Lighted Address Sign

For the gable front of the new carport, above the larger round vent hole?

http://www.comforthouse.com/ovaladdress.html

Lighted address signs work on doorbell power, 24V AC or less, which the code basically lets you do anything with.  You can drill a hole in the wall and run doorbell wire right through the hole.  For 120V AC, code requires Electrical Boxes, which must have covers or access panels.  For a long time I had this idea of having the address light up from within the round or oval vent hole.  I could find nothing of the kind, and of course it would be illegal to do this with 120V AC power.  Where would the Electrical Box be?  Obviously the Electrical Box cannot just be in the vent hole.  However, it would be possible to add a lighted address sign to a gable vent cover IF you use Doorbell Power (I think).

Nobody makes something like this…but once I have my vent cover I could re-manufacture it to have lighted numbers.  An interesting project…

But I have to remember to ask the carport builders to run a doorbell power line through the carport roof structure (I'm assuming there is a ceiling below the roof, not an open roof.  A ceiling provides better insulation and looks nicer).

I had been thinking no ceiling lamps.  The Luddate-Job (which I'm thinking is a great place to start) has ceiling lamps.  But that adds the electrical expense, and I was thinking my new outdoor Happy Trails sconce was sufficient lighting, with or without a carport.  But ceiling lamps are a nice touch, and the comfortable house is all about nice touches.  With ceiling lamps, you can see where you just dropped your keys.  And the ceiling lamps could come on automatically when a car enters the carport.  And it's far harder to add the electrical afterwards.  Afterwards it would have to be external through conduit, which has an industrial look (though I think OK basically).

So I think I'm going to start by asking for the Whole Ludgate, lamps and all, plus the doorbell line to the the front vent (leave it to me to run the rest of the way), 22.5 ft inner distance between the all brick posts, 4 posts for the carport and one for the walkway (just like Ludgate).

Funny thing is, I think I once drove past the Ludgate house. I couldn't believe it, it looked like a hotel here in the middle of a subdivision I had accidentally turned into.  I got in to check it out, and actually my first impression was the carport was too cheap to be the luxury hotel I thought it was, and it wasn't as big as I thought it was.  But it was fine, very fine, for an actual house, as I could simultaneously see it was.  An all metal carport even like the Kirby-Job, which at first I liked better than Ludgate, would not have that same feel.  It's cheap country ranch style, not pinnacle affluent district style.  The Ludgate approaches the affluent district style, but if you look close enough, you can see it isn't the real affluent district style, it's a metal framed carport disguised as brick and wood.  (Here where I live, "the district" would be Olmos Park.  I'm trying to emulate that a bit here, though I more often promote the name East Alamo Heights for my increasingly-surrounded-by-expensive-subdivisions ghetto that I'm struggling to transform.)  But the Ludgate-job is close enough to affluent district style for my house.  In fact, I've generally thought it out-of-reach (and it may be, though I'm going to try, try).  The brick would be new, I might ask if I could also brick the front sides of the garage just like Ludgate (though my sides are smaller, much smaller, but so much the better as it needs far less brick).

I think the Ludgate is Real Brick, though clearly it's a metal pole wrapped in one and one half brick sides.  I think that's a great design, far more narrow than the space wasting Craftsman style supports I often see.

I not only drove past the Kirby carport, I saw it being welded.

When you look at carports at Houzz, you see many people take them very seriously, and they are often built to exactly match the house, with exactly the same or even more heft than the actual house.  Now as far as affluent district look goes, you couldn't do much better than this:

http://www.houzz.com/photos/61519/The-Cliffs-Vineyards-traditional-exterior-other-metro

Now look at the brick sides supporting that carport roof.  They look suitable for a major bridge.  Actually I think this whole house looks obscenely affluent from the outside.  I might partly be the camera lenses they are using (much with the Ludgate-job pictures, I think, which used a very wide angle lens).  The inside doesn't look quite as obscene, and I didn't think the floor space was too far beyond the usual rich folks place these days.

But it illustrates my point.  You shouldn't go cheap on the carport.  That's the first impression right there.  If I can't build my NeoLudgate now, I'll try to get there somehow.

Update: just after writing this, I had my estimates from Stephen's Roofing.  As to my specifications, a metal frame carport like the Kirby, but nested just over the roofline for almost full coverage, would cost $15,900.  This was with standing seam panels, which I would mandate.  With a hand wave he said a wooden carport like the Ludgate would be $29,000, and I don't know if he was counting the brick, which he said was an extra $1000 or more for each pole.  They said the Ludgate was real brick with wood framing.

Well this proved my worst fears, it was actually higher than the high prices I feared.  I feared paying $20,000 for the Ludgate, but I might do it.  At $30,000, it's a clear no.

I suppose I could get other estimates, and I was thinking after reading reports on Stephens that I WOULD get someone else anyway, but now I feel I just won't bother soon.  Although I've been re-thinking the solar idea again.  Not being attached to the house doesn't sound so bad anymore, and it could be little more than a carport now that I've given up the Ludgate.  If it's detached, it might as well be some solar thing.

I got a cement estimate, and I didn't even like that, remembering far less from an hand waved estimate several years ago.

First Week of May

Lawn front and back is looking wonderful.  Mowed front and back on May 2 and two weeks earlier.  Irrigation has still not been turned on since November, but good spring rains have done magic.

New tiny (7 inch high) viburnum planted on south side for privacy.  This will ultimately block a view to driveways and doorways across the street through the neighbor's yard.  I had planned to put a viburnum here two years ago, but the big viburnum from nursery couldn't be planted in this spot because of dense array of (mostly obsolete and unused) telecom wires that run along the south side of my yard.  So a tiny viburnum which wouldn't interfere with the wires (while being planted anyway) was needed, and obtained last week from mail order through Gardener Direct, which apparently got it drop shipped from Liner Source Inc.

New 2 zone temperature monitor was installed on top of the blank switch cover in the King's Room.  The blank cover was originally where the room light switch was, but 6 feet into the room and around the corner it was useless, and controlled an outlet on the opposite side of the room where I've never wanted to put a light.  22 years ago I removed the switch and put on the blank cover, but that cracked the sheetrock below the cover, so there was always a small gap.  It looked bad.  I replaced the cover with a jumbo size cover that covered up the gap.  I also filled the gaps around the plastic electrical box behind the cover with Duct Seal, the specific fireproof compound approved for this purpose.  I vacuumed the box but must remember to do that more carefully next time…despite the vacuum my shirt got covered with sheetrock dust and debris as it was being sucked out of the box.  I used a new 1 1/2 inch 6-32 stainless steel screw for the upper screw holding the cover.  That screw was long enough that it could be exposed sufficiently to fit into the hanger hole in the temperature monitor.  The screws go into long slots on either side of the box and do not endanger wires.  The other screw is 1 inch because of how the box is recessed, that is the minimum length.  The temperature monitor shows the temperature in the room and also in Lyndhurst Garden House, with min/max displays for both.

A very fancy wreath hanger was fixed and hung on the door of the hall bath.  The way the hanger came from the factory it was useless because the front plate rose above the door top support.  That way you couldn't close the door because the front plate would hit the door trim.  What were they thinking??? I had to re-bend the metal to a very small radius going straight up from the front by 1/2 inch, and the only way to do that was with a small hammer.  Then I had to re-bend the top and back of the support metal but that was easier and I simply put the metal in a vice and bent it.  I had to do this a second time because the first time the wider radius of the top bends prevented the hanger from resting on the top of the door.

I installed the Dual White LimitlessLED bulb in the back yard flood light reflector, replacing the RGB bulb.  The Dual White allows me to play with color temperature, which is interesting in the back yard, instead of pure hues, which are not very interesting (though they might do for the patio light).  I need some kind of remote control bulb to get the light output just right to make the back yard look relatively evenly lit, which has a cool effect.  I hadn't been able to get the Dual White bulb synced until I went to a computer club meeting on Saturday and fiddled with it some more.

The Dynatrap mosquito trap was set up in the exercise (garage) room.  I had to clear a small space on top of the two drawer wood filing cabinet for it.  In so doing, I cleared away junk that had been sitting there for years. Every little thing there required deliberation or special handling or testing before it could be properly dealt with (that's why the mess had staying power--every time I looked at it I found stuff that needed to be worked on first).

I will need to be doing a lot more organizing/sorting/discarding like that this year.  Finally!  I have two almost useless rooms that need to be cleared out, and I'd like to clear out my $80/mo storage unit also.  I have a big storage building (Lyndhurst) but it's already filled up and needs cleaning and organizing too.  So this clearing of the wood filing cabinet was a little start.  I need to be doing this every week to make progress incrementally.  I know from experience that when you start clearing, it's far harder than you ever could imagine, but it gets easier.

Kitchen Doors at Richelieu

My kitchen cabinet doors below the sink have been horrid since I bought the house 24 years ago.  The cheap builder grade "wood" is heavily stained.  For the longest time I figured I simply had to remodel the kitchen, new countertops, cabinets, etc.  But even then, I might end up with new Home Depot grade wood cabinets, not much if any better intrinsically than what I started with.  And the kitchen remodel would be another $10,20,30k expense.  Simply disconnecting and reconnecting all the plumbing would be expensive, and that's just the start.

So then I though about covering the existing cabinet doors with plexiglass, polycarbonate, or something like that in a white color.  I could even glue cut pieces (if nicely beveled) onto the existing doors.

Anyway, with some random browsing thinking about this I discovered Richelieu Hardware, who sells a whole variety of Cabinet Doors !  (I could just remove the existing cabinet doors and bolt on the new ones!  Hurray!)

They have wood, polyester, stainless steel, Brillante (some kind of plastic), Aluminum frames with glass or plexiglass inserts, Thermoform, and Harmony.

I like the idea of some kind of hard material (like glass) that you know can be easily cleaned with a damp cloth, that stuff can always be removed from later even after hardening, and that wet rag won't hurt.  Stained (as in factory stained) wood fancy cabinet doors makes no sense to me.

I like the aluminum framed doors with either acid washed or Kadricolor glass.  I wonder how the eye catching Fuchsia would look in my kitchen.

My dream version, however, would be frameless, as the aluminum frame is just another thing for dirt to get stuck on or under.

Cat goes back to being Outdoor Cat

Sadly it didn't work out.  Augie, once he recovered from a bad fight after 3 days inside, regained his oats and was becoming a threatening, clawing monster inside.  After 12 days, I was feeling under siege in my own house; I had to constantly wear thick sweatpants and shoes for fear of being attacked (he snagged my pants and shoes by surprise a few times after hiding out in corners, and made a leap toward me as if to initiate a fight several times, but since I refused to engage in any fight and walked away from any sign of confrontation I remained unscratched).  He would sometimes get so hyperactive running around the house at 20 mph and tearing up his weasel-toys as to be frightening.  In retrospect I wonder if he was telling me he was ready to go back outside already.

So I've let him back outside and changed his designation back to outdoor cat (with his own heated house on the patio--which he loves, food, and water).  He was unpleasant to live with inside, but he never caused any serious damage.  He clawed some already clawed furniture, and that's about it.  He somehow knew never to touch my electrostatic speakers--which had been my big fear all along.  He toyed with a lot of wires, which my house is full of, but as far as I can tell never pierced any wires.

He goes outside willingly, and nowadays I'm even a bit disinclined to handle or move him, but when I go out to bring him more food he invariably dashes in.  So I have to have all bedroom doors closed so he really has no where to hide and then, after not too long, he goes back outside.

Unfortunately my "patio cat" idea doesn't work…it's simply too easy for Augie to scale my 6 foot garden walls and be part of a grander area he must consider his territory, though he apparently shares it all with another cat, a white and battle-worn cat I've named Atilla.  Augie lets Atilla come by and eat food, so I will be stocking the bowl twice daily with enough food for two cats, and hope they keep getting along.  The most serious fights have occurred when the food bowl has been empty.  It could be that having an older and tougher mentor cat is a good thing for Augie (though it's likely also part of the source of Augie's aggressiveness).  Anyway, I didn't choose to have Atilla, he was simply there, and apparently the new boss after the disappearance of Alexander, Augies previous sparring partner.

My current standards in USA having an outdoor cat, or even and indoor/outdoor cat, it considered negligent or cruel or something like that.  But it's certainly better than letting the poor darlings starve to death, not get their neutering and shots.  It's probably better for the cat than euthanasia (though not better for birds).  I still hope that well fed cats will be less aggressive toward birds, but I don't know.

Here's an article defending Indoor/Outdoor cats, which accounts for 90% of pet cats in Britain and other places.

No Splash Guard Needed!

The remodeled King's Bath is fantastic!  And now in one more way!  No Splash Guard is needed, water simply doesn't get through the gap between the shower curtain and the tile wall.  On Wednesday I took a long and vigorous shower including both shampoo and conditioner, and there was not a drop of water.  With the 4 inch tile baseboard on top of vinyl flooring, it would much matter anymore if there were a few drops…but there are none!

I had been expecting a Splash Guard to be needed based on all my previous experience, and I had purchased several different kinds.  Prior to remodeling, the baseboard on the right side of the tub (where the spray head is in this shower) so much water had gotten through the gap that the baseboard was rotted out, and even the sheetrock above the baseboard was damaged.  In the Queen's Bath, a puddle consistently forms on the spray head side after taking a shower.  And this is despite using a (not very well attached) splash guard there.

I think this is because of the curved shower rod, and how the ends of the rod curve back in so the front edge of the curtain hangs vertically down into the inside of the tub.  In my previous tubs I mounted the shower curtain rod just in front of the front edge of the tub, to make a more roomy shower.  This was my mother's way of doing this from way back.  In fact, when we moved into this house in 1992, I first installed the shower rods more inside the tub so the curtain was hanging straight down, simply because that looked right to me.  My mother immediately had me change it to be on the outside edge, and that seemed fine, I really didn't know how it was supposed to be done, so I did it that way and forgot about it until now.

I'm lucky it ended up this way.  Actually, I had been planning to mount the curved rod about 2 more inches out.  But I had to move it back so that the rod would generously clear the high cabinet above the toilet and just in front of the shower.  I wanted generous clearance so a damp shower curtain wouldn't be rubbing against the cabinet.

Now while it hangs vertically, the shower curtain doesn't actually come right up to the wall.  There is still a half inch or so gap.  But it still works.  I'm thinking I may use a couple of shower curtain clips on the wall to hold the curtain tighter to the wall, even though they don't seem to be needed.  But I won't be using the Tidee-Tubb splash guard that is glued to the top of the tub.  The Tidee-Tub looked like the best of the lot, and capable of handling the lack of squareness between the tub top and the wall which defeats the generic slash guard I got at Lowe's for the Queen's Bath.  The Tidee-Tub has two pieces that adjust to accommodate any slight wall tilt (and they all tilt, strangely enough).  But why glue something to the top of your high end Kohler bathtub when it isn't needed?

From Back Yard to Indoors

Friday night I came home and put a scoop of food into Augie's bowl on the patio.  As usual he came and ate a few kibbles, then left again.  It wasn't until later I noticed he wasn't looking good: thin, slow, mottled fur.  Then I noticed several blood stains on the Thermo Kitty Pad inside his house.  I let him into my house, and he walked slowly to the living room and sat under the coffee table, and looked at me.  He didn't have enough energy to start clawing.  So I said to myself, as long as he's good, he can stay inside.  He seemed to get the message.  He was good…no more clawing or jumping on sofa or running to the hallway.  Of course he didn't have the energy.  That was another good reason to adopt him as an indoor cat now--while he was showing good behavior.

Late last year Augie got eye scratched, now in April he had bloody wound.  This doesn't seem to be working out.  And Augie is thin precisely because he seems to save his outdoor food for other cats.  I saw this in action earlier this week.  The white cat came over from the side bamboo plant (apparently a convenient ladder to the next door yard) and started eating from Augie's bowl.  Augie sat in his house merely watching, not raising his voice or anything.  I had a few run-ins with this white cat before.  I usually just raised my voice a little and she'd run off.  One time he wasn't leaving so I turned on the sprinklers.  That maybe a bit cruel, but it seemed to keep her away for about a month.

Well this time I just tapped the window and she left.  But 5 minutes later she was back eating Augie's food.  I took a good look at her and felt sorry.  She was chunky looking, muscular.  Possibly pregnant (not from Augie).  And she had a half-bitten off ear.  So this time I watched as she ate and said nothing.  She polished off the entire bowl quickly, leaning into it (and putting some ants in the normally ant proof Fool a Bug bowl).  Then she left.  That was Tuesday.  Then Friday a bad scene of some kind must have happened.

In the meantime I had been thinking it was OK for Augie to save food for his friend.  I'm OK with him having friends.  I couldn't really stop it anyway.  I told my friend and immediately we were talking about having to capture the lady cat and take her to the vet for shots and sterilization.  It would be good to abort cat fetuses if she had any.  Then again, maybe they'd be the children of Alexander, the male cat who was pestering (or being friend?) Augie a few months ago, until he disappeared after a two day freeze.  I might actually feel bad about having all of Alexander's kids aborted.  He was an especially pretty cat, I thought.  Unlike this white cat, who beyond the bitten ear looks like tramp all over.  Chunky muscular tramp.

But after this blood stain, I decided maybe the relationship wasn't actually that good.  Augie let her eat his food because he had little choice: eat or get beaten up.  This lady was collecting her protection money daily (that's why Augie wouldn't eat much) and if it came a little short, as it had done on Friday when I didn't put out a second scoop at 3pm (bowl was still over half full at the bottom (about 2/3 scoop) because Augie himself wasn't eating much) she gave no forgiveness.  I forgot to add more and was also expecting my friend to add more (but she missed Friday night, in fact she had missed the entire week because of her husband's hospitalization).

So now we see how my cat neighborhood works.  Alexander had been doing likewise, eating Augie's food and Augie wasn't putting up much if any resistance (after the first month or so, when there had been some apparently bloodless fights).

And it doesn't look good for a young backyard patio cat.  My 6 foot walls don't keep cats out, so Augie was vulnerable, and apparently not up to the task.  He's still just a young cat…no more than teenager according to the charts, and other cats, even feral cats, may be bigger, stronger, tougher, and meaner.

So now I've adopted Augie as an indoor cat.  He's a nice and very smart cat in many ways.  I've been afraid of him clawing apart my electrostatic speakers mainly.  But I play classical music through them, and he loves classical music and seems to understand what the speakers do, and he seems to respect them.  I'd noticed that before, which made me warm to the idea of having another indoor cat roaming freely, something I had not though possible until this weekend.

I hadn't strongly wanted another cat, though interestingly this week I had come across photos of my previous indoor cat, Kitty, 1991-2007.  I had loved kitty dearly…she slept with me through some of the most important transitions in my life.  I missed her, but also remembered the hassles, grief, and primarily the endless worry.  So I was not planning to have another cat despite missing her.  And the biggest fear would be that another cat just wouldn't work out, especially now that I have electrostatic speakers and work all day.

It's been pretty good so far.  Augie seems to be gradually losing bad habits, becoming less likely to swipe at you with his paw.  Last night she sat under me at the table and, as if to show me it was safe, rested her back paw on my foot.  There was no claw, it was perfectly soft.

On both Sunday and Monday nights I sat on the back patio as Augie played in the yard.  He had previously seemed unwilling to venture far into my small back yard, but after it was mowed on Sunday he was happy to follow the laser toy to the far ends.  And on Monday he just liked to sit in the grass for awhile.

He's insisted on sleeping with me, and we've found ways to make that work, but he also made himself a small bed where my weights are as backup.  I made that bed a bit nicer with a foam piece, and he's happy there about half of the night, and then the other half finding spaces in my bed.  On Saturday I put him on the left side, which would be good.  Of course he didn't go back there again until he had rediscovered the left side himself, as he did on Monday night.

The New Palms

Poor old palmie never rooted well and was leaning over.  Probably not planted correctly, possibly pushed over by kids, possibly got too damp from nearby sprinkler head, possibly damaged by freeze or strong winds.  Palmie was dug and cut out of the ground a month ago, lay near the sidewalk for almost a week, and then someone carried her off to an uncertain future, but at least better than straight into the trash.

I had already been thinking, almost since the day of planting almost 3 years ago, that palmie was planted in the wrong location.  Even if palmie had good roots, a transplant operation would be very expensive (to have professionally done, by professional tree service at $250-$400 per hour).  It would have been cheaper simply to buy new palm and have nursery plant it.  Or it would have been dicey for me and my friend, who know little about such things.  Dicey means it could end up like last time or worse.  All this to save what was a $29 tree.

By my lights, Palmie was too close to the street and sidewalk at only 3 feet from the sidewalk.  My chief concern was visibility when pulling out a car, and also not blocking the sidewalk with fronds.

Buying a new palm to have nursery plant is the plan now.  My friend suggested having way back from street this time, and the same distance as the existing tree from the street.  She further suggested having the new palm very close to that old tree, which is well past its expected lifetime anyway and lost several major  branches last year.  We don't expect that tree to last much longer anyway.  She felt this was a good location because the existing tree is at the top of a gentle rise, and so there would be better drainage.

I resisted the idea of planting close to the old tree at first, but now I see it is essential.  I plan to widen the driveway by about 6 feet.  The palm should be an additional 6 feet minimum from the new driveway, or at least 12 feet from the existing driveway.  I had been thinking about allowing some additional margin and making it 14 feet from the existing driveway.  The old tree starts around 16 feet from the existing driveway.

Further, I'm now thinking of having at least 2 palms.  One 12 feet from the street (that almost lines up with the old tree) and the second 24 feet from the street.  There are about 50 feet to work with from the sidewalk to the front door.  I could have 3 palms at 12', 22', and 32'.  Here's one of the few links I've found on spacing Washingtonia Robusta palms, which suggests a mere 6 foot spacing (minimum).