Sep 23 - some things work, some don't

Shall we start with the things that do ? Well, last June just before we were leaving, our relatively new dryer quit. It was coming up with error code E68 ... which I researched and concluded that I had to replace the control panel. Since we were just about to leave there was no time.

When we got back this time, I turned the dryer breaker on and Sandy ran a test load -- some of Abby's towels -- and the dryer worked fine. Ok, perhaps it was too light a load ... but it's worked fine ever since. Did it just need a break ? Who knows. At this point it's still working and ours is not to question why.

Yesterday was errand day. Sandy and I went to Ace Hardware to get some door trim and baseboard. She had decided that she wants a plainer-profile trim on the inside of the master bath, different from the trim on the outside (in our bedroom) which of course should match the door trim elsewhere in the room. Ace carries this profile, which is actually a fairly old design. Well, they had one piece of the old stuff. I needed three. They sent me next door to a lumber yard and lo and behold, they had the stuff. I got three pieces of that as well as three pieces of plain and we headed off to our next destination.

Further down US 1 was the plumbing place that Sandy had settled upon for getting all the pieces for the two bathrooms. Holy crap you can spend a lot on plumbing. I had not thought much about it since the cost of plumbing (finishing plumbing) was buried in all the other stuff we were buying for the cottage ... but we'll spend as much for plumbing as we are spending for custom cabinetry for the master bath. The Moen catalog is huge with all the options for the stuff that you see and the stuff that you don't. How can there be so many options for the visible part of a shower control ? Ok, I can understand different look and feel ... but why are there so many options for the behind-the-scenes stuff, i.e. the matching brass valve that's behind the wall ? Like the dryer working, ours is not to question why.

There were two guys in this small shop servicing customers, going through catalogs etc. A queue was building so I suggested that Sandy let Anthony complete his part of the "project", i.e. ensuring that all the pieces matched properly, without us there and without people wanting his attention. I could tell that some quiet time was required to ensure that we were ordering the proper parts, once he understood which styles we (aka Sandy) wanted. Later in the day he called and faxed the completed line-up to us so that Sandy can confirm.

One tub, tub spout, control & matching valve, sliding shower bar and head and "L" for the guest bath; shower control with diverter, shower arm w/o head (I have a head that I like), sliding shower bar and head and "L" etc. and we're finished with that. Jeff will do the installation when they do the tiling. This is one time when my only role is to pay the credit card bill. I'm not sure that I tagged along to the plumbing place other than Sandy wanted me there.

Back home we dashed from car to house since it was pouring rain. I pulled out the yellow pages because I wanted to check into marinas where we could leave the boat, rather than leaving it in our yard. Vic -- of "Designs by Vic" leaves his boat at North Causeway Marine. He calls them 1/2 hour before he needs the boat and they put it into the water. There is another place right beside them that offers the same service. While at our place the other day confirming the cabinetry for the master bath, he'd called them to check on availability and arranged that I'd talked to Tara.

We went over to the two places and looked them over. The one has spare spaces -- outside, not inside, both dry and wet. I was not impressed by the woman to whom we talked. At North Causeway -- ah ha -- this is the place where I'd taken the Boston Whaler a couple of years ago when it conked out on me -- we talked to one fellow who said that we'd just missed Tara, that she'd gone for lunch. We looked the place over. They have this huge, no humongous, fork lift with which they move boats up to 26' long on and off racks way overhead inside and outside. Quite a secure setup, this would be ideal. I said that I'd call her later. We left for home.

I dropped Sandy off at home and I headed over to West Marine on US 1 with my small shopping list -- anchor, fire extinguisher, bumpers and trailer light connector adapter. I looked over the adapters -- I needed one to go from the standard SUV connector on the X5 to a flat five pin, vs the four pin that I already have. The five pin accommodates the surge brakes on larger trailers somehow. They had the adapter -- a fancy rig with coiled heavy duty rubber cover, at $75. That was ridiculous, in my opinion, and I resolved to look around. Bumpers were $28. Am I going crazy or is everything overpriced ? Anchors were ... expensive and too many options. I need an anchor, of which there are a variety of styles and sizes, chain and rope. A complete package "deal" is $175. Fire extinguishers come in different sizes and purpose. By then I was tired of shopping. I tire of shopping easily. I left.

Ok ... what next. Well, there is an auto supply place similar to Pep Boys -- Advance Auto Parts -- which is a chain -- located close to my way home, and I headed there. Ah ha, they have the trailer connector adapter for $15. Now we're making progress. Ah ha, they're out of stock. It figures. I've shopped here before for a light and ran into the same problem. So I headed south on US 1 knowing that they have another store 2-3 miles away. I'm in luck; they have the part; I also buy a trailer lock.

Back towards home, I headed west on SR 44 to Wal-mart. I need a new Sonicare toothbrush since the one that I brought is refusing to hold a charge. I have had two die now, but that's because of the vintage. Disgusted with the process I decided to try a 2xAA battery version. You can always find AA's, rechargeable or no, and don't have to mess around with device-specific chargers or unit replacement and battery disposal. While there I checked out their marine stuff and bought dock ropes, anchor rope and chain, looked at their "lifetime" $10 bumpers and rejected them, checked out and headed back towards home with K-mart as my next destination. Wal-mart had anchors ... small ones ... no, I'm not anchoring a kayak.

At K-mart they too had small anchors, "house and garage" fire extinguishers in their boating area (???!!!), and nice $20 bumpers. We're getting there, but no fire extinguisher or anchor yet.

On the way home, since I'd decided that I needed to talk to my boat dealer and ensure that any anchor that I purchased would actually fit in the anchor locker, I headed towards the boat launch on the north causeway to check it out. The one that we normally use is under construction and on the other side of that little inlet is another launch that we'd be using during the construction period. I didn't want my first visit be when towing a boat on a busy day. At the last second as I headed there I decided to pull into North Causeway Marine to see if Tara was there.

Tara is a delight. She's the "office manager" but really runs the place, from the look of it. She reminds me of Arlene, my former secretary (not my sister). I introduced myself -- Hi, Vic ... don't know his last name ... was at my house and called you ... Messina, she said, since she only knows one Vic. Then she tells me that they have a waiting list. Look at the waiting list, she said ... no, I don't need to look at it ... no, look she said ... and she pulls it up on the computer ... 120 names going back to 2003. How many dry slips do they have ? 70.

So this gets really interesting. You know the golf club memberships and Maple Leaf season tickets that are bequeathed within families ? These boat slips are like that, in some ways. People actually buy boats for the slip then sell the boat as a trade-in. Yikes. This conversation seems to be going nowhere in my lifetime but she says that until the last year nothing ever came up. The waiting list was closed and nothing moved. They didn't even accept new people on the waiting list.

However, she said, Vic has talked to her. I love Vic even more at this point. She says that she could call 25 people on the list before even finding someone who's phone number is current, let alone being still interested in a slip. She has a limited amount of time for that sort of thing, she explains and here I am, standing right in front of her. However, that doesn't solve the "no one ever leaves" problem. However, there is a boat that is part of a bankruptcy deal that is due to move out soon. She is checking into whether they can move it onto one of the repair stands since it's quiet and the boat is due to leave early November.

She tells me to call back or check in (you can bet I'll be right there in her face) on Friday. She does attach a condition to this service -- "you'll swear that you've been on the waiting list forever" ... yup !

How it works is that within the facility there is also a waiting list for inside storage. It's not much more expensive -- add $1 per foot per month vs $11 per foot per month for outside) but you have to have outside storage before you can move inside. She tells me that I would be a prime candidate for inside since my boat doesn't have a T-top, so it can go in any slot, vs some T-top boats that either cannot go inside at all or can only go in certain slots. We saw that once you have a slot, it's yours. Water toys are piled around etc.

It's a family, so it seems. On the FAQ sheet they list the owners names and numbers, Tara, the head Mechanic, the Fork Lift operator ... typical New Smyrna Beach. You get access cards for each person entitled to get at your boat which can be turned off with a phone call. You call 1/2 hour before you need the boat during the week and 1 hour on weekends. Their hours are 8-4:30 -- if you need before or after that time you call and they put the boat in the water. If you return after 4:30, they pull out of the water the next morning. If you want a cover on your boat, you do it yourself. They'll put the boat on a repair stand so that you can clean, wash, cover whatever. One in and out per day (reasonable), if you want them to wash or flush -- $5, etc. etc.

They also have a very well equipped marine store. All of that running around that I did getting good prices -- I could have done just as well buying almost everything there. I'll go back later and pick up the fire extinguisher and anchor. Our demo/test ride for this morning has been postponed until 1pm today due to a doctor's appointment of someone at Bluewater Boats.

So ... let's get the stuff that doesn't work. Me. When I got home from my running around, I pulled out the miter saw and promptly made an erroneous cut in one of the trim pieces and put it back in disgust. I'm not going to do this work until I can do it all. I'll have to run over to the lumber yard and buy another piece of trim. The gas will cost more.

More me -- I'm not sure what I'm coming down with since I'm sweating profusely. I finally fall asleep but later wake up, around midnight, and Sandy is also awake saying that it's hot in here. Ah ha, it's not just me, the A/C isn't working. Oh damn. I went outside and checked the unit -- looks ok, can spin the fan with a stick and it's not trying to spin (this happened before with the failure of a capacitor). I turned the outside breaker off and on, went inside and turned the breaker on and off to no avail. The furnace fan is running, of course it doesn't know that the A/C compressor is not. I turned the furnace breaker off and on a couple of times ... nothing has tripped. I turned everything back on again and nothing happens. I'm not alarmed by this, normally the A/C unit won't come right back on because that would harm the compressor. It doesn't "know" that the compressor has not been running. About 5 minutes later the furnace starts up; I checked outside and the compressor is running. I can feel cool air coming out of the register, standing on a chair because all the registers are on the ceiling of course.

So it ran all night. The temperature in the house had gotten up to 82F and even though it's quite a powerful unit for this small house, it's like it's starting from scratch and I've got the temp set at 70F. This morning I reprogrammed the thermostat and everything seems to be working.

However, I know where this is going. I'm going to get an A/C guy over here and look at the unit and the furnace and end up replacing the lot. The furnace stinks when it starts up (heat, not cold), it has no filter, it's old and rusted. It's probably hugely inefficient since the vintage of the entire thing will be the age of the house which is now heading towards 20 years. The furnace, being in the garage as they do down here, gets humid and hot and makes it age faster than it should. Yes, I know where this is going. I'll get a call into a guy this morning. I might as well deal with the company that replaced the capacitor a couple of years ago. At that time Trish Hinton called them because the house was hot since the A/C wasn't working. I think that their name is "Advance Heat and A/C" but I'll check my bills. Perhaps they left a sticker somewhere.

So call this the good -- dryer -- the bad (or stupid) -- the door trim -- and the ugly -- the A/C. One outta three ain't bad ? No, 33% is failure, I'm afraid !

Perhaps today will go better. Actually, I'm not that bummed -- the slip thing could work out nicely; I did expect to shop around some for marine parts and need to get to know who stocks what and at what price; the trim thing was just silly, not a big deal; and the dryer -- well, undoubtedly that part has a limited lease on life.

With the change of boat demo schedule I thought very briefly about going for a bike ride this morning, but I'd already told Judith that I was going out on Friday and I think that she is looking for riding company. It's getting close to Endless Mountains, the 1200km ride in PA, that I believe she is still doing that starts next Thursday.

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Vic -- Designs by Vic -- just called to return my call from late yesterday and I thanked him for his reference on the Marine and also got from him a name for the A/C look-over/work. This is a small town and everything good is done by personal reference. The more time that I spend here, the more that I like it.

Onward ...