Buy Local

We went to Lowe's last night and were unimpressed by the paint and the service. Ironically, there's a Sherwin-Williams paint plant in Fernley right next door to Lowe's, but no Sherwin-Williams dealership. Maybe we'll go look at S-W paint in Reno this afternoon. We rather like the idea of not only the local retail store getting the money, but much of the rest of it being spent in Fernley for manufacturing it. We're still trying to figure out just what exact shade of red-brown to buy. Lisa says she hopes they'd mix us a small paint sample that she could test out on one step to see if she likes it. We just want to get those steps repainted this year, because while things will keep a long time in the desert, it's not good to leave the wood unpainted; the sun bakes things, rather than the rain rotting them.

Paint Patrol

Lisa and I got away into Reno later than we originally planned. The plan was to go have lunch at the Peppermill's buffet, but we got there after lunch closed and before dinner opened, so instead we went to the Sherwin-Williams dealer on South Virginia Street. The place was empty when we got there (although apparently we'd just missed a big rush). The guy was very nice to Lisa and me. When we explained that we were painting a porch, not just any outside woodwork, he recommended a particular type of their paint intended for such surfaces. That particular type isn't manufactured in Fernley — he showed us how to read the codes on the cans so as to find out if a given can was manufactured here — and it's more expensive than the ordinary exterior paint, but it's meant for foot traffic. We bought a quart of it colored to the shade of red we think is closest to the dark red/crimson ("fireweed") we want to use. Lisa figures she can paint a step or two to see how well it works and looks, and if it's not what we wanted, we can just paint over it later. The guy at the shop made Lisa feel very good about this purchase, too, unlike the folks at Lowe's who either ignored her or made her feel uneasy.

The SW paints will probably be more expensive that what Lowe's is offering, but they also look like they should wear better, and there's something to be said for spending your money in places that treat you better.

After dealing with paint, we went back and had an early dinner at the Peppermill, then went to Winco for groceries. We meant to go by Work World so I could pick up some more slacks and shirts, and Lisa some socks, but we forgot about the time and they'd already closed by the time we got there. Lisa did check in the adjacent Home Depot and found a particular US-made piece of EMT fitting that Lowe's only carries in the Chinese brand (and the US-made item is less expensive, to boot). Then there was Whole Foods, where we got the nice undyed pickles they have, and also a brand of cereal that seems to agree with my blood sugar control. Finally we stopped by the Nugget to tickle my club card. Lisa had poor luck with Paradise Fishing today before we headed home.

Tonight I am tasked with duplicating a few disk drives. Unfortunately, some of the blank drives we bought seem to want to draw more power than my Dell D600 can produce through the USB port, although they seem to work okay off of my work computer (A Dell E6510). You can't duplicate a drive if it won't come up to speed.