Independence Day

We couldn’t decide what to do on the 4^th this year since Evan was gone and Erin was working the entire holiday weekend.  We thought seriously about going to a fireworks display somewhere but Erin wasn’t interested.  She wanted to buy some of our own and shoot those off so that’s what we ended up doing.

It turned out to be a wonderful evening for that.  Earlier in the day it got cloudy and rained a fair amount.  By the end of the day the sun had come out and dried things up enough to be able to avoid getting wet in puddles.  This made for perfect fireworks conditions – the ground was moist so that any falling sparks wouldn’t touch off a fire.

We watched the fireworks in Washington DC on the TV and then went outside.  Our box of black powder based entertainment went pretty quickly but we got lucky in that four of our neighbors up and down the street had obviously bought several hundred dollars worth of stuff.  They must have been having parties and everybody brought their own because the shooting started and did not stop for over an hour.  We’re talking big stuff.  We could see big things bursting all over the place.  It was great.

Sunday turned off quite cool for this time of year so I got up early and took a walk around the block.  I was expecting to see the streets littered with the leftovers of the virtual war but surprisingly, everyone had cleaned up and piled all the trash on the curb for the trash man.  There were numerous boxes with labels like “Armageddon Party” and so on.  This made me feel self conscious since I had not cleaned up at all.  I cut my walk short and went straight home to clear off my driveway. 

Evan got home at around 7:00 last night with stories of rain and drenched camping gear.  The van looked like you might expect it to look after four guys had spent a week camping in it.  It cleaned up quickly though.  His stuff is still drying in the back yard and garage.

I love holiday weekends.  I end up exhausted and barely able to wake up and go to work.  There are psychologists who would probably say that that’s due to career burnout and that I should take a sabbatical but I prefer to think that it’s just because we have too much fun on the holiday weekends.  It’s probably moderately amazing that we do so without the use of beer.

 

Architecture Appreciation Day

On our day off on Friday, we decided to head to Bartlesville visit the Price Tower again.  We had done so a couple of years ago but at that time I had not realized that we needed reservations to take a guided tour.  This time we got online and set that up and so we headed north with confidence.

I have a low-level fascination with architecture and so was quite interested in getting the “back stage” view of the Frank Lloyd Wright creation.  I couldn’t help thinking all the way through the tour that although it was really cool, if I had been the patron who was paying for the building, I would have been plenty pissed off by the time it was done.  It was an expensive building at the time and it did not have to be.  Still, the owner at the time was thrilled with it so I guess there’s no harm done.

What struck me about it was the small scale of things.  It reminded me more than anything else of being in an RV.  If you had been a renter back in 1957, it would have been exactly like living in an Airstream trailer.  The furniture came with the apartments for the most part since the architect wanted everything in the building to be self-consistent as far as design went so he simply designed all the furniture, carpeting, and wall coverings.  But the scale of things was quite small.  I don’t see how you could have actually owned all that much stuff because there is no place to put much of anything.  I guess it would have been great if you were single and just starting out. 

Unfortunately, the price tag would have prevented most people who were just starting out from renting; in 2009 dollars, the rent would be about $3000 a month.  In Bartlesville, Oklahoma, that’s a bit of a stretch.

The elevators were custom made for the building and reminded me of the mine-shaft elevators in a gold mine we visited once in Colorado.  Again, they were tiny; four people made it really crowded.  They were not square – more of a trapezoid.  In fact, there is not a single 90 degree angle in the entire structure.

But it was still really cool.  Until it actually got crowded with people, no place in the building seemed small.  It was a place that felt pleasant to be in for a variety of reasons – no doubt that was exactly what the architect intended. 

We ate in the restaurant they have there.  The former apartments are now a destination hotel and the restaurant goes with that half of the building.  Sitting there gave us plenty of time to take it all in and gave us some pretty nice views of the prairie all around us. 

After all this, we headed home to attend a concert of patriotic music at the local community college theater.  The local symphony does this every 4^th of July and it’s quite popular and always sells out.  We had never been and we may have been the only ones there under the age of 60.  It was quite nice though and it was a good way to end a day.

 

Road Trip

Evan left early this morning with his buddies for the Cornerstone music festival in rural Illinois.  He loaded three of his friends and all their stuff into the old minivan and headed out before dawn.  They are traveling with another van containing three girls.

It should be interesting – none of the girls have ever camped before.  I foresee a rough couple of days until they get used to it.

I have mixed feelings.  The van has 109,000 miles on it and I worry about it breaking down although it has never broken down before.  Still, that’s the sort of thing I worry about.  And of course it doesn’t handle like his Accord and I worry that he’ll be surprised how long it can take to stop.  They’re going past the wreck site on I-44 where 9 were killed earlier in the week which is totally irrelevant but which makes me be concerned anyway.  I of all people should be able to ignore unconnected events but I guess it’s normal to be concerned about what your kids are doing.

Last year, they had the time of their lives.  That almost sets up a situation where this year could not live up to the memory of last year.  I hope it’s not that way though – they’ve been planning this for months so I hope it’s all they want it to be.  At least it’s forecast to be cool up there.

 

Life Without Mom

While Mel was in Branson, I’m pleased to say that we managed to eat and get the laundry done in more or less normal fashion.  I had dreams of trying something new on the grill but that would have involved going to the grocery store and I decided that was too high a price to pay considering that it got up to 102 degrees Saturday.  We just ate what we had in stock.

On Sunday I broke one of the commandments by staying home from church and mowing the grass since the temperatures had plummeted down to around 90.  It actually seemed cool.  I wasn’t the only one; the first mower started up around 8:15 and by 9:00 half the neighborhood was mowing and edging.

I had a massive novel I was trying to finish so it was no stretch for me to stay inside and read.

 

Just Me and the Kids

Mel is off to Branson with her mom and sister for a long weekend.  Presumably they will see some shows and eat out; all without the hassle of wondering what the boys would like to do.

We were off to a good start last night as I cooked dinner and Erin had a friend over to watch a chick flick.  Unfortunately, I could have sworn that it was Friday night rather than Thursday night.  Realizing that you have to get up and go to work after you’ve stayed up till midnight watching movies is a rather disappointing feeling.  I guess I can do the same tonight though and then not worry about it.

The temperature is predicted to be about 102 until Sunday so I feel justified in staying indoors and doing more sedate things than yard work.  I will also try extra hard to actually cook something rather than just say “let’s go out”.

 

Impending Vacation

My vacation is coming up in two (and a half) weeks and I’m starting to mentally check out already.  Mel and I realized recently that we haven’t actually left town on a “vacation” in about three years or more.  Her breast cancer treatment occupied one summer and we haven’t gone anywhere since then.  Erin has already spent a week in New York and Evan is spending next week at the Cornerstone music festival in Illinois so we decided to plan one too.

I’ve spent frequent flyer miles to get us to Washington DC and we’ve planned a five day itinerary.  The only cloud on the horizon is the fact that July in DC is, if anything, more hot and humid than Tulsa but that will just have to be as it may.  If we are drenched in sweat as we stroll through the Smithsonian, then so be it.  Nobody knows us there and everybody else will be in the same condition anyway.

I have already arranged tours of everything but the whitehouse and they haven’t gotten back with me yet. 

I really can’t wait.

 

Recent gifts

“The Message” paraphrase of the New Testament and “The Complete Writings of Josephus”.

Now there’s a couple of hard reads.  First I shall tackle a few novels featuring Horatio Hornblower.  I’m not sure I’ll ever be up to reading all of Josephus.  There’s no denying the historical significance of it but the guy did not put a very high priority on “weaving a story”.  It’s kind of like reading the contractor’s blog  for your house construction.  You’re kind of interested and some things stand out (wow, it takes that much drywall?)  but your attention soon fades.

 

It’s Hot

And it’s only mid-June.  It reached about 98 degrees yesterday depending on where you measure and it was 90 in the garage this morning at 7:15 when I left.  The minute amount of food waste that made it into the trash can quickly festered into a reeking, fly-attracting stink-hole which I happily took to the curb.

That’s normally what I would expect to feel in August.  Maybe mid-July.  If this continues, it’s going to be a long summer. 

Generally speaking, we have four seasons here and this hot spell will eventually be balanced out by a mild summer (like we were blessed with for the past several years) so I can’t really complain.  It isn’t like I live in southern Arkansas any more (where my parents used to have to have their house power washed with bleach solution to keep algae and mold from growing on their walls and sidewalks).

But right about now, I’m wondering how much a summer home in Minnesota would cost.

 

Father’s Day

This was a most pleasant weekend.  Both kids had to work on Saturday but Erin was off Sunday.  She lost the charger to my camera while in New York and it’s a strange battery that only goes in that one camera so we had to buy another one.  As punishment, she has had to do the lawn and help me put in an attic stair.  Punish them with sweat and boredom; that’s our motto.  As a result of all this weird scheduling stuff and mixed punishment, I ended up getting the entire weekend off for father’s day instead of just Sunday except for one home-improvement job.

It was very hot this weekend and it’s one of the early summer hot weekends so we aren’t quite used to it yet.  I guess the kids are since they work in it all day every day; especially Evan.  He kind of revels in it like most kids in their teens or early twenties.  He feels like he’s ironman since he can sit out in the heat for hours a day and he’s got the proof in the form of a nice tan.  I, on the other hand, am not used to the heat yet.

While installing the attic stairs on Sunday, I ended up stranded in the attic for a bit longer than expected and almost got overheated.  Not too bad but I know the signs.  I went in for a rest.  Just a bit too much sweating I guess.  Still, it underscored the fact that either I am out of shape, too old for this sort of thing, or just not used to the heat.  It’s probably a combination of all three. 

But apart from that, it was a most pleasant weekend.  I got to sit inside and read some of the books I’ve accumulated over the past few weeks, we went to the gigantic used bookstore to browse, and we all sat down to watch a couple of episodes of Sherlock Holmes during the hottest parts of the day.  I was not asked to help get the laundry done, go to WalMart for groceries, or anything really.  Plus I got the lawn mowed.  It was excellent.

 

Finishing My Way

I don’t follow any of the rules of putting a finish on wood but it all seems to work out OK.  Which goes to show you how important it is to do it by the book.

 And I bought the book too:  Understanding Wood Finishing by Bob Flexner.  It’s a good book but I still break the rules because I’m lazy.  I don’t like to clean up and so I find ways to cut corners.  Like saving my old socks.

Let me back up. 

Generally speaking I like to “seal” the wood first to keep it from absorbing any stain unevenly which makes it look like crap.  I use shellac for that since it dries almost instantaneously.  That supports my impatience habit.

Then I usually have to stain it to match whatever else is nearby.  I use whatever I can find that matches the color – usually something that says “MinWax” on it.  It’s all about the same. 

Then I put something shiny on top of that so that it will look shiny.  I like shiny.  For that I use MinWax Wipe-On Poly.  I like the wipe-on aspect of it because it doesn’t take a brush.  That way I don’t have to clean a brush.  Again…lazy.

Let me make a quick aside on the subject of shellac.  The stuff in stores is reputed to be not so good since at any given point, it may be near the end of its shelf life.  Shellac that is old will never actually dry; it will remain sticky until the end of time.  So I mix my own.  The book says it will take about a month.  Well I say BS to that.  I put the flakes into the food processor and grind them to dust.  I add the alcohol and then put that (with the lid on) in a pot of warm water until the alcohol is near its boiling point.  I then let that stew for awhile, shaking the jar frequently.  After half an hour of that, it will usually dissolve by the end of the second day.  The book says you should strain it after that.  I don’t but I agree that I should.  Anyway…

The book says you have to use the finest brush money can buy when doing all this.  That’s fine but since it’s expensive, you have to clean it and that takes forever.  Plus, the last time I used a brush with polyurethane it produced a bunch of confounded bubbles on the wood that had to be sanded out.  Grrr. So I don’t even use a brush.  I use an old sock to wipe everything on.

The book makes reference to using a wipe-on technique in certain cases but it says to only use a clean, new, lint-free cloth.  They sell those at the home center too and they’re not cheap.  But my old socks, after going through the wash hundreds of times have got no lint left – they work fine.  It doesn’t seem to matter a great deal whether they’re clean or not either.  I keep them in an old trash can that is uncovered and it gets lots of sawdust in it.  I shake the sock off and use it.  I’m not sure what harm wood chips would do anyway unless you’re working on your final coat. 

So I do this:  put on a rubber glove, pull the sock over my hand, pour the finish (shellac, stain, or poly) into my hand and wipe on.  When done, I shuck the glove like a surgeon and pitch it.  Quick work, no brush marks, no cleanup.

I will admit that using something that wipes on, which is typically pretty thin, takes more coats but each coat is so fast that it seems worth it to me.  Especially since I never clean anything – I just throw it away.  The only problem is when I run out of old socks.  But I can always go buy new ones and retire the current crop.  Sometimes I’ll use an old washcloth or dishcloth.  No color has ever bled out of the cloth and onto my projects. 

So there you are.  Wood finishing heresy!