topflightpro

I found out last Tuesday that we were going to be closed on Friday for Good Friday. Seems weird that a state university would be closed for that, but I'm not going to complain about getting a day off. I ended up using the day to finally do the yardwork I've been saying I needed to do for the last year and a half.

I had 1.5 tons of gravel and 40 bails of pine straw delivered to the house and spent the day putting it out. Truthfully, I could have used another 1 to 1.5 tones of stone. (I've got some major drainage issues, and I am trying to use the stone to better manage them.)

Anyway, all that work came after a hard week of intervals, and by Saturday morning, my legs weren't feeling too hot. Still, I went out for my team ride and managed to survive the ride - I did fall off during the one stretch where some of the guys wanted to push it, but that was just before our planned stop to refill bottles.

himespau 

My son has some sort of weird skin infection (not a good sign when the doctor says, "oh wow," and then calls in the other pediatrician and all the nurses because no one is sure what it is). So anyway, he was in a lot of pain and couldn't eat/sleep most of the weekend. Saturday, I tried the one thing that has always calmed him down in the past - a super long walk. Pushed his stroller 3+ hours in the afternoon in some crappy shoes and seem to have developed some plantar fasciaitis as a result. Hurts like mother every time I put my foot down, not that that's in any way on the same level as the kid's pain.

spectastic

Good to hear. I dislike places that have large tourist destinations. I think they tend to mask the native feel of the location with hustlers and rip offs. My parents are huge suckers. I was having a perfect day snorkeling in mexico, because they lease the equipment for daily use... until my dad wanted to spend $70 to get me diving gear, seeing the same ****, except with an o2 tank. The reef wasn't even that great... at all.... I just wanted to swim with fins because they wereally awesome

I think that was cozumel. The cruise stopped in a more rural location the day before. As soon as we left the ship, we were having people saying and doing anything short of putting hands on us to get us to buy their services over the others.. "that man liar. Come with us. We take you to big Aztec ruins. That man trying trick you"..... my parents were ready to spend all kinds of cash on mediocre services that you can find anywhere. Mtbing was one of the cheapest listings at 149.99.. for 2-3 hours.

canuckbelle

Anyone in SF area maybe have a bike with a power meter I could rent/borrow for a ride on Thursday??

grolby

Doing some preliminary research on windows - we're painting the house this summer, and thinking painting the falling-apart original casement windows on the sun porch is probably not worth it. So, we're thinking about replacing them. So far, seems your basic single-light modern wood casement window actually isn't as expensive as I would've thought. But, oh, you want divided lights to match the style of your Cape? Better bend over. What I'm learning about house stuff: the basics sure aren't cheap, but prices there seem reasonable enough. But they really nail you on the details. Even the tiniest style upgrade costs a fortune. And since you have to live with the plain Jane option for years, it's easy to see why people are willing to pay the asking price. Not sure we can afford it, though. Sigh.

himespau 

After living in a house with wooden casement windows that are alternatively rotting and extremely drafty or swelled shut depending on which window (even in the same room), when I get the money to replace I'm going aluminum casement. Of course a lot of the problem is the previous owner didn't take care of his house at all and let ivy cover the damn thing, but still, it's hassle I hope to avoid in the future.

grolby

Yeah, we have a similar issue where the previous homeowners just let everything kind of fall apart. We had a lot of deferred maintenance issues to deal with when we bought the house - the painting is one of them. It just happened to be a lower priority than things like the gutters, which we had to replace at an exorbitant price last year (going from wood to aluminum = $$). As are these windows, which if maintained probably wouldn't need anything except some new hardware. But sadly they weren't maintained, and the frames are falling apart, the glazing is peeling off and it's just a big mess. I can see the appeal of aluminum, but dangit the wood just looks so much better!

Harlan

Gah, thanks for reminding me why I don't want to buy a house that needs work.

And my brother gets through telling me how he hasn't slept through the night since his daughter was born (7 months ago) and how he was currently cleaning puke from his new car, then says you should have kids! It'll be fun to have them at the same time.

I'm so happy I rent and just have dogs.

topflightpro

You should also consider vinyl or fiberglass.

globecanvas

Advice 1, don't go with the in-between option of grilles that go over the glass to imitate true divided-light muntins. It's inconvenient and looks cheap.

Advice 2, IMO single-light windows look fine when modernizing a house. Depending on how old it is, your house may also have originally have had wooden gutters, asbestos siding, or any number of other visible features that are no longer appropriate. Replacing windows with something modern is fine.

grolby

Thing is, the houses that don't need work just aren't affordable. Not for people like me, anyway. Owning a home isn't the be-all, end-all of everything, but it is nice to have total control over my house and never have to worry about needing to move because the owner sold the building, or the rent got jacked up, or whatever. And it's a lot of money, but the way the market is currently going, we're adding more value to the house than we've spent. Still, I don't think it's a good idea to get too comfortable with the idea of the house as an investment. The idea is that I want to a) ensure it stays standing, and b) make it more pleasant to live in. We want to stay here for a long while.

Yeah, the windows in the main house were replaced sometime in the last decade or so, and they have those grilles (though they're internal, not external). And yep, they look pretty terrible. Overall, they're not very nice, and as replacements, they make the original small windows even smaller. But they're tight, and they're there, so we're stuck with them for a good long while. I figure we're probably going to end up with the single-light windows and you're probably right, they'll look fine. We did indeed replace wooden gutters with aluminum last summer, and they look like they belong there.

Blackdays

Size?

Homebrew01

We went with SDL (Simulated divided lights) on most windows. The good ones, with dividers between the panes, and permanent grills inside & out, look just as good as TDL, but less $$.
Much nicer (but more $$) that the simple grills.
Also got aluminum clad exterior, with wood interior.

https://www.weathershield.com/News/WS...d-Lites-Window

Enthalpic

Pictures please .

canuckbelle

I can make 54-58cm work.

ridethecliche

I'll talk to him and get back to you.

Haha, the kid is like 6'3. seeing him on 170's would be comical.

Blackdays

Ah - unfortunately I'm tiny so my frames are 50's. Shouldn't have trouble finding a bike in that size though.

carpediemracing 

Hm. 175s... I wonder what I have. Want me to check? The SRMs are off limits. I might have some Octagon whatever BB spindle 175s.

Doge

Well it wasn't a race, but junior tested himself against the Como street long elite (Google if the ride is unknown to you) on Easter Sunday. Unfortunately when he gets this fit he also gets sick. Redlands is 9 days away.
If he maintains this form (no getting sick) he should do well. Big if, as that race is a whole different level.
Still, this is the only break I know of started in canyon held to the end. I enjoyed it.
https://vimeo.com/160564152

beatlebee 

puppy so strong! @Doge

himespau 

Yeah, it's a bit too early for me to do that to everyone here (I have pictures though because they want us to take them every day to compare to see whether they're getting better or worse.
My best guess for what's going on:
He had conjunctivitis 2 1/2 weeks back and went on broad spectrum antibiotics for that. A week or so ago, when he came off those, he got his 15 month course of vaccines. So now you've got a little boy with a somewhat stressed immune system (vaccines - which I wholeheartedly believe are a good thing) and a disturbed skin microbiota that might be biases towards antibiotic resistant streps (thanks to the broad spectrum antibiotics). Combine that with the fact that he perpetually has eczema and you've got a perfect setup for impetigo, which he probably started getting at a low level last week. We were notified yesterday that one of his classmates in his day care has been diagnosed with hand, foot, and mouth, so he probably picked that up on Friday on top of the impetigo, and together they've made the perfect storm of skin infections (it kind of looks like either one in parts but doesn't completely look like one or the other - and there might be some of his really bad eczema presenting too). Either the strep also migrated to his throat or it's the hand, foot, and mouth making it painful for him to swallow (plus, he's teething so has lots of extra saliva) and he's drooling all over the place too. If he were a traveler coming back from a third world tropical country instead of a toddler from Kentucky, some parts of his body would make me say early stage Hansen's (well, maybe not quite, but it is awful with swollen, discolored, uneven crusted over hands, arms, and cheeks while his torso and legs have an extensive spotted rash).

hubcyclist

Saw on my FB feed that a childhood friend of mine is going to be a grandfather. The wrinkle here is we are 35/36 yrs old. I'm not even 5 years into being a parent myself, it just blows my mind

caloso

I get this. I grew up in a small town (my folks still live there) and many of my childhood friends got married and had kids right out of high school. 18+18=36=grandparent before 40.

Enthalpic

That sounds rough... hope he recovers quickly. Fever?

himespau 

No fever, thankfully, but it does look like he just dunked his hands in a fryer full of hot grease. So swollen, cracked and nasty. Unfortunately, as long as they don't have a confirmed diagnosis, he can't go back to day care, so my wife and I are alternating taking time off around our teaching schedules (not that I dislike a little time off with the little one). We both ended up using him is examples in our microbiology classes yesterday, so that was good timing.