Worth One Picture

I wanted to do this blog post with pictures, but I keep being busy at home, so I will replace said pictures with 1000 words. I hear there’s an equivalency there.

Further adventures in home ownership!

Project 1: Killing my lawn.

So I’ve noticed that when you put a brick down on the lawn and wait for a little while, when you come back the place under the brick is just dirt. I’ve also noticed that the grass we have in our lawn is a non-native type, and it is therefore pretty hard to keep it alive during hot, dry summers. So I’m trying to kill my lawn, in stages, and replace the grass with something native and easier to manage. The first step is, of course, killing it.

So I went out and bought a big tarp. It’s currently sitting over a patch of lawn in the backyard that is, already, pretty dead. I’m hoping it will get reduced to just dirt so I can get a bunch of seeds and give them a good watering to see how well the new grass will work out. I’ll keep everyone posted.

Project 2: New bathroom!

So after much soul (read: contractor) searching, Jess and I settled upon a contracting company to redo our bathroom shower. Our current shower is just a one-person stall with a tub next to it and a big ol’ closet that we don’t use on the other side of it. And Jess and I like to shower together. That’s right. I said it. I like seeing my wife naked. *What of it?* Also we go exercising together a lot and often need to shower at the same time anyway. So we’re getting the contractor to come by, tear out the closet and the old shower and give us a new shower that is much larger and has two shower heads. Premium!

Well the price was right and the company seems competent and dedicated, so we’re hoping for the best. They cover all the costs except for tile and the valves (and the glass, but that's later), which are aesthetic things that are probably best left to the customer. So over the past few weeks I’ve learned more about tiles and shower valves than I ever thought I would.

The tile is relatively easy. We went to a place called ‘The Tile Guy’ and looked that their selection of tiles, all of which were a lot less expensive than we would have thought. We weren’t sure which kind we wanted, though, so the guy at the store just let us pluck some tile off the walls and take it home to see which we liked best. Very kind of them. Calculating how many we would need, what with extras for waste and edging and the like, was a bit taxing, but I think we’ve figured it out.

Valves were more odd. For one, Home Depot had *nothing*. I even asked. Just some pipes and replacement handles. Lowes had many more, but nothing in the configuration we (initially) wanted. We were going to have one temperature spot and then a ‘transfer valve’ to put it out to one shower, the other shower, or both. We figured out a better scheme where we would have one temperature valve and two volume control valves so we could turn each head on or off as we saw fit. Well as it turns out that configuration, just with the valves and the handles, was going to run us $700. We could have gone around the corner and bought a couple of full shower sets for like $80 each, but for some reason ordering the parts individually was going to run us a lot higher.

Well I was feeling a little down about that until I went home. Ah, internet. Now that I knew what it was I wanted to buy, It was trivial to find it for much cheaper online. Dramatically so. We decided to change our minds again and just put in two separate shower systems, with temperature and pressure controls on each, and finding and purchasing those valves was a snap, and much cheaper than it would have been at Lowes. (Yes, dad, I’ve already told the contractors, they know.) So now I’m pretty much a professional when it comes to shower valves. Go ahead. Ask me anything.

Project 3: Hockey in Vegas (not a real home project)

Tomorrow (Thursday) Jess and I take off for Sin City once again, for her annual “Hockey tournament and meet up with old hockey friends from LA” gathering. Also it’s nice to visit some of my extended family out there, too. It’s always good fun. I know a lot of them, I get to come to the games, and Its always nice to have a long weekend. I’ll put up pictures as appropriate.

Also…I’m quitting Wing Tsun. I haven’t told my Sifu (teacher) yet, but I will tonight, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t read this. It’s a few things, but it’s mostly that Wing Tsun is not providing the challenge, or the exercise, that I want out of my martial arts. It’s all cool in practice, and it has its perks, but the main thing you’re trying to train is your sensitivity. Literally the ability of your arms to sense *very* subtle change and respond accordingly. It’s interesting and fun at times, but that’s not really what I want. I want to sweat, I want to hit things. I need a different kind of challenge. There have been other things, too, but Jess helped me decide on this, and so it’s back to the internet to search for another style to try. I’m hoping to find Judo somewhere. I need to learn how to fall. *That’s* a useful day-to-day skill.

Also, I’m losing weight! This whole ‘eating less’ thing seems to be working out for me. Jess tells me she can even tell the difference. When I got back from Xmas break I weighed 230 lbs. I’m currently around 215 most of the time. And I haven’t been that hungry, much, either. I just have to treat food a little differently and it seems like my body will take care of the rest. I want to go running, again, too. I want to see if it feels any different with the equivalent of a young toddler of weight off my knees.

So, yes, that’s the big news, and I’ve clocked in at just over a thousand words so far. There you go. Enjoy my wall of text, peace and hugs to all.

-N