Okay, I was walking through the cherry room when I looked at the curtain and noticed it had little lines at random places, not a pattern or anything I thought should be there. Then I looked in Chris's yellow wagon, why it is in the cherry room, who knows? But, it had two of my hats, a teddy bear, and a cocoon I rescued from the field outside the west window, when I mowed it the last time this fall. Of course like all good construction, the heater vent is directly under the window, and that puts it right next to the yellow wagon. I was pretty sure it was a praying mantis cocoon when I brought it in, you know, about as sure as you can be when you have no idea what you're doing around a particular subject. I spent the 30 years previous to moving here, 4 years ago, in Akron. NOT a horticulturist's paradise, with the constant bug spraying, open chemical ponds, and lack of sunshine due to the marvelous lake effect, it's a wonder there are any bugs, which in general isn't a bad thing for a city of cockroach wranglers, the only thing that seems to thrive in that environment. So I haven't seen many egg sacks from anything except spiders since I was a kid. BUT I do remember what the praying mantis cocoon looks like, I think! So anyway, I went a little closer to the curtain and, yep, there were a few little bugs on it. And I looked down at the yellow wagon and, yep, a few more bugs there, and at the cocoon, out of which were emerging, little bugs, lots and lots of little bugs. I guess I said something like "UH OH that's not going to be good!" Because I had remembered about the cocoon a couple weeks ago when I changed to my winter hat. Well, not so much remembered but noticed it was sitting there. Of course I made a mental note that I would have to put it somewhere before it popped in the spring. YOU know months from now, when the sun is out and the little critters all come out and try to eat each other to extinction, months from now, not Dec 13th in the cherry room!

But that's what happened, hundreds of little critters climbing out of the cocoon, and up the curtains, and up the walls, and across the ceiling, and into the adjoining rooms and trying to get away from the stuffed bear and the hats, and looking for something to eat. Well I quickly grabbed a jar out of the trash and began attempting to scoop them into it but the edge of the jar was about equal to a 4 by 8 sheet of plywood being slapped at a human and having them fall into a chasm. Not likely, most of the first ones I tried to recover were simply smashed, not a good rescue attempt. Next I tried to "tap them off" the curtain and into the jar, this worked a little better. As the number of little religious minions mounted in the jar, the chaos became obvious, they were doing their best to eat each other. Another point at which the desired end was backing noticeably away from realization. As Chris researched the situation she shouted out suggestions from her seat at the window with her laptop. They will seek water, so I went to the faucet and dripped a little water into the jar, which, by design, had a rather pronounced high point in the bottom and was surrounded by a deep "moat". Not quite deep enough though. They began to drown in large numbers as they rolled into the water. Now really, it was a tiny amount of water. But I guess they were even tinier. I finally decided that I should get them into something bigger as crowding them was a sure call to eat each other. So I placed the ones that were happily feasting on each other in a jar, in the cooler with a jar of hot water "for heat", and set off for the basement of the little house. I knew I had an aquarium where I murdered "rescued" dozens of baby frogs and crayfish a couple years ago. I thought there was a heated rock that I could put in it, but I probably gave that to Ryan back when he had the boa constrictor, so I set a lamp against the side of it and, along with a treasure trove of dead bugs and a couple recently dead flies, I dumped the victorious manti in, and left to find some tape to seal the top so they couldn't get out.

Meanwhile back at the house a half dozen of the little critters remained and I placed them in Chris's plants. We'll see how they do. (UPDATE) Not too well. After a week, we only find the little carcasses, but a couple are unaccounted for , there is a modicum of hope.

 

 

In the continuing saga of events relating to the junk Fords I own, the truck has surfaced as a concern again. The shifter I welded over a year ago just broke again, in the coldest weather, the same as last time. It's like it's designed to break in the cold, which of course is when its operation is most necessary, and it is the most unpleasant to work on it. Boy those Ford engineers are good, that's why they all drive BMW's . Their products are designed to fail at the most critical times. Ever notice that? Well, that's my opinion now that all the cars I own are turning on me. Anyway, I've got to get something fixed and repaired today. Fix Or Repair Daily. Says it all. Now to be honest, I do bear some responsibility because the weld was crap, it was done back a year ago when I hadn't watched Richard weld aluminum. After I saw what happens, and how it's done by a knowledgeable person, I have improved a great deal ( I hope ). I will re weld it, and this time it should stay connected for a while, at least until the next cold spell when I need to shift the truck again....

Unfortunately I am about out of Argon, and it caused me to have to work quickly, also the shape of the part is impossible to hold and it's made out of total crap aluminum. Those are all the excuses I need to move to a substance which I am proficient in.

I remanufactured the stupid thing out of steel, actually two old galvanized water pipes, and a piece of scrap steel from the table top project. What cha think?

I sorta like it, I eyeballed the whole deal and it bolted right in and worked, and it has some slop built in, I really meant to do it that way, because it always gets seized up, on the large bolt it rotates on, and that causes it to break. And the reality is, that it just pushes a flat arm to rotate a rod that relocates a gear in the transfer case anyway. For all it's design and fancy shape, it basically moves a pin to one of three slots. Big deal...

 

 

 

 

My next project is, to replace by recreating a weldment of, this little spreader. Which I broke two years ago, removing the totally rusted in place hitch ball adapter on the Ford Pickup. Again it will be better when I replace it than it was new. So I consider it an upgrade. And it will be good to have the spreader back again, as it was of major use to me in getting many things apart, even though they didn't want to be.

 

 

 

 

 

I had been putting an outlet box up every other day in the Garage. I need them to connect the lights to, and I can only work overhead about an hour, every other day. So getting things done above 5 feet is a slow process. But I can do it, because I have time. Unfortunately with all the Christmas silliness and my yearly head infection I am currently behind on my electrical projects, (pun intended). I've also been moving "almost everything" around in the garage to facilitate the wiring and to attempt to find a functional arrangement for the benches and work tables that will allow a smoother movement of projects through the area.

 

I also have to relocate the wood burner after the new " insurance company", (what a story that is), decided the proximity of the wood burner to the metal coated wall needed to be 36 inches, which would completely make getting a car in the garage impossible, I decided it was going to be removed. Which is of course what they wanted. Make the use of a wood burner impossible, I can't imagine they have any brains in their office if they think that an installed wood burner is more dangerous than the use of torpedo heaters, or the demonstration kerosene furnace, I am now forced to use. But hey, they call the shots, looks like they want to buy me a new garage. What morons! I had been leaving the wood burner at the front door because it was there, I'm lazy, and the smokestack is already in place. But I guess, I'll have to move it to where I think I will gain more heat from it, and the dumb asses who want my garage burned down, won't see it. It seems no matter where I go there are mental incompetents that can somehow reach out and annoy me. But, it challenges me to circumvent them, so I guess in the end it is good practice for dealing with the world. I also wonder about the "home office" defense. The kid that came to do the inspection and take the pictures, seem a nice enough fellow and he asked a couple questions in a strange way , at least in my understanding the one that seemed to bother him the most was when he asked how often I cleaned it? I said when it was full, I cleaned it, he wanted to hear twice a year. I was talking about emptying the ash pan, he was talking about the chimney. In fact I have never, and probably never will, clean the chimney. It's 1/4 inch wall steel pipe, and stands away from the building. It's also a foot in diameter, I expect it will turbo itself clean whenever it needs to, but it doesn't accumulate soot due to it's size, it never really even gets warm, and if it did start to rocket engine, as they do when they need cleaned, it will burn itself out, and being at least a foot and a half from the metal sides of the building. No big deal. I have been to many chimney fires and this particular installation is pretty much fail proof. THis chimney is about the only thing here I can say is a good design properly executed, of course it's weak spot was the pass through in the wall, where they had stuffed old blue jeans to stop the drafts, that did catch fire the first time I lit the wood burner, and fortunately, I was there to remove the burning denim and tear out the beaver board before it burned the garage down. Now, of course, there is a metal lined pass through, which I will have to seal up and duplicate when I place the stove in the rear of the structure. When I do that I will also reroute the stovepipe so that it radiates more heat into the garage before the smoke leaves thus increasing it's heating efficiency. And yes, I realize the importance of, the difference of the temperature in maintaining the draft, so it will be a challenge to get it to work at first, but hey, I have a lot of time...

Speaking of which, I finally found a snow blower! I have been looking for three years for one of these, that I could afford, and get here. They were always states away, and too many dollars, for something thirty years old at least! But, my buddy Mark called one evening, about an ad in the local paper, which I don't get, too cheap? Anyway, it was for a walk behind gravely snow blower attachment. Sounded promising so I called. Whoopee! It was 30 miles away and a price I could afford! So I went and picked it up. Unfortunately my car is pretty small, Ford Escort Wagon, and the Pickup was sidelined with the shifter issues. So I had to take Chris's Escape, which is "not to be messed up with old junk ya know!" But I took a tarp, and the fellow selling it had some heavy paper bags we used as padding. And well it's a real "kitty tosser"!

The Gravely that usually runs, ( I have a few, but they are mostly for parts right now) decided to become a fuel depot, meaning the gas I put in it went somewhere but not where it would run. I later discovered the float was stuck or the float valve, who can tell, without an earwig butt to hold up to the light, anyway the $70.00 rubber hose, that goes from the air cleaner to the carburetor, was filled with fuel, creating a sort of totally choked, and flooded situation. Tough to describe if you don't see a picture of the installation. Anyway the bright red spot above the tire is the rebuilt carburetor. And all that red in the front, is the attachment. I also discovered, while fooling around with it, that the exhaust pipe was broken and apparently had been for a while. I didn't notice it being very loud at all, but then some around me, claim I'm stone deaf. So maybe I wouldn't notice. (Heads will be nodding about this, I'm sure.) So I took another piece of galvanized, and made a new exhaust pipe. You might ask, "Why all the galvanized pipe for these things?" To which I respond, I have a bucket of it from doing all the plastic pipe replacement work this last summer, and it isn't good for anything else! In fact most of it had to be cored out, to remove the built up rust and crud, so I could use it at all. But that's the power of reuse, recycle, yes?

Here is the broken part, on the right, and it's galvanized pipe replacement, being held in the vice. Yes, the broken part has a female thread, into which there was a nipple threaded, that would accept a screw-on-can-style-muffler. I just eliminated the middle man, and went with the nipple from the start. Which sort of makes no sense, with all the sex references being wrong, but that's why I think Luigi is stuck in the pipes trying to rescue the princess! Plumbing is always never what it seems. Why is there a "B" in plumbing anyway, and why are all the dimensions wrong? This is one area I still need to look in the books to find out what I'm working with. I have at least three handbooks to tell me what the hell thread size I'm trying to match, and I still just take an old one with me, and match it up. Only way I'm going to get even close.