Spelunking..ugh

I took no less than 44 photos during a recent trip under the house. No, I don't use drugs under my house. These photos here are the glamorous, beautiful cream of the crop. They are small in case you are eating.

This rusty thing I found under the bathroom. It's about 8" long and could be mistaken for a faucet except that, it's rusty and the "spigot" hole goes all the way through. Both ends look round but are actually a hex shape. Perhaps it's a bracket of some sort, maybe for the toilet?











Here, it looks like the bathroom gas heater (radiator?) was installed underneath the sink. Does this mean the house had a wall-mounted sink, not a pedestal? Our inspector did say the white PVC should be replaced with the less-likely to freeze CPVC. Luckily this year it was 29 degrees at the lowest, for about 3 hours. And it was a warm 29.









This photo shows rotted wood torn away revealing a 2-3' length of original mesh and mortar tile floor. Glad to see it's so very supported from below. I don't know how much will be salvagable. I would totally try to find green reproduction tile, or if not, buy a kiln and learn to make it, and then sit there and piece the tiny tiles together. I will not give up my obsessive quest. Perhaps American Restoration Tile would know something.








But here are some newly found hex and black tiles from below the floor, once buried in rubble and now back together with their mosaic tile friends. I bet the green would be prettier if it was sealed. It must be a border to the hex. The tops of the black baseboard tiles had whisps of white paint, possibly making a match to the scored false-tile plaster board pieces in the rubble, also painted white, meaning there was no water-repeling wall tile when the bathroom was built. I think the white subway tile was installed in the kitchen.













And some mischief with a sleeping cat. If we could train her unconscious to hold a pencil, maybe she'll learn to write!

Cornell U Human Ecology Photographs

From up where we used to live, Cornell's library has made available online photographs of their home and institutional economics classes, homemaking apartments (5 weeks of learning how to properly clean and cook and even practice with a real loaner baby!) interior design, nutrition and agricultural fairs. Most photos date from 1910-1945. On their HEARTH website there are 1003 volumes of books and journals, mainly from 1850 to 1925, consisting of the stuff women's days were made like dressmaking, gardening, decorating and chosing colors for your home, and childcare.
From the HEARTH front page:

"Home Economists in early 20th century America had a major role in the Progressive Era, the development of the welfare state, the triumph of modern hygiene and scientific medicine, the application of scientific research in a number of industries, and the popularization of important research on child development, family health, and family economics. What other group of American women did so much, all over the country, and got so little credit? ... We must do everything we can to preserve and organize records and materials from this important female ghetto."
- Joan Jacobs Brumberg, Stephen H. Weiss
Presidential Fellow and Professor, Cornell University College of Human Ecology

Now he can see the racoon stealing his food

Finally, light in the backyard with a new (old) porch light from Oklahoma. It looked a little Gorton's Fisherman on the living room floor but looks great outside.

Also, I discovered our laundry room (mud porch, utility room, etc.) is entirely bead-board on the walls and ceiling, all running lengthwise. It looks like a super pain to strip so we covered it back up with the fiberboard paneling for now. The jagged hole also goes through the kitchen wall. Hm.

Bathroom mystery solved!

When I first looked at the marble chunk, "threshold" crossed my mind but thought, it's way too thick to waste as a threshold, and it's also set in wall plaster. I looked at the marble threshold in my sister's bathroom, c. 1926, 6 blocks away, and realized that I could see rough plaster around her doorframe edge. This morning I removed my modern wood threshold, and under the floor layers was a broken bit of matching marble still stuck to the 1" deep plaster threshold base, and also a gouge in that threshold to match my plaster/marble chunk. Most of the plaster surface is flat even with the hallway wood floor, but below the level of the green and white checkerboard tile. I'll guess because the marble chunk is 7/8" thick, it was probably beveled at the sides. I'd probably trip over it frequently. Perhaps people did and maybe that's why it was removed.

Bathroom mystery

In the crawl space below the bathroom is a big pile of bathroom remodeling rubble. The stuff was probably swept down there while the built-in bathtub was removed during two different remodelings in the 1950's and 1970s, because most of the original checkerboard tile floor is still intact. In the pile are large pieces of sky blue, black and creamy white tiles. The white tiles are probably of the time of the checkerboard floor; they are stuck to a thick mortar base and, although not intact, could be of subway tile proportions. Perhaps the sky blue and black are from the 50's. Also, there is part of an old wooden door frame which could be the medicine cabinet or a vanity.

Anyhoo, during one hasty trip under the house, from this pile I recovered a broken chunk of fat whitish marble, 3x4-ish with a smooth face, securely stuck to a full thickness of wall plaster. There seems to be a very thin line of limey white between the plaster and marble. What could this be? We live in a very modest house, barely 1000 sq ft. I can't imagine a marble sink back splash or tub surround here. The thickness of the marble makes me think it was once a much bigger piece and I should try to find more of it, but even that can't convince me to go spelunking in the bombed-out ditch under the house. I'd rather go to the dentist. I'd rather x-ray the walls to see where the patched spots are.

You Know Your Police are Understaffed When...

they ask your help in searching streets for the gun that was stuck to your forehead, and your missing wallet. Incidentally, yesterday was our 3rd wedding anniversary, and while I went off to buy some buttons, Jason went for his evening walk and was held up five houses down from us. The kids, who did it on a dare and were wearing white!, were caught thanks to a very observant neighbor who called the police before Jason even made it to the phone. Thank you, neighborhood watch! It really does work!

Rather than reform homeowner's insurance, (or fund education or environmental cleanup) our developer-friendly state legislature is trying to lower/eliminate property taxes to help homeowners on fixed incomes and vacation home-owners without homesteader exemptions (which, incidentally bring in lots of money). The missing money cannot be replaced by new taxation and this is creating a crisis in fiscally responsible cities and towns like Jacksonville, where property taxes are our largest source of revenue, $50-$85 million worth. Thusly, the mayor has asked departments to cut 10% of their staff, eliminating public health care, and has instituted a hiring freeze which includes the Sheriff's Office, already low on patrolmen.

This makes neighborhood watches invaluable. I've noticed anytime anything happens in the park across the street, like young kids trying to build a cardboard box camp with a camp fire, or the guy screaming at his cell phone, the police show up in numbers. It is odd to feel people watching from their homes when you walk down the street, but that's the best way, I guess. I do it too but always thought I'm too nosy. We do live near a "home" and the intersection of heavy-traffic roads so odd things and people happen frequently.

I worry about retaliation even though the guy was probably 15 and the detective said he was no thug. I'm nervous to be near the windows at night and well, I never answer the door when I'm alone during the day anyway. I am happy, though, to pay my full property tax.

What I Have Learned but Kept Secret!

Looking through my google keyword log, I've noticed that the phrases directing people to Ralph's House are often phrases I mention but never follow up on. I'm sure this is true for many sites. I feel badly that people are directed here and waste .2 seconds of their time scanning my page to discover it has nothing to do with their issue. .2 seconds adds up! So, here is a list of keyword search phrases which I fear pointed uselessly at my blog, and then all the knowledge I know about anything. Actual information, better late than never?

"can I cover up an electrical socket with drywall"

No. Either cover the outlet with a flat plastic plate to block the outlet, from your local electrical parts aisle (this was done with my 220 wall AC outlet, which is still an active circuit although closed off in the 1980s) or remove the wiring and outlet, then patch.


"cauldron shop"

Try Jas. Townsend and Son, Inc., a great place for reenactment clothing. Also, Smoke and Fire.


"drilling in brick deck ledger" (common)

My bricks were too soft and fragile to attempt hammer drilling, so I dug for concrete-based posts right next to the foundation instead. However, you can rent a hammer drill from a local tool rental outfit. Sometimes they insist you rent a bit from them and pay bit insurance, sometimes they let you use your own drill bit. Either way, for us it would have been $60 for several hours' use. My mom recommends Red Head anchor bolts for concrete block. It involves pre-drilling holes in both the wall and your ledger board. The diameter depends on the type of material you are anchoring to. Maybe your hardware store personnel can help. Trying to hammer nails into your brick wall to make holes doesn't work well. This is a good link for general deck construction info: Hometime - they also have a video from the early 90s called, appropriately, "Decks".



"ralph houses"

Unless this is a fancy term for pub, I don't know of any houses where you can get away with this. Ralph does it weekly, and everyday when she ate that new cat food in the green bag with the commercial of the cat doing yoga. Its color didn't match our wood floor very well. I recommend buying food to match your flooring.


"attatching pergola to deck" (common)

Our plan of attachment is for the deck support posts to be the same posts supporting the pergola joists (see bottom of page). I think the latest Lowe's woodworking newsletter gives directions for a pergola (though a little more complicated than it needs to be, I think).


"decking" (common)

We used pressure-treated yellow pine from Lowe's and HD. Pine is plentiful around here. We couldn't afford to use redwood or spruce or composite. I didn't have a drawn plan, just went by measurements and sort of made it up. I say draw out a plan first.


"missing piece of popcorn ceiling"

Ugh, why would you want to replace a missing piece of popcorn? Take it all down!


"my brick home needs tuckpointed bad"

Tom Silva shows how to do this sometime in the 06-07 season of Ask This Old House. Although I'm fairly certain Kevin calls it "ass this old house".

Yes, you can put your water heater in the attic. It does just fine, and if it leaks, it was past time for you to buy a new one anyway! Naughty!

Fort Clinch

Just to confuse my shiny, geometrically patterned Art Deco dreams, yesterday we went to one of our local coastal forts. Fort Clinch was begun in 1847 and never really finished, part of a 2nd tier series of fortifications built by Congress. It was used in the Civil War and WWII but never saw much action. On the first weekend of every month it's populated by men who talk about the place like they live, eat and work there and do not know the world from which visitors come. You think they're a little cracked in the head, but it's okay. It's fun, and their characters do seem to know about point-and-shoot cameras.

The guy who kept the outdoor fire going was heating and straightening bent window pulleys just like ours, and over the fire in the very hot kitchen was a cauldron of bean and chicken stew. Most of the structures were reasonably cool despite it being 90+ degrees in the open sunlight. On staff yesterday were the jailer, pharmacist/doctor, guards, and cooks.

Shiny, gold!

This is the new light in the dining room. Labor was about 5 hours, doing touch-up paint on scratches, re-wiring (although I skipped re-wiring the little twist knob at the bottom), finding a plate to hang it from, and then hanging. And some more touch-up.

The gold paint was mixed from craft store liquid acrylic leftover from a medieval icon project in college. It has a metallic sheen. The light has 4-5 different shades of gold and amber, so I mixed in raw sienna and raw umber canvas paint to make the colors. It took an hour of patient mixing and painting in thin layers to match chipped and scratched areas to the lovely original brass, green and coppery color. Even though the original finish held up to a soft toothbrush and water, when I tried to gently flake off acrylic errors the first finish came with it in specks, exposing tiny bits of clean aluminum underneath. There was no going back. Then it was covered with two coats of Zinsser spray shellac with a yellowish tinge. The tinge was helpful because the acrylic paint touch-ups didn't have the same translucence of the original "brass" paint. I think there is no finish as beautiful as the aged original; it makes me angry to see the "Professionally Refinished" fixtures on Ebay covered in swaths of solid, bright colors that, at least on fixtures like mine, are nothing like the original, subtle polychroming.

There are companies online that carry replacement porcelain sockets and cloth-covered wire, like Sundial Wire and Savta, but I decided to try Lowe's first. Surprisingly they had the exact same porcelain sockets, and without the hard-wiring, but with a different bracket. Lowe's also had replacement candelabra sockets, for vintage wall sconcery. They didn't have the fake wax candles made of paper for the candelabra (just a note for my future project) or the cloth wire, but I went ahead and bought zip cord and twisted it into a similar look. One of the bulbs is an appliance bulb for now. The existing fan support -which was only attatched to the ceiling plaster, not to the box!- is now attatched to a new multi-use plate which is sandwiched between the light fixture's support and two metal rectangles included with the plate. I removed most of the chain after realizing that chaining it to a hook above the dining table (off-center in the room) looked silly.



Pretty!

Goodbye, 80's Ceiling Fans!

That is, to electric ceiling fans, not to people who are fans of 80's ceilings.
J and I have had little time together lately, but his last show closed on Saturday so we decided to go out on Sunday afternoon. The idea was to walk around Jacksonville's Five Points neighborhood, where our old apartment was, but smoke from the Georgia fires just north had turned the sky the color of peach yogurt. You couldn't see the opposite banks of the river. So we went to Fans and Stoves, a Points antique store instead. While I was looking for an eggbeater and vintage glass bowls for my sister, I saw 3 shelves of old glass bottles. I thought, I have tons of those under the house! but to the right was this light:


I've been after this light for months but never wanted to pay the bidding price. Of the cast and painted designs that pop up on ebay, this one seems the least ornate. Hopefully a future Ralph's House owner might give this one a chance, as opposed to a fixture thickly covered with scrolling flowers, cut-outs, straps and Spanish shields. I wouldn't want to eat below one of those for fear stuff might be falling into the food. Ew!
So now we've set a type of lighting for the house and can start to acquire more fixtures based on this style. What a relief.

House Owner History

The first owner of our house was N.F. Merck, either Noble Frank or Frank Noble. In 1927, he and his wife Marion lived with Horace Merck in the Springfield neighborhood, in Apt. 5 of a building on Main St. next to N.F.'s pharmacy, "Merck Drug Co." My mom, a nurse, became very excited when I told her about Frank, or Noble, but I don't think there is a connection to Merck & Co., (of Vioxx fame) which patented its name a decade before "Merck Drug Co." opened shop in Springfield. Merck owned this house for 5 years. His wife became a saleswoman for a drugstore chain, Lane Drug Co., at neighborhood store #76. It's possible that the Mercks left Springfield so Marion's commute would be shorter, while N.F. probably drove across town. (Maybe he parked his car in the garage footprint!) Merck Drug Co. moved downtown in the 1930s to what appears to be the block of buildings torn down two years ago to build the new main library and contemporary art museum, by Hemming Plaza. Interestingly, the 1927 directory listing for Merck Drug Co. advertised their slogan as "Drugs with a Reputation", which was then the slogan for Walgreen's Drugstores. I found a photo from 1947, four years before the drugstore ended, and the sign does say Merck Drug Co. All of Mr. Merck's previous residences are now parking lots, and in the 1940's he was just a post office box.

The house has since had many residents:

1934 - Vasco and Ethel Geiger, Vasco was a clerk.

1938-1955 - John H. Webb and wife Miriam. John started in lumber, and moved into poultry. He appears to have had the longest ownership.

1956 -1967 - A series of renters. The Webbs no longer live in Jacksonville. There is a different renter in the house every year for at least 12 years, many in the Navy, one a florist, one a stevedore, one who worked for local grocer Winn Dixie.

1968-1991 - The library closed before I could continue in the directories and indexes. Jason says if I keep this up, I'll open a portal to the underworld.

1992-2005 - Agnes Hogan. I'm not sure how long Agnes actually lived here; by the incoming junk mail there have been many renters in the past few years but Ms. Hogan's name has been on the property taxes as owner AND resident. Probably not legally. The house was purchased from her trust by Mr. Hazouri, the flipper. There is a small handful of infamous Hazouris in Jacksonville, one a mayor in the early 90s. I remember my mom snagged him in a parking lot after his speech at a US Navy event to shake hands and voice an opinion. His keepers looked nervous. My hair was unclean and I was skipping school. But I digress.

The first owner next door, in 1929, was JC Rawlins, a cashier for Cudahy Packaging Co.

Also, in the 1800s this southern part of the neighborhood was a cotton plantation.

There are still many more leads to follow, especially with the Merck Drug Store. Was he a black sheep in the American Merck family to be living in this small house, barely incorporated into the city, or a distant relative, or was he unrelated? It's all very interesting, and I haven't dug into any city-owned paperwork like tax or business records yet.

Friday night in the attic

I feel guilty for kicking J out of the bedroom closet (I have a serious pajama collection). I hope I made up for it last night with this temporary light for his closet. Despite him being the primary wage earner, his closet is half the size of the other, and he shares it with holiday decorations and the attic opening. Poor J. Even worse, until we move the opening to the kitchen, everything in his closet needs to be portable for the ladder access.

I was so eager to surprise him with this light by the time he came back from rehearsal last night, I didn't even paint it. The light was $7 on clearance from Lowes, its main benefit being a sturdy wall-mounted arm. I wired it to an in-line switch and plug, which plugs into an extension cord (bad, I know). The extension cord goes into the attic, where the attic light is hard-wired on its own circuit right above the opening. There I screwed in a socket with an outlet for the extension cord. This way, the light and backer plate are completely unpluggable and removable so we can take down boxes and stick a ladder in the ladder-sized closet. This cost the same as those dim battery powered lights from Target. Still, this is a very low-wattage bulb, as lights in tiny spaces make me edgy. We'll get him a permanent, cooler ceiling light when we close this attic opening.

While I was in the attic, I poked around a bit. There are four stacks of puzzle boxes from the 80's and 90's. Lots of Charles Wysocki, and several mystery puzzles, like Murder She Wrote. I also found a Sears receipt from November 1992 for Reebok shoes, purchased by the previous owner, and a punched-brass Christmas ornament of a teddy bear. Then I sat on a joist and just looked around. It was so nice up there on a cool rainy night. Usually I come down the ladder unable to bend my knees because the pants are so thoroughly wet with sweat. But last night it was nice enough to make me want to finish the space! Hot times are coming soon, though, and even nights up there will be 100 degrees. Who needs ventilation? We do! Last week I looked at some local eaves and saw that between every other rafter, two 1 1/2" holes had been drilled about 6" apart, and backed with screen. This seems more economical than drilling holes and popping in those plastic cup vents, although those have larger holes=more airflow.

Wiring your own subway

I have often wondered, as I race around the footstool and couch and basket of newspapers and floor lamp at the farthest corner of the house to answer the phone, why is the phone line installed on the fireplace? Is it so when the fireplace catches fire, the fire can call for help? Was this someone's attempt at wiring the intelligent house of the future? After researching on TOH's website, and here, I decided, I've got wire cutters, I'll go under the house and re-wire. It took the usual 6-7 project hours (never feels like a quality job unless it takes at least 6-7 hours) and two trips to Lowes. Now I have a fax machine in the office rather than on the fireplace bookshelf, and a corded phone on the kitchen wall so I can sit there, like in olden times, and talk on the phone. I made sure to call my mom to tell her what I had done.

Sometime in the past, when a cable-co. person was installing a line for the office, they guessed at the location of the wall and drilled through the living room floor instead. Rather than go back under the house and re-do the hole (oh that crawl space is nasty!) they continued to feed the cable up through the floor and drilled another hole through the wall and into the office. I removed it and paired it up with the phone cable in a correct new hole between studs and then attached a fancy new coaxial/phone line plate to the office wall. It looks like we're high-tech! And I used to be afraid of wiring. I'll use the remaining wall hole for another line in the living room, as it's a central location.

To add these outlets, I mapped out all our wiring. We have 7 phone outlets installed (only two working) and also two boxes with separate electric supplies. The house is only 1000 sq feet. You can stand at one outlet and spit to another. So why did the existing kitchen phone alone need a second phone line? Why pay monthly for another phone line when so many things around here needed fixing? Like, you know, attaching the kitchen sink drain to a drain pipe.

Phone wiring diagram, all non-right angles are the cables, including the one which circles around the eaves (see, no one else wants to go under the house either):














Then I decided to map our electric system in the attic, too, for kicks:
It's like a badly designed version of London Underground. Each color is a different circuit. The red is fabric from 1928, as is part of the blue. There are a few minor things that need to be done electric-wise, like three-way switches. Some people are afraid of sewing machines, I'm afraid of electricity. But I'm getting better.

Free undies!

This morning we went out to mow and fertilize. In the ferns, just where our house meets the neighbor's, was an expensive new but probably used pair of men's white underwear. Our neighbor was locked out of his house at 4AM, probably a little wasted too, what with the window screens down and him yelling, but there didn't seem to be a good explanation for the nicely laid-out lingerie. By the time I realized what fun it would be to take a picture of the renter randomness, the underwear was gone.

I know the deck doesn't look so 1920's. Some may say the railing appears out of scale or too busy. Sometimes I like it, sometimes not. If only I could have Martha Stewart 1928, on call to answer my questions about lights and cabinetry and plants and dinner. I do tons of period research, but I hardly ever look at it. The research is more fun than planning the project. And I'm encouraged to be an impulsive shopper, although I move like a snail when making decisions.

However, the pine will only last 15 years in our climate (ooh, even less if a hurricane comes along! not that I'm asking), and then something else will go up. Besides, the deck rail is good practice for the eventual front porch railing, which will have wider, flat boards, closer together.

I have good pictures of a pergola, for the deck extension, from 1928. I will follow the picture this time. That helps me feel I'm making progress toward restoration rather than just adding on. And because our brick was too soft to attach ledger boards to, the only alteration done to the house was to knock out the top two steps, which were cracking up anyway. My theory on restoration is to only do things which won't cause future loss (i.e. cracks in the foundation) and can be reversed. Pergola:

Wow, I want a house for $696. Elmhurst #3 (top right) is most similar to our layout. Looking at this now, maybe beefing up the posts (hee says the vegetarian) will help my deck, and perhaps by adding more balusters? And window boxes with cascading vegetation. Totally. Or what if this car was parked in front of it?

Nearly a year in the house

So it's about time I fixed what's been bugging me since before we moved in: the popcorn ceiling. Actually, it's more like sprayed-on, chewed-up oatmeal. It's just awful, especially when I go into houses our age and older, and see beautiful, smooth ceilings. Or even textured ceilings with patterns. It's nauseating lying in bed looking at it. If I had known how easy it was to remove it, I would have done it long ago. Now, I know it was applied in the 70's or after, because it covers the drywall which was applied to cover up the wall and ceiling cracks when the house went through its massive exterior face lift. However, I have not had it tested for asbestos. I don't necessarily recommend doing this without testing.

Recently, sections of it were loosening above the oven because of the steam, and I thought, water! Water took down our plaster when the AC unit's drain plugged (a few days after we moved in) so why not use it to loosen something attached to plaster? I squirted water in 2ft. areas on the ceiling with a spray bottle, waited about a minute, and used a spackling knife to peel it off in large sections. It didn't really drip while I was waiting, it absorbed so quickly. It peeled very easily in sheets and the new surface is nearly smooth because it was previously painted with enamel. This might be the stuff you can buy in five gallon barrels at HD; it seems like little smooshy pebbles encased in drywall mud. Or someone decided they didn't care for their oatmeal breakfast and spat it at the ceiling. Whichever. The recent layer of latex paint seems super important in the process; it holds water inside the oatmeal and helps the stuff come down in sheets rather than clumps.

Since the ceiling underneath is not entirely flat, bits of the mud-like stuff (plaster?) remain in divets on the enameled sage-colored ceiling, causing a splotchy look. I'll paint over it. It's very nice! I'd rather see the cracks in the ceiling (and fix them properly) than look at this stuff!

Steps to a happier, healthier deck

Because, who wants to fall off the deck?

The balusters were cut as one piece.











This Old House #2615 described how to frame the balusters with lath and then mount them on the rails, rather than toenailing. Instead of staples, I used 1 1/4" self-drilling screws in my lath. These screws also secured the lath to the top railing, from the underside.













The bottom railing is screwed into every other baluster from the bottom, with 2 1/2" deck screws.














View from the underside, attatching rail to post.















This may happen to our deck someday.














Please take this cat home with you. Not only is he pettable, with parti-colored eyes; he now has carpentry skills.

A month of events

The irresponsible and overwhelmed neighbors with the five kids (+ a new baby) moved out!! They left approx. 70 cubic feet of trash on their front lawn (all weeds anyway) which for three weeks has been steadily rained on and picked through by passers-by. The tenants threw out all their furniture, matresses, beds, and piles of cardboard boxes with junk inside. Last weekend they came back from their new digs and replaced interior hollow-core doors, and painted, and also tossed a dishwasher (they must have brought it with them from their old house?) As delicious icing on this tasty cake, an hour before the end of February they jumpstarted their mini-van with the flat tires, parked on the street since July. Goodbye!

I observed all the action while building the deck railings. There is one more railing to go, and then onto phase two, continuing around the side of the house. I was dumbfounded on how to build railings; I hate toenailing because I always split the wood, but then I saw an episode of This Old House's Boston House in which Tom rebuilds an old railing. I'm glad I decided to go with a common railing, anything fancier would have been even more frustrating with the bizzaro stair angles.

That white and brown tail at the bottom of the steps is another thing the neighbors threw out, literally. His carrier was also in the trash pile. He's very, very sweet, and has one blue and one green eye. Anyone need a great cat?

John Quincy Adams and Ralph did this to Ralph's pirate toy. They pulled down his pants and tore his brains out. I can't find his eyes. Sounds very piratey to me.

Some ugly photos!

We don't use the fireplace very often, only twice this winter, and when we do, it's with a candelabra and some pillar candles stacked on bricks. Browsing through the Lehman's catalog, I saw this, # 600 Castable Refractory Cement, meant to replace missing firebricks. The product claims to last five years, so I might try to source actual firebrick and then use this to patch around the brick. Since our chimney is also uncapped, (what were they thinking??)I found a top-damping chimney cap . Most of our house improvements are DIY, but I don't know if these additions would make me comfortable enough to really use the fireplace. Having a hose and bucket handy may make it mentally easier in learning more about my fireplace while it burns. And of course, the whole thing needs to be cleaned and professionally inspected, & trees pruned back.

Continuing on the theme of "free", none of this is, but I'm sure it is much cheaper than having a professional insist it's entirely failing, not that it is at all, and is $4000 in repairs. Human beings have had fireplaces like this for several hundred years. In areas without a mason, handy people had to figure these things out for themselves. Why couldn't we attempt to improve the situation ourselves with lots of research and product assistance?

Here is the clay lining. The dark stripe is from today's rain. There is water damage, obviously.










There are several types of firebrick in the box. The Stevens Volcano (H. Stevens & Sons Co., Macon, GA? **see below) seems to be more brittle. All of the mortar, especially in the liner, should be tuckpointed, if not redone.














See? we do have a brick house!














Water damage, from open chimney. We have soft, water soluble bricks all over our house. Again, what were they thinking? This was built around the time of the stock market crash-maybe that's the reason?














**November 15, 1927 Atlanta Constitution
Milledgeville Pottery Plant Damaged by Fire; $50,000 Estimated Loss Milledgeville, Ga. Nov. 14 (UP)
"Fire which started from a stove in the molding room of one of the plants operated by Stevens, Inc., at Stevens Pottery, nine miles from here, partially destroyed the smaller plant owned by the company. The loss is estimated at $50,0000 by Walter S. Stapler, president of the organization. Stevens, Inc., which is owned and operated by heirs of the late W. C. and J. H. Stevens, manufacture firebrick at their two plants at Stevens Pottery. Mr. Stapler said that the fire will not materially affect the company as the larger plant was not damaged and plans will be made for the rebuilding of the destroyed plant as soon as the board of directors can be convened. The company has its own fire apparatus and firemen were at work soon after the flames were discovered. It was only due to the work of the employers who aided in fighting the fire that the damage was not greater, Mr. Stapler said. The building was partially covered by insurance. "

Ralph!

Of plants and sinks

There hasn't been much going on at Ralph's House in the last 2-3 months, except for great new back steps and hooks I installed in the laundry room. Not nearly the progress that would be if money and health were normal. Especially money. It's better to be sick when there is enough money to buy basics, let alone get me a lovely new router table with 3hp motor and shaker cabinet door/45 degree joining bits.

So we'll focus on free things for a while. This is the butterfly garden I planted a few months back; now it's nice and overgrown. It has purple Swedish ivy, sweet potato vine, yellow moss roses, a leggy plant with striated leaves and tiny white flowers which the bees love, irises and random marigolds. It hasn't attracted any butterflies, but it has attracted bees, lots of them, where there were few before. Subsequently, we've had lots of tomatoes and bell peppers this winter, 3x more than in the regular growing season. Last week I made tomato sauce with a pound. I think I'll keep this plot around. It makes the vegetable plots and compost look more attractive.

Parsley loves mushroom compost.


The NY Botanical Garden grounds are free on Wednesdays. They say they have 90563 vascular plant specimens. When I went up last week to move my sister to Florida, we visited. How do you make these things in miniature for a tiny corner-yard?
























The bus from LaGuardia passes Demolition Depot, so we got off and looked. $$$.
















Since dreams are also free, this is my dream kitchen sink! I want to acquire one before starting the kitchen cabinets. Here in the south, it's harder to find the salvage you see in the north and midwest. Here, new construction is far more popular and old building salvage gets put in the trash; when you do find stuff like sinks, stoves, doors, it's silly overpriced or in very bad condition, usually from rots, rust and other water damage. As in many towns, lots of early 1900's stuff was torn out in the 60's and 70's, from cabinets and plumbing (my house) to entire Henry Klutho buildings. Currently, Florida is besieged by developers razing swamp ecosystems, farmland and trailer parks, and the Jacksonville City Council seems pretty susceptible to their needs in the name of slick progress, similarly to what happened here in the 60's. Without the internet and vigilant citizens' groups, much of the historical buildings that give downtown Jacksonville its character might have been razed in the name of building a glossy new downtown. I think true progress and revitalization in a city involves embracing history, rather than just building 10 new highrise riverfront condo structures to bring in the winter tourists.

Anyway, in looking for this sink on ebay, as I've been doing for 7 months now, all listings have been in Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Michigan and the like. I kick myself every time I see a listing in upstate New York, where we used to live. If only I'd been psychic!

O-o-oh who are the people in your neighborhood?

Speaking of creepy residents, a few weeks ago I was a block away (thankfully in my car) approaching a left turn in front of the train tracks. A hefty man with lots of jewelry crossed to the left, and walking 15 feet behind him was a tall, inconspicuously-dressed guy. He crossed very slowly in front of my car as I stopped for the turn, all the while looking at my car. I thought, "maybe he has my car, too!" because I always stare at my car when I see versions of it around town. But then, he paused at the left curb and turned to face me, then followed my face as my car made the left turn. Then he picked up where he left off, walking behind the first guy as they approached a convenience store. Weird! I made up several possible stories for them. Man and bodyguard? Stalker?

A block in the other direction is a main street in the neighborhod, though only two lanes wide. Many afternoons there are two girls standing on the corner, usually smiling and talking, while two guys stand across the street, looking more somber. Hooking? Easier done in pairs?

One morning soon after we moved in, I was getting in my car and saw a young guy, about 14-15 years old, on the street after our pocket park. He wore a dark hoodie, with the hood pulled up. I changed my route to drive past him, and he didn't hide the fact that he was looking in windows. I drove down to the main intersection for our neighborhood, waited for Amtrak from Miami to pass and made a right to circle back onto my street. Sure enough, the guy was standing at the end of what we'll call my driveway, looking into my backyard. I pulled up 4 feet from him, got out of my car, and went inside. He pretended not to see me and slowly ambled on down the road, eating cheese puffs.

We live a block down from a very poor "home". It has a tall chain link fence and the group of hundred-year-old houses are peeling but the grass is always mowed. In afternoons its gate is left open and people, mostly men, wander out, down our street. There is one man, who likes to stroll down the street, right up to where people are working in their yard, or walking their dog, and he immediately turns around and walks the other direction. A younger man about my age walks around the neighborhood yelling "WHAT!" There is also a couple who likes to lay in the park or right outside the home's fence, and make out.

So there, stories of people from the neighborhood. A cop lives three houses down from us, and I carry a cell phone, so I feel reasonably safe, but for months our ditzy new next-door renting neighbors let their pre-school son run loose. I caught up with him once down by the train tracks and talked him back with the promise of petting the fluffy kitty on our porch. A few minutes later, his father roared up in his car at the corner and yelled "git in the car!" to this kid, a mentally disabled 5-year old. I think the family found a lock for their door, thankfully. I debated calling child services but figured this newly-formed family of 7 had enough to worry about. The father is military, too and I'm sure the intrusion wouldn't have been nice at all, but maybe not as bad as losing his fiance's child. I'm glad they worked it out.

It's cat-on-a-post. The fireplace window is her favorite entrance. From there she watches me open the front door and call her, but won't move until I move the plants and vases and open the window above the bookcase. I'd been wondering how she got up there. Guess I can't cut off the excess post now.

Railing

Our house is plain on the outside; all the brickwork and original stucco is hidden under the 70's stucco, and most of its limited period woodwork was removed with the installation of new electrical service and also when the stucco was put on and porch rebuilt. A passing neighbor commenting on the improved state of the yard even mistook her 1940s house as older than mine. We look like more like a run-down house rather than the more charming run-down bungalowesque house. Because of this, I'd like to have a different deck railing, that didn't look so everyday. Not only is it a deck, it's also our back entrance.

I think this Chippendale bench pattern would be nice as a deck railing, but slow to piece. I also wonder that if I made it, it would become convex and net-like, if one leaned against it.

Pockets of trellis squares framed into the railing?



The eventual pergola will give it some character too, but it won't be visible from the street.