Good Morning!!!! 54F @ 4:45AM. Sunny to partly cloudy. High 82F. Winds SSW at 5 to 10 mph.
You've led a charmed life, Bird. My folk's home was burglarized three times before I moved out on my own. I had a night job for a while back when I was in college, and one morning while I was sleeping I heard someone in the hallway outside the bedroom talking to the dog. They'd broken in and were trying to shut it in another room. I grabbed a 20 gauge shotgun and chased them out of the house. Called the police but it took them half an hour go respond, so they were long gone. Someone broke into another campus house I was renting and stole some tools a year later. I've been very careful about security ever since.
The longer I live, Eric, the more it seems there is to do. More than a lifetime's worth, it seems. It's a good feeling when a job that's been on the list a long time finally floats to the top, isn't it?
Then there are the problems you didn't even know you had, the worst ones caused by someone else's negligence. Yes, I'm talking about the ex-van mechanic again, who I recently learned left a banjo fitting and accompanying vent line off the transaxle. I've been finding gear oil splashed all over the front of the transaxle since I got the van back, and had taken the decoupler off several times in an effort to find the leak. Yesterday I sprayed white foot powder all over it, threw a big piece of cardboard in the back, and went for a drive. The idea was to drive a short distance, park, and crawl under there to see if I could find the leak. Drive a little, get out again and have another look, and keep doing it until I found where the oil was coming from. After about five stops I still hadn't found the leak, but I hadn't gotten above 45 MPH, either. So I got on the state route and got it up to 70 MPH. Then, thinking it could be the open breather hole at the front of the transaxle, I jumped the brakes pretty hard when I pulled over to look. And sure enough, there was oil everywhere, with a drip line coming out of the breather hole. Even better, UPS had come while I was out and the banjo fitting and bolt were waiting for me in the parcel box. Now the real fun begins, as I can barely see the breather hole, let alone get fingers close enough to screw in the bolt. It's looking like I might have to drop the transzxle/engine combo to get to it...
Before that I put the sprayer on the side-by-side, filled it with water, and headed up the hill to pound some rebar stakes in to supplement the wooden stakes left by the surveyor. I used the sprayer to wet down the area to keep from sparking a fire. Thanks for the idea, Bill. I also carried three 10' lengths of PVC pipe to slip over the installed rebar so I could see from one stake to the next and get a better idea of where the property line goes. That idea worked well for the first three I did, but when I went looking for the next one, which was down a very steep hill, I came up empty handed. The grass was also pretty deep, but not that deep, and it also looked like the neighbor had been grazing sheep and goats in the area. His idiot kid pulled survey stakes when they put the phone line in, so I wouldn't put it past him to have done it again. My contractor buddy with the 'dozer says he can start clearing the fire brake in a couple of weeks, so I have that long to figure out the puzzle.
Earlier this morning I saw the faint flicker of lightning in a cloudless sky. The closest rain was sixty miles away, so now I wonder if what I saw was really lightning.
And now I'm hearing the low moaning sound of a mountain lion down below the house. Probably hoping to jump a deer for breakfast. Or a turkey, which I can also hear gobbling in the distance. Or maybe it'll be the neighbor's rooster that makes the menu, or one of their sheep or goats. They've lost a LOT of them that way.
Hope everyone has a great weekend!
