March 8, 2023 - Blog Response and What I Have Been Fixing Over the Last Week

Thanks to everyone for responding to my blog question. The unanimous consensus was that I should continue the blog by reporting what we are fixing up and changing at the Florida place, the activities we are involved in here in the park, our travels and activities while in Florida, and reporting any RV trips we take in Homer.

So here is what has been going on the last few days:

Last week Kelly ordered a new shower curtain for the shower in the master bath. It was delivered and I was immediately able to put it up because the prior owner had left a new bag of shower curtain hooks. Kelly loves it (which is all that counts). Here it is.

Friday Kelly wanted to get new globes for the sconces in the two bathrooms. We couldn’t find modern globes that fit the sconces that were in place. Kelly found new sconces at Lowes and bought five of them. For the master bath she wanted burnt brown. Before and after. 

For the hall bathroom she wanted brushed nickel to blend with the faucets. Before and after.

After coming back from Lowes on Friday we found a note in our mailbox from the Postmaster. It stated that all new residents had to put a mailbox out at the curb. They would no longer walk ten more feet to use the mailbox on the house. Crazy but true. I found a nice mailbox and post at Home Depot and purchased a bag of concrete to install it. This was a hundred bucks I wasn’t planning on spending but what can you do? I filled out a request to cut down a tree between us and the neighbor. You can see it in the picture of the mailboxes. It is already hanging on the house and needs to go. Here is the mailbox installed, with the required house numbers on the side, and the old mailbox on the house. I'll remove the old one so there is no confusion. Now we are totally legal I guess.

Saturday, March 4th, we hit four garage sales. We bought a few little items that didn’t amount to much. We ended up back at Roberts RV Park to see how much stuff our friends sold at their garage sale. They sold a lot but still had items left to donate to the Salvation Army. Dave and I went to the house and got our empty boxes for them to pack up these items. Upon bring them back the women made short work of boxing it all up and loaded into the car. We then ordered a couple of pizzas with adult beverages to wash it down. We enjoyed our visit.

A small Sunday project was putting a striker plate on the hall bathroom door. Without the striker plate the door would not close tight unless you twisted the knob each time. I have a number of striker plates in Perryville and didn’t want to buy another, so I stole one off the guest bedroom closet door. I’ll bring a replacement down next fall. For the installation I had to do a little chiseling without a chisel. I’ll bring down a chisel in the fall, I have several in Perryville as well.

Another quick project was hanging a bulletin board by the back door. We are regularly getting notes about activities here at the park and need a convenient place to post them. Kelly wants me to make a coat rack to hang under it when we get back home.

My final improvement project for the day was switching the two light switches by the back door. As it was, the first switch as you came in the door turned off the outside motion detector light while the second switch turned on the light in the room as you entered. This was backwards. Now the first switch you reach for will be to light up the room.

Trash is picked up on Tuesdays and Fridays. Tuesday after the trash was collected this is what our trash can looked like:

The can rolls and the handle has been completely torn off. The prior owner had "hot glued" it at one point, but it obviously didn't hold. I thought about making a handle, but I just don't have the tools here to do it. This morning I bought a new trash can. 

Since day one the washing machine has been acting up. It was old and the timer was jacked up. It would stop halfway through a wash cycle, and you would have to remember to go out and turn it back on to finish the cycle. Also, it would not switch to run a "cold' load. We decided to buy a used one. I looked on Facebook and found a used appliance place in Tampa that had used washers reasonably priced which came with a 30-day warranty. I called and they would deliver, install, and haul off the old one for $70.00. Yesterday morning (Tuesday) they showed up right on time and installed the new (used) one and hauled off the old one which looked like this.

The delivery folks were a Mexican young woman and young man. He didn't speak English but was all business about getting it installed and the old one hauled out. She made sure to text me the warranty information. A very nice transaction.

Yesterday afternoon our Michigan friends, who are staying in Roberts RV Park a mile or two away, and Celena, came over for some adult beverages followed by a spaghetti dinner, salad, and garlic bread prepared by Kelly. The meal was delicious. After visiting for a while, we had ice cream with all the toppings and the biscotti I made the day before. It wasn't my best biscotti. It was the first time I ever baked in an electric oven so I need to adjust. They taste good but are a little overcooked. Before they left Jean took a picture of Kelly and me on the front porch.

This morning I was up at 3:30 a.m. I've been having trouble sleeping later lately. I decided to do a load of laundry in the "new to us" machine. I loaded the washer, put in the detergent, and turned it on. After the water filled and it tried to agitate it made a grinding noise you could hear across the street. I just knew it was going to wake Kelly up and I was going to get "a talking to" about that. Something was wrong with the drum or the agitator. I got it to drain but it would not spin. I then had a load of sopping wet clothes to deal with. We do not have a clothesline. The big towel in the load I put outside over a chair to let the excess water drip out. The rest of the clothes I put in the dryer for three cycles to get them dry.  At 8:30 a.m. I texted the appliance lady and told her of the problem. She promptly texted back that she was sorry this happened. They were out making deliveries and would bring us a new machine. Before noon they were here, took out the machine, and replaced it with one that works fine (I did a load of laundry to check it.) This machine even looks better than the first one. You can't beat that for service. 

Last week I bought a two-burner CharBroil gas grill for $32.00 off of Facebook. Kelly thought it was a piece of junk when she saw it because it is rusted at the bottom. I don't care about that, everything down here rusts. It came with a propane tank that was empty. I got a refilled tank and hooked it up. It wouldn't work. I took the hose off the end of the regulator and could hear no gas coming through. I diagnosed it had a bad regulator. I went to Home Depot because online it said they had the exact replacement I needed for $9.95. When I got there all they had were regulators with longer hoses that cost $24.95. I wasn't paying that. I then went to Walmart and found a nice stainless-steel hose and regulator for $15.00. I bought it. I hooked it up and the grill works like new, it just doesn't look like new. All that was left to do before using it was cleaning up the grate. I told "Miss Doubting Kelly" to get out a steak and I'd cook it on the grill for supper. 

Our porch furniture is made out of plastic pipe with plastic rollers. One or two are falling apart or fall off when you lift the chair. 

I hate plastic crap so I bought some metal replacements online. They arrived yesterday. Upon trying to install them I found out that I can't budge the nuts on the old ones, again because everything rusts down here. I will take them all home, cut off the old ones, and install the new ones. When I install the new ones I'm going to put anti-seize on them to see if that helps.

Tonight is the St. Patrick's Day Dance. This will be the first activity we attend in this park. I will report back. Now I need to go fire up the grill for supper!