End of the World. Beginning of a new one. The Life of Amberwolf.

[amberwolf]

I didnt' find my paper with the fuse info on it, so I went back up there, and found out why: I dind't have a paper with that info because there wasnt' any on the unit itself. It has a chart showing potential max power usage and ratings for it's optional heater unit (not installed, AFAIK) but it doesn't have anything I can find that directly tells me what it's max power usage/ratings are for the A/C cooler section.

So, I asked the landlord what size/rating fuses it needs so I could go get some, and he apologized for accidentally leaving those out, and is getting them for me (he said he'd install them, too, but I can do that easily enough once I have htem).

It's not a big-hurry thing anyway, as it's not that hot yet. Most likely I won't *need* the A/C till June, though it's supposed to break 100F "officially" (already has a few times in my part of the city) end of this week, just halfway thru May. Hopefuly it'll cool back down after that, but it's only a short time before it'll start staying up there most days.



Still, I am interested in seeing what the power usage is for the big roof A/C unit.


FWIW, in our previous "heat wave" a week or two ago, I tried out the window AC unit I'd found cheap at Goodwill back when I was still at the apartment, and A) it does work with the remote I still have left from the unit stolen right after the fire, and B) it doesnt' take very much power to cool off the single bedroom--though it wasn't really hot to start with, and I only tested it for to days, for about 12 hours each, from around 10pm thru 10am-ish. It seems to add about 1KWh or so to the daily usage. Not much of a sample to verify with, but I had it set to 72F to see if that would be a powerhog, and only had a thin curtain in the doorway.

So most likely if it becomes necessary, I can put it back in and use it to keep the bedroom cool enough (80-85F) thru the day for me and Tiny (and any other dogs I end up with this summer, if any).




Wilbur and Jebus are continuing to adapt to being there, as Tiny is adapting to them. But W&J seem to be picking at each other soemtimes for reasons I haven't determined. Niether has fought at all, AFAICT, but I hear snarling sometimes from Wilbur, and sometimes whining from Jebus.

I took the gate down from the bedroom doorway last night, as Tiny seems to have stopped being possessive of the bed and the room, and Wilbur slept on my legs while Tiny took her usual floor sprawl, for a while. Jebus seems to prefer sleeping on either the couch in the back room or on Tiny's blanket in the front room floor.

One of them had an oopsie poopsie in their room sometime yesterday, before I got home form work to let everyone out in the yard. Dunno which of the two it was, but it was at least solid, if stinky. Not sure why they didn't go in the many hours before I left for work but I suspect it is because it was very windy and gusty, and neither of them seems to like being outside in that muc hmore than Tiny does (which is not at all!). So maybe whoever held it in just dindt' wanna stay out there long enough to find a spot and go?

No harm done, though.

 

[dogman dan]

I put the wattmeter on my 8000 cfm unit, and was quite surprised how little it draws. Particularly in the AM, they are quite efficient now. Similar AC from 20 years ago were not.

Same applies with the roof unit. Though large, it's a ton more efficient than the ones years ago. As a kid, my dad used to spend $350 a month running one. In 1968 dollars!!!.

By closing all but two vents, and turning up the control, you should be able to cool two rooms very fast, at little cost. Then shut it off. PITA to have to keep switching it off, but 30 min run time will not cost much. You might be able to just leave it on, but set to 80-85 F. That's how I do my swamp cooler. I might be running one window cooler in a bedroom, but the swamper will turn on if the kitchen is getting towards 90F. That means it stays off till about 3-4 pm, about when I need to cool the whole house for when the wife comes home. With good insulation, the morning cool will last till mid afternoon in the whole house.

You now have a double dose of better efficiency, modern AC, and roof insulation much improved.

 

[marty]

For itchy skin. Try different laundry detergent.

 

[dogman dan]

Sounds to me more like something you ate made you itch.

My weird allergy is sesame oil or seeds. If I eat sesame, it starts on my neck and ears, and spreads from there down. Goes away in about 2-3 hours. If I get it bad, i'll hive from head to toe.

Took me about 2 years to finally pin down exactly what was causing this. The reaction sets in 30-60 min after eating, so it wasn't so obvious at first it was something I ate.

My brother has it for pine nuts, but only the china grown ones. That threw his ability to pin it on pine nuts.

 

[e-beach]

It's not a big-hurry thing anyway, as it's not that hot yet. Most likely I won't *need* the A/C till June, though it's supposed to break 100F "officially" (already has a few times in my part of the city) end of this week, just halfway thru May. Hopefuly it'll cool back down after that, but it's only a short time before it'll start staying up there most days.

A southwest high pressure system for sure. I even had to run my window air conditioner for the first time in almost 2 years. My bedroom was up to 94*f and that was enough for me. Gunna be like that through tomorrow then start to cool down in a few days towards the 70's around here. I am sure you will get cooler in a couple of days. But summer is coming. Keep the dogie cool.

 

[Eskimo]

This is the first week i was able to turn central heating off
We have double windows. This is the first week i am able to keep the inner window open overnight. Not both of course not even during the day.
I wish i could trade some of this climate with yours.
Then, very soon, it gets around +30C 24/7 because sun is up 24/7, and nobody has AC, so it"s +30C inside during the night. But it"s short period.
They promised it might start next week. Up here summer comes on like a thunder. Coolness turns to heatwave very fast. Then it"s just T-shirts.
Good to hear you got your house OK again.

 

[amberwolf]

Same applies with the roof unit. Though large, it's a ton more efficient than the ones years ago. As a kid, my dad used to spend $350 a month running one. In 1968 dollars!!!.

While I was up on the roof, I peeked down thru the fan on top and could see the compressor inside: it is only about half the size of the compressor that was in the ground-based unit, and it's connections to the coils are far less complex. The coils around it, however, appear to be larger surface area total.


FWIW, I *know* the old ground unit also was not as good as it oculd've been, cuz it was damaged by the installer overheating it severely (smoking hot), cuz he started running it without adding any oil/etc and then when it didn't work right and began smoking, he shut it off and THEN added the oil and coolant, after soaking it down with the garden hose for a long time (until it stopped steaming the water off). My mom was in charge of things like that at the time, so I don't remmeber if she ever tried to get the company or the landlord to make them replace the unit.

So I don't think it ever really worked right, from day one, and it was always very loud, partly cuz the noiseblanket it came with was left off by the installer cuz it would overheat very quickly if that was on there, and shutdown. (which I'd call a sure sign that he'd damaged it and shouldn't have even left it installed, and hsould've gone to go get a new unit instead).

By closing all but two vents, and turning up the control, you should be able to cool two rooms very fast, at little cost. Then shut it off. PITA to have to keep switching it off, but 30 min run time will not cost much. You might be able to just leave it on, but set to 80-85 F.

That's most likley how I will do it--opening only the vents to the one (sometimes two, when I am going to use the "music/computer" room) bedrooms right next to the hallway where the intake vent is, and curtaining off that hallway from the front room, so Tiny can go in and out of there as she likes/needs. Same way I did it before the fire with just hte window A/C in that one bedroom.

One thing that'll be different is I need to install a metal strip on the floor under the edge of the "curtain", and put magnets in the curtain edges. (there's already metal strips in the walls at the corners). Then the magnets will tend to pull the edges back in place to hold the cool air in better, after I or Tiny go thru the curtain, without manually repositioning it. Ideally I could just use a really heavy curtain instead, but since this one won't be fastened to the cieling or wall at the top, just a pressure-rod pushing against blocks on the corners of the walls entering the hallway, it probably won't stay in place against both that weight and me and Tiny pushing it aside a lot.

For itchy skin. Try different laundry detergent.

Definitely isn't hte detergent. Same crappy stuff I've been using for years :lol:, and no problems with anything else washed in the same load of stuff.

Sounds to me more like something you ate made you itch.
<snip>
Took me about 2 years to finally pin down exactly what was causing this. The reaction sets in 30-60 min after eating, so it wasn't so obvious at first it was something I ate.

Yeah, I've narrowed down dog allergies a few times over the years, (and a few of my own), by making a dayplanner for it. Take the DP and stick pages with all the ingredients for all the packaged things you eat, wear, use, or are exposed to, and lists of other things you touch or breathe or whatever, and/or places you go, and put different colored dots on them, or colored highlighters, crayons, or markers.

Then in the DP time/date pages, use the same colors to mark down when you eat/wear/are exposed to the different things.

Then write down any reactions you have at the time they start/finish/etc, and over time you'll start to see the patterns. After a few weeks, sometimes months if the reactions are rare, you'll probably be able to figure otu whatever the problem items are. If there are a lot of them it may take years to figure them all out, but the method works well enough. It's how i eventually figured out Loki was allergic to only chicken (he'd chew on his feet and tail a lot before I figured that out).



Anyway, I'm not *totally* certain, but at this point I'm pretty sure it's Wilbur I'm allergic to. Either his fur or something that's *in* his fur causes me to break out in that rash every time I give him hugs. If I wear long sleeves then I can hug him a little bit, but his fur is so stiff it pokes thru the cloth and gets me anyway after a while. I tested by wearing my raincoat and some black latex gloves and it doesn't happen, but it does if I forget the gloves, or just hug him anyway.

It doesn't seem to happen with Jebus, and has never happened with Tiny or any other dog I've had (or dogs that aren't mine that I've hugged). Just with Wilbur. :/

I haven't tried to give him a bath to see if it removes whatever it is; I don't know how well he does with baths, or what shampoo/stuff *he* might have allergies to, and I'd rather not cause him any problems, so I'll just leave him alone for that, and just use the raincoat/gloves to hug him with.


If I only pet his head or scratch his chin, I don't have the reaction....but the fur there is a little softer than the rest. So I dunno what is causing it. I also didn't have the reaction until a few days after he'd been here, so I suspect it's some combination of his fur, oils in his skin, and something he's wallowed in around here. But I don't really know for sure.




FWIW, Wilbur and Jebus and Tiny have started mostly pal-ing around now. She's still not sure what to do with Jebus, and he's still afraid around her, but I can mostly trust them together as long as he's not in his "whine" mode, which seems to agitate her a lot cuz she doesn't understand what's happening.

Wilbur barking she just ignores once she sees he's not barking *at* anything.


So I've been able to leave the gates down while I'm there, and Wilbur has been sleeping on one corner of hte bed by my feet (he wants to sleep by my head but I can't let him cuz of the itchies). Tiny as usual sleeps on the floor, sometimes by my feet and once in a while curled up in front of me, but it's too warm for her most of the time. Jebus sleeps on the floor jus tinside the bedroom door, and once in while on the corner of the bed. More often he sleeps on Tiny's blanket in the front room. Sometimes in the middle of the night he just starts this barky-whiney thing until i call him into the bedroom, where he comes in then turns around and goes back and lays down somewhere I can't see from the bed.

I've tried osme tests where I go do quiet yardwork in the front yard and around the side/alley outside the fence, with the blinds and front door closed, and noisemakers going in te front room so they can't really hear me out there, and they have done fine up to a couple hours at a time, just chillin' out from what I can tell. Dunno if they'd last out the whole day that way, so when i go to work I still put J&W in the master bedroom, to ensure no bad stuff, but I have a feeling they'd probably be fine if I didn't.


If they were here permanently, then eventually I'd probably work them all into staying together when I'm gone; but that might take weeks to months and they won't be here that long.

This is the first week i was able to turn central heating off
We have double windows. This is the first week i am able to keep the inner window open overnight. Not both of course not even during the day.
I wish i could trade some of this climate with yours.
Then, very soon, it gets around +30C 24/7 because sun is up 24/7, and nobody has AC, so it"s +30C inside during the night. But it"s short period.
They promised it might start next week. Up here summer comes on like a thunder. Coolness turns to heatwave very fast. Then it"s just T-shirts.
Good to hear you got your house OK again.

Yeah, up there it might be nice to build a house inside a house, sort of, to have more insulation and "airlocks".

 

[amberwolf]

Well, they've adapted much faster to each othe rthan expected, and I was able to start leaving htem all together all the time without problmes.

And Wilbur and Jeebus have also figured out the "doggie door" window I originally set up as Tiny's escape route in case of problems (fire, etc). So all three of them can go in and out to the backyard whenever they like.

(eventually I will get a back door I can cut a hole in for the actual doggie door I've got here, but until then this will have to do. The one that's presently installed is hollow steel, not wood, and while I could cut it I would rather leave it alone so that if I have to move out for some reason I don't have to either replace the door or leave my doggie door behind).


Mdd0127 is due back tonight; I'm sure W&J will be really happy to see him again!


Not much new on anything else at the house yet.

No more lantana sprouts have died off, rest are doing about the same. Having to water more frequently now that it's getting a lot hotter and not cooling off as much at night.

No fuses for the A/C unit yet. Had to put the window A/C unit back in the bedroom (had taken it out in anticipation of having the main unit, but it's gotten hot enough now that it was over 90F in the house when i got home from work the hottest day last week, and that was after 10PM at night, when it was still almost 90F outside). Tiny can't really take that very well, so have to give her at least one cool room to stay in when it's that hot.

Sorted more stuff in the sheds to find parts for the new bike, still nowhere near sorted enough to be able to build the shelves to make it easy to get to stuff. Everything is still just crammed in there. I think I would need a week or two off of work, and muhc much cooler weather, to get it any better than it is now, cuz I would have to completely empty out a shed, build shelves into it, then put it all back in an organized manner after removing the junk and destroyed garbage stuff from all the mess that was moved out fo the house after the fire. then repeat that for hte other ones. Probably take at least a few days for each shed, and that's assuming I'm not working--could take weeks if i have to work, too. Can't leave the stuff out that long.

 

[amberwolf]

Attached are some pics of the small-animal-shipping-containers as planters, some of the recovered lantana, etc. Also one pic of the hole left when Tiny apparently stole the growing onion out of a planter. I'll have to make something to put the planters on or in that she can't reach (maybe put them inside the still-not-moved/set-up aquarium), for any food-type stuff. I will probably have to fence off the "pumpkin patch" that seems to be starting over by the north-yard-area faucet I dug the holes to reach the pipes to. For now I have chairs over the top of it to keep her from just running them over when she's exploring.



It's been getting hotter and hotter pretty quickly lately, and staying hot thru the night most nights. Last night we got some very slight rain in the wee hours, but there was no sign of it left by dawn.

Water bill is too high with the way I've been watering, so am going to have to figure out a more efficient water delivery system that only gets water *just* to the specific plants I want, and only just enough to keep them growing, without having to manually go water each one throughout the day (cuz I ain't home to do that for almost half of each day for six days a week nowadays, due to work).


Electric is still staying pretty low, around $35-$40/month, even with the window AC unit running during hte night to cool the bedroom down enough to leave Tiny a cooler spot in the house to retreat to when i'm not htere in daytime.

(still can't use the main A/C unit, havent' heard back about the fuses yet, figure I'll recheck after a month has passed since my last contact, which is another week and a half or so, unless the weather becomes unbearable before then for some reason. The bedroom is all I really need to be cooled right now, so the window A/C unit does that just fine, except that I can't leave anything plugged in when I leave the house except the fridge and deepfreeze and those only because I have to or risk losing the food in them. So the bedroom has to be coooled a lot more than I normally would do so that it stays cooler longer for Tiny until I get home from work).


Rest of inside of house gets to around 88-91F nowadays, by the time I get home from work around 10pm. So it's probably hotter in there before then, maybe a little after sunset (as heat soaks thru the insulation, before it begins re-radiating back out as the sun isn't up anymore and the air cools outside). If it cools down enough at night outside, then when I have the house windows/doors open from when I get home at night until just about dawn, the house air gets down to about 75-78F before it begins warming back up again.

Sometimes there's no breeze and I have to use a box fan in one of hte windows to suck air thru the house from outside (this is why I really wish i still had the swamp cooler, because even without it's water turned on it could still be used as a high-volume air-mover, to blow cool outside air thru the house with little power, very quickly. Unfortunately that's no longer an option as it doesn't exist anymore, and it's entrance to the house was also covered over).

I've considered building a large squirrel-cage fan, and putting it into one of the back room windows, and hooking up one of the big motors I have to it, perhaps a hubmotor so I can control it's speed and thus the amount of power it uses. I'd have to cut out all the blades and weld them into very circular holders, install bearings, axle, etc., and that's a fair bit of work, so it's more likely I would want to find a used fan unit somewhere, preferably one being junked so it costs nothing but time to retrieve. I do have a radial type fan for high-volume air movement, with it's attached motor, but it has no cage or mounts so I'd still have to build that. And I need a startup cap for it, I think, but I probably have one of those somewhere. Just not with the fan. Teh sq cage would probably move a lot more air for the power/noise it uses/makes, though.


Anyway, pretty soon the air outisde even at night will be hot enough all night long to make that method a lot less effective than it is right now, so I don't know that I will bother. I have other things that I need to spend time on, like the watering system, and the new bike, which are much more pressing.

 

[amberwolf]

A few updates:

Surviving lantana is beginning to really grow, for the most part. A few are still tiny little nubs. Some of the ones on the grave are almost handsized now, a couple new ones have sprouted and are actualy outgrowing Fred's transplanted one (one is near that one, and another is over by Loki's). All of the ones I transplanted to Hachi's place have died but a new one sprouted almost over to Nana's, which I will just leave where it is so I don't kill it, too, and also because it is appropriate that it is coming from Nana's, since Hachi did, too.

A couple of the "eucalyptus" tree sprouts and transplants have begun to grow in earnest, but most of them are just kinda hanging on not much bigger than they were when put where they are now.

A whole BUNCH of new lantana sproutlings have come up under one of hte older lantanas, and I think I successfully moved most of them to those new ex-animal-transport planters. So far only a few have wilted. It'll be a long while, maybe late summer or fall, before I will be able to try planting them out along the fences where I really want them.

A whole bunch of new "eucalyptus" sprouts have also come up under the southeast mulberry tree, over between the carport gate and the east gate. Because they cant' actually be let to grow under that tree, long term, and I don't want to destroy their roots when I would eventually move them, I went ahead and moved them to another one of those planter boxes, too. They all seem to be doing fine--none are even as big s the first joint of my thumb, though, so it'll be a long while before they are ready to survive out in the hot sun on their own. When they are, I may put htem on the back fence and keep them trimmed down as bushes instead of trees. Or maybe along the front sidewalk. I don't really know. We'll see how they do first.

I think I accidentally deleted the pics of it, cuz i can't find them now, but I finally found hte hose and pumps and set them up to start moving the greywater bath/shower wastewater out to water the big mulberry by the house. I've got the hose stuff out to reroute the washer's wastewater to the yard, too, but haven't got that done yet. Kitchen I'm still using a bucket and dolly, as I'd like to find my pvc piping and make something I can leave installed under the counter edge, right from the drain of the garbage disposal straight to the backyard, with just one hose section that goes under the back door so it can squish when I have to close the door.


I also got the RFID-collar-controlled doggie door installed in a window (instead of the door so I don't have to cut a hole in the door, as it is a hollow metal door and I haven't located a cheap door in good condition that I can either replace it with or add as an "outside" door). Tiny has no problem going up the couch inside the window, out the window, onto the workbench outside, and down to the ground via what's left of the blue puffy chair that Hachi, Nana, Loki, Fred, and Bonnie always liked so much (but which was too damaged/etc to put back in the house, after the fire/smoke/water damage, and almost a year outside with local feral cats).

It's good enough to at least mean not leaving the window just wide open, with hot air coming in. The flap stops that, mostly, as long as the air is mostly still. It'd be better able to resist wind but I had to take the magnets out of it that lock it in place, and leave it locked open instead of RFID controlled, because while Tiny doesn't have a problem going thru the flap, she will not even TRY to go thru if the flap is held in place AT ALL, which the magnets do pretty well, because she seems to have been trained pretty well by someone to never try to open things by pushing at them. Normally that would be a good thing...but in this case I *want* her to go thru anyway. Might be able to teach her eventually.




I've also been inch-by-inch moving the big aquariums and stands from where they were originally going be shaded by that tree, which then had all of that half of the tree cut off by landlord/workers, forcing me to have to move them so they won't be simply always in direct sunlight. I was going to move the biggest one over between that tree and the house, but I couldn't figure a good place to put it there that wouldn't end up in the hottest afternoon sun, that wouldn't also be in the way of other things.

So now it's going to go at the southeast corner of the barnlike shed, which is right at the north side of that big mulberry tree. That will keep it shaded completely after around 11am, and mostly shaded from about 9am to 11am, so it won't get so hot that plants/fish would just die, or the water evaporate so much (huge surface area, like a small fish pond, perhaps 30 square feet?).

I have not yet even begun moving this particular aquarium, however; still working on moving the other smaller one out of the way first. Before I could even move the smaller one, though, I had to move the equally-heavy "desk" or whatever it is called that was along hte ends of them, which I want to put inside the house but have not been able to move at all until recently (now that it is a lot warmer all the time, usually hot, my joints tend to feel better than usual, though still worse than last year). The desk-thing is now enough out of the way to have finally as of this morning gotten the smaller tank almost out of the way of the big tank.

Now I have to figure out a way to get the big tank off it's stand without breaking the tank (it has pipes that go down into the stand, which are not fixed to the stand but mean I cannnot just slide it off on a ramp or something--and I can't get the pipes off, either). Since the tank overhangs the stand by a LOT, I can't move them together without great risk of tipping them both over, which is just about certain to break the tank. Once i get the tank off the stand it's easy to mvoe the marine-plywood stand, after I set up bricks/etc to keep it off the actual ground, and to level it. Then the hard part again of putting the tank back on the stand.

I've spent a few hours this past week when i couldn't sleep in the music/comptuer room playing around with the "new" ASR88, loading up old unfinished projects (from many years ago) and either just using their soundsets and goofing off noodling around, or recording new bits or editing old ones, or even combining a few of them into new projects. Very little of it is even worth re-listening to, but some of it has some promise, if I could figure out what to do with it, or have someone else go in there and chop it up into something other people would want to listen to. Also been playing on Thud's acoustic guitar, but haven't recorded any of it as the music workstation computer isn't up and running...yet.



I've finally got enough more-modern pieces of computer stuff that other people didnt' want anymore to rebuild a music workstation that is pretty close to what I lost in the fire. I haven't had time (and energy at the same time) to actually get it all together, but it's enough together to get Windows XP reinstalled on it. I had to start that from scratch, using a no-activation OEM CD, though, because I can't seem to find a way to permanently re-activate my copied-over original XP install--every 30 days it deactivates itself even though it's a perfectly legal install (though I doubt that I still have the cd or key sticker for it anymore, as those were probalby in the room that burned, along with the actual computer). Tried it over the phone, but their computer can't understand my speech, and couldn't get a human on the phone, just got stuck on hold and can't waste my expensive minutes on something like that.

I tried various workarounds, but all of them require that I make sure and boot up the workstation before the 30 days are up to redo them without a bunch of steps that are difficult to do as quickly as must be done (beffore I get autologged out), and I end up doing so many other non-music things that I forget to boot the computer up within that time, and so when I *do* finally feel like making music, have time, and am awake enough, all at the same time, then I go to use it, and it's stuck at the reaactivation window again.


I suppose there are probalby cracks for it out there, but I shouldn't ahve to use them just to use my own legally-purchased OS. If I want to use my original OS, I'll probably have to use the workarounds to get everythign installed and setup on the "new" computer, then take it to Bill's or somewhere with hardwired internet (no wifi on it as there's no need), and then try to get it reactivated over the internet, assumign that MS hasn't turned off the XP activation servers. (if they have, I guess I'll have to find and use a crack to use it).



I haven't done anything aobut hte wifi/internet situation yet, since finally giving up on the wifiway/etc stuff as pointless (only spanish version of any of the different ones I can find is actually available, no matter what their webpages say, no english versions exist to actually download!).




In anticipation of eventually getting the main A/C up and running, I've gotten the hallway curtained off with a thick puffy blanket/comforter on a clamping-curtainrod with blocks of wood to protect the corners of the walls. That way the intake of the main A/C, in the hallway, plus the bedroom (and the main bathroom and the computer/music room) are in their own "mini-circulation-path" so I don't have to waste money I don't have on cooling the whole house, when really I just need to keep a small space livable for Tiny during the day (when I'm usually at work), and both of us at night (when I'm usually home).

Naturally it's not completely airtight or anything, but it will tend to keep most of the cool air at that end of the house, and reduce the cooling bill by a whole lot. My guess is it would be <20% of the cost of cooling the entire house, possibly even less. Maybe less than half that if I keep the bathroom and music/computer rooms' doors and vents closed, and only cool the bedroom itself. But if I'm going to just do that room, I could probably more cheaply do it using the window A/C unit...I'd rather keep all three rooms cool since I would like to be able to spend time in the computer/music room as well, when it is too hot outside to do any significant work out there, but still want to accomplish *something*.

 

[amberwolf]

Haven't figured out how, but I managed to break my phone's LCD screen last night, despite it being in my pocket by itself with the screen facing my thigh, and not hitting it on anything, and with no mark on the face of it that could be impact-related to the screen.

There is no damage to the touchscreen overlay of the face of the phone, either. :?

The break point is at the upper left corner, but cracks extend all the way to every other part of the screen, so almost all of the screen is unreadable. Most of the time it comes up all white; sometimes it has *some* of it visible. Only hte far left edge, about 1/4" wide, and 1" of the bottom edge is mostly readable. That obscures the majority of thigns like the dialpad; I can sometimes see the 1, 4 7, 8, 9, and 0, and can guess where the others are, so I could dial out manually as long as the screen works. Most of the time I can't read the stuff in the phone/address list because there are lines thru the text making it mostly unrecognizable. For the ones I recognize anyway I can sitll pick them to dial.

Texting is essentialy not possible for read or write; no matter whihc way the phone is oriented the text entry box is not visible.

As long as I don't need to know who it's from before answering, I can still receive calls fine with it. Sometimes I can still see enough of the name to figure out who it's from, too, but not usually.


Didn't even intend to be on wifi today, but had to see if I could find a replacement screen for it (or used version of the phone) online somewhere. So far, no luck; apparently there are at least two very different-looking versions of the LG840, and mine (GPLG840GB) isn't the one pictured in any of the links I can find so far.

I'll have to take it apart tonite after work or tomorrow to see if the LCD in it actually looks like the one in the images for the other version that does have links to a replacemnt LCD.


So the phone has lasted me just a bit more than a year before making it close to useless, except to receive calls.


I have a Samsung android phone from Bill, which I sitll use as a camera, but AFAICR from my original experiment, it doesnt' appear to be able to read the SIM card from this Tracfone. I'll have to try the rooting method I found a while back for it, and then see if it'll read the SIM and SD card. If not, then repairing this LG phone will be my only good option to retrieve the data on the phone (especially phone numbers, etc). (even if I do fix that Samsung I think it will need a new battery, cuz it doesn't last even a whole day)

 

[nicobie]

It's probably cheaper to just buy a new one than replace the screen.

Here is a new triple minute lg 840 with 600 minutes for 29.00 NO tax, free shipping. The minutes alone cost more than that! It's a beautiful shade of pink but I've got a couple of covers for it that I could send.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Pink-LG-840G-Prepaid-Phone-w-600-Minutes-and-Triple-Minutes-Tracfone-NEW-/141137204439?pt=Cell_Phones&hash=item20dc6ed4d7

I have seen used ones and refurbed ones going for $14 (with no minutes).

 

[amberwolf]

Thansk...before I saw your reply I found one on amazon for $20 that Bill can get free shipping on, and it's the best option vs just a screen, cuz A) I get a whole phone's worht of parts shoudl I go that route, and B) I could theoretically just move my sim/etc over to the new phone and be set and ready to go. So that's what's happening right now.

(based on other people's experiences with Tracfone's support, I don't think it would be nearly that easy to swap phones and have all my stuff/minutes/etc transfer over, so most liklye I'd use it for parts to fix mine, but at least there's that option).




It's definitely getting on the hot side nowadays. When I started trying to post this (problems connecting off and on), it was only just past noon here and was already "officially" 101F (airport, probably) and right here in my part of the city it was 104F and still rising.

Now, 2 hours later, its' already 105F officially and 109F where I am, still rising. It's 122F in the sun on the bike, under teh coroplast on the handlebars, according to the analog thermometer I keep there. Sidewalk pavement is probably 135-140F at least by now, and I don't wanna know what the asphalt temperature is.

There are wispy clouds to the north and northwest, but I dunno that they'll end up over the part of the city I'm in, given that the wind down here appears to be from the southwest. can't tell yet which way the clouds are moving, since I just noticed them.

Yesterday it was 110F when i got to work at 1pm, and still 90F when I got home at 10pm, and the house was 91F (only cooling the bedroom with a window a/c unit, so it stays at 80F for Tiny).

I dunno what the temps will be later this summer, but given what it is already a few days into June, and what it was in May and April, I wouldn't be surprised to see 125F sometime in the next couple months.


I am having to water everything at least every other night, and all hte little things not under big trees have to get water every night when I get home. The pumpkin vine that came up from probably a bird-dropped seed out by the sheds needs quite a bit of water every day, and even so it wilts during the day past about 11am, only reviving later at night. It probably won't survive the summer, even though I have it shaded by chairs (which are really there to keep Tiny from trampling it).



It's gotten so hot that at least for daylight times I can only really do much, if any, work on things from just before dawn when it's light enough to see, until maybe an hour after dawn when it's already well past hot enough to make me dizzy, and Tiny doens't wanna be outside anymore.

At night when I get home it's just falling past that point, but it's too late (and dark) to do much outside, without disturbing neighbors.



I can wokr inside the house on stuff, but can't do building on the bike (cutting, welding, etc) there. Gonna have to build an awning/tent thing over by the clothesline / tree / shed area so I can work outside on the bike in daylight before going to work. Will also have to set up a mister and fan system to keep me cool enough even in the shade. Am in hte process of digging the stuff out of the north shed for that (and for hte bike).

Also sitll have to finish moving the aquariums out of the way there, as I ahven't gotten them any farther in the last few days. Once i have them in their place, if I could set up their piping/etc (if I knew where it was) then I could also fill them and then evap from those would help cool that little area, a little bit at least.



So I'm slowly working on getting things how I need them...if I could sleep better I could accomplish more, though, cuz it takes me most of the time I am not at work to get enough sleep to function minimally at work. But even as things are, life is progressing, if slowly.

 

[dogman dan]

Hot one here too. 108 in my yard Wednesday. So of course my huge bike ran over a big nail 5 miles from home. Started trying to change the tube, and it was just too hot to even think how to get the wheel off. Rear tire, of course . That means removing the big panniers.

Realizing the tire was chopped to hell anyway, I rode home 6 mph on the flat tire.

The dogs are really enjoying their summer shave down. Daisy is back to chasing rabbits on her run, instead of just staying by my side too hot to do more. Much easier to brush out what's left, when it's just a Mohawk down their backs that's still full length.

Praying for rain as usual. With patience, you will get all your plants back. When fall comes, try again with transplants.

 

[amberwolf]

Yeah, by then the stuff I have growing in planters ought to be big enough to survive, I guess. Though I wil lhave to split it off to other planters by then, cuz they'll be too big to be together in the ones they'r ein now.


I had my own tire incident night before last:
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=12500&p=904712#p904712
Thankfully I got home before anything happened to it.


Here's some pics I keep forgetting to post. First up is the first pumpkin vine that sprouted (from a bird dropping? dunno) over in the hole I dug near the faucet out by the sheds, trying to find the pipe that feeds it. Once I fix the faucet's source, it'll be a good place for it cuz it'll be really easy to water. :lol: The vine is about 5x that size now, and I have three chairs aorund it to keep Tiny from trampling it (as much).




Then there's the place where the aquariums are/were in front of the barn-shed. one has been moved toward the house out of the way, and the other bigger one is sitll there, waiting till I can get help to move it (or figure out a way to do it by myself withotu breaking it again like I did last time I tried).



This is a closer shot of that big tank:



And this is where it is going to end up:



And this is the smaller one I was able to drag out of the way, along with the desk-thing behind it (which needs to go in the house).



And this is Tiny's doggie door, from the outside, showing the blue chair she goes up/down to get to/from the white workbench and thence to/from the doggie door that's in the window.
View attachment 1

Ideally I'd like to make her some stairs to use it instead, but I am hoping ot have a better solution before having to put that work into it. For now, she excitedly runs up to the chair and bench from outside to go in, and the same to the couch inside to get out. Here's the inside view, with the gray couch from previous inside pics directly under that window.



She actually has a lot of fun climbing up there to do that, and sometimes does it a few times in a row just to do it. :lol: When I have the back door open at night, if it's cool enough and she gets excited, she sometimes runs up to the couch and out the window, then bakc in the door, then around up and out the window and back in the door, over and over for a minute or two. I have yet to catch it on video though.

 

[The fingers]

Video of Tiny going through the window doggie door would be awesome. :lol: As it is here, we have to get up and go downstairs to let Oliver outside several times a day.

 

[amberwolf]

I guess it at least keeps you active.


Watering has had to become more frequent and higher quantity. I expect >$100 water bill this month (maybe $150), partly because the entire front west yard area has only the shade of the very small trees (not much past kneehigh yet), so has very high evaporation. Not much grass there yet either, so it comes right out of the soil. I've been spreading the cut grass over the area whenever I trim it, as a partial barrier, but it doesn't help enough yet, as it's not much of a cover yet.

I sort of wish I had a "watt meter" for my water use, on each hose, so I could see what it takes to keep things watered.

I completed the "final" version of the bathtub greywater recovery pump/hose, and it works better than it did, but I sitll have to "prime" the pump by removing the hose from it's output, starting it up underwater, waiting a couple of seconds till it begins firehosing water out, and then screw the hose back into it, or it only barely moves any water up thru it and essentially never gets any water up and out to the tree. I'm still looking thru my stuff for some kind of T valve that I could put in there to allow water to bypass the hose during startup, and then shunt back into the hose once it's flowing. Something automatic would be really nice but I don't think I have anything I could make that with, so manual will have to do.


The washer drain out to the east fence lantana works fine, though, thankfully. Would like a larger diameter hose to do it with cuz the washer pump sounds a little strained compared to normal, but ATM the garden hose size is all I have that's long enough, other than metal pipe I'd have to weld together.


It's hot enough now that the cold water is never really cold, and I can shower in that, if I leave the water pressure low enough to slightly warm it as it passes thru the overhead pipes in the attic. This saves me a lot of electric power in not having to run the hot water heater, but it's not as nice as a hot (or even warm) shower would be. Ideally I'd prefer to build that solar water heater, if I can find time to find the parts in the sheds and dig them out, and then build the thing...but there are just way too many projects I need to do and not enough time when it is cool enough to do them, while I *also* have the energy to do it and am not at work.



Pumpkin stuff still wilts during late morning thru sunset, even if it's really wet ground. I guess the plant just can't feed water up to the broad leaves fast enough for the evap rate. Still, several flowers have bloomed, and one has begun to grow a pumpkin (less than an inch across).

Am looking thru my stuff for things I could quickly and easily build a shade from that won't stop the light, just diffuse it more, and also not look like a pile of crap from the street. Have a roll of fabric a yard wide that I may be able to make an awning from, that I will also try to make an awning fo rthe west side of the house with, to shade that wall (including my bedroom) from the afternoon/evening direct sun.

that may also let me start growing lantana/etc around that side yard that will eventually be able to do that shading for me instead.


Haven't lost any more lantana in a while now, but two of the "eucalyptus" sproutlings appear to be dying--one over by the south sheds has one drying-out leaf, even though all of those western-yard trees now have much higher berms around them to hold more water, and most of them have at least some grass cover, and I also have leaves/grass cuttings covering inside the berms, too, to help minimize evaporation (it helps a lot, actually, compared to bare dirt).

I have a "planter" full of replacment sprouts, but none are anywhere near big enough to survive in teh full sun. Have to wait at least till end of summer, probably end of fall, before I coudl safely move them out into the sun like that.


I also have a planter full of lantana sprouts, but they also are too small to survive the present heat out in teh sun. They'll also have to wait till the hot months are past.

 

[amberwolf]

Got that Tiny doggiewindowdoor vid up:
[youtube]733LkywkcqU[/youtube]

Not quitethe same as she usually does....

 

[dogman dan]

I'm sure you know they exist. But of course, even $25 can be too much money.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/WATER-TIMER-SAVE-WATER-FLOW-METER-TANK-BUCKET-POOL-RV-SOAK-HOSE-PATIO-GARDEN-/151330702693?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item233c034565

I had one for a time for work, and it didn't last long. But it will only take one or two uses to get you a ball park idea of your flow rate at different times of day, then you can just time the water.

And of course a low tech method can work too, fill a 5 gallon bucket, and time that.

I'm getting really hopeful for a good monsoon this year. I'm watering way too much too. But if I can keep the back lawn semi green in June, July rain can make it so nice for the rest of the summer. Then it doesn't go to bare dirt so fast in winter.

 

[tomjasz]

Eucs are pretty much trashy trees. Often weak branching and prone to wind damage.

Typically old school gardeners focused on good soil development first. Develop the soil and improve it's biological mass and water holding capacity should be the first step in any desert home landscape. An old school second generation Japanese gardener, now diseased, in Las Vegas planted and watered a nitrifying crop like oats, clover, vetch, and such.Then planted grass. But turf in the desert SW will always be a water sucking adventure. To much it gets all sorts of diseases, to little and your flirting with the permanent wilting point. Grey water makes good sense, sadly our homes do't make it's use homeowner friendly. Your water district surely has reasonably accurate calculators. ET evapotranspiration is a value often published, and incorporated now into irrigation controllers, for determining how many inches of water need to go down in a given period.


One of my TV bits.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MiAFrSEryek

 

[amberwolf]

And of course a low tech method can work too, fill a 5 gallon bucket, and time that.

Doh. Didn't evne think of that. :lol: Though I'd have ot do it agian every time I turn the water on cuz it's a little different no matter how careful I am to set the valve the same. Probably have to use a 1-gallon bucket or a 1-liter bottle, something smaller, to reduce the time I wait sitting there for it to fill since it's usually just a dribble for most of my watering.

I'm getting really hopeful for a good monsoon this year. I'm watering way too much too. But if I can keep the back lawn semi green in June, July rain can make it so nice for the rest of the summer. Then it doesn't go to bare dirt so fast in winter.

Bare dirt is what happens here in summer, while in winter it usually is warm enough to be really nice and often greener than any other time except spring. Monsoon here though just means clouds, wind, dust storms (habib?) and relatively high humidity, rather than actual rain, for most of this century so far, vs previous years.

Eucs are pretty much trashy trees. Often weak branching and prone to wind damage.

Well, I haven't seen that in the ones here that did make it big before being cut down, or the much bigger one that's between the fence and one of the sheds in back, so maybe they aren't eucalyptus, then. There *are* a lot of easily-damaged trees that get planted in parking lots and business areas aorund here, which grow pretty fast (faster than the ones I have by a lot) and typically after 3-4 years start having large chunks of them destroyed in our storms--sometimes as much as half the tree could be ripped off in one storm, occasionally the whole tree will just break off somewhere between the main lower branches and the ground, damaging the cars underneath. (naturally, people prefer to park under the trees for the shade, so it's more likely than not for a non-full parking lot to get cars damaged by this in a storm).

When i look at pics on google image search, there's an African Sumac that does look a little like the ones I have, but it isn't quite the same to me. I tried a few landscaping sites that show common trees used here, but dindt' find them in it, either.

There is *one* of the trees, the really tall one (taller than the power poles) in the northwest corner, that does look like one of the Eucalyptus trees, except that it is a simple very tall tree and not spread out at all, unlike all the pics I see of the Eucalyptus that have similar leaves/etc. So I don't really know what it is for sure.

Typically old school gardeners focused on good soil development first. Develop the soil and improve it's biological mass and water holding capacity should be the first step in any desert home landscape. An old school second generation Japanese gardener, now diseased, in Las Vegas planted and watered a nitrifying crop like oats, clover, vetch, and such.Then planted grass.

I typically try to gradually increase the area of growing things, so that the soil is being developed by the stuff intruding into the empty dry areas over time, breaking it up and helping all the support systems down in the dirt to grow with it, instead of just pouring water in there hoping for the best (which is what I sometimes see others do around here). I haven't actually looked into planting something specifically to help starting things up, though. If it's something I can trade for, or is cheap enough to buy seeds for, I can try that.

But turf in the desert SW will always be a water sucking adventure. To much it gets all sorts of diseases, to little and your flirting with the permanent wilting point.

I actually don't care about the grass itself, and I'd be fine with any kind of ground cover that the city doesn't consider a weed, and that doesn't leave spiky little seeds like a couple of the plants that keep springing up trying to take over my yard all the time.

Ideally I'd like to have "shade trees" that cover the whole area enough to not have to worry much about ground cover (as far as evaporation from sunlight goes), and lantana or other hardy bushes that can provide screening along the fences and such. But now that all my stuff spent almost a year unwatered because there was no water connected to the property to do it with until it was finally re-approved by the city after the repairs, and then the landlord's crew cut down so much of what was left, including several whole trees, it's going to take years more to get to that point than it would have otherwise. (it'd take a lot less if I could win some sort of water-lottery and get a year or two's supply of free water, and just irrigate everything all the time especially in late spring, summer, and fall. :lol: ).

The stuff I do still have is recovering pretty well, some of it way better than I could have ever imagined, and it's only about four months in since I got back, so as the ground gets wetter deep down and roots re-spread and whatnot, they'll get even better even faster. I've mostly concentrated on the existing larger stuff near the house, to improve shade and cooling there, but also trying to get the little row of trees to shade the sheds going. So far they're still tiny, and one of htem probably is not going to make it (it had been the second biggest, on the southernmost end of the line), and will probably take several years to become any kind of shade for more than a cat. :lol: (right now they *might* shade a few ants).

Stuff in front is gonna also take several years to get past cat-shading, too, I suspect.

Grey water makes good sense, sadly our homes do't make it's use homeowner friendly.

That's true--unfortunately it seems to be city (and other government) codes that preclude it's use, or at least preclude plumbing routes/etc that would make it easier. AFAIK that's why the landlord couldn't run pipes for the purpose out from the drains during the rebuild, but I don't know for sure that's the only reason.

Given our water's limited supply especially here in Phoenix area, I'd expect that the cities would want to *promote* the use of greywater in lawn/yard watering, and start having that built into homes/etc, but AFAICT no one cares. It'd certainly save on using freshwater for the purpose, leaving that for the stuff that only that can be used for.

Your water district surely has reasonably accurate calculators. ET evapotranspiration is a value often published, and incorporated now into irrigation controllers, for determining how many inches of water need to go down in a given period.

I'll have to look that up; it's another thing I hadn't thought of. (it's a long list, getting longer)

 

[amberwolf]

Forgot to post the pics of the power usage nowadays; it's about 3x what it was before, because I've been cheating and running the window AC down to 72F for too many nights (I have less nightmares the colder the room is, for whatever reason, and I'm all for less of those). I still change it back to 80F when I finally give up on sleep and get up for the day, until I get home from work (or done with hte day of stuff at home, whichever it is) and try to go back to sleep.

It's also a little because of the deep freeze being in the back room, which while that keeps it from adding heat to the rooms Tiny and I are usually in, also means it's in a hotter room to start with during the day (although it gets significantly cooler at night than any other non-AC'd room, by up to several degrees). I have the thermostat on hte DF set to one notch above minimum, cuz for some reason it doesn't stay cold enough for deepfreeze at the min setting (it makes water freeze to ice, but it's not very hard). So that takes more energy during these summer months when the nighttime temps don't usually get below 80F outside, and usually not below 85F inside even with the whole house (except hte bedroom) opened up to the outside.


Power usage for the time I've been back at the house now:


Power usage for yesterday, when I ran the window AC at 72F right up to about 10am, then changed it to 80F for hte next 13 hours, then back to 72F, with the peak power usage before I turned it back to 72F from cooking and recharging batteries, etc.:
View attachment 1


I have stopped trying to force-ventilate the house at night with a boxfan in a window, since several experiments with using diffferent windows and differnet airflow directions show that the only one that makes much difference in any room is by pulling air from the back room via the fan in the front east bedroom front window...and there is sometimes JUST enough breeze going the other way to cancel out most of the airflow during parts of the night, as it's not a very good box fan. (makes lots of noise, doesn't move all that much air...which is fine for the whitenoise function I bought it for, not so good for THIS purpose though). Also, it only pulls air from the backroom windows, meaning only that room really changes in temperature overnight, and the front rooms and kitchen stay around what they were at peak, maybe losing a degree or two at best, cuz tey're getting all the heat from the backroom and kitchen pulled into them.

Every other way of settin gup the fan and windows typically ends up pulling warmer air off the street/front yard into the house, and usually winds up either making it at best a degree cooler than when I started, or at worst makes it *warmer* by one or two degrees!

If I simply leave all windows and doors open except the bedroom, overnight, then by just after dawn it has usually dropped the front room by 4-5 degrees, on nights the temperature is already lower outside than inside when I get home about 10-10:30pm. I don't understand how this can be the case, but that's how it's worked out so far.

On nights when the temperature outside doesn't get below the inside temp by midnight, there's not much point in opening anything up, cuz it isn't going to get any cooler by dawn if I do (cuz I can't open it up before it gets cooler outside than inside, or it gets hotter instead of cooler in there). Unfortunately there are more and more nights like that, and will be the case for the next month or so, at least.


I've got a much more powerful fan I can try in the window, to pull air from the backroom faster, but it isn't mounted in a frame or cage, so I have ot build one before I can use it. Also have to find the starter cap for it. Hmmm...I think I already posted about that recently, but cant find it now. :? Brain not working.

Anyway, time to go home from wifi, sun is setting soon, temperature is only 109F and finally cooling, so I might get some stuff done outside since there's some breeze.

 

[tomjasz]

Feel free to ask any garden questions. I'm pretty up on desert horticulture.

Tom

 

[The fingers]

Google xeriscape for ideas using zero water landscaping. :wink:

 

[tomjasz]

Google xeriscape for ideas using zero water landscaping. :wink:

Magic? Or Namib Desert?