had a sort of black stripe with rows of reddish roses in between.
i loved that fabric, and it has been on those chairs for a lot of years. but over time it has faded. and i was just not loving it in this house. but i left it, because i had told diandra that when she got into her own house, she could have the dining room set. of course, i told her that before we bought this house, when i thought that we were going to downsize and not have enough room for it. but now it is in our new dining room, and it looks so good with the wood floors and the paint... so i talked to diandra and we struck a deal, and i'll be keeping the dining room set. for now. i think.
so, it was time to recover the seats! i remembered this as being a quick and easy project. i looked at my pile of fabric and found a piece that i thought would be perfect! so last night after rollie went to bed, i took the old fabric off one of the chair seats and got it ready to recover. but then i got tired and went to bed.
those chair seats were going to be my first project this morning, because rollie was playing basketball which meant i had to put the sink project off until later in the day. and doing the chair seats first had the added benefit of letting me stay in my pajamas. (in case you are wondering about my sudden attachment to wearing my pajamas around the house, i asked for flannel pajama pants for christmas. and i got some! and adorable "hello, kitty" slippers!! and now, that is all i want to wear. they are comfy, cozy, and cute.) so i unfolded the fabric... only to discover that it wasn't one big piece. it was several smaller pieces, none of which were big enough to cover the chair cushions. this was not a good start to my saturday...
i was bummed. i slouched on the couch for a while, but i finally got dressed and announced to rollie that i was going to do some errands. i had decided to go to lowe's to ask someone about my plumbing issues, but the bigger problem was going to be finding fabric. there are just not a lot of fabric stores around anymore. i had seen one storefront across from the mall that said "rugs! fabrics!" but most days they have a "going out of business" sign outside, which i figured meant a limited selection. but i was desperate, so i went in...
... and the angels sang! there were rolls of fabric everywhere! in every color! but you know how i am about making decisions... i knew i was in trouble. and it got even worse, because as i was walking around i remembered that i had been looking for a shower curtain for the downstairs bathroom, and i needed to recover the headboard on our bed... i was like a rat in a maze--a rat who couldn't make a decision. i put rolls of fabric into my cart. i took rolls of fabric out of my cart. i sent pictures to rollie--which is what saved me! after over an hour, i finally found my way out into the parking lot, with fabric for my dining room chairs AND a shower curtain :) the decision about fabric for our headboard will just have to wait for another day.
then i went to lowe's. i don't go to lowe's very often, because home depot is just around the corner from our house. and lowe's is at the long beach town center, AND the parking lot at the long beach town center is like the seventh level of hell--especially on a saturday. but that one last plumbing fixture was bugging me, so i decided to brave the parking lot in hopes of finding an answer to my problem.
i found the plumbing section and a guy in a red vest. whose name was NOT steve! i showed him the picture i had taken of the underside of my plumbing fixtures and he said, "oh sure! you just have to twist this piece here to tighten your fixture."
now. was that hard? no, it was not. i guess if you know what you are talking about, the solution is easy. and now i had a solution! i made a quick detour through lighting to get a new glass globe for the old ceiling fan that manuel had installed in our downstairs bedroom, and rushed home. i had a solution, and i was anxious to finish up my plumbing project. but when i got home, i was once again thwarted, because rollie was taking a nap. rollie often takes a nap on saturday after playing basketball all morning, which is fine, but today his nap was interfering with my projects!
you know how patient i am (not!) but i tried to wait. first i distracted myself by playing with my new fabrics, but i didn't want to get started on a project and then have to drop it when rollie woke up. so next i decided to change the glass part of the ceiling fan with the new one i had just bought. i took the old one off and tried to put the new one up, only to discover that it was too big. this did not make me happy! now i am going to have to brave the long beach town center parking lot again to return the stupid, non-fitting glass part of the ceiling fan!
unless it accidentally breaks first...
i finally decided i could fix the faucet by myself. i mean, i knew what to do, i just had to figure out how to do it all by myself. i poked around rollie's workbench until i found the spray stuff that would loosen the rust. because of course there was rust! the faucet had been loose which meant water was dripping underneath it sometimes. i squiggled underneath the sink and tried to maneuver the spray into position... and managed to knock the long pointy part off. which meant i had to squiggle out from under the sink to retrieve it, reattach it, and try again. which i did.
(can i just say here that it is no easy task to get positioned under our kitchen sink! there is no room to turn over or around, which means you have to go in on your back. which kills so many muscles that i can't even list them all! and then your torso is elevated about six inches from where your legs are trying to just stay out of the way, which is torturous to your back! and THEN to get out, you have to hold your torso up off the floor while trying to get your head clear of the sink, garbage disposal, and all that tubing, which makes your abdomen scream like an angry toddler. now that i think about it, it is probably pretty good exercise...)
after spraying the loosening goo, i waited a few minutes, grabbed my pliers and tried to twist the tightening piece. it wouldn't budge. but the pliers fell out of my hand and landed on my face. fortunately they didn't hit my eyes. unfortunately, they did hit my expensive glasses. i decided maybe i shouldn't be wearing my expensive glasses while laying under the sink holding a pair of pliers in my hand. so i took them off and attempted to twist the tightening piece again. and again, i dropped the pliers. fortunately this time they didn't hit my face--they hit my shoulder, which was a little too close to my unprotected face for my comfort.
i decided i needed safety glasses.
but i didn't have safety glasses! i know rollie has safety glasses, but he was asleep. so i used my sunglasses instead. i have a pair of those fit-over sunglasses that i can wear over my regular glasses. they are big and ugly, but i have customized them with swarovsky crystals, which makes them cuter... they are still pretty big, though... i was really hoping i wouldn't drop the pliers on them, since the only other pair of sunglasses i have do not have swarovsky crystals on them, and since we live in the land of eternal sunshine, i kind of need sunglasses. but i figured if i was going to drop those pliers again, better to wreck my sunglasses than my eyes...
i worked under that sink for about half an hour. i was getting nowhere fast. it finally became clear to me that this was not a one woman project--i was going to have to wait until rollie woke up. which he finally did. and no sooner did his groggy little head move his recliner into the upright position, than i was right there telling him about my morning... the fabric store... lowe's... the plumbing stuff... how we still needed to hang the bathroom mirror (oh there is a story there too, but i think i will save that for another day.) all the poor man wanted to do was watch a little basketball and let his brain wake up, but he could see that i was in "let's get it done" mode. so he came downstairs, gathered a few tools, and watched me head back under the sink.
we finally got that thing tightened! finally! i was the muscle under the sink, but rollie knew which tools would get the job done. if he hadn't handed me some sort of socket wrench with a bendy handle, and firmly held the faucet in place while i used that tool to tighten it, we would still probably be dealing with a wiggly faucet. or paying someone $500 to replace it!
i came out from under that sink today, and i felt powerful!! i felt awesome! i made rollie high five me, and i said, "WE ROCK!" (yes, to diandra's chagrin, i actually say things like that...) and so, now our kitchen sink is clean and shiny AND the faucets work properly...
...and it looks so good, that now i hate to use it.
Friday, January 6, 2012
mrs. fix it, part 1
so today . . . i had an "if you give a mouse a cookie" evening...
"if you give a mouse a cookie," is a children's book that illustrates how one thing leads to another. which leads to another. and another. and that's what happened to me this evening. it all started with cleaning my kitchen sink...
when we moved into our new house, i determined that i was going to keep it sparkly clean and shiny. this is a bigger challenge for me than you might think. we have two dogs and lots of stuff. this means muddy puppy feet walking on our floors, pet hair taking up residence wherever it can find an unguarded space, and stuff that doesn't really have a place of it's own...which means that it ends up on the dining room table... or the kitchen counter... or the bedroom chair... well, you get the idea. and since i have a regular job, i don't have lots of time to dedicate to keeping up with it all. so sometimes my house threatens to eat me.
but when we moved, i determined that was not going to happen any more! the first step was buying a house that would be easy to maintain, which meant wood flooring instead of carpets. which we did. the second step was not to move all of the stuff. which we didn't. i donated a ton of stuff to charity and filled a small dumpster with the things i was pretty sure no one else would want. the third step was to find a place for everything in the new house--if it didn't have a place, i was going to get rid of it--that way everything could be put away. which i mostly did, but i admit there are still a few things... and the last step was figuring out some sort of system for cleaning. because if i don't have a system, nothing gets done. it doesn't always get done even when i have a system, but at least it has a chance... so i got a microfiber duster, two roombas, a spin mop, and decided i was ready...
...and then i went back to work. and everything house related sort of started falling apart. i managed to keep my head above water, but just barely. so of course i started looking for solutions (that's where the microfiber duster and the spin mop came in.) i made lists. i downloaded apps on my ipad. i cruised the internet. and one day, while cruising the internet, i found a site that said keeping your house neat and orderly all starts with cleaning your kitchen sink. well, i wanted my house to be neat and orderly, but the method of cleaning the kitchen sink sounded very involved! and that's not all--once it was cleaned, you were supposed to keep it clean and shiny every single day! and you know how i am about doing anything every single day. so i chose to ignore this particular site.
which i did. until today. because today i was home all afternoon, and so i decided to put the christmas dishes away. but that meant i had to wash a couple of them, and that put me in close proximity to the sink, which made me start thinking about having a clean sink, and a clean house, and the next thing i knew, i was filling the small sink with hot, bleachy water...
i filled the small sink with hot bleachy water, because i wasn't really sure how this was going to turn out. and our big sink is big! and deep! which means it takes a lot of water to fill it up. so i decided to start with the small sink. i let it soak for an hour. then i followed the rest of the directions for a sparkly clean and shiny sink. and then i moved on to the faucets. and as i was working on the faucets, i realized that they were loose. and the soap dispenser didn't work. so i fixed the soap dispenser (i think,) and scrubbed the faucets, and dried and shined everything up, but those faucets were still loose. and now they were bothering me, because my small sink looked so good!
i thought there had to be a way to tighten them, so i took everything out from under the sink. and put it on the counter. now my previously clean counters were full of stuff, but it was nice and clean under the sink. i flopped down onto the kitchen floor and squiggled my way into the empty cabinet. it was dark in there. and i didn't have a light. so i squiggled back out and got a clip-on flashlight and dove back under the sink.
there is a lot of flexible tubing under my sink. and the sink is extra deep. and there is also a giant garbage disposal under there, which made it hard to move around. which is why i was under the sink instead of rollie. but i knew i was going to need help. i couldn't tighten whatever had to be tightened without someone holding the faucets steady. so i yelled for rollie, and he came to see what i needed. but all he could see were my feet and legs--the rest of me was buried under the sink...
"i need help!" i said. although i'm pretty sure those words weren't necessary. i'm pretty sure that it was fairly clear that i needed help. "what do you want me to do?" he asked. "just hold the faucet still while i try to tighten it up." this sounds simple enough, but over the course of the next half hour, rollie retrieved tools from the garage for me to use, he tried not to step on the part of me that was hanging out of the cabinet, and he finally handed me my phone so i could take pictures of what i was dealing with. because just like everything else that the previous homeowner decided to do himself, these faucets had not been installed exactly according to the directions...
i had rollie pull me out of the abyss, and i announced, "i'm going to home depot. i'm sure i need parts." rollie said, "let's just buy a new faucet. we can have manuel install it." but i had looked fancy kitchen faucets up online--i knew how expensive they were. "no," i said, "i think we can fix it." so i grabbed my phone with the photos i had taken, and the checkbook, and went to home depot.
home depot was no help at all. "yep," steve said, (i think every male employee at home depot is named steve. it may even be a job requirement, because every time i go there for help, the guy's name tag says steve!) "it looks like you need some parts to fix that. we don't sell those parts." of course they don't. "if you know the manufacturer, you might be able to get parts online." thanks, steve, thanks a lot...
i was not ready to give up. i came home and started looking online for my faucets, and miraculously, without a manufacturer or model number, i found them! and then i found installation instructions!! yessss!!! i could see by the installation instructions how to tighten one of the faucet pieces. so i yelled for rollie and stuffed myself back under the sink. i figured out a way to prop my flashlight up so that i could use both hands, and prepared to tighten. but there was a problem. of course. the fitting wouldn't budge.
this is where the expertise of a guy with a fully stocked workbench comes in handy :) "it's stuck," i said. "i can't move it." "wait a minute," rollie said, "i'll be right back." and he disappeared. and i waited. twisted like a pretzel under the sink. but it was worth it, because when he came back, he handed me an aerosol can of something guaranteed to unstick stuff. so i sprayed it (and hoped it wouldn't drip on my face,) and waited. and it worked! i was finally able to tighten the fitting so that one more piece of our faucet was tight. but as i emerged from under the sink, i realized that my shirt and hair were wet. this is never a good thing when you are working under a sink. i felt the floor of the cabinet, and sure enough, there was a good sized puddle. "uh oh," i said to rollie, "i think something is wrong..."
did i mention how many pipes and flexible tubing and stuff were under the sink? and did i mention how i just barely fit under there?? and did i mention that it was impossible to maneuver without bumping into something??? well, apparently in all my squiggling about, i had bumped the drain pipe in the big sink and dislodged the connection. i was now really, really glad that i hadn't filled that sink up with water and bleach to soak! i ran to get towels while rollie reconnected the pipes. and then he went to bed. i think he had reached his "help julie with whatever impossible project she has decided to tackle" limit for the day.
did i mention that rollie gets a little uneasy when i get into "i can fix it!" mode? just because one time i tried to fix the washing machine with a screwdriver without disconnecting it... sheesh.
anyway, now there was only one piece left. this one was going to be a challenge. this was the one that steve at home depot said needed a part that they didn't have. but i had sort of reached my plumbing "fix it" limit for the day since rollie had gone to bed, because that meant there was no one to extract me from under the sink if i decided to go back in...
...which brought me back to cleaning my sink. because i had only done the smaller one earlier, just to see how it turned out. but now that all but one of my faucet components were tightened, i decided to clean the other sink. so i filled it with hot, bleachy water, and waited for an hour, and shined it up, and now it looks beautiful!
of course, now the countertops are filled with all the stuff from under the sink, but i can fix that tomorrow. tomorrow i am going to figure out how to tighten that last faucet component...
...or drown trying!
"if you give a mouse a cookie," is a children's book that illustrates how one thing leads to another. which leads to another. and another. and that's what happened to me this evening. it all started with cleaning my kitchen sink...
when we moved into our new house, i determined that i was going to keep it sparkly clean and shiny. this is a bigger challenge for me than you might think. we have two dogs and lots of stuff. this means muddy puppy feet walking on our floors, pet hair taking up residence wherever it can find an unguarded space, and stuff that doesn't really have a place of it's own...which means that it ends up on the dining room table... or the kitchen counter... or the bedroom chair... well, you get the idea. and since i have a regular job, i don't have lots of time to dedicate to keeping up with it all. so sometimes my house threatens to eat me.
but when we moved, i determined that was not going to happen any more! the first step was buying a house that would be easy to maintain, which meant wood flooring instead of carpets. which we did. the second step was not to move all of the stuff. which we didn't. i donated a ton of stuff to charity and filled a small dumpster with the things i was pretty sure no one else would want. the third step was to find a place for everything in the new house--if it didn't have a place, i was going to get rid of it--that way everything could be put away. which i mostly did, but i admit there are still a few things... and the last step was figuring out some sort of system for cleaning. because if i don't have a system, nothing gets done. it doesn't always get done even when i have a system, but at least it has a chance... so i got a microfiber duster, two roombas, a spin mop, and decided i was ready...
...and then i went back to work. and everything house related sort of started falling apart. i managed to keep my head above water, but just barely. so of course i started looking for solutions (that's where the microfiber duster and the spin mop came in.) i made lists. i downloaded apps on my ipad. i cruised the internet. and one day, while cruising the internet, i found a site that said keeping your house neat and orderly all starts with cleaning your kitchen sink. well, i wanted my house to be neat and orderly, but the method of cleaning the kitchen sink sounded very involved! and that's not all--once it was cleaned, you were supposed to keep it clean and shiny every single day! and you know how i am about doing anything every single day. so i chose to ignore this particular site.
which i did. until today. because today i was home all afternoon, and so i decided to put the christmas dishes away. but that meant i had to wash a couple of them, and that put me in close proximity to the sink, which made me start thinking about having a clean sink, and a clean house, and the next thing i knew, i was filling the small sink with hot, bleachy water...
i filled the small sink with hot bleachy water, because i wasn't really sure how this was going to turn out. and our big sink is big! and deep! which means it takes a lot of water to fill it up. so i decided to start with the small sink. i let it soak for an hour. then i followed the rest of the directions for a sparkly clean and shiny sink. and then i moved on to the faucets. and as i was working on the faucets, i realized that they were loose. and the soap dispenser didn't work. so i fixed the soap dispenser (i think,) and scrubbed the faucets, and dried and shined everything up, but those faucets were still loose. and now they were bothering me, because my small sink looked so good!
i thought there had to be a way to tighten them, so i took everything out from under the sink. and put it on the counter. now my previously clean counters were full of stuff, but it was nice and clean under the sink. i flopped down onto the kitchen floor and squiggled my way into the empty cabinet. it was dark in there. and i didn't have a light. so i squiggled back out and got a clip-on flashlight and dove back under the sink.
there is a lot of flexible tubing under my sink. and the sink is extra deep. and there is also a giant garbage disposal under there, which made it hard to move around. which is why i was under the sink instead of rollie. but i knew i was going to need help. i couldn't tighten whatever had to be tightened without someone holding the faucets steady. so i yelled for rollie, and he came to see what i needed. but all he could see were my feet and legs--the rest of me was buried under the sink...
"i need help!" i said. although i'm pretty sure those words weren't necessary. i'm pretty sure that it was fairly clear that i needed help. "what do you want me to do?" he asked. "just hold the faucet still while i try to tighten it up." this sounds simple enough, but over the course of the next half hour, rollie retrieved tools from the garage for me to use, he tried not to step on the part of me that was hanging out of the cabinet, and he finally handed me my phone so i could take pictures of what i was dealing with. because just like everything else that the previous homeowner decided to do himself, these faucets had not been installed exactly according to the directions...
i had rollie pull me out of the abyss, and i announced, "i'm going to home depot. i'm sure i need parts." rollie said, "let's just buy a new faucet. we can have manuel install it." but i had looked fancy kitchen faucets up online--i knew how expensive they were. "no," i said, "i think we can fix it." so i grabbed my phone with the photos i had taken, and the checkbook, and went to home depot.
home depot was no help at all. "yep," steve said, (i think every male employee at home depot is named steve. it may even be a job requirement, because every time i go there for help, the guy's name tag says steve!) "it looks like you need some parts to fix that. we don't sell those parts." of course they don't. "if you know the manufacturer, you might be able to get parts online." thanks, steve, thanks a lot...
i was not ready to give up. i came home and started looking online for my faucets, and miraculously, without a manufacturer or model number, i found them! and then i found installation instructions!! yessss!!! i could see by the installation instructions how to tighten one of the faucet pieces. so i yelled for rollie and stuffed myself back under the sink. i figured out a way to prop my flashlight up so that i could use both hands, and prepared to tighten. but there was a problem. of course. the fitting wouldn't budge.
this is where the expertise of a guy with a fully stocked workbench comes in handy :) "it's stuck," i said. "i can't move it." "wait a minute," rollie said, "i'll be right back." and he disappeared. and i waited. twisted like a pretzel under the sink. but it was worth it, because when he came back, he handed me an aerosol can of something guaranteed to unstick stuff. so i sprayed it (and hoped it wouldn't drip on my face,) and waited. and it worked! i was finally able to tighten the fitting so that one more piece of our faucet was tight. but as i emerged from under the sink, i realized that my shirt and hair were wet. this is never a good thing when you are working under a sink. i felt the floor of the cabinet, and sure enough, there was a good sized puddle. "uh oh," i said to rollie, "i think something is wrong..."
did i mention how many pipes and flexible tubing and stuff were under the sink? and did i mention how i just barely fit under there?? and did i mention that it was impossible to maneuver without bumping into something??? well, apparently in all my squiggling about, i had bumped the drain pipe in the big sink and dislodged the connection. i was now really, really glad that i hadn't filled that sink up with water and bleach to soak! i ran to get towels while rollie reconnected the pipes. and then he went to bed. i think he had reached his "help julie with whatever impossible project she has decided to tackle" limit for the day.
did i mention that rollie gets a little uneasy when i get into "i can fix it!" mode? just because one time i tried to fix the washing machine with a screwdriver without disconnecting it... sheesh.
anyway, now there was only one piece left. this one was going to be a challenge. this was the one that steve at home depot said needed a part that they didn't have. but i had sort of reached my plumbing "fix it" limit for the day since rollie had gone to bed, because that meant there was no one to extract me from under the sink if i decided to go back in...
...which brought me back to cleaning my sink. because i had only done the smaller one earlier, just to see how it turned out. but now that all but one of my faucet components were tightened, i decided to clean the other sink. so i filled it with hot, bleachy water, and waited for an hour, and shined it up, and now it looks beautiful!
of course, now the countertops are filled with all the stuff from under the sink, but i can fix that tomorrow. tomorrow i am going to figure out how to tighten that last faucet component...
...or drown trying!
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