Tons Of Fun

Monday: (09/21) Up early. Moved the RV out of the driveway and down the street. Also the cars. Today's a busy day. First thing we received 8 tons of base rock on the driveway at 8am. The base rock is recycled concrete ground up to 3/4 in pieces with the sandy grit as well.

I then dashed over to Peninsula Building Materials in Redwood City to get filter cloth. It's placed under the baserock to keep the baserock from mixing with the clay soil.

About 11am the dumpster with the dirt was hauled away. I spent the day moving some of the baserock to the backyard for the base for the sheds. It may seem like I'm over doing it but we have heavy clay that heaves and ooses and I'm trying to make sure the floors stay somewhat flat and uncracked.

Breakfast was an English muffin with peanut butter and jelly. Lunch was Chinese from down the street. Our dinner was prepared by Courtney. It was Japanese. A nice tofu soup and a sweet chicken with onions on top of rice. Very good.

Lou and Dawn went shopping. They met Dawn and went out to Luu Noodle House for lunch. Ernie was busy with a doctor's appointment.


Tuesday: (09/22) Dawn had to get up early today to go to work in San Jose. It's supposed to be very hot today so an early start for Ernie and I seemed in order. We moved more of the baserock to the back yard and are ready to compact though I'll probably install some drain pipes first. I wanted to go to an Adobe Flex users  meeting in San Francisco. It was all about the life cycle of Flex components, whatever that is. It was very informative. I caught the train toward SF about 3pm. The return train from SF left at 9:40pm so it was a late night.

I had an apple fritter for breakfast. Others had cereal. Lunch was a roast beef and cheese sandwich. My dinner was free pizza at the meeting.


Wednesday: (09/23)Ernie and I made a corral by the arbor and moved the excess base rock into the corral. It will be used for a couple of future project but that may not be until next year. Most of that excess was free because it brought the quantity up to 8 tons and the cost of the additional material was less than the delivery charge which became free at 8 tons. It was an awful lot of material, about 3 tons. I then put things back in order placing the berry plants that had been there around the pile. It isn't too obvious but is sort of like hiding an elephant. Next was a trip to a couple of hardware stores to get the drain piping and the rebar for the floor.

Breakfast was a bacon egg and cheese sandwich. Lunch was cheese, crackers and our good bologna. Dinner was BBQ ribs, macaroni salad and green beans.


Thursday: (09/24) I dug out some of the baserock I just placed and installed some drain pipes and then put the rock back. I should always engage the brain before deciding what to do each morning. We have a real water disposal problem when it rains and the pipes are just in case.

Breakfast was fried eggs and bologna with cheese. No bread in the house to place it in. Lunch was macaroni salad and an Italian sausage. Dinner was white fish, macaroni salad, and green beans.

Friday: (09/25) I did some final fill of the baserock then I went up to Redwood City and rented a plate vibrator. After compacting the baserock for the pad and returning the vibrator I cleaned up. I finished in time for all of us to go out to lunch.

Bread pudding for breakfast. We've been assigning Friday's as our dinner out night. Today's dinner was lunch at the Sunny Buffet in Sunnyvale, a Chinese buffet. Dawn baked some bread and we had hot fresh bread as our dinner.

Saturday: (09/26) Ernie and I built the forms and set the rebar for the shed floor.

Breakfast was the usual egg, bologna and cheese muffin. Lunch was macaroni salad and a sausage. Courtney fixed hamburgers for dinner.

Sunday: (09/27) Lou, Dawn and I headed over to Half Moon Bay (HMB) on the coast for a cooling off day.We visited many of th shops. Our favorites are the Half To Have It shop, an antique shop that has lots of interesting old yard decoration and lots of glass art. We also like the feed store. Traffic was mostly stop all the way across the mountains to the coast on highway 92. Lots of other people had the same idea to get away. That's the problem with weekends. We came home via Pescadero road a few miles South of HMB. It's a longer route through the mountains but much prettier and almost no traffic.

Breakfast was egg, bologna and Swiss cheese muffins. For lunch we shared a couple of sandwiches, avocado and cheese and a pastrami at a deli in Half Moon Bay. Ernie fixed meatloaf and garlic mashed potatoes for dinner.

Now the Last Of the Dirty Work Begins

Monday: (09/14) It really rained a lot last night saturating the yard, so little work today. I did strip the form off the flower bed retaining wall shown above. I also ordered a dumpster to get rid of some of the dirt. Now i do have to figure out what to do with all the concrete blocks that used to line the edge of the removed raised flower bed. Another home in our yard or to the dump? I'll have to ponder that for a while.


The dogs are enjoying the outside. They get put outside at 8am and don't get in again until 8pm.They find the dirt pile a challenge. Walter is resting in a hole in the pile. They are always tossing the dirt onto the patio. Wolfie enjoys his big water dish.

Dawn's friend Courtney is returning to Palo Alto from a couple of years near Boston at school. Lou and Dawn spent most of the day picking her up and helping her move into her apartment.

Breakfast was leftover French toast with bacon. Lunch was leftover sausage soup. Dinner was fried green tomatoes, baked chicken breasts, and a Waldorf salad.

Tuesday: (09/15) Breakfast was waffles, Italian sausage, and fresh pineapple. Lunch was leftovers. Lou and I had refried bean sizes (refried black beans on bread with Italian sausage and cheese. Ernie had pork chops. That got rid of half the leftovers in the fridge. Dinner was spaghetti with clam sauce.

About 10:30 the dumpster arrived and Ernie and I were loading it by 11:00. We got about 8 of the 10 yards loaded but decided to stop after I fell rolling one of the loads up to the top of the dumpster. I managed to twist both ankles so we called it quits for the day. Probably worked about 5 minutes too long today. Ernie started the day with a fall over one of the dogs. Such a pair of wimps we are. We should get the rest loaded tomorrow if we're still moving.

Wednesday: (09/16) Being in no particular hurry to start work ,we enjoyed some morning TV shows when my cell phone alarm went off reminding me of a club meeting today.I spent the morning at the meeting. Lou picked up some 3 gallon buckets for our use in loading the remainder of the dirt. That will keep me off a very precarious ramp since the last 1/5 of the dumpster must be loaded with the door shut. Ernie started loading while I was away at the meeting and made a noticeable dent in the dirt pile.

At my meeting of the Traffic Signal Association there were presentations on new signal products. Of particular interest to me was the improvements in accessible pedestrian signals (for the visually impaired). Some very nice tings becoming available.


When I returned, both Ernie and I worked on loading the dirt and made fairly short work completing the last of the dirt pile completely filling the 10 yard dumpster. Walter seems to wonder where the dirt went (above right).

As it turns out, a cubic foot of dense dirt weighs about 125 pounds. Since 10 cubic yards is 270 cubic feet we moved 33,750 pounds. That's a little over 16 tons. We're now another day and a half older and deeper in debt as Ernie Ford might sing. Actually it went pretty quickly.


The area for the shed floor is ready for the baserock.

Breakfast was leftover sausage soup. Lunch was leftover risotto from the neighbors and leftover baked chicken. Dinner was, of course, more leftovers. We are making headway. Spaghetti, Waldorf salad, Italian sausage, Swiss steak, etc.

Thursday: (09/17) Not much accomplished today. To move the dirt, we borrowed our neighbors wheelbarrow giving use two making the job go faster. That worked for a short while until the wooden handle broke. Old age. Today, we replaced the handles on the wheelbarrow and returned it just like new, maybe  better than original. Other than that I just waited for the dumpster to be picked up but they never showed up. Tomorrow we'll be off to the Santa Cruz County Fair in Watsonville so will miss the show.

Dawn had a doctors appointment so she Lou and Courtney went down to San Jose. Courtney picked up some things for her apartment, Lou visited the doll shop and Dawn had her eye doctor visit. Unfortunately she will need another surgery set for next week. Dawn and Courtney went across the street to the neighbors to read to there children this evening.

Breakfast was Ernie fried potatoes and eggs with sausage. Lunch was leftover spaghetti Alfredo. For dinner Ernie baked a pork roast and potatoes and steamed some broccoli. Courtney joined us for dinner.

Friday: (09/18) We all headed off to Cupertino for breakfast at the Country Inn. Dawn and Lou started with a slice of apple pie followed by a shared California eggs Benedict. Ernie had biscuits and gravy with scrambled eggs on top. I had eggs, bacon, hashbrowns and Swedish pancakes.

After breakfast we headed to Watsonville South of Santa Cruz to the Santa Cruz County Fair. It's a nice smaller real fair. Few vendors and lots of animals and competitive entries.

We stumbled upon some old friends, Harvey, Georgia Cohen and their daughter. They have been selling  stone lithography seedart packets for a number of years. They usually sell at art and wine type events. They've been looking for a new venture so they started selling Harvey's Gourmet Mini Donuts this year and all is going well. It was interesting to stumble across them again. (Learn more.)

We had dinner in Watsonville at the Super Taqueria then returned over the mountain home.

I forgot my camera so no pictures of the fair. Here is a link to last years post.

Saturday: (09/19) Lou and I made a shopping trip. Gas, a check at Big Lots, and then finally, the purpose of our trip, a visit to Lyngsol Supply. I ordered my base rock but they can't deliver it until Monday morning. Lou picked up some drivable grass bricks. She's going to install them by our front porch in the flower bed and grow baby tears in them. Of course, we stopped at a thrift store on the way home.

Breakfast was a egg,cheese and bologna sandwich. Lunch was a nacho supreme at Chavez Market in Redwood City. Dinner was ??

Sunday: (09/20) Today was a day off. I tinkered at the computer some and accomplished little.

Breakfast was an English muffin with peanut butter and jam. Lunch was a gripped cheese sandwich. Ernie roasted a chicken for dinner

Finishing Up The Fence

Monday: (09/07) Labor Day? Aren't they all. Dawn fixed some homemade sourdough pancakes and bacon. She got the starter from our neighbor Eric. Lunch was leftover tuna salad and potato salad.

I stripped the forms of the fence base, backfilled around the base, and installed the fence posts and rails for the fence.

Lou fixed BBQ ribs for dinner with bean salad and potato salad.

I had planned a walk-about in San Francisco tomorrow but the extended Bay Bridge closure suggests a better day might be Wednesday. I plan to ride the train up to SF then to walk the Embarcardero to Fishermans Wharf, through Fort Mason, along the marina and through the Presidio to the Gloden Gate Bridge, then through the Presidio along the coast to Golden Gate Park then back toward home via the train. Ernie is going to go with me, sort-of. He'll go to Fisherman's Wharf then make his way to Golden Gate Park and meet me there. With the potential traffic problems I'll probably work on the fence tomorrow instead and head North on Wednesday.

Tuesday: (09/08) Even though they did get the Bay Bridge open this morning only 2 hours late, I had already started work. I made a trip to the hardware store for sand, mortar, concrete and 2x4's. When I got home I reinstalled the green house floor that was removed to install the fence base. Erine and I also grouted the bottom fence rails to seal them.  We then installed most of the fence boards. I then worked on finishing the rails for the fence section around the tree. When we get back to work Thursday the last of the fence boards will be installed and and we'll install the rest of the screws and it should be a fence, again. Quite a diversion form building a shed.

Breakfast "to each their own". I stopped at the Happy Donut for an apple fritter on my way shopping. Lunch was left over dinner from last night. Lou fixed a meal-in-one using the leftover quinoa.

Wednesday: (09/09) Ernie and I left early to catch the train to San Francisco. I haven't had a day off for a while and this is my day off. We were in SF by 9am and stopped at McDonald's for breakfast. We then walked up the Embarcardero to the Fisherman's Wharf looking over everything along the way.


We stopped at Pier 39 to look over the sea lion colony. It was foggy so the views wer not the best.


Ernie wasn't up to one of my treks so I continued on up through Fort Mason, Crissy Field, by the Golden Gate Bridge and along the coast through the Prisidio to Baker Beach. I decided to abbreviated my trek and walked South on 25th Avenue to Golden Gate Park. I enjoyed a walk through thew Strybing Arboretum there and then called Ernie to see what he was doing. He had walk down the "crookedest street", Lombard Street, up to Coit Tower and was sitting down to a late lunch or early dinner in Chinatown. I grabbed some eats as well. I stopped at the Crepevine Restaurant on Irving at 7th Ave near the park. I had their Tuscany savory crepe. It was a crepe with chicken, mushrooms, tomato, provolone cheese, pesto, and sour cream. It included home fries and a green salad. Very good.  I then caught the Light Rail "N" train to meet Ernie at the Caltrain station to head home. We were home by 7pm, much earlier than my usual return but we were both worn out.

Lou and Dawn went down to San Jose in the afternoon. Dawn had a job interview with the County.

Thursday: (09/10) Finished putting the fence boards on and putting all the screws in. Then I cleaned up and put stuff away. Not too much but it filled the day.

Breakfast was cereal and yogurt. Lunch was the quinoa meal-in-one leftovers. Dawn baked some sour dough bread. She got the starter for the dough from our neighbor Eric. Ernie fixed sauerkraut, potatoes, and pork chops and or sausage for dinner.

Friday: (09/11) Breakfast was Don McMuffin sandwiches. I tinkered most of the morning in the office writing letters, paying bills, and  catching up on email. I also reassembled the green house. It uses the fence as the back wall and three feet of the fence are part of what was rebuilt. Lunch was a salad.

Ernie took us to dinner at Cecelia's Mexican Restaurant about a block form home. The food is good and they have coupon's in our local paper.

Saturday: (09/12) First thing today I was watching the morning news and the weather report said lighting, rain and hail today. I went outside and covered my concrete sacks. It had been drizzling but no rain occurred, just some thunder and sprinkles.

Lou fixed breakfast of eggs, pork chops, and toast. The toast was from Dawn's homemade sourdough loaves.

I worked doing more earth moving. I did what I hope was the last of the digging. It took all day but hopefully it's now ready to receive the baserock next week.

Lunch was more of the quinoa meal-in-one leftovers.

For dinner Dawn made sausage soup with kale.

Sunday: (09/13) Ernie fixed French toast using Dawn's sourdough bread. It was served wth eggs and bacon. Lunch was toastados made from the leftovers from our dinner out at Cecilia's the other day.


The fence is finished, above left. I built the form for the end wall of the remaining raised planter and then Ernie and I poured it. That was all that was accomplished today. After i poured it i got to sit around and watch it dry until the final finishing of the 4"x40" surface. BIG job. Tomorrow we may get busy, if not then then soon thereafter. I'll be ordering a dumpster to be loaded with the dirt I've been digging up and will have the baserock delivered. Hopefully the two don't get in each others way. Pretty soon, our street is going to get busy as the City replaces all the gas lines on our street. They're starting the next street over tomorrow.

Finaly Some Headway On The Sheds

Monday: (08/31) No Eggs so my morning sandwich was eggless, just grilled bread, bologna, and cheese. It worked. I didn't get up until near 9am so everyone else had eaten already.

I got started on the fence repair for the new shed project. I spent most of the day chipping off the roots near the trees. Not easy work but much better today that last week in the really high heat. By quitting time I had the form in place for the first post and was readdy to pour but will wait Until tomorrow to do it.

Lunch was a leftover pizza slice and a V8. Dinner was my fovorite, chili sizes. It was just Ernie and I and we both like them. Lou and dawn are out on their thrift store run and are eating out on the way.

Tuesday: (09/01) Breakfast was eggs, sausage, and waffles. Lunch was Lou's quesadillas. Dinner was Noodle soup. It started with Ernie's egg drop soup leftovers.

I started the day by pouring a post base then removed the last section of fence and removed the post and base, dug out for the fence base, set the form for the post base and poured it.

Wednesday: (09/02) Lou made chili rellenos for breakfast. Dawn had leftover quesadillos.  A good start for the day.

I like very few TV shows anymore but one i like is Perry Mason and it's on at 8am and noon here. If I happen to get up early I can, and often do, watch it. Then If I'm not moving yet, Rachael Ray is good. Cooking shows are one of Ernie's favorite show types. I also like the begging chatter on the View however since the digital TV upgrade we don't get the channel anymore. The transmitter is on Sutro Tower in San Francisco and they supposedly had to raise the antenna after the analog transmitters were turned off. After the supposed fix we don't get it anymore and haven't since the switch to digital but did before. Looks like they goofed up and I'm beginning to assume it's permanent. There isn't much good on ABC the past few years anyway. Just don't mess up my CBS.

I'd better get busy now so I can do a little work before the noon Perry Mason. Actually we often miss Perry but it is nice to eat breakfast and lunch with.

I made a couple of trips to the hardware store for more concrete. I couldn't do much while the concrete cured enough to strip the forms. It was still too soft this morning. It was a hot day today anyway. Of course, now it's going to rain per Google. Works every time, better than a rain dance. I hope it's an error.

Dinner was a vegetable soup Dawn made.

Thursday: (09/03) Nice and sunny outside, no thundershowers like promised by Google, but then that didn't seem too likely. Just a demonstration of the occasional inaccurate data on the Internet. Better Safe than sorry as far as my covering the cement pile.

For breakfast I fixed waffles and sausage. Lou fixed stuffed tomatoes for lunch. We had Dawn's leftover vegetable soup for dinner.

Ernie and I worked all day building the forms for two of the fence sections. This fence is no ordinary fence, its more like hover dam with a few boards on top. Maybe I over do it sometimes but I don't want the neighbors trees pushing the fence around too soon. Tomorrow we pour.

Friday: (09/04) I fixed a nice breakfast of fried eggs, sausage and toast.

Ernie and I had work to do. We fired up the mixer and poured the concrete for two of the fence sections using 32 bags of concrete mix. That only took an hour and a half but i had to hang around a while to do some finishing. Lunch was another stuffed tomato ala Lou. We all went our separate merry ways after lunch. I picked up more concrete since i now know about how much I should use for the remaining fence section. I get the concrete at Orchard Supply Hardware (OSH which is part of Sears). They had a really good sale on the table saw I've been intending to get so I picked it up as well. My existing table saw is 3'x7' and weighs a ton. Works perfectly well but is a pain to move. My new saw has wheels and legs and folds up to about 18"x3'x4' and can be stuffed in a corner. I'm trying to down size since by show will be smaller. Now to find a new home for my table saw which is now more than 30 years old.

We went out to dinner at the Peninsula Creamery in downtown Palo Alto. I had a turkey pot pie, Ernie had fish and chips, Dawn had baked macaroni and cheese and Lou had a cobb salad. Lou Dawn and I rotated our choices making an interesting combo. That was all followed by a one of their excellent cookies.

Saturday: (09/05) Lou fixed breakfast of eggs, sausage and toast. A good breakfast starts the day off nice and lasts better than cereal or the like. I didn't need lunch until 2pm.


I looked at the concrete and it looked dry enough to strip the forms. It looks good. The forms can be reused for the third section. I worked on building the form for the third,  odd ball fence section near the trees. The base has to dodge the base of the tree and hopefully will be able to keep it from intruding further. I managed to get it all prepared to pour tomorrow morning.

After a good days work Ernie's dinner was nice. He fixed some rolled steaks that he saw Rachael Ray make a couple of days ago.  It was served with his buttered fresh spinach and some quinoa, a rice like substitute from Trader Joe's.  All very good.

Sunday: (09/06) I tinkered with Dawn's computer most of the morning. Ernie took the dogs to the dog park to see their friends.

I built a little form to fill a gap in the fence base and when Ernie returned we poured 25 bags of concrete for the last fence section and the little piece I formed this morning.

Lou fixed grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch. I cleaned up some of my mess and did the final finishing and took a siesta or two while I waited. I finally assembled my new folding table saw as well. It will be nice.

Ernie fixed a nice potato salad and we had hot dogs for dinner with All sorts of fixings like seasoned refried black beans, sauerkraut, onions, and avocado.

Slow Work On Sheds

Monday: (08/23) Started with a breakfast egg sandwich. I then went shopping to get materials. Loading and unloading 8 plywood panels and 20 2x4 and misc other stuff consumed the rest of the morning and then some. I had Chinese food from our local fast food restaurant for lunch. When I couldn't delay real work further I dug out some more dirt to add to the ever expanding pile I'm making. I completed the rough cut and now just need to skim of an inch or two her or there in final preparation for the base rock. Dinner was beef stroganoff with broccoli and a carrot apple and raisin salad.

Tuesday: (08/24) I fixed home fries with red and green peppers, onions and mushrooms. I added some fried eggs to go with some strips of steak (roast) Ernie had prepared yesterday. I then wasted the morning watching TV and working at the computer. After lunch of tid-bits from the Hong Kong Bakery which Lou picked up after dropping dawn off at the train I finally did a little work. Quite little. I erected a temporary fence to keep the dogs at home when I work on the fence repair/replacement. I'm still  not sure how much I'm going to do repair or replace. I just staked up some plywood panels with EMT stakes driven in the ground. Enough for today, Lou wants to go out to a cheap prime rib dinner at 430 so I don't want to do too much. Any excuse!

Wednesday: (08/26) Leftovers for breakfast. In my case broccoli, Waldorf salad, cottage cheese, and an Italian sausage. Interesting! About 1030 I finally got to work outside. I removed some of the existing fence and chipped away the roots and moved more dirt. Lots of fun. Lou worked on cleaning the back yard. She blew leaves from the planters and raised them up on blocks to male future cleanup easier. Lunch was an olive loaf and horseradish cheese sandwich. Dinner was tortellini and sausage soup.


Thursday: (08/27) I needed to remove the old posts so I started with this one. Of course the hard part is getting the concrete base out. The clay soil is just about as hard as the concrete. The neighbors trees must remain so this is going to be fun installing the concrete footing and post bases. To keep the doggies at home I erected a temporary fence.

Friday: (08/28) More of the same working on the fence. A lot of digging to be done in hot weather. I got two of the three post holes dug but still need to remove a few more tree roots.

Saturday: (08/29) After cereal for breakfast I went by Shoreline Park in Mountain View. The concessionaire was selling a bunch of kayaks. Turns out the weren't discounted enough for my liking.


Ernie and I then went to the Palo Alto Electric Vehicle Rally.The electric bike above left pulls the long trailer all over town carrying materail or a couple of people.


The above looks like an electric scooter for Ben Hur. Its for a wheel chair riding driver.



The vehicles above and below left are from Green Vehicles of San Jose. I rather like the van above right. I mentioned it in the blog a week or so ago when I looked at it in one of their showrooms. It's really rather well builtcarries 7 people or about a ton of freight and has lots of head room. They buy the body from China and put the electric drive and transmission in. Could be a good city car but I don't yet know if it could be towed. And then there is the crash test information that is still to come.


Above left is the Green Vehicles sports car. It has a 200 mile range and cruises at freeway speeds. The car on the right has been in the works for three years so far. it will be quite nice when complete.


The Sparrow EV above right looks much like a bug. The sports car on the righ looks like it has a short.

Sunday: (08/30) Ernie baked some eggs and fried some spuds for breakfast.

Lou and I went to the OSH hardware store to get some things including the 12 sack concrete limit the car can carry. Unfortunately they only have weak steel post bases so those will come from somewhere else.

I made a couple of more trips and now have a pretty good stack of concrete bags to start pouring the post bases. I hate to run short in the middle of a pour. I found good heavy gauge post bases at Home Depot. i don't get the concrete there mostly because I don't have to handle the loading at the store at OSH.

Lou Dawn and I took a walk after dinner to the California Avenue shopping district near home.

A Hike And Some Chalk Art

Monday: (08/17) Ernie fixed a nice breakfast of eggs, bacon and hashbrown potatoes. I'm busy back to avoiding work, or at least delaying beginning it.

Goofed off so much we forget what I did?

Tuesday: (08/18) Ernie and the dogs left early this morning for a little trip North to see the redwoods.

Toast and jam for breakfast.  I had a dentist appointment this morning to get a filling repaired. I seem to break a lot of them. After the visit to the dentist I had lunch (barley beef soup and lemon cheese cake) at the Country Inn in Cupertino. It's amazing that the mouth is no longer numb for days after a visit now days. Things have improved.

Dinner?

Wednesday: (08/19) Lou and I dropped Dawn off at the train station in Mountain View. We all had breakfast at the Hong Kong Bakery before she left.

We goofed off shopping around and had lunch at Lou's favorite spot, Luu Noodle house sharing our usual combination chow fun with a couple of egg rolls.

When I returned home I did a little work filling the trench for the pipes and chipping away dirt to the level I determined after staking the area and determining the grade. I didn't really accomplish much though.

Dinner?

Thursday: (08/20) I got up early and hitched up the RV for a trip to it's doctor Leale's RV in San Jose. The generator has been sick since we left on our winter trip last December. It coughed and ran rough. I looked at it and, knowing nothing about it, couldn't fix it so we limped along. Actually we just lived within our solar generating abilities. It's now running nice and smooth with a clean carburetor, new fuel filter  (which I never found) and new spark plugs. When I arrived iIwas told it might have to be there a few days. I had thought my appointment first thing in the morning would allow it to be completed in the one day. I really hate leaving the RV anywhere. I went a short distance up the road to Denny's for  Grand Slam breakfast.

Southern Lumber is close and the best lumber store in the bay area. i needed some 2x12 pressure treated boards for the fence and couldn't find them tinted red, the chain lumber store only have green boards which i don't like. While Southern is well stocked it also isn't cheap but getting the boards there may save some gas to offset the higher price. I also checked on steel tubing price and availability at Sims metal which is also nearby. I stopped by Family RV to see if they had any good cheap used trailers for Ernie, nope. I did see one for sale with an open house in the parking lot of a Home Depot i stopped at. It looked good so I called Lou to come look at it. There turned out to be some title problems so? The Leale's service rep called before noon and promised the RV would be completed today so I continued to goof off shopping. Lou and Dawn came down and looked at the trailer then went on to their dental appointments.

I had a slice of pizza from Sbaro's at a mall for lunch. I picked up the RV about 4pm, hitched up the toad and returned home. Even though it was commute time traffic wasn't too bad.

After getting the RV parked Lou was ready for dinner so we went out to Chevy's for dinner. Wow, ate out all day. We didn't have the usual Chevy Cinco combinations for dinner this time trying new things. Lou and Dawn shared an assemble d combo of chili relleno, steak enchilada and ?. I had a combo with chicken and shrimp skewers, steak enchilada and taco. All good, and different.

Ernie returned late this evening, with doggies, from his trip up North to the redwoods.

Friday: (08/21) Cereal with bananas for breakfast.

We tinkered around in the morning and had lunch before heading North to the San Mateo County Fair. It's been a pretty good fair while many others are dying like our own Santa Clara County Fair. It was a good fair with lots of crafts and such, animals, etc but they have closed two of the building  whick look like they are becoming the turf club. The Bay Meadows horse race track next door closed recently. How it stays a real fair.

We stopped at the Chavez Market Taqueria in Redwood City for dinner.

Saturday: (08/22) Breakfast of a Don McMuffin sandwich.

I started by re-locating the avocado tree that I just got planted a couple of months ago. It's been in a planter pot for more than eight years, finally made it into the ground but I put it in the way of the new sheds so it was moved again. Poor thing. Fortunately, it hadn't established itself yet so it moved fairly easily except for the ground being so hard to dig. I then continued chipping away at the area where the sheds will be. I need to remove 4-6" of dirt to install the base rock and concrete floor to the correct level. This was interspersed with lots of resting.

Lunch was leftovers, for me black eyed peas and European bologna. For Lou a salad.

About 3pm I cleaned up and Lou, Dawn and I went downtown to the Palo Alto Art Festival. Unlike most of these street fairs the vendors here seem to be doing their own art not importing it. Lots of neat stuff. And there is also the sidewalk chalk art. The pictures were about have done when we viewed and should be finished tomorrow so we'll probably return tomorrow.

Ernie fixed a nice baked tuna and noodle casserole served with Lou an Dawns fresh green beans.

Sunday: (08/23) Breakfast was cereal. After a relaxing morning in the yard having tea, at least that's all I did, I had the leftover tuna noodles for an early lunch and headed for the hills. It's hike day.


I've been trying to get out at least once per week to take a hike. Today's the day. I headed West just over the mountain to Portola State Park. Fortunately, it was still open, not closed by our dear Governator yet. I took a little hike into Memorial Park next door to the Pescadero River then along the old Haul Road to the Iverson Trail.


It was a pleasant hike along a creek an in the redwood forest.


I stopped for a look at Tip Toe falls, barely a waterfall. Our backyard pond has as much flow. Then headed on back to where I parked. About 5-6 miles of hiking was enough. A few years ago, I took a hike here starting up at the Tarwater Trailhead, down the mountain to Portola park (3 miles) then through the park to the Peter's Creek Grove and back to the park visitor center (13 miles). I had a cold and it was dark so I surrendered and called Lou for a lift back to my car up the mountain. Sometimes, I am smarter than I look and know when to call it a day. I mentioned all this because today, I opted for the shorter trail rather than the 13 mile trail out to Peter's Creek and back. I haven't been hiking much recently and need to build up to the longer hikes, or be prepared to call Lou again.


When I got back down the hill I stopped downtown and called Lou to let her know and remind her that the chalk sidewalk art should be ready for another look. We had another look and they were impressive as usual.


Some probably won't be finished with les than an hour left to do it. Unfortunately, some of the work was modified by shadows so bad photos. Sorry. The picture above right was good enough to post wven with the bad shadow.


I loke the polar bears but it looks simpler than it must be to do. At one end of the street there is a young artist area.

Lou had been slow cooking some pepper steak for dinner. She used some peppers we get a the Iranian market in Mountain View. The peppers are small mild green peppers. It's the same market where we get our Mediterranean yogurt. We find interesting items all over and if we like it we return especially for it. This market has two specialties.

Continuing On

Sunday: (08/09) Cereal for breakfast. Not much being accomplished. I cleaned up the shop a bit to make it usable for working on Lou's wheel. We all drove up Pagemill Road and hiked the fault trail in Los Trancos preserve.  This was an accomplishment. Ernie, Dawn and Lou haven't been good hikers recently but yielded for the day. Unfortunately, the temperatures were HOT and that may stick in the memories. We took a picnic lunch which we enjoyed at the pond at Russian Ridge Preserve nearby a summit Road. Dinner was more leftovers.

Monday: (08/10) It's going to be hot again today.


I built a jig to hold Lou's wheel on the router table and spun the wheel over the bit to put a couple of grove on the edge. It worked well. Lou fixed some shef's salad's for lunch. I played the rest of the day, too hot to work. When i was in the shop (tent) I set up a big fan with a mister in from to air condition the tent in the 95 degree heat, otherwise hotter in the tent. It was quite comfy. Lou had a class at Kaiser on controlling back pain. Dinner was leftover pork roast and corn on the cob.

Tuesday: (08/11) Up earlier than usual (0700) Breakfast was eggs, fried beerworst with cheese and toast.

I drove Dawn down to San Jose for her class. I then dropped by her apartment to tweak her PC. I installed Carbonite backup software on it but the license didn't stick so 45 minutes later I had the license set. It seems like that should have been an easier task like I had originally thought byt Carbonite didn't work that way. Just the usual, doing things right the first time is easier than fixing it later.

I had a dentist's appointment for cleaning at 11am after which I stopped by the nearby Chinese buffet for lunch. Those clean teeth didn't last long.

Next door to the restaurant was the Ethicalapproach Store, an electric vehicle store. They had several brands of electric bikes and scooter, the ZAP electric vehicles and a new Green Vehicle electric van and trike. I was quite impressed with the van. Hoss Cartright and five equal sized friend would ride in the van in comfort (I had 6" head room with room for my knees in all seats) with a range of 100 miles. I was told it can cruise on the freeway by the literature says its a NEV (35mph). The Triac car can go 80mph, for sure. They are made here in San Jose so it will be interesting to watch. Is Silicon Valley going to be an auto making center now (Tesla, Green Vehicles, Sparrow)?

I then returned to San Jose. I stopped at Leale's RV repair and scheduled the generator repair. I also stopped by where the Steel House used to be but it was gone. I'll have to find another place to get my metal. Gee, why aren't then still in business. I was there just 10 years ago. They must have been waiting for my return business. Lou did a little shopping and Ernie baked some cookies.

Dinner was smoked chicken, lima beans, and spinach.

Wednesday: (08/12) French pancakes ala Ernie for breakfast.I spent the afternoon looking for materials and generally avoiding work. Lou fixed enchiladas for dinner.

Thursday: (08/13) Parmesan cheese popcorn for breakfast. I can't eat popcorn in the evening so breakfast is a good time for it. Ernie bought himself a new folding Dahon bike at REI. I didn't really do much today. Lou and I did made a visit to the hardware store and another garden supply center. Leftover smoked chicken for dinner with au gratin potatoes and salad.

Friday: (08/14) Breakfast burritos for the refrigerator leftovers. I worked a little in the yard starting to re-route some pipes by digging a trench. Lunch was cold cuts. Dawn picked one of her tomatoes a persimmon tomato, it was a very good yellow tomato. Dinner was leftover enchiladas with fresh broccoli slaw

Saturday: (08/15) Lou made and Ernie baked cinnamon rolls last night. We enjoyed them for breakfast. I worked on my trench more today finishing whittling it in the afternoon. Lunch was leftover spaghetti. Dinner was more leftovers, enchiladas and potato salad. In the evening we went to the Stanford Theater to see a couple of old movies starring Ginger Rogers.

Sunday: (08/16) I worked all day digging the last three feet of the trench through the bricks in the floor of the green house and then at re-installing the pipes for the sprinklers and faucets in the rear yard that were displaced when the flower bed was lowered. It all took longer because I tried to avoid removing the bricks and attempted to find a way to push the new pipes under them. I finally gave that idea up and just lifted them. Of course, now I have to try to re-insert them which will probably be a lot of fun.

Breakfast was evidently not memorable but lasting. Lunch was leftover Iranian potato salad. Ernie fixed a lean beef and chicken burger meatloaf for dinner with carrot apple and raisin salad, and black eyed peas.