17 May 2016
Ron Highter showed up
right at 7 with the frames for all of the custom cabinets that he is
building. Sonny and Brandon spent all
morning trimming those pieces to fit their respective openings. Sonny also put a final coat of paint on the
sun room chair rail. They spent the
afternoon installing crown molding in the study. Steve also arrived promptly at 7 and
continued installing plumbing fittings and fixtures. By the end of his workday we had two
functional toilets (in bathrooms with no doors, but that’s just a small
technical detail), a functional kitchen sink, and a functional pedestal sink in
the half bath. Also the water heater
under the stairs was busy making hot water.
Jeff, Tim, and Pete got here about 7:30 and had finished stretching and
trimming all the carpets by mid-morning.
Chree and I spent a couple of hours this afternoon cleaning up the mess
they left behind. Tom Hobbs also arrived
early and installed the ductwork for the shop dust collection system. Now, when the planer is busy spitting out
copious quantities of wood chips and dust, those byproducts will get sucked
into a large plastic bag. Ditto when the
radial arm saw is disgorging sawdust by the bucketful. Tom Morrissey, once again, spent most of the
day working on the master bath tiling.
He put on his electricians hat mid-afternoon and installed the two
lights over the master bath vanity, hooked the under stairs hot water heater up
to electricity, and put in an outlet under the stairs into which will be
plugged the circulating pump that will ensure we have instant hot water
whenever we turn on a hot water tap anywhere in the house. (This was one of our pet Virginia house
peeves: waiting F∙O∙R∙E∙V∙E∙R to get hot water in the master bath if the supply
line hadn’t been used in the previous hour.)
Using 220 grit paper, I lightly sanded the bumps out of a half dozen
interior doors. Then I tried putting a
couple of coats of furniture paste wax on the half bath door. The door now is nice and smooth, and looks
like kaka (which is a much more refined term for doo doo). Tim Ryan stopped by at that point (seeking
much moola for services rendered last week) and advised me to just leave the
doors as they are for the moment, then take them down into the shop one at a
time next winter and apply another coat of quality polyurethane, e.g., Last n
Last® or Lenmar®, not (repeat 1,000 times) quick
drying Minwax. Sean and Jim Ploof also
stopped in bearing invoices. Spent some
time with Jim outlining the additional site work we want him to do… and
congratulating him for finishing 1st (overall, not just in his age and
gender categories) in a Spartan Ultra Beast Race that drew over 600 starters (and
only 327 finishers) down to New Jersey weekend before last. After nearly 30 miles and 9½ greuling hours,
he beat the second place finisher (who was almost half Jim’s age) by 15
minutes. Be impressed; be very, very
impressed!!!! Spent some time with Sean
reviewing recent work progress and making sure our visions for the near term
future were in alignment. The commercial
grade 30″ two-drawer lateral file cabinet I ordered from Staples was delivered,
placed in the shop lavatory (and tool storage area), and promptly filled with
assorted power hand tools… that we now will know right where to find and won’t
be tripping over on the shop floor anymore.
One small step for man…
