Kevin Standlee: Fandom Is My Way of Life

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, the pump on the swamp cooler stopped pumping water into the pads that make it work. Due to our hard water, replacing the pump every year or three is something we've become accustomed to doing. Yesterday afternoon, Lisa undertook the repairs.

( Pump Doesn't Pump )

Lisa opened up the swamp cooler and replaced the old pump with the new one. While the impeller now worked, no water went though the system. Further investigation led her to remove the top of the cooler so she could get at the screw that held a T-shaped distribution pipe. The pump sends the water up to the T-shaped pipe, which sends the water to the pads on the back and sides of the cooler. When she removed the pipe, she found that it was completely clogged. Fortunately, the build-up hadn't hardened, and she was able to get it out by forcing water the "wrong way," blowing air into the pipe, and poking at the clock with a probe.

There was also a lot of crud in the bottom of the cooler. Lisa and I carried the cooler outside and she washed all of the crud out. While we were doing this, we kept hearing a periodic thumping noise coming from the minivan, which was a few meters away. Investigating, we discovered that one of the power door lock switches was stuck in the "unlock" position, meaning that it would periodically try to unlock the doors. Poking at the switch got it unstuck, and I'm glad of that, because not only was it unlocking the doors, but it would have eventually run down the battery.

We carried the cooler back inside, Lisa reassembled everything, I brought in buckets of water to refill the tank, and she turned it on: Success! The cooler started pumping water as it should, and soon thereafter, we started getting cool air wafting through the living room.

I thanked Lisa for doing this. She's much more handy with these sorts of home repairs than I am. I can carry things, buy parts, and so forth, but knowing what to do is more up her alley.

The next step of the Summer Reconfiguration was today. The high temperature here in Fernley was 36°C. Not Las Vegas or Phoenix hot, but still not comfortable. It was time to get the air conditioning going, such as we have here.

( Welcome to the Swamp (Cooler) )

Our high temperatures here in Northern Nevada don't get so awful as down south. It rarely reaches 40°C, which is where the cooler can't keep up. Fortunately, just like we rarely have days colder than -10°C in the winter, those very hot days don't happen much either. When it gets that hot, it's hard to do anything at all, and even the computers start straining and clocking themselves down to prevent overheating.

One key thing here is how cool it gets at night. Most of the time, it cools off sufficiently that we can open the windows and get some air circulation that dumps the hot air out of the house and brings in the cooler overnight air. It's that desert thing again. There will be times when that doesn't happen, and then it can get very unpleasant. Also, if wildfires send smoke our way, keeping the windows open also messes up the indoor air quality. But we mostly get by.

Tomorrow is the climax of the 2025 Music, Murals and Margaritas Festival in Fernley. As in past years, the big event, including performances, food trucks, etc. takes place on Center Street, which is the east boundary of the East Lot adjacent to Fernley House. That meant that Lisa and I had work to do today.

( Preparing for M3 )

We're not trying to be killjoys, but we also don't want to be sued by someone tripping and falling while walking to or from a festival where there will be plenty of alcohol flowing. It's not obvious that this lot is not just abandoned "free" land, and if we didn't do this, I'm certain that tomorrow morning we'd wake up and find it covered with cars parking close in to the festival. Now they'll end up parking in the Union Pacific rail yard across the street, and I'll let UP figure out how to deal with that.

We'll be more or less trapped in the house all day tomorrow, or at least only be able to venture out on foot, but it's okay. We didn't have any plans to go anywhere anyway.

This morning, just before dawn, I went out to work on the accumulation of tumbleweeds on our fences that blew in during the storms we've been having: gale force winds but no rain.

( Darn Tumbleweeds )

As it happens, this probably would have been a good day to do brush burning: dry, windless, and cold. However, I've not gotten around to going over to the fire station and buying a residential burn permit. We usually end up only managing one burn per year.

This afternoon, Lisa and I tackled unloading the rest of the latest pallet of firewood.

( Filling the Box, Mostly )

It's always a reassuring feeling to have a full woodbox. Our temperatures are lately ranging between around -7° and +7°C, and it takes extra firewood to keep the living room (which is also my office) habitable.

After we finished the wood work, Lisa drove the minivan around to the far side of the property, where we unhitched the utility trailer and chained it to the fence, as is our usual practice.

We have a total of three propane bottles: two small seven-gallon bottles and one large 27-gallon one. As of yesterday, Lisa was down to just the last small bottle. Originally, the plan was to take the large bottle to be refilled; however, it was raining most of yesterday. We can't transport the large bottle in the minivan because you're not supposed to transport vertically-oriented propane bottles on their side. So instead I took the small bottle down to Hanneman Service, transporting it in the back of the minivan.

Today, the weather was dry and warmer, so after work, we put the large bottle on the hand truck and I walked it down to Hanneman's. Lisa and Kuma carried a box of cookies. We have for the past few years given the Hannemans a box of cookies from Cost Plus World Market for the holidays. In this case, we bought two boxes and ate one of them, so we reckon we're giving them a good box.

As is usually the case when someone who has never filled our large bottle does so, we had to walk him through how he has to change the fitting on the propane pump. We got it done in the end, and now we are fully stocked with propane.

Lisa's shoulder feels better when she can keep it and everything around her warm, so I have no problem with making sure she has enough fuel to do so.

For those of you on my friends list, thank you for the kind words about Kayla's visit yesterday. The amount of support I've received has been very heartening. I'm glad I have you as friends. I even had some kind words from one of my cousins, which confirms to me that I have a good family.

For those of you only following me on LJ: I did not cross-post the friends-locked entry because I stopped maintaining the friends list on LJ. I only cross-post because I long ago bought a life membership on LJ and I'm still making use of it.

Overnight, it got pretty cold here, and freezing fog rolled in. This covered everything in ice, and made footing treacherous. Both Lisa and I slipped multiple times on the sidewalk and steps, but fortunately neither of us got hurt.

( Watch Your Step )

After a few hours, the sun burned off the fog and melted the ice, and I was able to get out to the stores for a few things. I then refilled the wood box in the living room, which got down to zero overnight. The fire did not go out, and I could have gotten wood from the reserve supply on the front porch.

Early this morning as I started work, I heard the sound of a mouse rattling the bars on the non-lethal trap. I picked up the trap and saw the mouse inside. I don't like going outside in the dark to let the mice out of the trip, and I know there was little chance of the mouse starving in the next couple of hours, so I waited until after sunrise. I opened the trap and there was no mouse inside, but there clearly had been one based on the state of the crackers with which I bait the trap. The clever little mouse must have figured out a way to open the one-way doors that lead into the trip. I guess if I hear a mouse again in the trip, I'll have to go take it away even if it means taking a flashlight with me.

Today, we planned on finally unloading the pallet of firewood from the utility trailer into the wood box.

( Preparation for Stocking the Wood Box )

Just before Lisa started the open the plastic that covers the pallet of logs, the 7% chance of rain that was in the forecast turned into a 100% chance. It did not rain that heavily, but because we didn't want our firewood turning into a pile of soggy sawdust, we postponed the unloading, possibly until tomorrow or this weekend when there is less chance of rain.

After a day of extreme discomfort where I spent about 16 hours alternating between my bed (where I could lie on my side, it being the only way I could get comfortable) and the bathroom, I am more or less back to normal. I'm going to get another dose of magnesium citrate, though, and stay close to home for most of today. OTOH, I felt good enough this morning to walk to the Wigwam for breakfast. There, I had the opportunity to thank Dawn, my regular server, for how nicely she treated Kayla on Thursday.

Thursday night, the humane trap in the kitchen started rattling again. That sound is usually due to a mouse trying to gnaw its way out of the metal trap. So it was time to escort the mouse out of the house again.

( Another Day, Another Mouse )

I don't really care where these mice go as long as they don't come back to the house.