random thoughts – Day 2,431 (Friday 11/13) – no snow and other things

The day's forecast was for snow from a coating to two inches. It was wet when I woke up, and soon a few flakes were fluttering in the air.  And that was it. Nothing stuck, it was as if it never happened and I was fine with it. The solder was due to deliver and I kept checking the tracking like an obsessive nutcase. Package tracking might be my favorite online ordering feature. 

Ellison Barber and guest
on the set of Allegedly.

To pass the time, I organized the work table and almost immediately cut my hand. Today’s investment tip: buy stock in adhesive bandages. The Netflix viewing choice was Allegedly, which I am way behind on episodes. And I still love the wall color on the set and am trying to figure out which wall(s) I can paint in this color. A quick search yielded a social media account for show host Ellison Barber and the color "juniper." 

Meanwhile, the house continued to smell like burned oil every time the furnace blower was going. Since it’s gotten colder the past few days and the furnace has been busy, it’s been a wee bit gross. It made me long for the days of not so long ago when I couldn’t smell anything.

I reached out to the furnace guy and he was here in a few hours to check out the situation. It seems that something may have happened to the exhaust pipe when the new roof was installed and the pipe wasn’t sitting correctly. The problem was fixed and the warm air blowing though the house no longer reeks. Thank you, furnace guy.

Coloring the pattern.

While the furnace received an examination, I colored in the large glass panel pattern with pencils. It’s easier to plan the glass colors with the colored version, especially where I will likely have to buy some glass for it. Now that the small panel is done, it feels like the time to start working on the big one.

After the furnace service, I decided to go to Aldi in search of food I might want to eat. The plan was for a small, quick shop, which was aided by not having a quarter for the carts because I forgot I had spent all my quarters in a tire air machine a couple weeks ago. The refrigerated take and bake pizzas were fully stocked and that was the winner of tonight’s supper wheel of fortune. There were some cat treats in what looked like the correct shape for Kiki’s refined palate and I rolled the dice and bought some.

The solder delivered as I was in the driveway preparing to leave for Aldi, providing a solid reason to shop fast and hustle back home. The rolls of solder were retrieved from the front step and the sweatshop resumed production. The two larger and one smaller crescent moon cut and foiled this week were soldered and received handing loops. Progress!

I was wishing there was an easier way to measure the amount of solder used in projects, but I haven’t found one yet. It comes on a spool and is sold by weight. I don’t have a scale, so weighing the spool after each project isn’t possible. The solder lines on each piece could be measured for a rough estimate of the length, but the spool doesn’t note the length of the stuff, just the weight. And I’m not a good enough mathematician to calculate it using the known variables, but I could set up a spreadsheet to track the projects done with a spool.