Good Morning!!!! 56F @ 4:15AM. Sun and clouds mixed. High near 60F. Winds light and variable.
Nothing but light showers in the 10-day, with the Pacific high building in and once again pushing the rain up to the north.
I wonder how well plain old silicon seal will hold up to the weather, David? I didn't have much luck with it on my dearly departed flying porch cover. OTOH, I used a sealant from
Dicor on the van, and it's holding up pretty well. Maybe Ron can suggest something, too? Regardless, good to see you have a partner in crime for the project!
Some times a fresh start can have surprisingly good results, Mike. It's a good thing you walked away instead of persisting in beating your head against that wall.
Sad to learn that Amtrak is living up to their reputation, Drew. Hope it doesn't get any worse...
If you already have a YouTube account, Paul, posting video there is pretty straight forward, as is copying and pasting the link into the media icon in the page editor here. But I'm no internet genius, so others might have a better solution. Oh, now I see you do. And that you get better results holding the phone long way parallel to the ground. Do they call that landscape mode?
Win some, lose some. No sign of any oil leaks on the new high pressure lines on the truck, but now it's got a little drip on the new oil pan drain plug. This in spite of using a new aluminum crush washer, but then again I was playing Dutch boy with my thumb over the hole to keep the oil from running out during the plug swap, and maybe didn't get the sealing surface as clean as it should be. Good enough until the next oil change, though, and I'll just keep it parked out on the gravel, where the drip will help keep the dust down.
Wanting to cover all the bases in trying to find the missing speedo, yesterday I spent an hour searching every nook and cranie around here looking for it, as I couldn't be sure I hadn't forgotten I'd received it and put it somewhere I wouldn't lose it. Still came up empty handed, but then noticed an email telling me that Amazon had left two new parcels up at the mail box. So I went up there to get them and as I lifted the parcel box lid, I noticed another box laying back behind the fence in the shadows. Yep, it was the speedo. And I had to fish it up and over the fence one board at a time because it wouldn't fit under the bottom rung. Which meant that whoever (d%&n mailman) put it there had just dropped it over the top. Fortunatly the rebuilder had used plenty of padding inside the box, and the speedo still works.
Quick trip to town yesterday, just three stops and then right back home. I was hoping to get some time in afterwards cleaning up the big wood pile, but then noticed the problematic front tire on the tractor was flat again. And that the valve stem was MIA. WTF? The only thing I can come up with is that it still has a slow leak, and I didn't notice it until I'd run it long enough that the bead came off the rim and pulled the stem back inside the tire. Or at least that's what I think happened, as I couldn't find the valve stem anywhere and I don't have Clark Kent's x-ray vision glasses. I was able to limp it back up to the garage, get it up on a jack stand, then pull the wheel off and use the FEL to push the bead down far enough to get another valve stem installed. Think I'll take the neighbor's advise and hunt down some steel valve stems, but I'll have to keep an eye on that tire before each use for now.
Once the dust settled on the repair, I was able to get an hour in and more trees moved to the big pile, and enough limbs cut up for a nice camp fire. Missed having music in the background, but the insurance company is balking at reimbursing personal property items, now insisting I supply receipts for everything, including the speakers that used to hang under the old porch cover. I've got them here, but it's gonna involve a lot of digging... At this point I can say State Farm is better than nothing, but if I had a choice, I'd have gone with another company because the reviews I read on them were pretty accurate about their stingyness and reluctance to settle fairly.
TGIF gang!