What's everybody doing today?

[LadyLocust]

@Sewingcreations15 that was quite a week you had. Last year the month of June was like that for me but not just auto accidents. You've done well since then so hopefully you got your fill and are done with those things
@MoBookworm1957 Congrats on the new place. The packing and sorting is a lot of work but will be worth it. Take care of yourself and enjoy a cup of tea (or whatever) here or there. By the way, don't you think you have enough rain? You should let some of us have some
We have the air conditioner on which I don't like, but it's hot. I'm just cheap so don't like to pay for it.
@Spikedriver 1 word Hideakey. Yep, it's a word to me . @SheepDog I'm with you - I have an old bronco that I will be restoring rather than buying a new rig (same $, but better less annoying rig) and I love that the keys are flat.

 

[Terri9630]

I've got some wedges and scrap pieces to help with that. My biggest trouble will be getting the measurements right. If I do that it'll be just fine. If I mess that up...back to Menard's for another door!

Use the old door as a template.

 

[Sewingcreations15]

Rather time consuming is that we have been sorting out issues related to DH's injuries in both the tank accident and also another incident where he was burned by a faulty choofer stove with DVA. We are working with the doctor, DVA occupational health and filling out multiple forms and are also working to have his burns and PTSD recognised as conditions caused by his service.

DH was somewhat peeved that when he had his accident that they left him in his clothing without washing him after expecting him to die overnight. Then to add insult to injury he had to fight through court for any compensation payments as the accident happened in Australia on a training exercise for which all service people are not covered for. I think he gave up trying to get anything done after that but I am pushing him to have all of these things recognised and him being compensated financially and have them treated professionally as they should have been years ago.

Today we went to the doctor and we filled out forms in relation to his burns and the doctor confirmed her diagnosis on the paperwork which we sent off today. While we were there we also got creams for his burns and they have recommended DH be supplied compression gloves for his hands where the skin is fragile and damages easily and filled some pain medication scripts.

Also while in town I had back x-rays done to find out what damage I have to my back and why I am getting shooting pains down my legs. I will get the results back tomorrow to find out what the problem is. The doctor thinks it is sciatica but are trying to rule out bulging discs in my back or arthritis too.

After all that and many hours we went and had lunch at another RSL club and a soft drink each and sent away our forms to get travel allowance and our meals paid for which we can do on all trips and meals are paid for by DVA for trips over 100 km as we did today. We also posted his claim for having DH's burns recognised as a condition caused by his service today too and got a referral to a psychologist so they can assess his PTSD too as another condition he developed during his service.

Then onto doing the last of our shopping where we went to Aldi and picked up the remaining few things on our shopping list. Shortly we will date, rotate stocks and put the groceries away. Just had nice warm showers and no cooking tonight as we had a late lunch and we are both tired and just munching on homemade chocolate coconut biscuits .

 

[Amish Heart]

Been training a new assistant to me at work. My other one of two years left with no notice, well I knew she was leaving, but her last day was supposed to be the 21st since I'll be on vacation till the 24th. A little nervous about leaving her completely in charge after today being only day 4 of training, but it's what I've got. Still need to think about packing, and would be ready by now to leave tomorrow, but these 10 hr plus days this week have been kicking my butt.
Need to get some keys made for the newbie, get into work, and off I go. Daughter who is taking an 8 week job at the hospital in Barrow, Alaska leaves this weekend, and stayed and visited with us last night. Hope she likes it!

 

[Sewingcreations15]

Hope everything works out well with your new assistant @Amish Heart and glad you found someone good by the sounds of it.

 

[snappy1]

Had a good time at dinner last night with friends. Woke up this morning and feel sick. Like head cold, sinus, respiratory kind of sick. Have to take Peanut Butter to the beauty parlor and pick up some fence wire and stakes from Tractor Supply. May stop at doctor's as I have a couple of other issues going on too. Then home. Made carnitas in the slow cooker yesterday, so I need to finish that project.

 

[hiwall]

Wonderful day yesterday. Weather was mostly sunny with a high reaching 80* and almost no wind. Rode bike in the morning and wife and I spent the afternoon on the lake.

 

[The Lazy L]

...My other one of two years left with no notice...Need to get some keys made for the newbie...

Change locks too if the "no notice" didn't turn in their keys?

 

[Grimm]

Trying to get a handle on Roo's "ADHD" with exercise and a strict routine. She is doing much better now that school is out for the summer. She will be homeschooled next year as an attempt to train the new good behaviors and push out the BS the public school taught her. I have her registered in a private homeschool and am finishing up the last of the forms I need to fill out and return. I have one last subject to get curriculum for and we are set to start 'class' in August.

We are also trying to beat the desert heat. We had to buy a window AC unit for Juju's room last weekend. With the temperature hitting over 100 and the summer just started I wanted to focus on keeping our utilities bill lower than it has been for the past few summers. Using the house's central air that does not work to cool a house of this size costs us a bundle. I decided that window units used at night in the girls' rooms would cut the cost of running an inadequate house unit 24/7. We have a small portable swap cooler for the shared living areas and fans for my room. So far we turned the central air on once and that was before we got the swamp season ready.

 

[Terri9630]

Trying to get a handle on Roo's "ADHD" with exercise and a strict routine. She is doing much better now that school is out for the summer. She will be homeschooled next year as an attempt to train the new good behaviors and push out the BS the public school taught her. I have her registered in a private homeschool and am finishing up the last of the forms I need to fill out and return. I have one last subject to get curriculum for and we are set to start 'class' in August.

We are also trying to beat the desert heat. We had to buy a window AC unit for Juju's room last weekend. With the temperature hitting over 100 and the summer just started I wanted to focus on keeping our utilities bill lower than it has been for the past few summers. Using the house's central air that does not work to cool a house of this size costs us a bundle. I decided that window units used at night in the girls' rooms would cut the cost of running an inadequate house unit 24/7. We have a small portable swap cooler for the shared living areas and fans for my room. So far we turned the central air on once and that was before we got the swamp season ready.

Glad to see you. Good luck with getting Roo to unlearn the public school behaviors. We were able to get rid of most of them with our oldest but it took awhile. Our part of the desert hasn't been hot yet. I think we have only hit the 90's 3 times now.

 

[Caribou]

Welcome back Grimm, lately I've been wondering how you were doing.

 

[Grimm]

Glad to see you. Good luck with getting Roo to unlearn the public school behaviors. We were able to get rid of most of them with our oldest but it took awhile. Our part of the desert hasn't been hot yet. I think we have only hit the 90's 3 times now.

I figure I only have 2 years of public school to unlearn. If it takes me the rest of her school career then so be it. I figure I can use the curriculum for Juju when she gets to that age. Just a 5 year wait. But with homeschooling I can make sure she is learning at her level rather than where the school system wants her to learn. She is reading at a middle school level (6th-7th) and will be starting 3rd grade in August. In math she is a tad behind because she needs a bit of one on one to memorize her facts.

It has been cool and nice up until this week. Starting Sunday we have been in the mid 90s to low 100s! Today it went back down to the mid 80s so we spent the morning outside before it got warm. If this is any indication of how the rest of the summer will be then we are in for a HOT one!

 

[Grimm]

Welcome back Grimm, lately I've been wondering how you were doing.

You have my email. Feel free to use it.

 

[Terri9630]

I figure I only have 2 years of public school to unlearn. If it takes me the rest of her school career then so be it. I figure I can use the curriculum for Juju when she gets to that age. Just a 5 year wait. But with homeschooling I can make sure she is learning at her level rather than where the school system wants her to learn. She is reading at a middle school level (6th-7th) and will be starting 3rd grade in August. In math she is a tad behind because she needs a bit of one on one to memorize her facts.

It has been cool and nice up until this week. Starting Sunday we have been in the mid 90s to low 100s! Today it went back down to the mid 80s so we spent the morning outside before it got warm. If this is any indication of how the rest of the summer will be then we are in for a HOT one!

Its 96° today but Mondayish it didn't even hit 60. Its been wet too.

 

[Spikedriver]

I hit the farmer's market for some local fresh honey. Now it's off to work on whatever else there is to do. Tomorrow is my town's City-wide garage sale day and I promised to take my daughter to the sales. I browse a little but she turns into a little pit bull when she sees a garage sale. I expect she will need to "borrow" some money...

 

[Grimm]

I hit the farmer's market for some local fresh honey. Now it's off to work on whatever else there is to do. Tomorrow is my town's City-wide garage sale day and I promised to take my daughter to the sales. I browse a little but she turns into a little pit bull when she sees a garage sale. I expect she will need to "borrow" some money...

Thanks for reminding me that tomorrow is the farmers market and I wanted to take the girls.

 

[Weedygarden]

We have a small portable swap cooler for the shared living areas and fans for my room. So far we turned the central air on once and that was before we got the swamp season ready.

I have a swamp cooler that does a great job of cooling off my house. They are such a great way to keep a home cool, especially when you live in a dry area.

Good to see you here! I hope all is well with you and your family.

 

[Weedygarden]

It's starting to rain again. But right now it's a gentle rain good soaking type rain.

I haven't seen you much lately. I was going to post, wondering where you are. I think you are having or maybe had knee surgery and are or have just moved.

 

[Grimm]

I have a swamp cooler that does a great job of cooling off my house. They are such a great way to keep a home cool, especially when you live in a dry area.

Good to see you here! I hope all is well with you and your family.

The house we rented a few years ago (we were there over 3 years) had a swamp cooler that cooled the whole house. The place we are renting now has central air but the compressor/AC unit is too small for the total square footage of the house. The landlord doesn't think we need a bigger one to cool the house below 85-90 degrees when it is over 100 outside. So we got ourselves a small portable unit last summer. It took the whole summer to figure out how to get it to work best as the manual didn't offer any tricks or tips. It is made so that ice goes in the priming pan up on top but we found that it melted off too fast. What worked was filling the base tank with ice blocks then cold water. I have a few silicone loaf molds that I form the ice blocks in and store them in a bucket in the deep freeze.

So far the utilities bill is a lot lower than the first summer when we ran the AC.

 

[snappy1]

Accomplished my missions today-- still feel like crap-- and on antibiotics for the first time in at least a few years. First time I remember going to the doctor because I was sick since about 2005. Watered garden, re-packaged food that was made yesterday and made my lunch for tomorrow. Have to put the goats to bed and take a shower. First time I haven't hit 10,000 steps in months and first time I skipped exercise/ walking since I started it almost a year ago. I'm ready for bed now.

 

[Caribou]

Grimm that is fantastic way to go. A BTU is the amount of energy that it takes to change one pound of water 1℉. It takes 960 BTU's to change state. So, one pound of 32℉ ice to 32℉ water absorbs 960 BTU's and double that, plus the rise in temperature, for converting it to vapour. Every pound of ice is worth a couple thousand BTU's of cooling. If you are in a hurry or need extra help throw some rock salt on the ice. That is how an ice-cream freezer works. When it gets dry, or close to it the same salt should work on the next block of ice.

 

[Grimm]

Grimm that is fantastic way to go. A BTU is the amount of energy that it takes to change one pound of water 1℉. It takes 960 BTU's to change state. So, one pound of 32℉ ice to 32℉ water absorbs 960 BTU's and double that, plus the rise in temperature, for converting it to vapour. Every pound of ice is worth a couple thousand BTU's of cooling. If you are in a hurry or need extra help throw some rock salt on the ice. That is how an ice-cream freezer works. When it gets dry, or close to it the same salt should work on the next block of ice.

My concern with the salt would be it dissolving in the tank and going through the pump and filter. I have 2 extra filters that I bought when we got the unit and the one that came with it is still in perfect condition for being a thick cardboard and not aspen fibers.

 

[Caribou]

My concern with the salt would be it dissolving in the tank and going through the pump and filter. I have 2 extra filters that I bought when we got the unit and the one that came with it is still in perfect condition for being a thick cardboard and not aspen fibers.

I guess I don't know your unit. My grandparent has a swamp cooler and all the did was pour water in a tray and a fan would evaporate it. My cousin has a swamp cooler and his has a fan and cloth that wicks the water up but no pump. The salt could be a problem for any metal. If the pump impeller or pump housing is steel I'd worry about it. If you do wind up using salt be sure to rinse it out well at the end of the season.

P.S. If you don't need to use the salt don't bother. If you need the extra cooling then consider it after evaluating your system.

 

[Tank-Girl]

Today I brought 120 canning jars, went and brought 4 20 kgs bags of chicken manure pellets, 2 new feverfew plants.

I had enough left over to top up my panadol supply and some tinned goods.

The garden is looking very good at the moment.

 

[Bacpacker]

Welcome back Grimm!

 

[Sewingcreations15]

@Grimm nice to see you again and life is really busy with two little ones in the home. Homeschooling sounds like a great idea from what I have been reading about the school curriculum in the United States.

Also we had a portable swamp cooler and would refrigerate water in milk bottles and put it in there and found that helped it to keep the rooms cooler, always worth a try. You are right air-conditioners and especially ducted ones cost a fortune to run in electricity.

 

[Sewingcreations15]

Good to hear your garden is looking good @Tank-Girl ours looks like ferrets attacked it and dug holes everywhere for our garden enclosure posts. Still waiting to firm those in connect up the drip irrigation and put on the shade cloth to protect it from frosts and then we can start planting. Medical appointments for DH are taking up most of our time at the moment.

 

[Grimm]

I guess I don't know your unit. My grandparent has a swamp cooler and all the did was pour water in a tray and a fan would evaporate it. My cousin has a swamp cooler and his has a fan and cloth that wicks the water up but no pump. The salt could be a problem for any metal. If the pump impeller or pump housing is steel I'd worry about it. If you do wind up using salt be sure to rinse it out well at the end of the season.

P.S. If you don't need to use the salt don't bother. If you need the extra cooling then consider it after evaluating your system.

The unit at the previous house was a cube and had a tray and pump with aspen pads on three sides. The pump pushed the water from the tray to a drip 'spider' in the roof of the unit that dripped down to the aspen pads on the sides. The fan would pull air through the damp pads and into the house on the fourth side. Our portable unit is a plastic box that has one pad not three.

 

[Weedygarden]

The unit at the previous house was a cube and had a tray and pump with aspen pads on three sides. The pump pushed the water from the tray to a drip 'spider' in the roof of the unit that dripped down to the aspen pads on the sides. The fan would pull air through the damp pads and into the house on the fourth side.

This is what mine is like. Since my house is a Victorian with a steep pitched roof, I had no interest climbing up there a couple times a year to set it up for the summer, or to winterize in the fall. I have mine in a window in my dining room on the first floor. I can stand by an open window upstairs, at the back of the house and feel the pressure from the big fan. I put a double fan in that window upstairs, blowing out. I pay for the water and the cost of running the fans.

 

[Meerkat]

Well that gentle rain turned into heck cat black sky thunderstorms quick.
That wasn't supposed to hit until 6 pm.
Been building fence around the garden area.
Trying to keep Great Dane/ Mastiff mix out of the garden.
Zeus is 6 months old.
Been moving my garden over to granddaughter's daddy's house.
Went to doctor last week, wasn't gone 5 hours.
Came home 3/4 of my herb garden dug up, dirt and all.
So been moving the reminder by 5 gallon buckets.
Monday, I pick up the key for my new apartment.
Finally got enough saved for the deposit and half month of rent.
So been on marathon of cleaning out, packing up.
Will start moving Monday morning, probably totes that will fit in my car.
Hope to have present apartment cleaned, painted, carpets clean and out of here by the 10 of July.
Donated 8- 13 gallon trash bags of fabric to quilt guild that makes lap blankets for children suffering from cancer.
Donated 6 boxes of books.
Tomorrow will finish packing linen closet, my bedroom start to finish, then kitchen.
Been sorting, donating as I go.
Next Wednesday or Thursday will have no internet till after the move.
I will check back in periodically from the library.

MoBook I hope you get some relief soon from all that rain. Down here we were starting to worry about fires and last few days got some welcomed rain. But I do know both can be very bad.
Took a day trip today and it was good to get away. Found a place to put boat in and found out it is the Intracoastal that runs into the inlet. I thought it was just a inlet waterway.