Monthly Archives: July 2024

20240601-09_the-first-9-days-of-June

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NOTE:  This is a long post that includes six (6) photos with captions.  Unless otherwise indicated, photos taken by me (Bruce) with a Google Pixel 6 Pro.  (Photos by Linda taken with a Google Pixel 6.)

 

SATURDAY 01 thru SUNDAY 09 June 2024 — the first nine days of June

 

School was done for the year for our two younger grand-daughters, but their mom and dad still had to work.  The girls would be headed off to various camps over the summer, some local and some a few hours away.  Our son and daughter-in-law would also have some time off and engage in some adult-only travel.  All of which added up to Linda and Meghan (our daughter) being “on tap” for child-care services.  (The girls are too old to call in babysitting anymore.)

 

Saturday 01 …

Sadie takes a break with her dad while Apa (me) looks on.  (Photo by Linda)

Sadie had her last soccer game of the season at 9 AM and we were glad to finally be spectators.  Her dad (our son) brought her to the game and stayed to watch, but afterwards we took her to Anna’s House for breakfast.  It was a special treat as she usually has to share the attention of the adults in her life with her older sister.  But not this morning, as Mads had to be elsewhere.

 

Sadie with her after-game gift/treats bag.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ama (Linda) and Sadie working on something with crayons while we wait for our breakfast an Anna’s House in Ann Arbor.

 

Sunday 02 …

We went for a walk at Kensington Metropark today.  It was very nice and I’ve included a couple of wildlife photos.  Linda walks almost every week, usually with Diane, but I am not so much into that.  I prefer working around the property, but I need to walk more regularly in preparation for a 14-day Rick Steve’s tour of England (with one stop in Wales) in May 2025.  We will be transported by motorcoach, but we will do a LOT of walking on this tour.  We will also be touting our luggage to and from the motorcoach and, in some cases, up and down stairs to our hotel rooms.  Rick Steve’s Tours tend to book smaller (boutique?) hotels in city centers.  This provides ready access to the city for tour participants, but these hotels sometimes lack elevators, and might include communal restrooms.

 

While walking a trail at Kensington Metropark, we spotted this Red-Bellied Woodpecker.  The wildlife at this park is somewhat acclimated to the presence of humans, sometimes lots of them, all moving around and doing things, like hiking and bicycling and having picnics.  As such, people can sometimes get close enough to them to take a decent photo without needing specialized/expensive camera equipment.

 

The same bird as above just a moment later, having moved from a tree trunk to the ground.  It has something in its beak, but I’m not sure what it was.

 

Monday 03 …

The last time I used our gasoline powered string trimmer, it leaked fuel.  BTW:  I have suddenly discovered on Youtube that folks in Europe refer to these as a “strimmer.”  Okay, I get where that comes from, but I have no idea when/where that originated, and I don’t understand being so lazy that you feel the need to reduce two words to one. Anyway, rather than fuss with it, I decided to buy a battery powered one.  I chose a Milwaukee model at Rural King that came with an extra M18 6.0 W-Hr battery for free.  Those batteries are not cheap, so it was a decent deal.

 

Tuesday 04 …

Our BdW guest, Wade S. left today for their next destination.  Yesterday or today (I/m not sure which one) we decided to book a cruise for early December (this year).  We found a Virgin Voyages “Pre-Holiday Caribbean Refresh” cruise departing San Juan, Puerto Rico, on December 6 and returning there on December 14.  We booked an XL Sea Terrace (balcony) cabin on Deck 12 Forward.  Paul and Nancy subsequently decided to book the same cruise.  It will be nice to be out cruising with them again.  The main attraction of this cruise, for us at least, was that it spends most of its time in the south Caribbean visiting some of the Windward Islands, specifically; Tortola, St. Maarten, Barbados, Martinique, St. Lucia, and St. Kitts & Nevis.  We have cruised the eastern and western Caribbean several times now, but never the southern islands; the only ones in that list we have previously visited are Puerto Rico and Tortola.

 

Wednesday 05 and Thursday 06 …

Our calendar is blank for these dates.  We probably worked in the yard, weather permitting, or at our respective desks, or a bit of both.  One thing that probably happened during this time was that I called Glenn Williams of Tenor Clock to set up an appointment to fix our grand-father clock.  It was still keeping time, but had stopped chiming recently after I rewound the drive weights.  I jammed the gears once before while doing this, but was fairly certain I had not done so this time.  I was, however, unable to diagnose the problem and repair it myself.

 

Friday 07 …

Glenn Williams (Tenor Clock) showed up at 9 AM, as scheduled.  After spending time with the clock mechanism still in the cabinet, he concluded that the mechanism was dirty to a degree that he could not clean it “in situ.”  The problem was my own fault; in an attempt to get it run/wind better, I had tried to oil it, thus gumming up the works.  The only solution was for him to remove the entire mechanism, including the weights, pack them carefully, and taken them back to his shop where he has a fully-equipped bench and a stand (or stands) for mounting such mechanisms to work on them.  This clock was a gift to myself upon the completion of my Ph.D. program in the fall of 2003, so it was important to me to get it repaired and running correctly again, however long that takes.  Glenn always has a backlog of such work, so “late summer” was his best guess at this time.

Sometime during the afternoon (I think) BdW guest “Virg and Clio” arrived for a 1-night stay.  We’ve had a steady, but not continuous or over-whelming, parade of guests since mid-April, and several others who had confirmed stay requests but had to cancel.  It happens; travel plans change for all kinds of reasons, and we certainly never take it personally.

 

Saturday 08 …

The grand-father clock cabinet, sans the clock mechanism.  The chimes are still there but, alas, nothing to strike them.

Glenn Williams (Tenor Clock) was here yesterday, but I only got around to taking this photo today.  BTW: the reason for the name of Glenn’s business is that he is the tenor in a 4-man singing group named “Three Men and Tenor.”  You might think that’s a bit of a take-off on “Two Men and a Truck” (and it might be, for all I know) but Glenn is not a big guy, while the other three singers are, so the name pokes fun at that contrast.  Plus, tenors sing in a higher range, so there’s that. 😊

BdW guest “Virg and Clio” left sometime this morning.

 

 

 

 

Sunday 09 …

Linda might have gone to Ann Arbor to supervise (and play with) one or both grand-daughters, but it’s tentative on our calendar, so maybe not.  I am writing this some time after the fact, and neither of us any longer recall the facts.

 

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20240616-31_the_2nd_half_of_May

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NOTE:  This is a long post which includes nine (9) photo(s) with caption(s).  Photos by me (Bruce) taken with a Google Pixel 6 Pro.

 

THURSDAY 16 – FRIDAY 31 May 2024 — The 2nd Half of May

 

In addition to normal household and property chores, the second half of May saw more garage cleaning, barn/workshop organizing, and property maintaining.    It also saw a significant medical event (good), anniversaries, social time with neighbors, and an uptick in Boondockers Welcome (BdW) guests.  Highlights for various days follow:

 

Thursday 16 …

Linda sporting her eye guard on her right eye to protect it while it heals following cataract surgery.  The guard frame is flexible rubber and is taped onto her face.  The central shield is a harder plastic and is perforated, allowing for air to get to the eye and for some limited vision.  She was immediately able to see with that eye.  She’s holding an Edible Arrangements fruit bouquet sent by Nancy and Paul.

Linda had her first of two cataract surgeries today with Dr. Verkade at the Kellogg Eye Center (KEC) within the UofM Health (UofMH) Brighton Center for Specialty Care (BCSC).  First up was her right eye.  She has long been near-sighted in this eye and far-sighted in her left eye, so her brain is used to this difference.  In consultation with Dr. V, they agreed that she would get a near-vision replacement lens.  It took several hours between admission and discharge, but only about 10 – 15 minutes of that time was the actual surgery.  Other than some initial time in the waiting room, the rest of the time was taken up by pre-op and post-op procedures and personnel.

The facilities and staff at BCSC-KEI were first-rate, and the entire experience was calm and relatively stress-free.  Dr. V used eye drops rather than injections to do the final preparation for surgery.  Linda reported no pain at any time, and only minor discomfort during the procedure.  She had a perforated eye guard, but reported already being to see.  She was advised to “take it easy” for a week, but her only specific restrictions for the next seven (7) days were:  1) Not bending over, and 2) not lifting anything heavier than a gallon of water (~8.6 lbs.).  Both of those things can increase pressure in the eyes, which the doctor did not want.  She was also told of symptoms that would prompt a phone call to the clinic.  She had to keep the eye guard in place until her follow-up visit tomorrow, and wear it at night for the next week.  Obviously, she did not engage in any property maintenance for a while.  Her final follow-up visit would be approximately 30 days from today, after which she would have the same surgical procedure on her other/left (far-sighted) eye.

 

Friday 17 …

Linda had a (9:15 AM) follow-up visit with her ophthalmologist, Dr. V. at the KEI in the UofMH-BCSC.  Her eye was healing well and her vision tested well-enough for her to be able to read without glasses.  Needless to say, she was excited by this.  While the main reason for the surgery was clearer vision, Linda also hoped that it would result in better vision to the extent that she would not have to wear glasses, something that has been a part of her daily life since she was 7 years old.  Late in the afternoon Boondockers Welcome guest Connie G. arrived for a 4-night stay.

 

Saturday 18 …

Our daughter (Meghan) and her husband (Chris) celebrated their 11th wedding anniversary (2013).  Both of our children (now in their 40’s) made good life-partner matches which is a source of comfort and joy to us.

 

Sunday 19 and Monday 20 …

Nothing of note, apparently.

 

Tuesday 21 …

Today was a double-header:  Linda had brunch mid-morning with Diane and we had dinner with Kate at 6 PM.  We always dine with Kate in the Ypsilanti / Ann Arbor area.  Sometimes we meet her at the venue, but it’s become our standard practice to pick her up and return her home.  Her partner, Brian, sometimes joins us, but not this time.

 

Wednesday 22 …

Today was another property maintenance day for me.  Here are five (5) photos highlighting the work.

I just like this photo of our pink (&white) rhododendrons, framed buy nice conical evergreen tree and a stand of tall grass at the SW corner of the garage.  The grass is blocking a view of our Kohler whole-house generator, and the rhododendrons conceal the exterior compressor/condenser unit for the air-conditioning portion of our library HVAC system.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have cut our honeysuckle bush, on the right in front of the window by the chimney, down to a reasonable size.  It was over six (6) feet tall and almost as wide, and completely blocked our view from this window, which is in our living room.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The evergreen bushes at the east end of our main deck on the rear of the house eventually grow up above the cap-rail and block our view in the direction.  Every few years I cut them back down to the level of the cap-rail, and this was one of those years.  I also got in behind them and cut them back away from the deck railing, and removed the lowest branches to open up the space below them and make it easy in the future to clean out the bed and the area under the deck.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another view of the evergreens around the east end of our main house deck.  Also visible is a 4” corrugated drain line.  Not visible is the 10-foot section of 1-1/4” plastic pipe the I attached to the discharge pipe for our sump pump and then slid the corrugated drain line over the end far enough to stay put during a discharge cycle.  For most of the time we have lived in this house, the sump pump discharge has flowed through a 4” corrugated drain line underground down into the valley and along the  (valley floor all the way to the march.  This worked well for many years, but more recently we developed numerous puddles along the valley floor that never dried up, even after a period of no rain.  (The gutters on the house also flow through underground drain lines to and along the valley floor.)  It finally dawned on me that there was probably a problem with the sump drainage, and that re-routing it out into the yard, away from the valley, might result in the valley drying out.  At that is exactly what happened.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The east end of our main deck, showing the evergreens trimmed down to the cap-rail height.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thursday 23 …

Linda had her 1-week follow-up phone visit at 4 PM with Dr. V in the KEI at UofMH BCSC.  Her eye continued to heal well and her brain was adjusting to the new lens.

We have a variety of plants, bushes, and trees in front of the east façade of the front of the house.  They were all there when we bought the house, and probably had been for quite a while.  They were planted too close to the wall, and probably too close together, and had now reached a size where it was difficult to clean around their bases and impossible to get behind them.  I worked my way along behind them, removing any dead branches, as well as some live ones, to create better access.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday 24 …

BdW guest PhotoGuy1057 arrived for a 5-night stay.  He would be exhibiting/selling photographs at the juried arts fair being held at Kensington Metropark for the next few days.

 

Saturday 25 …

Our daughter and son-in-law recently closed on a house in a lakeside community—about half way between their current house—and ours and invited us over to see it.  She found that it was already wired for a portable emergency/backup generator and wanted me to look at the setup.  Here’s a photo of what is there:

The lake house emergency/backup connection panel.  I had never seen one like this.  I still need to research this in more detail, but I did quickly find references to this exact GenTran manual transfer switch panel in a Google search.

The connection point for the portable generator is lower right in the photo.  It is clearly a 4-pin twist-lock connector, so a 240/120 VAC single phase w/ ground setup (L1-L2-N-Gnd).  As such, it can power both 120VAC loads (L1-N-G and L2-N-) and 240VAC loads (L1-L2-G).  Because a 120VAC circuit requires a neutral (N) wire, it appears that each single switch also requires a neutral wire in order to return power to the generator, whereas a 240VAC load does not (but both hot wires have to routed through the GenTran box).

The labeling of the two power (Watt) meters at the lower left indicates that the three switches on the left (A, B, & C) are on one hot leg (say L1) and the three switches on the right (C, D, & E) are on the other hot leg (say L2).  These six (6) switches are, in fact, individual transfer switches.  With the switches in the DOWN position, as shown, incoming utility power is simply fed through the switch and back to the main panel and then on to the load.  Circuit protection is provided by the circuit breaker in the main panel which feeds the power to the GenTran.  With a switch in the UP position, however, the return wire to the main panel and load is connected to the portable generator.  As the circuit breaker in the main panel is no longer in the circuit, a separate push-to-reset “pop-out” circuit breaker is located above each switch and takes over the circuit protection function.  These circuit breakers are only active when the load is being powered by the portable generator.  (Obviously, sic, the wire and circuit breaker sizes have to be appropriate for the current rating of the load.)  Note also that the two middle switches (C & D) are tied together, so they are always in the same position.  This means they are powering a 240VAC load, probably the well-pump.  (There is a chart showing what each switch/breaker powers, but I did not photograph it.)  Note that the portable generator connector is NEVER connected to the utility power coming into the main panel.

What I found fascinating about this device is that each load has to be individually switched to the generator, which also means it is possible to provide power to any one or more (or all) of them from the generator even with the house still running on utility power.  Not that I think that would ever be a good idea, but the fundamental design of this box makes that possible.  If it was desired to do this, at a minimum the load would have to be OFF before switching it to the generator.

 

Sunday 26 …

We attended the Kensington Metropark art fair today, or perhaps it was tomorrow, but I did not make a note of which day it was.

 

Monday 27 … Memorial Day

We did not do anything special today.  It is not our family tradition to get-together on holidays such as this, or the 4th of July, or Labor Day.  We do gather on Thanksgiving, Christmas and Christmas Eve, but not on New Year’s Eve,  and the only “Hallmark Holidays” we celebrate are Mother’s Day and Father’s Day.

 

Tuesday 28 …

I do not have any notes about what we might have done today, but based on this photo, we apparently had some interesting weather.

I like the clouds and the lighting in this photo of the valley in our backyard as seen from our main deck.  Tuesday was also grass-mowing day, so the lawn looked it’s best.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wednesday 29 …

Without much fanfare, we celebrated our 53rd wedding anniversary (1971) with dinner out at Ciao Amici’s in downtown Brighton.  This was our first visit to this local Italian restaurant.  We have generally heard good things about the place.  We knew that it was not particularly vegan-friendly, but decide to go anyway.  Linda selected something that was reasonably vegan-friendly, while I went a bit off-diet (vegetarian instead of vegan), but we both had meals that we rated as very good in a nice setting.  We dated for four (4) years before we got married, and were acquainted for three (3) years before that.  That means we have known each other for about 60 of our slightly more than 70 trips around the sun.

 

Thursday 30 …

Nothing of note today.

 

Friday 31 …

Linda met Diane at 9:30 AM for their weekly walk.  Boondockers Welcome (BdW) guest Wade S. arrived around 1 PM.  As always, I (Bruce) met him in the street and directed him into our guest site.  Linda prepared some food items for a gathering later in the day.  Just before 18:00, we walked down to Gary and Marta’s house for the get-together with our neighborhood friends (Gary & Marta, Mike & Gail, Rose & Jerry).  We always enjoy the company of these people.  We would welcome getting together more often but, even in retirement, we all continue to have busy lives.

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20240501-15_the_1st_half_of_May

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NOTE:  There are two (2) photo(s) with captions in this post.  Photos taken by me (Bruce) with a Google Pixel 6 Pro.

 

WEDNESDAY 01 – WEDNESDAY 15, 2024 — The first half of May

 

In the first week of May we continued to do some property maintenance work and started cleaning out the garage.  The later mostly involved moving things to the barn.  I tried to identify things for recycling, to no avail, but I did move some things to the trash, and set scrap wood aside for the next burn pile.

Linda walked with Diane on Wednesday the 1st and Tuesday the 7th.  She also walked with our daughter (Meghan) on Thursday the 2nd, doing a portion of the Mike Levine Lakelands Trail State Park section of the Great Lake-to-Lake Trail near Pinckney, Michigan, meeting at a trailhead about half-way between their respective houses.  On Sunday the 5th (Cinco de Mayo) we attended an afternoon performance of the Ann Arbor Youth Chorale (AAYC) at First Presbyterian Church in Ann Arbor, Michigan; our 11-year-old grand-daughter (Mads) is a member.  On Monday the 6th an HVAC technician from Lakeside Services Co. serviced the air-conditioning portion of the HVAC unit for our library.

Mads in concert with the Ann Arbor Youth Chorale

In the second week of the month, we continued with our usual household chores as well as working on cleaning up the garage and trimming up the property.  On Wednesday the 8th I changed the engine oil and filter on our Cub Cadet lawn tractor as well as the air filter.  The air filter, which I bought at the local Tractor Supply Company store, turned out to be the wrong size, but I made it work while I ordered the correct one from Amazon.

On Thursday the 9th, the F-150 went in for preventative maintenance.  I had the transmission drained/flushed, the (spin-on) filter replaced, and then refilled.  They did not, however, drop the pan and replace the screen, as this was much more expensive and the service advisor said it wasn’t necessary at this time.  That specific maintenance item will occur closer to 100,000 miles.  I also had the front and rear differentials, and the transfer case, drained and refilled.  The truck had approximately 53,000 miles on it, so these services were done ahead of schedule at my discretion, but given that we tow our trailer with it, I thought it best to have it done now.  I was told a long time ago that the best, and yet cheapest, maintenance you can do on a vehicle is regular lube, oil, and filter (LOF) changes.  The service advisor agreed with me, but then he wasn’t going to refuse to have the dealership do the work.  🙂

This photo of the oil filter on our Cub Cadet XT3 GSE Enduro Series lawn tractor indicates that I last changed the oil and filter about five (5) years ago when the tractor had ~70 hours of run time.  (ABIR, Paul helped me with this, so he and Nancy must have been staying at our place in their motorhome at the time.)  The tractor has not accumulated a lot of hours since we bought it because we have a lawn service to does most of the grass mowing.).

On Tuesday the 14th, Linda did her weekly walk with Diane and wrote a check to Everlast Doors for the deposit on new garage doors we had agreed to purchase a few weeks ago.  These doors will be better insulated, look better, and work better than the existing ones, which may well be original to the house (mid-late 1970’s).  One of the things I am looking forward to is having the wall-mounted lift operators at the end of the spring shafts rather than the ceiling-mounted, chain-drive system that is the norm for garage doors.

Steve and Karen arrived mid-afternoon to visit and have dinner.  Linda and Karen are in regular contact via Words With Friends, and we try to get all four of us together several times a year.  They also have a place in Florida (near Venice) and we have visited with them there, and even stayed with them on several occasions during the winter months.

On Wednesday the 15th , a technician from Schutz Heating & Cooling arrived around noon to service the heat-pump for the main floor of the house.  They come twice a year; spring for the A-C function and fall for the heating function.  Later in the afternoon we headed to John and Diane’s house in Farmington Hills to attend a satellite concert by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra at The Hawk Center, which is walking distance from their house (although they drove us there).  The Hawk Center was formerly Harrison High School (the school symbol was a Hawk), where both of our children and both of their children attended/graduated (late last century).

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20240422-30_Spring-is-finally-here-4

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NOTE:  There are two (2) photos with captions in this post.  Photos taken by me (Bruce) with a Google Pixel 6 Pro.

 

MONDAY 22 – TUESDAY 30 April 2024 — The end of April

 

During the 4th week of April, we might have started working on pruning trees and bushes, and pulling weeds, but we tend not to record these kinds of work days on our calendar, and I did not capture that information in real time.  As of Wednesday, June 5, however, I think the burn pile had been lit at least twice, and maybe three times.  We are trying to not accumulate numerous/large piles of stuff for the burn pile, like we have in the past.  We do wait, however, until we have enough to justify lighting it, a bit more to add to, and have decided to work in the yard and create even more material to add to it.  So far, it seems to be working out for us fairly well.  Some highlights of specific days of the week were as follows:

 

Monday 22 …

Nothing of note, apparently.

 

Tuesday 23 …

I had a note on the calendar to call the University of Michigan Health (UofMH) Travel Clinic so see about getting additional vaccinations in advance of some of our planned international travel.  I was told that the clinic currently only services faculty, staff, and students and was referred to a private clinic in town.  I might have called that clinic as well, but I don’t recall specifically.  HFHS Columbus Center also has a travel clinic, so I called them.  Linda still has here primary care physician there, but I do not.  No matter, as it turned out, they will still see me.  We will need to send them our itineraries in advance of an appointment, which we have deferred until later in the summer.

 

The new cat tree, fully assembled and positioned in the library near the doorwall to the living room.  Only time will tell if Cabela deems it interesting enough to be worthy of her use.

 

Wednesday 24 …

Linda had a mid-morning appointment with her ENT, and we both had early afternoon appointments for eye examinations with an optometrist in the Kellogg Eye Institute at the UofMH Brighton Center for Specialty Care.  I got a new prescription for glasses, but Linda got a referral to an ophthalmologist at the Institute for possible cataract surgery.  We met our friend, Kate, at 17:30 for dinner.  We dined somewhere in the Ypsilanti / Ann Arbor area, but I did not record where we went.

 

Thursday 25 …

Linda met Diane at Kensington Metropark for their weekly walk.  Boondockers Welcome guest Woosch32 arrived for a 1-night stay.

 

Friday 26 …

Sometime earlier in the week I had scheduled a used furniture pickup with the local Habitat for Humanity ReStore for 9 AM this morning.  ABIR, they showed up right on time, and shortly thereafter all of the living room furniture that had been in our Rec Room was out of the garage and on its way to the ReStore.  This was the second batch of this furniture we have donated.  The first batch found a new home (or homes) very quickly (so we were told) so we hoped this batch would as well.

 

Saturday 27 …

I took a photo of the boxes for the pigment ink refills (that I needed to order) for our Epson EcoTank 16650 multi-function wide-format inkjet printer.  The photo was not worth displaying, but apparently I ordered the refills today.  This printer uses Epson’s 542 series pigment inks (CMYB) which come in reasonably large volume bottles; 70 ml for C, Y, and M, and 120 ml for B.  The special bottles are keyed to match the refill ports on the printer’s built-in ink tanks, making it essentially impossible to put the wrong in a tank.  It’s a very economical way to buy ink (thus the ecoTank branding), and the system is very easy and clean to use.

 

Sunday 28 …

Nothing of note, again.

 

Monday 29 …

After an exchange of e-mails over the last month or so, I was able to set a date to get together with Ken Schramm, founder of Schramm’s Meadery.  Ken and I both worked at Wayne RESA at the same time, and became friends as well as colleagues.  Linda and I, with Paul and Nancy, had been to his retail shop and tasting room in Ferndale, Michigan just before the CoVID-19 pandemic, but he wasn’t there that day, and they ultimately had to close the storefront due to the loss of retail business.  The meadery, however, survived the economic difficulties of the time.  It was located just around the corner, in a housing area just off the main commercial street.  I met Ken there and got a personal tour of the operation before we went to a local Thai restaurant for lunch and a prolonged, and much overdue, conversation.

Back at the meadery, I bought bottle several bottles of mead, including a “Patty Fay.”  Patrica Faye was Ken’s mother’s name, but Patricia is also my sister’s name, her last name is still “Fay,” and she has always gone by “Patty.”  She does not drink alcohol, however (to the best of my knowledge), so the bottle is for us, in her honor.  Here’s to you, Sis.

 

Tuesday 30 …

A picture of the new Hisense wine refrigerator (taken in early July 2024)..  I pulled the wine racks out, which is more obvious in the reflection in the door window.  The fabric artwork on the wall (partial view) is a hooked rug I made in the late 1970’s.  The pattern was inspired by a pseudo-colored X-ray radio telescope image of the Milky Way galaxy.  The various colors indicate portions of the galaxy that are moving towards our position or away from it, and how fast.  The complete piece is about 4’ x 6’ in size.

Sometime in the past few days I ordered a new Hisense wine refrigerator from the local Lowe’s store.  It was delivered today mid-afternoon.  They had them in stock at the store, but with delivery and take-away service, it was easier to do it this way.  In advance of its arrival, I moved the dining room table to make room, and emptied the old wine fridge, putting the bottles out of the way.

The new wine fridge looked good, although I did have to figure out how to attach handle.  I had to partially remove the door gasket to get the holes in the door frame for the handle bolts.  One of the things I really liked about this unit at the store was that the bottle racks each slide out, making it much more convenient to access the bottles.

 

 

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