2013 in MORE of a blur!

It started with a frozen pipe, on a day that I thought it would thaw. I decided to try and leave a "trickle" of hot water. When I got home the floor was soaked and there were 2 inches of water in the cabinet and water was streaming out of the light fixture in the apartment downstairs! Yikes!
Somewhere that trickle had become a BLAST and there was enough slow drainage in the sink to lead to overflow. We needed a new counter/cabinet because we were rolling on 'contractor grade' as they call it.
We grabbed a cheap WOODEN setup of the same size and a new faux granite counter top. Went to IKEA for a cheap new sink to go inside.

Then we had to dry and clean downstairs, replace lighting and eventually the ceiling which still has a horrible poorly done patch.

Then our taxes went up. Gah!
Renovations still on hold.
Many events - no garden beyond parsley, thyme, wild dill and a TON of basil.

2012 in a BLUR!

We spent the winter thinking about events, recording music and planning gigs.
We built a vardo for camping and misnamed it the Nuage Tragique which guaranteed a flat tire on our first trip, on a Sunday afternoon, in the middle of nowhere Maine. It took us 2 hrs to find a replacement and there REALLY were no other places left to try.
When we go to Walmart it is the END of the line.
The platform in the first photo is 2 pieces so the blue can be slid on top and the mattress we have folds and there is more interior room. Makes it easier to pack.  2nd photo shows hoe the crossbars work. We use a decorative fabric as the inside layer, then a plastic tarp in the middle and a canvas outside. Very cozy when it is all set up and I don't have to sleep on the ground like a chump!

 interior version 1

 exterior paint version 1

there is a plain canvas that goes over this when we are on site

Pre New Year's Assessment

A farewell...

2011 was the Year of Plumbing Disasters and we are not sad to see it go.

We had 2 frozen pipes in January, lost 1 hot water heater in February and the second 2 weeks later as March rolled in. Before the end of winter we also had replaced the shower head. By the end of April we had replaced a toilet and had to clear a blockage in our sewer main, a job which required tearing up flooring in the basement and Dave's nephew up to his shoulder in sewage, yay! Sometime during the summer the kitchen sink started to leak and we patched the drain hole with putty that failed. We have been living with a heavily dripping sink since then. We have a vague plan to renovate the kitchen, but I haven't found the new sink I want yet.

So glad this year is over...

Thinking about food

It is hard to do in the Northeast.

A very small part of the country with less farmland every day.

Short growing season and not a lot of hothouse production.

This year I hope to grow a lot of food in the teeny urban yard.

Thinking about food

Not quite a year...

After talking with some "influential" family members, I am back on the keys for this blog.

First thing will be a lot of updates sourced from my Facebook page. I am going to try to date them appropriately as well.

So...

Look forward to the suspense and the excitement of our Home Depot roofing fiasco.

This is a saga that STILL continues, though we were promised a one day job in April 2010.

Hear the jaw dropping tale of our broken water pipes and dead hot water heaters as well.

To bring you back down, I will bring over a bunch of cooking that I was going to place on another blog, but I think I'ma (my favorite contraction=I am going to) just put it all here. I really can't manage more. It'll just all stay PG-13 I guess.

I can keep the trash on Facebook!

more stuff

painted and some decor




This is all catching up -