Caught a Weather related break today

It didn't rain as expected so I was able to get a second coat on the steps.  The railings look fine with just the one coat so except for touch ups I'm essentially done with the Mountain Spruce part of this paint job.  Though I'm debating if I want to tackle the lattice or skip it entirely.  I seem to have overestimated the paint I needed though I probably saved some hassle by getting the 5 gallon instead of single gallons.  I was lucky that I waited until Home Depot had a pre-Memorial Day sale which was exactly like their Memorial Day sale and got some rebates on the paint, along with a 10% off coupon I had because they think I just moved or something.

If the weather is cool as expected tomorrow, I can work on the spindles.  These I need to take my time with and use painters tape so it might be a case of working one set at a time.  If i can finish the north end of the porch, I can put the porch swing up.  I should be able to the other porch furniture out now since it shouldn't be in the way or can easily be moved when I'm working on a section.

 I'm settling into a New Normal around here, or at least trying my best.  Weeks ago I cleaned out my desk and moved everything that is staying at the office into my storage cabinet and now I work 100% from home.  If I have to be downtown for something or a friend wants to met for lunch, I can go into the office and hunt for a seat or just use the cafe areas off the breakrooms.


The good news is I can log in at 7 and check emails so I'm not as ambushed when I get started as before.  My hours are still 8-5 CST though but I figure the extra time justifies when I run an errand during lunch that goes over an hour or the Traffic Gods don't favor me.

 On that note, I tried to cancel my gym membership.  I expect the process to be painful but not as bad as some of the lower end gyms in the world.  They wanted to charge me for June's billing cycle even though I let them know well before the end of May (they would try this even if I canceled May 1).  luckily the credit card they have on file expired though I'm sure they will still try to go after me for it.

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Project Paint the Porch: working as I can

As expected, the porch painting is going slow.  We were out of town for Memorial Day (including the days that bookend that weekend for traveling), though the weather was so hot I would not have been able to work on it anyway.

At least as far as the steps are concerned, I want to work under the required conditions of not too hot or humid and no chance of rain for 24 hours.  For various reasons, I decided to skip to Stage 3 and finish the railings before the spindles.  I still have to do a second coat on the steps though I'm debating if I need to do a second coat on the railings.

I'm hoping that I can do the spindles with more patience and care so I don't drip paint all over the green part.  I want to be finished by Father's Day so it looks good for the neighborhood yard sale.  Plus I want to get our front deck furniture out.



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Doing my due Diligence regarding Your Data and GDPR

I’ve had no one ask me how the European Union’s new General Data Protection Regulation law affects this site, but I do get the prompt below within the internal admin part of Mysteries of Life, so, let me talk about that very briefly.

European Union laws require you to give European Union visitors information about cookies used and data collected on your blog. In many cases, these laws also require you to obtain consent. 
As a courtesy, we have added a notice on your blog to explain Google's use of certain Blogger and Google cookies, including use of Google Analytics and AdSense cookies, and other data collected by Google. 
You are responsible for confirming this notice actually works for your blog, and that it displays. If you employ other cookies, for example by adding third party features, this notice may not work for you. If you include functionality from other providers there may be extra information collected from your users. 
Learn more about this notice and your responsibilities.

I am not collecting any information about anyone, other in the very general sense of reading and comprehending whatever bits of personal information people leave in their comments. Even so, I don’t do anything commercial with any of that — I don’t mine my comment threads for personal data, and certainly don’t comb through them for sales, advertising or other commercial purposes. It’s not that kind of site, and I’m really not that interested.

And if we are being totally honest here, I don't get the volume of visitors here that would make that sort of thing useful in the first place.  I don't get many visitors here and the ones who do generally comment anonymously so I don't have much relevant user data.

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One reason I don't like to travel

Since meeting Nightingale, I've logged more trips to Michigan than Missouri in a shorter amount of time.  Actually I'm not sure about that statement but too lazy to fact check.  It's probably about even.

Anyway, the hardest part about the drive is getting in and out of Chicago Metro traffic.  It doesn't seem to matter what time we leave here or Grosse Point, there is always traffic and it's ugly cousin Construction to impede up. 

Take our return on Tuesday. 

With our GPS app telling us we had 43 miles and 1 hour 9 minutes to go. 

Eight minutes later we have 33 miles to go.  Then with only 15 miles to go, it is still estimating another 43 minutes!  even with only 10 miles to go, it will take us 38 minutes to get home.

The closer we get, the slower we move because of traffic.  Oh and guess what!  There was a car accident that closed 3 local lanes to punish us for not taking the express lanes both chances we had. 


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Project Paint the Porch: Stage 1 begins

I wanted Atlantic

I have done the first coat on the porch though not as far as I had hoped.  The edger I got, from Aldi of
all places, held up pretty well until I was almost done and then it came apart with two small sides left.  It isn't an easy thing to fix with paint on it so I did the best I could but decided not to do the steps and just focus on the whatever the formal name of the porch platform is.


I didn't start as early as I could have for a couple of reasons.  First, I went for a run before work because my kids miraculously woke up early and we were able to get them off to school.  My New Normal is to log into the office around 7 am or earlier and just check emails though I officially start at 8 CST.  I got back right at 8 and decided to cool off and then mow the postage stamp sized amount of grass in the backyard.

I didn't start on this yesterday because the humidity was right at 79-80 and I didn't want to take a chance, especially since I had just power-washed the porch on Tuesday.  Today was much hotter but the humidity only about 40 right now.

I also couldn't start on the painting too early because part of the prep involves using a leaf blower to clear any dust and debris.  While it only would have been for 5 minutes at the most, I don't want to be the neighbor that makes that kind of noise before 8 AM.

I need to do a second coat, which I should be able to do this evening before nightfall.  When we get back from Michigan, I'll have all summer to finish though I do not plan to take that long.  The weather looks decent next week so I should be able to get the spindles knocked out then.  After that, it's the railings and risers.



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Project Paint the Porch: Stage 0

The time has come to paint the front porch.  This is actually a stop-gap solution because we
eventually will have to repair/replace the porch at some future date.  I'm hoping that future date is sometime after we sell the house.

My neighbor used a product called Deckover and it looks pretty good on his old steps.  I thought I'd give it a try.  I wanted to change the color of our house and shift from Green to Blue or grey or something that isn't green because our house has an overabundance of green.  However Nightingale pointed out that it would look too funny if we didn't paint all the trim around the house and it would be too much work to do so.  Hence we are going with Mountain Spruce.

My plan is to do this in stages since I need to do it when the little DN are at school and the weather cooperates.

• Stage 0:  Power wash and Prep the area
• Stage 1:  Paint steps green.  Two coats
• Stage 2:  spindles (another color)
• Stage 3:  green railing
• Stage 4: risers
• Stage 5:  install quarter rounds on the six steps and paint those green as well
• Stage 6: Touch up and cleanup

I bought everthing I need (except the quarter rounds) over the weekend so I should be able to start if the weather cooperates.  The temp needs to be between 50-90, with less than 80% humidity and no rain expected for 24 hours.

It's raining today and it is also supposed to rain this weekend, starting Friday.  This is what my phone app says right this minute, it's always subject to change.  That gives me a slim Tues-Thursday window, depending on when the rain will come friday.  We are also traveling to Michigan for Memorial Day weekend so I won't be able to finish (or start) until next Wednesday.







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Changes at the Office and home

So I made it through year number two at Big Audit.   It has been rough from almost day one.   I realize belatedly that one of the reasons Headless Nick was so cold towards me was, from his perspective, I was replacing him.

 So a week or so ago my PML forwarded me an email from the person who manages hoteling in the Chicago office.  Note: they reach out to our PMLs instead of to us directly.  This is one more sign of how dysfunctional things are at Big Audit.

I'll miss the white board and coat cubby

The issue was they wanted to move some tax group into my area, which would mean relocating me.  At the same time,  Hoteling Dude asked if I really needed a permanent seat since my utilization was under the threshold.  I could come to the office and hunt for a desk, but that doesn't make sense.  I do not work with anybody in the Chicago office and coming to the office is really just a thing I did to make Headless Nick happy and provide me some structure.

When I started in 2016, we could somehow get the kids to daycare and get to work between 8 and 8:20, especially with my mom helping out in nicer weather.  However, as the kids have gotten older and are learning to test limits, getting them to daycare has become a longer battle ordeal in the mornings.  I simply cannot get to work anywhere in the zip code of On Time.

Anywho, I'm giving up my desk at the office and WFH more.  Until they officially take my desk away, my plan is to go into the office a couple times mid-week.  Eventually I will switch to full time at home, unless and until the rumored restructure impacts me. 


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