New light shades installed in the dining room.
Mood Lighting
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Author Archives: Patrick Calder
New Year
It’s a new year. You can be anything you want. You can do anything you want. You have nothing to lose. And everything to gain.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
In the Attic
We knew when we bought the house that the attic was in less than ideal condition. But we hadn’t been up there since closing on the house. Since then, there’s been a hurricane, and earthquake, and numerous rambunctious cats; all shaking up the house. So about a week ago, when we went back up the ladder, things were in rough shape. Maybe a third to a quarter of the attic floor was uninsulated. The rafters had once all been insulated and covered in cardboard, but had long since begun to fall apart. There were drooping and fallen panels, and lots of patches of missing insulation. And some of the insulation on the floor had been disrupted during renovations, and never replaced properly.
So overall, it was a half-assed mess.
We first cleaned up what we could. Removing fallen, moldy cardboard and insulation. Pulling down some now-empty panels. And removing rafter insulation over areas we would soon be insulating, so as not to have to do it later when there was fresh insulation in place. We put down some insulation that was still in rolls sitting in the attic. When that was all done, we figured out the remainder we would need, purchased supplies, and finished up insulating the rest of the floor yesterday.
Eventually, we’ll probably remove the rest of the rafter insulation that’s in such rough shape. The current plan involves having the rafters re-insulated using the expanding foam.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Fire Dancer
At Pennsic, the parties apparently used to be much more diverse, and, well, weird. But with age and success, things seem to homogenize. You can basically be assured of a bar, a drum circle, and fire demonstrations of some kind. This picture came from Vlad’s camp, the night of the slave auction, I think.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
let there be light
The house – when we bought it – had an overly large, inappropriate light fixture on the front porch. So it became a low-priority fix, with us occasionally looking at new fixtures. But when we came upon something nice and size-appropriate at the Community Forklift, we grabbed it, and prepared to put it up.
After shutting off the power, we took down the old fixture. Fairly simple… just screwed in. Even simpler than we expected, really since there was no junction box, nor much of anything else. Just a couple brackets screwed to the wall and shimmed in place.
A little bit crazy, but we were taking it down anyway.
The new fixture was going to be ceiling-mounted, rather than wall-mounted like the old one. So we searched for the appropriate placement, and planned on fishing the wires from where they had dropped down to the old fixture, to the middle of the porch for the new fixture. Lots of fumbling around, trying to grab the right lines.
But Heidi noticed something weird. So I reached up and grabbed some lines that were unexpectedly right near the new hole. Pulled them through. Turns out, the line running to the old fixture had simply been loosely tied into a electric line running the length of the porch. (Presumably from some even older fixtures). Just capped and lightly taped, and dumped on top of the wooden ceiling. Again, no junction box.
Well, we installed the junction box, installed the light. Taped up everything. It all looks much better. And we try not to think what else we’re going to find in the future.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Rhode Island Avenue
Seen as I walked off the Metro (subway) on the way home tonight.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Sanding the Mantle
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under the stairs
If you remember, one of the first things we did at the house was have the floors redone. This included removing tile that had been put down in the main hallway. Without the tile, the floor level dropped about an inch, leaving the baseboards dangling. So we pulled them off, and have been touching up the plaster and paint, so we can reattached the boards at the new lower level.
So… when Heidi was scraping the wall by the stairs, she noticed a smell. “Noticed” might be an understatement. “Was assaulted by” is probably closer to the truth. So much so that she ended up digging into the stairs. She was quite certain one of the cats had been doing foul things at the foot of the stairs. But what she found was not quite what she expected.
The first tragic thought was that this was someone’s former pet cat. I mean… look at it. But after getting it out, it was quite obviously a rat. (A big one). And a whole lot rat feces. So friday night became “Clean and scour under the stairs” night. Several days later, and several types of smell abatement treatments, and life on the stairs is much more bearable.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Heidi
A year ago tonight I met this wonderful woman. And now my life has changed in many ways, and I love her more all the time.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
on a platform
“Gare de Lyon” by Jon Siegel
I love this photo. He just nailed the depth of field. The colors and the lighting are incredible. The urban-porn of all these different people going in every direction from the train platform. The single, centered vanishing point. The halo around the girl.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
bad light
You want a horribly colored photo? Stick me in a room with incandescent lighting, and beige walls, and beige furniture. No matter how much I mess with the white balance, I can never quite get it right, under those conditions.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Family Picnic
On my way back from a family picnic in NY. Looking at the photos… my family is so very white.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Earth Time Lapse
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Dragon*Con 2011
Click any photo to see the whole set.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
World War II: Women at War
For the nations who were deeply involved in World War II, the war effort was total, with women volunteering in huge numbers alongside men and filling traditionally male positions at home, in industry, and the military. Women took both active and supporting positions in factories, government organizations, military auxiliaries, resistance groups and more. While relatively few women were at the front lines as combatants, many found themselves the victims of bombing campaigns and invading armies. By the end of the war, more than 2 million women worked in war industries, hundreds of thousands volunteered as nurses or members of home defense units, or became full-time members of the military. In the Soviet Union alone, some 800,000 women served alongside men in army units during the war. Collected here are images of women involved directly in the events of World War II, and some of what they experienced and endured.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Pennsic War
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Natural Disasters
Yes we survived the earthquake. And the hurricane. I’m not so sure about the locusts on the horizon, though.
This street is apparently notorious for the power going out if someone so much as sneezes. This is a big change for me over living further downtown, where all the powerlines are buried. So with the approaching hurricane, we felt a little… doomed.
Knowing something would probably eventually happen, I suggested we go to bed, and try and get some rest while we could. Less than two hours later, at about midnight, the lights when out and the UPS started beeping. We threw on our clothes and went downstairs quickly.
You see, we have a sump pump in the basement, powered by electricity of course. And we have a drain on our back basement steps that empties into the sump pit. Not a good combination in a hurricane. The drain constantly fills the pit, and the lack of electricity means the water doesn’t get pumped back outside.
So we started bailing out water. First into the kitchen sink upstairs. Then after a few different tries, Heidi fashioned a makeshift funnel — out of a Windex bottle — that allowed us to reliably pour the water into an old washing machine drain.
Ten hours. For ten hours, we took shifts, bailing water out of the sump pit, before it couple flooded our basement. Around 10 oclock in the morning, after one false start, the power came back to life. Lights hummed. Hot water started percolating. And the pump was quickly reconnected and began work almost immediately. Even 2 days later, it’s still pumping water out of the basement pit every few minutes.
We’ll be getting a battery backup, and bilge pump, before the next big storm.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Natural Disasters
Yes we survived the earthquake. And the hurricane. I’m not so sure about the locusts on the horizon, though.
This street is apparently notorious for the power going out if someone so much as sneezes. This is a big change for me over living further downtown, where all the powerlines are buried. So with the approaching hurricane, we felt a little… doomed.
Knowing something would probably eventually happen, I suggested we go to bed, and try and get some rest while we could. Less than two hours later, at about midnight, the lights when out and the UPS started beeping. We threw on our clothes and went downstairs quickly.
You see, we have a sump pump in the basement, powered by electricity of course. And we have a drain on our back basement steps that empties into the sump pit. Not a good combination in a hurricane. The drain constantly fills the pit, and the lack of electricity means the water doesn’t get pumped back outside.
So we started bailing out water. First into the kitchen sink upstairs. Then after a few different tries, Heidi fashioned a makeshift funnel — out of a Windex bottle — that allowed us to reliably pour the water into an old washing machine drain.
Ten hours. For ten hours, we took shifts, bailing water out of the sump pit, before it couple flooded our basement. Around 10 oclock in the morning, after one false start, the power came back to life. Lights hummed. Hot water started percolating. And the pump was quickly reconnected and began work almost immediately. Even 2 days later, it’s still pumping water out of the basement pit every few minutes.
We’ll be getting a battery backup, and bilge pump, before the next big storm.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Floors
The first thing we did with the new house was have the floors redone. They’re the original hard pine floors, and seemed to be in generally good shape. But some previous owner had coated them in this gawdawful stuff that sat on top of the boards like a plastic coating, coloring them deep red. And given that they barely managed to make it all the way to the baseboards, where it would start to glop up, I doubt it was a professional application. There was also a marble tile in the foyer/hallways, that stretched back to the kitchen. Just the site off it made Heidi twitch involuntarily, so it had to go as well.
Our initial preparation consisted of pulling up a ridiculously large area of tile surrounding one of the fireplaces. They were obviously looking to cover up something. There was a patch on one side, but beneath the other side, the floor was beautiful. This was quickly followed by the professionals coming in and tearing up the tile floor in the hall. Having seen it all from the porch where I was watching over things for the first day or so, the professional crew (Universal Floors) was worth it . That tile was down good. Glue, screws, etc.
They next came in and sanded down the floors, (uncovering a few new, interesting marks, cuts, and gouges.) Two passes with the big monster belt sander, and hand work along the edges.
We had a couple boards that had previously been patched with something quick and dirty, like maple. Really stood out once everything was sanded down. The flooring people thankfully reclaim wood whenever they can, so they had a stock of old wood to patch in.
Then they finished the floors. Two coats of Osmo, which is a very natural color — no tinting. Soaks into the wood, rather than sitting on top. Feels good to me, though Heidi is still cautious about it. But everyone agrees it’s much better than the old floor.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Starting Out
A few months ago, we started looking at houses in Washington, DC. Heidi wanted to move closer to the city life, and I was happy to move out of my apartment.
Via friend-of-a-friend, we connected with, and quickly came to enjoy working with Jason Kangal (Kangal Real Estate) as our agent. He’d lived all over the city, and been involved in real estate for some ridiculous length of time. He could be counted on to like or ridicule houses without reservation. He kept the stupid at bay, and made the process as fun, educational, and productive as possible.
We found a house. It had potential, a huge yard, plenty of parking, and a tree-lined neighborhood. Despite potential paperwork drama, it all moved through the bureaucracy very quickly. Last Friday, we closed on the house. Tomorrow comes the (hopefully) final move-in. I’m excited. I’m nervous. I’m ready.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!