Sunday, March 23, 2008

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Water Woes

Well, the recent deluge and melting snow caused all sorts of fun in the basement. I thought I’d set a record last year when I filled our 10-gallon shop vac 6 times when this happened last year. This year…I had to spend the evening Tuesday and all day Wednesday running the vacuum every 20 minutes (I mean every 20 minutes) just to keep up with the inflow. I started to lose count after I’d drained the shop vac for the 15th time.

Tuesday night I kept it up until about 10:30, and realized there’s only so much I could do. I’d have to go to bed and let the inevitable happen. When I got up at 6am the next morning, I was greeted with the sight of water running from the fireplace all the way into the bathroom 20 feet away. I was able to get it cleaned up and kept it at bay in the fireplace area, and laying towels to corral the water, and then changing those out when they got saturated. But it was constant work. I laid down for a quick nap around 2:30, and I paid for it when I let it go for about 40 minutes without attention. It never stopped coming in until about noon on Thursday. Shaunn took care of the final vaccing and cleanup on Thursday when I went back to work.

During the 16 or so hours of this party, I had plenty of time to contemplate various ways to solve the problem. The first and most needed thing is to fix the poor grading around the house. I intended to do it last year, but after the spring rains, we had a dry spell that lasted most of the year, so it was forgotten as a priority. I’ve found a company that will deliver it – right where I want it around the house perimeter – for about double what it would cost to have it dumped in the driveway for me to handle. I think it’s worth it, as my back still has not so find memories of filling in my parent’s in-ground pool in 2005. A cubic yard of dirt weighs about as much as a car, and we’re getting 7 of them delivered. Shoveling that and moving it around the house would take a few days even with help, and then I would no energy left for the other project to fix the basement.

Sunday, March 9, 2008

Down Time

One benefit of being cooped up in the house all weekend was...free time. Lots and lots of free time. I've officially caught up on all the shows that the dvr has been capturing...
I just watched another episode of a show that I really recommend for jazz lovers, called Legends of Jazz With Ramsey Lewis . It's a PBS program that's been on public radio for a few years, and I discovered the television version this week on our public tv HD channel. They don't make it easy though, with an airtime of 3:30 am on weekdays.

Ramsey Lewis is a legend in his own right, trust me, you've probably heard him at one time or another. The show is only 30 minutes, and it looks at different styles and influences, with performances from artists specializing in the style du jour.

The first episode I saw featured Dave Brubeck (yes, he's still alive) and Billie Taylor. I just watched the American Songbook episode, with two performers that I admittedly haven't heard of before, but they were excellent. Other episodes look at influences from the blues, tenors, latin jazz...it looks like a great series. If he ever has Diana Krall on, I may wet myself.

The Aftermath




The airport officially received 20.4", a new all time record. I don't think we had quite that much here, but it has to be close. I know my cousin in Wisconsin is wondering what the big deal is.

The snow started to force the back wall of the shelter out of the way...



Clearing the driveway is not an option in snow like this. The snow was higher than the intake opening for the snowblower. I thought it would just choke and die, but it was able to get through it - I just had to treat it like when you're trying to cut very tall grass with a mower. It took about 30 minutes to clear a path wide enough for the car. This is going to be fun when it all starts to melt.

And what was my reward for doing all this? I figured this would do...a steak that would have been given its own chapter in an Icelandic Saga.

Saturday, March 8, 2008

And it keeps coming

Believe it or not, I cleared our front porch last night when I got home. This is what we've gotten since then. Keep in mind our door is about 5 inches above the porch level.

The Weather Channel just said we've had 18 inches of snow.
I'd cleared the area between the car shelter and the house last night too, but today it's been lovely. I had to go out early this morning and remove the snow from the shelter's roof, so it didn't bring the thing down. So all that plus the snow that's fallen and drifted over there, made for waist-high snow to be cleared, just to be able to reach the driveway. I can't remember snow like this since I lived in Chicago in the 70s!

Over a foot, easily














And it's supposed to keep snowing all day.








Friday, March 7, 2008

Storm of the Century of the Week



Well, it's not the end of everything...but for the Cowlands, it's pretty significant. I don't know how much we really got, since wind is drifting it everywhere. But I checked 3 areas with my trusty ruler, and they were all 5 inches or thereabouts. And we're supposed to get another 5-8 into tonight and during tomorrow.
I left work at 4, and it took me about 50 minutes to get home. I was expecting at least an hour, so I was kinda pleased. The highways were moving 20-25mph, when they were moving. Luckily, most drivers were relatively level headed, no glaring idiots at least on my drive.
So I got home, cleared the driveway, and took a few pics:It's hard to believe it was 70 degrees just on tuesday.

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Basement Blues

Well, 3 inches of rain, the day after a few inches of snow finished melting = basement water. I shouldn't be surprised at this point (and I wasn't), but this is getting old. It's not bad, and I have really improved some areas that were just awful when we moved in...but we now have a bad issue with water coming in around the chimney. It never leaked the first year, it wasn't until after we'd used the chimney during the winter of 05-06. Gotta be a connection - perhaps heat expansion of the flue is cracking the mortar up at the top. I've eliminated runoff or roof drainage as suspects, so now it's time to get up there to redo the crown and seal all the cracks.
I also need to get a truckload of dirt delivered to make sure the grading all around the house is as it should be, because there's spots where it most definitely ain't.
Then seal and/or replace the gutters. And then seal the interior basement walls. After that...witch doctor?

Sunday, March 2, 2008

Big In Japan


An Art Car show in the U.S. would be totally shamed by one of these:


I give you the Dekotora, which simply means Decorated Trucks. If your retinas are still intact, you can check out more here.