So... What are YOU doing? - Part 8

[tango]

Christmas Eve fun for me is likely to look like taking a wrecking bar to some featherboards and maybe, if I feel like I can cope with the excitement, filling some gaps in the wall with cement. They are currently stuffed with fiberglass so it's not like it's a major problem if I don't get to it.

I also need to figure out how to cut through some cast iron pipes. I don't think I can remove them without using extreme violence against them - in an ideal world I could unscrew them but I think they are far too old for that sort of finesse to work. I'm not sure what I'd need to use to break them apart. I sense a trip to the hardware store in my immediate future....

 

[Lamb]

Took a couple short walks already, got my husband's birthday cheesecake baked and need to make the bread pudding before I go to bed tonight.

 

[tango]

The pipes resisted anything even remotely resembling finesse so I took a trip to the hardware store. A "thick metal" cutting sabre saw blade later, and the pipes gave up the ghost. I was really rather impressed how fast the blade ripped through the pipes, although cutting it ripped through the batteries that power the sabre saw pretty well too. Now I've got space to get at the assorted trim etc behind the pipes.

The pipes are so close to the wall they wouldn't allow any meaningful insulation to fit behind them, so they had to go. The room above, where they fed a radiator, also needs insulation so the radiator will need to move a few inches away from its current location. Trying to get the elderly cast iron pipes adjusted to move a few inches is far more work than it's worth, when I can run PEX pipes under the floor and feed them through somewhere more sensible. What I'd really like to do is have a whole bunch of pipes fed up through a single boxed in section. It would be really nice to have a bank of valves so any individual radiator could be isolated and drained if required, without having to shut off the entire heating loop. The valves that offer that sort of functionality are a bit spendy but against the total cost of everything they aren't so bad.

Now I can press on with ripping featherboards off the wall and sealing drafts as I find them. Today's work so far also included an awful lot of cleaning up messes and shifting stuff around. Now I've got a big stack of salvaged wood in the basement. Much of it is likely to get cut into small pieces and given to my friend for fuel but some of it looks like it could be reused for something more productive.

I'm thinking I might take tomorrow off. It's been good ripping all this stuff apart, it's good to have my mojo back, but a day off at Christmas doesn't seem like a big thing

 

[Confessional Lutheran]

Busy feeling blessed at the moment. Came home awhile ago from The Nativity of Our Lord Candle Light Divine Service. No Communion, but we did have a regular Divine Service and we lit the candles and passed the candleflame to others to the strains of " Silent Night." Pastor's Message tonight was absolutely beautiful. It dealt with the Gift that the Lord gave us in the Birth, Life, Death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ. What better Gift is there than the Gift of Our Lord? What can beat forgiveness and eternal life? Maybe this Gift wasn't seen as such by the Blessed Virgin and her husband, Joseph. Consider how they had to trudge 80 some odd miles from Nazareth to Bethlehem so Joseph could do his civic duty and register for a census. Sometimes God calls us to travel for Him. To live in exile for Him. To die for Him.

How wonderful are the rewards for doing so, though! As we travel, we take our faith with us and share it with others. We witness with our own life's blood the Life Blood of the One Who was crucified, died, was buried and rose again for us. As we celebrate the Christmas season, we know that only a few weeks will separate the Feast of the Epiphany from that of Lent. This is a time for joy and to remember that the Lord keeps all His promises. As Jesus Christ came to us to save us from our sin, He will come again a second time to usher in a New Heaven and a New Earth. Such a wonderful message tonight. Merry Christmas, you all!

 

[Naiwen]

Merry Xmas all! How are you? Today, since it’s Xmas, just playing some games on my phone before rocking myself to sleep tonight.

 

[Lamb]

Merry Christmas! My daughter will be here this morning so I need to start preparing.

 

[Confessional Lutheran]

Merry Christmas, one and all! I'm listening to this at the moment. Don't speak a lick of German, but the tunes really are beautiful for a Christmas morning.. Praetorius - Lutheran Mass For Christmas Morning - YouTube

 

[tango]

Merry Christmas everybody!

I'm taking a day off the heavy duty wrecking but couldn't take a day off fixing stuff completely, so just got done fitting a door sweep to an external door. We had a bit of a draft coming in underneath it, and now we don't. That's probably about as heavy duty as I'm going to do today - a quick session with a hacksaw and Stanley knife to trim the sweep, then six small holes drilled and six small screws applied.

 

[Naiwen]

Happy weekend all! How are you? Today, I’ve just had leftover pizza with lemon iced tea for lunch. Tonight, just playing some games on my Switch before lulling myself to sleep.

 

[Lamb]

Lots of things to do today...first of many loads of laundry in the machine now. Making another pizza for lunch

 

[tango]

After my day off wrecking yesterday I think today is going to consist of breakfast and then a return to the wrecking. Truth be told once I've pulled the last of the window trim off and sprayed foam into all the gaps that will probably be about it for the time being, at least in this room. I may end up pulling down a part of the ceiling so I can get at the floor joists above and spray foam around those, but then it will be time to resume normal service in the other rooms and think about how best to rebuild rooms rather than continue wrecking stuff.

What I really want to be able to do is put a doorway between the two sections at the top of the stairs and get the staircase on the other half taken out. That way I gain two bedrooms and a bathroom, which means I can move everything out of the guest bedroom into the two new bedrooms and gut the guest bedroom. Gutting the guest bedroom should deliver some more wins as far as overall sound proofing is concerned because it will mean I can get at the floor joists and where they are supported in the exterior walls, spraying foam to seal holes as I find them.

What will probably happen is that I'll put the door between the two sections, continue to wreck and rebuild using the other staircase while keeping the door locked (this makes it much easier to get stuff in and out, without having to constantly dodge the cat), then take out the other staircase and turn the upstairs space recovered into some kind of closet and then take the door out of the doorframe because it won't be needed any more.

 

[NewCreation435]

I changed sensors on my cgm this morning for the first time by myself and charged the transmitter. I'm proud of myself that it appears I did it right the first time

 

[Confessional Lutheran]

Ruminating on the events of St. Stephen's martyrdom. St. Stephen’s Day in 2020/2021 - When, Where, Why, How is Celebrated? (holidayscalendar.com)

 

[tango]

I got the beam pulled off the wall and some of the ceiling pulled down. I've revealed a nasty draft, I just haven't figured out exactly where it's coming from. Tomorrow might see the application of copious quantities of spray foam....

 

[Naiwen]

Howdy morning all! How are ye all doing today? Today, I’ve just had leftover pizza with lemon iced tea for lunch again. Tonight, just enjoying my usual TV show before hitting the pillow.

 

[tango]

I got some more ceiling pulled down and most of the feather board removed. I've exposed a draft, I just can't figure exactly where it's coming from. I think I've still got an air gap between the floor joists and the brickwork, where the joists rest in gaps in the brickwork I think I've got a small section that I missed with my foam gun. I'll need to pull down some more ceiling, get my air compressor in there to clean out 90 years worth of accumulated crud, then get my cold weather foam to fill everything in sight. Hopefully this will mean it doesn't drop below freezing any more, in the cupboard that has water pipes in it.

 

[tango]

Lots of ripping and breaking today.

I didn't get the air compressor into play, I was busy pulling down drywall and cutting old pipes. I found a couple of pipes I didn't expect but after following them it turned out they are long since dead pipes. One end of them is now cut out and removed, tomorrow's task will be to cut the remainder of them away and get rid of them. I found a good size gap in the brickwork behind the drywall which was letting in a good flow of cold air, so stuffed that with fiberglass pending getting into everything with some cement to seal it properly. I got a load more wood trim around the ceiling removed, and a load more drywall stacked up ready to go out. Now I have about four bags full of the stuff, with each bag probably weighing around 80lb.

I signed up for a different garbage service so I'm thinking I can get a garbage can and put a load of drywall out each week. If that will work it saves me going to the landfill, it just means I end up with a stack of drywall that takes me two months to get rid of, a little at a time. I'll call them in the morning and find out.

It took a surprising amount of time to get the nails out of the pieces of wood I'm thinking I might keep and try and use later. Even when I'm cutting wood up for firewood I like to get the nails out, it makes it so much easier to carry around when I don't have to constantly watch for sharp nails. It also makes it easier to cut up because I can just run it through my miter saw rather than having to check with every single cut to make sure there aren't any nails. Now I've got another stack of wood in the basement and I can get at my power saws again. That's always a good place to be, I don't like having my saws covered with stacks of wood.

 

[Naiwen]

Yo sup there man all! How are you today? Today, I’ve just had my usual weekly 3 hours therapy session both online and by phone. Tonight, I’m indeed really way too exhausted to do anything else but rest in bed before hitting the sack.

 

[Lamb]

Going to get some things this morning and then learn how to use my new air fryer.

 

[tango]

Not a good night for me last night. I think I should probably have worn my respirator yesterday - not a whole lot of dust floating around but enough to dry my nose out, which meant I had to breathe through my mouth, which meant my throat dried out, and I kept waking up.

Today there's still more work to be done in there. A couple more pipes to cut off and remove (I hope I can get at the stubs in the basement but it's not a disaster if I can't). More drywall to pull down. More stubs of wood to cut out, since they are nailed into place such that finesse isn't going to get me anywhere. Then foam to spray, cement to mix and apply, and I'll probably look to cut some wood struts to replace the ones I'm ripping out to get at the beams. I don't think they are doing anything in particular but I'd rather play safe and put them back than rebuild everything and only then find out there were important.

Knowing this house it's possible their only purpose was to deflect the drafts around to make them harder to isolate, you never know.