Sayonara beautiful, re-useable hardwood

This weekend we ripped up the hardwood in the kitchen downstairs. This is step one in determining how to plumb a new kitchen sink, which is the bare minimum we need to function going forward. A kitchen sink, and a place to plug in our portable dishwasher because I hate doing dishes.

Before:


After demo:



The hardwood is at least one inch thick, and completely re-useable. I'm very excited, it was a large area and the cost savings will be substantial. Removal of the hardwood was just one of the many things we need to do before insulating the walls:
1. extend jog to accommodate kitchen cabinets. This requires replacing the sill under the wall. A sill is a large piece of timber in older homes that sits on the stone foundation, bearing the weight of the studs running (sometimes) two floors up. This substantial piece of wood is usually at least 8 inches by 8 inches, and for our house at least, there two side by side sitting on our foundation wall. Lucky for us, a farmer friend had a fourteen foot sill that we could use, so we've replace the one behind this plastic tarp with the longer one. It makes me happy we are incorporating gifts (a timber like that could cost thousands of dollars) from long-time family friends into the renovation of this old house.



Pulling the wall away while we work:


2 A close-up reveals one of the few places we've found rotten wood. The jagged gash running parallel to the window is damage caused by water from the improperly installed roof to the pantry. Our building inspector told us to expect it, so no surprises. We need to expand that wall to run along the new sill, so the location is at least somewhat fortuitous because we can just start our addition ten inches closer to the window.
3. Empty out the cistern below the floor. The cover to the giant pit of water is visible in one of the above kitchen photos, surrounded in orange paint. We just need to get a sump pump and some time.

4. Jack up floor in current kitchen to match level sill. There is a noticeable lean to the entire room so if we are going to fix it - better now then later.

5 .Plumb sink to the new location. Dismantle old leaky sink and corner cabinet.

6. Remove plaster from walls in the current kitchen. Dirty job.

7. Demo the pantry room, replace with a patio door. The window needs to be moved too.

There are other jobs too, but these ones will keep us busy for a few weekends at least. (!)

Say no to toasted perishables

Dear Californian Biorad peeps:

Thanks for all the free goodies we were promised as a reward for beta-testing some new products. But please realize we live on the very opposite side of the continent, in a relatively rural place (compared to California, anyway), and shipments sent mid-week will NOT arrive in "two business days".

In fact, judging by the flurry of emails volleying back and forth today between shippers, customs brokers, border agents, central receiving and me (-gah!), the perishable items on Day 10 of their transit are probably junk at this point. I hope we all learned a bit more about shipping sensitive goods internationally, because we will likely get a second shot at this very soon.

Changing Seasons

Promo

My bosses are leaving until December. I'm the head honcho as of tomorrow afternoon, when they take off to far flung place (across the ocean). We got tons of new equipment in that we need to organize. The access to it must be regulated in a way that (hopefully) ensures accountability of the students who use it. I've been setting up that junk while learning how to fill out tax forms/pay bills/any of the other million tasks that a small business owner has to do. Thankfully the internet has meant I only need to learn how to do the bare minimum (deposit paper cheques!) because my bosses can do lots of it from wherever they are. Oh, and we moved labs. Again. The construction was supposed to be done in March, we got sick of the noise&dust during the summer and moved to a teaching lab. Of course construction isn't quite done, yet the students are about to descend, so we needed to move into yet another "temporary" space.

Enough about work. At home, the ripening yields of harvest overflow. My arms are scratched up from picking blackberries. I've got a few cups of red gooseberries from my weekend trip out of town. The august apples from our orchard are ready to be preserved into jelly (this time with agar-agar-it WILL set, dammit!). I've made one batch of mustard pickles so far and another will be complete later tonight. Our garden is producing enough green beans and potatoes to feed us several times a week. I'd like to blanch some green beansfrom our garden and freeze them this year to see how that works. I've got ten pounds of blueberries frozen so far, twelve bottles of strawberry jam put away and I'm working on filling my 1 L mason jar with dried spearmint leaves from our yard. I'm hoping they make great tea.

I bought Firefly DVDs at a yardsale for a pittance a few weeks ago and have been watching those for the first time while I muddle in the kitchen. I've read "girl with the dragon tattoo" and "girl who played with fire" in the last few weeks, now I've only got the third book to round out the trilogy.

And finally: the dog got fleas while we were away last weekend and probably our indoor cat too. I've never had to deal with these pet-things before, so hopefully I just need to treat them, wash the dog's bedding, vacuum the floor and be done with it. It is a shame the dog succumbed while we were away...couldn't catch it before it got really bad for the puppy. Scratchy floppy ears. But alas, this is what it will be like having a dog. Better get used to it.

LabTask

Anyone know where I can get a transilluminator for under $700?? Anyone? Anyone?

Crispy

I knew all spring and summer that August would be the craziest month. Great big job-thing the first weekend, combined with a great big family-thing that also started the first weekend (but that has continued).
But the truth is, I have the best tan of my life, I've eaten the nicest meals (local seasonal food so August is key), I've played games, watched movies, read books and cleaned the house on a regular basis. All that stuff that makes me think I have it figured out for now.
We did not trade our summer to the reno list. I am just now starting to become nervous it won't get insulated before the winter, but there are still a few more weeks of sunburns yet.

#97 Patrick Watson / Part 1 - A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.

We share the same birthday.

Albert, not Pierette.