Monday, June 22, 2009

Busy Bob

Well friends, It's been 6 weeks since my last drivel. Who'd a thunk it!
I've been a busy little beaver at home & at work.
Where do I start?

The ongoing asymmetric warfare between The Bobette & SWMBO continues. The most recent skirmish was over The Bobettes mobile (cell) phone. As with most gullible parents we were sold on the safety aspect of her carrying a mobile. To date I have called her mobile about 3 times, the rest of the time it's just a social networking device for her. She has (I think) lost 5 of the damned things in about 2 years. So after losing the 5th phone we (meaning SWMBO) decided that enough was enough. The Bobette would learn the value of blah de blah if she was forced to live with the consequences of her yah de yah. You know the story.
So we are apparently cruelly depriving her of an essential human right - namely the capacity to get "wat U doin?" text messages at midnight. Anyhoo, after a couple of months of "clean up your damned room" guess what she finds behind the desk? mobile #5.
So The Bobette-with the memory of a goldfish- says "Mum can you buy me some phone credit?"
SWMBO "No. Get a job, I'm sick of financing your social life."
Kaboom - Up it goes again & I'm back in my foxhole with the top of my blue helmet just visible over the edge. I lack the resources to materially affect the outcome, so I'll just try to stop them killing each other and Bear Witness if they do.
Maintaining a neutral position is damned hard, and doesn't endear me to either of them.
Dog help me.

Work.
What can I say? Work is work.
If they didn't pay me I wouldn't turn up.
Nice days, crap days, idiots, villains, poachers & hopeless clowns. Nothing new there.
I snapped this the other day heading into Tin Can Bay - I just liked the reflections.









Handy Bob. I've been busy with a couple of projects .

Where I live is "Flat as a sh!tcutters hat" I have about 20mm fall from the back yard to the storm water outlet on the footpath. We are about 100m west of the dunes in what was Melaleuca swamp before the developer dumped a couple of meters of crap clay fill & built what was to become Chateau Nowhere II on it. The clay has all the absorbent properties of plastic. So whenever we get more than a light rain I get pools in the backyard. No biggie - Labradors like the water, but when it starts pooling in the shed it is unacceptable. So what to do about it? If I just raise the backyard level all of the water will pool in the shed. I mulled over this issue for weeks before accepting that I would have to do something heavy duty.

The drain across the front of the shed slab is self explanatory but note the cast alloy grate. It covers a 300mm square pit that I have cut the arse out of (black disk on cement) and concreted onto a buried 200 litre drum. In the drum is a mains powered pond pump. See the black hose running in from the left? that's 50m of 80mm slotted drainage hose that drains into the pit, but inside that is a garden hose that runs most of the way out to the storm water outflow on the footpath. So the rainwater now trickles down the slotted pipe into the pit, it collects in the drum & every time it rains heavily while I pump out the pool I also pump out the drum. Inelegant, but it works. Installing it all & digging the 50 m long, 60cm deep 40 cm wide trench, laying in gravel, slotted pipe, refilling et al turned out to be a week of work. Doesn't look like it but there you go. It was actually really good spending a week pottering around in the backyard talking to noone. I've said it before & I'll say it again. People suck.


Shed Works B.

When we moved into Chateau Nowhere II, I knocked together some shelves out of some scavenged rough pine, it has done the job but it was only ever a temporary bodge & I've been looking for an upgrade. Thank you Mr. Supermarket - they recently gutted all their shelving & replaced it. So a couple of midnight dumpster dives & hey presto: serious industrial shelving at the right price.

I'm sure the blokes reading are going "yeah right good one" & the ladies are thinking "who cares?" Vive la difference!


Gate works.

Most recent job was the side gate. This is the only vehicle access to the backyard, and it's already pretty narrow. SWMBO complained "the side gate is sticking." So I go on out to investigate. H'm that's interesting. There is no post on the left hand side, just a scrap of fencing timber nailed to the fence. No wonder it's drooping. So I spent Saturday trying to bodge it, but the weight of the gate is bowing the fence, so I need to put in a gate post. Out comes the tape measure, guess what - I have 30 mm from the butt of the hinge to the fence. 30mm! a touch over an inch. Bastards! This is just another example of how the bastard builders who knocked up Chateau Nowhere II spent time & effort on showy features & completely f*cked the dog on standard tradesman type things like painting the sides & bottom of exterior doors properly & sealing the deck timbers. Anyway after wasting Saturday trying to bodge - I slipped into Bob mode & over engineering the problem. I removed a paling & have concreted in a 40 X 40mm gal steel box-profile pipe & hung the gate off that. I poked concrete & reo up the pipe & that connects to the footing. Droop now you bastard! It's a bit of a pity that it poured down rain 10 minutes after I put in the cement & the hole half filled with water. Nothing I can do about it now.
So, I've been a busy Bob. Sorry I haven't got anything particularly worth pondering.
Be well & happy, go the Wallabies.

11 comments:

  1. Roflmao on the foxhole bit. Some truth lays in there.

    Got shitloads of work to do around here to do Mr Handy if you're interested. Sure as hell know I'm not.

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  2. No way I am letting the wife read this, she will see through all my excuses for not doing stuff around the house.

    There's some good work there, glad to see the shed is now secure and dry.

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  3. That's some fine overengineering there NBob. If only dealing with teenagers could be solved with square section pipe and quickset cement. Well, legally anyway.

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  4. Beautiful shot of the water - every one here seems a better handy man than I - no fair!

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  5. Ah excuse me but I got seriously excited about your industrial shelves. Ahem.

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  6. Keeping your head down is always a good idea. Nice save on the shelves. Bloody tradesmen.

    PS you may have meant a carter, the cutter's was a very small denomination indeed.

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  7. Good to read you again, Bob.

    Your home projects look good-nothing wrong with a little overbuilding, since the contractor couldn't bother to do it right.

    Who loses 5 cell phones? And why wouldn't she just use another phone to dial her own? I've done that to find my cell phone here several times.

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  8. Hey NB
    Sorry we missed each other - twice! This litfiesta is a vortex I keep being sucked into. I'm off to sydberg tomorrow, back Monday next week. If you're on your way to anywhere in my direction, call - if I'm around the coffee or bevvy is on me.

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  9. Yeah, the selves were impressive, nice to see that you've occuppied your absence so fruitfully.

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  10. Bangarr, You're right. D'oh

    Dr. Yobbo, I'm sorely tempted at times. To hell with that whole "modern supportive parenting" thing. Bring back silence or the lash. Or silence & the lash.

    Lerm, a good handyman wouldn't have invested the excessive effort & over engineering. If I ever need to storm a defended bunker or seduce a blonde I'll be seeking your advice. H'mm parralels there?

    Hughsey, I'm aiming for last W'end of RB fest, but knowing me I'll lose track & remember 2 hours after the show.

    I was well pleased with the shelves. A PMO that I missed out on part E (of parts A-F)- bit of a bodge with ply & self tappers & she'll be right.
    Thanks all.

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  11. BANZAI, BANZAI!, NAMZAI!m TOP FUCKING EFFORT. I AM IMPRESSED. Steel, mmmmmm I love the feeling of steel in the morning. TOP effort, now, send some motivation and warm effin weather down here will ya

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I was the proud recipient of the worlds first monkeys ass to human face transplant. Friends of the donor monkey says it took well, I'm not so sure.