Saturday, November 30, 2019

Tucked away for the winter, almost...

Started on Friday, finished on Saturday.

Still need to change the oil in the snowblower, and the tractor desperately needs a greasing.

Not easy to see it, but I also got the Gravely mower moved from by the sauna into the garage where it will be much more sheltered.




The first Jeep picture dump

Being delivered on Wednesday

2010 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon, 53,200 miles.


Friday -- moving the trailer from Mom & Ed's to my place:






Saturday began with installing the fire extinguisher and putting the collapsible shovel in the storage compartment:




Let's call this Mission 3 (Mission 1 was a quick trip in the fields off Rukstella Road and Mission 2 was Wolf Den Drive which hasn't been maintained to proper standards since 1990-ish due to a town & state parks dispute).

Entered Bull Hill about 7:48 and was out about 8:20.

I'm pretty amazed how sure footed Ryuk is just from the gearing / wheelbase / tires / suspension; never even put in 4wd.










Went to Walmart. Still kind of chilly, and my knees were bothering me from walking around Walmart...so Mission 4 over Quarry Road and (mo pics) Mission 5 over Angell / Nightingale Road.

Slipped into 4wd for this mud puddle just to be safe, and there was a couple spots on Nightingale Road I did just to be safe. And hte very end was somewhat steep and covered with leaves and possible brush pushed there by a plow and/or dumped...popped it into 4wd and I suspect wouldn've had wheel spin otherwise (even though I would've made it up).



Mission 6 -- not even sure what this place is called, the beginning looks a bit rough and I never tried going down before.






2/10/2020 -- cleaning up my computer at work, adding the dealer photos:

Wednesday, November 27, 2019

Sunday, November 24, 2019

That's not bad

Baked Cod, baked beans, peas...and homemade cranberry sauce warm out of the crock pot. Not bad, just cranberries & honey. Going to try and tweak it later this week with orange juice and crushed pineapple.

Animated Photos...this would have been really cool..

If when standing on my tippy-toes to look through the viewfinder, I had focused the fucking camera.

Tuesday, November 19, 2019

Woodstove & Electric Bill, Part I

November bill:

2018: $122
2019: $97

Passes the common sense check, knock another $25 off and you're down around what my "low" bills are.

Woodstove provided most of the heat for 2 of the 4 weeks. Letting it go out as we have a reasonably mild stretch coming up and I'd like to stretch my split firewood (at least until I get to make more, hoping to get out with the splitter a bit over Thanksgiving).

Saturday, November 9, 2019

Woodstove again...

20 degrees overnight.

69 degrees in the living room when I woke up this morning.

Last wood -- and it was only three or four logs -- was at 8pm.

Yep, this will do :)

Tuesday, November 5, 2019

Woodstove...

Almost forget just how pleasurable the soft, warm heat from the stove is -- no air blowing around from the mini-split, just 75ยบ radiant warmth :)

(And the bedroom door closed and window open for sleeping :D)

Sunday, November 3, 2019

Bed & Woodstove...

If it's my Mom who is moving, why am I doing so much work on my house :/ ?

But first, it's time to break in the new wood stove, which needs a series of three increasingly intense (yet still small) fires at 100°, 200°, and 300°.

Did the first fire on Saturday which I knew wouldn't cause a stink. The second fire today I did have the fans going to blow out the smell of the curing paint. Just too tired tonight to do the third fire (stove needs to cool in between), so maybe tomorrow night.



Hehehe...IR thermometers are just cheating.



Fans exhausting the stove.


So, in order to fit the heirloom roll top desk in my little house, I need to clean out the corner it will go in. While I'll be able to store some of the stuff in it, but not all. And I don't want to put photos and papers in the non climate control areas...so the box spring goes and the bed is raised to give me 13" of storage underneath it :)

I am figuring I'll have to draw a map which box has what where underneath it so I know what to pull out :D



Lunch time...store bought dough, sure was a weird rise.




Bed did end up a manageable 1 or 1-1/2" higher than before. I have had the idea for a while if I get another dog, the bed goes up even higher so I can have a crate / den underneath it. That would require a platform next to the bed as step for me.

Friday, November 1, 2019

Carbon Footprint Calculations...

Playing around on a Friday afternoon:

London Rome: 234kg CO2
London New York: 986kg CO2
(But that does not include a ~1.8 "effective" multiplier due to releasing CO2 high in the atmosphere)

The weight of CO2 is greater than the weight of fuel due to adding 02 from the atmosphere.
1 gallon Diesel: 10.17kg CO2
1 gallon Gasoline: 8.63kg CO2

15,000 miles per year / 20mpg = 750 gallons per year
750 gallons per year * 8.63kg = 6,472kg CO2

Massachusetts average heating oil usage:
719 gallons x 10.17 kg/gal = 7312kg CO2

Average household size, 2018: 2.53

My house, Oct-May heating season actual usage: 4,168kWh above baseline most of which can safely assumed to be the air source heat pump.

EIA Statistics: 2017 Connecticut Electricity production produces 501lbs CO2 /MWh

(501 / 2.2) / 1000kWh
227kg / 1000kWh
.227kg / kWh

946kg...which is 1/8th the average heating carbon footprint.

Also:

Polypropylene needs at least 11 re-uses (and are largely imported due to the extra labor of weaving; I'm not sure that the labor + transport was accounted for) and a cotton bag needs 135 re-uses. I suspect nylon would be in-between.
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/09/to-tote-or-note-to-tote/498557/

https://digitalcommons.morris.umn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1002&context=urs_2017

https://medium.com/stanford-magazine/paper-plastic-or-reusable-cloth-which-kind-of-bag-should-i-use-c4039575f3f1

At 0.02kg CO2, a disposable plastic bag there are 431 plastic bags per gallon of gasoline or 300' of travel in the average American car.

More:
https://cascade.uoregon.edu/fall2012/expert/expert-article/