Another house problem, motion-sensor installs, suspended-ceiling replacement
(posted from home)
(this post covers the period 30 November- 8 December)

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Friday, 8 December-
This morning Labashi finished replacing all the suspended-ceiling tiles with new fiberglass tiles. In the meantime I got out the Sawzall and cut two feet off the standpipe for the washer discharge so we can finish drywalling behind the washer-dryer and can mount two more storage cabinets there. Late in the day we drove down to Home Depot and bought the drywall and cabinets for next week’s projects. On the way home we did our grocery-shopping chores at Eastern Market and our local Giant.

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Thursday, 7 December-

This morning I installed the second motion-detector device. This one goes on the pole-light. The idea is that you remove the light fixture, install the motion-sensor device atop the pole, then install the light fixture atop the motion-detector device. This one wasn’t quite so easy as the last one. I had to drill the keeper-screw and use an extractor to back it out and find a replacement screw. But otherwise it was an easy install. That afternoon I installed the third unit, this one solar-powered. This was another super-easy installation but I won’t find out how well it works for a few days. I first have to allow the solar panel to charge up the battery for three sunny days before first turning it on.
That afternoon Labashi and I fixed a long-standing problem with the gridwork of the suspended ceiling in the basement. We’ve had a problem with a few tiles sagging below the grid. The bottom line here was an improper original installation. Each grid should measure 47 x 23 at the opening but some of the openings were as much as a half-inch off on the long side. This made it impossible to keep all the ceiling tiles in place. A close examination revealed that the problem was really in only one row and we could resolve it by cutting one end of the main tees and put in a block from the other ends of the tees to force the entire grid to shift one-half inch in the bad row. That took all afternoon and required judicious use of a Dremel tool for the cutting process but we finally were able to get the right measurements throughout the grid. We installed new fiberglass ceiling tiles in a few rows and called it a day. That evening Labashi was feeling extra-anxious to see her new ceiling and installed the great majority of the remaining tiles.

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Wednesday, 6 December-

This morning I installed the first of the three motion-sensor fixtures we bought at Home Depot a few days ago. This one is very interesting in that the sensor is battery-powered and communicates wirelessly with two remote units. The remote units installed in our flood-light fixtures in less than a minute. I simply unscrewed the bulb, screwed in the remote unit, then screwed the bulbs into the other side of the remote unit. The sensor unit can be mounted anywhere within 100 feet of the remotes. After installation we spent a half hour testing and adjusting the unit and that was it; instant motion-detector.
That afternoon I had a checkup with my periodontist on my latest bone-graft procedure and all looked good. I learned that he has used a different bone-graft material this time and had recently attended a professional seminar where he met other periodontists who had had problems with the old material.
That afternoon I installed a new double-gang electrical box and two duplex outlets to power four new overhead shop lights. These go over Labashi’s workbench in the mud room. That evening I installed three fixtures and their bulbs. They provide a lot of light but after an hour or so I noticed one bulb ‘swirling’. I’ll have to check on that.

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Tuesday, 5 December-

This morning was very cold but I decided to go ahead and ride the motorcycle to Mechanicsburg for my dental appointment, a routine checkup. Afterwards I stopped at the local Starbucks. I noticed an ad in the paper which had a decent price on a fishing boat. My brother and I have recently talked about sharing the cost of a fishing boat so I thought I’d check it out. I rode up along the Susquehanna to the boat dealer and priced a series of boats and motors. But once I got home I realized I hadn’t really seen the right deal yet.
That evening we watched ‘Art School Confidential’, another flawed movie. We were disappointed in this one. It started out well and had lots of talent (including John Malkovitch) but somehow went awry in the second half of the movie. RottenTomatoes gives it only a 35% on the ‘critics tomatometer’. Ebert and Roper gave it two thumbs up but this is one of the times they are off the mark.

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Monday, 4 December-

This morning Labashi and I removed old ductwork and installed insulation in two rows of the basement ceiling. The ductwork had been there for a wood stove installed by the previous owner. We sold the stove last winter after many years of not using it. We couldn’t use the stove routinely because the smoke particles bothered Labashi. We had decided to leave it in place as a backup if we ever lost electricity to our electric baseboard heat system for more than a day or so. But the over-sized old stove was always in the way and we finally decided we could use the propane heater from Mocha Joe as our backup heater. The insulation we installed today finishes off the insulation project for the basement ceiling. We spent that afternoon at Home Depot and Lowe’s buying replacement ceiling panels for our basement’s suspended ceiling and buying three motion-detector fixtures for outdoors.

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Sunday, 3 December-

Today I spent the morning on the web. Later in the day I rode down to Rocky Ridge Park and jogged my ‘end-to-end’ route. Time today was surprisingly good— an hour and 28 minutes. It normally takes me over an hour and a half for this route. Rocky Ridge Park is the site of a Christmas lights extravaganza. I didn’t get to the park until 1500 so by the time I finished the lights were on and Christmas music was playing. Very nice!
That evening we watched ‘An Inconvenient Truth’, the Al Gore presentation about global warming, an excellent film.

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Saturday, 2 December-

Today we found a problem with our house. As part of preparation for drywalling a section of the basement, I pulled back the insulation to inspect the areas where I had repaired some termite damage last winter. The good news is there’s no evidence of termites; the bad news is I found several small wet areas. I had checked this wall for water intrusion during a hard rain last week but apparently it took some time for the water to percolate into the ground to the wall. The amount of water is very small—less than a teacup total—but it will only get worse. This intrusion is the result of the basement wall having been built too low. If the wall had been built one course higher there would be no problem. But at this height it resulted in backfill being placed against our home’s exterior aluminum siding. We spent much of the morning checking out the problem and attempting to identify contractors who might be able to help. Labashi was able to catch two contractors who were working in the office on the weekend and we will be talking further with them next week. Bottom line here is we have to do some serious work outside to provide additional drainage away from the house and we must get the backfill away from contact with the siding.

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Friday, 1 December-

We spent the day assembling and installing six additional hanging storage cabinets in our ‘mud room’ in the basement. These cabinets match the ones we installed on the opposite wall last summer and will allow us to eliminate our open storage shelves and give the room a much less cluttered look. The project went very well but did take most of the day.
I received a nice little surprise in the mail today. It was a letter from my three-year-old grand-niece. It’s a single sheet of paper covered in dramatic pink scrawling. I’ve since learned the highly complex lines represent music. It must be a symphony. Wonderful!
That evening we finished up watching the first half of Season Two of Desperate Housewives. It’s amazing to us how addictive this series is. Just when we’re starting to feel we know what’s coming next, there’s a new surprise.

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Thursday, 30 November-

Today I spent the morning blogging. In the afternoon I did some Christmas shopping and relaxing and reading the papers at Starbucks. It’s tough duty around here.