Whew. Currently 90 degrees outside, 64% humidity, and it’s 8:30 – when you get up at 5:30, that’s almost bedtime. And it’s way too hot to sleep like that, at least without fans. Or, better yet, air conditioning. Yeah, that would be nice. I can hear our neighbor’s unit kicking on as I write this, pumping delicious cool air into his house…

Not in the cards for us, it seems. Last night, Sierra and Karen and I were sitting on the new deck bench enjoying the breeze when there was a squealing sound from the external AC unit as it tried to turn on. That can’t be good, I said, rising to check on it – yeah, agreed Karen, I heard that before but I thought it was our neighbor’s. Uh oh…

Sure enough the fan wasn’t running. I put my hand on the frame over the fan and it was hot, way too hot to be good. Crap. Went inside and shut the thing down. It was approaching 90 in the house last night as we went to bed but some well placed fans (ceiling fans are amazing, too) and everyone made it through the night.

This morning we woke up to rain – a saving grace, I suppose, since it kept our garden and lawn alive, and probably lowered the temperature for the rest of the day, but we’re currently paying the price in terms of humidity. (Yesterday never got too bad since it was only 30-40% humidity.) The rain also kept me from exploring the AC unit (after of course flipping the breakers both to the unit and the internal blower)… Which in turn kept me from discovering the delightful picture to the left: a blown capacitor. Damn.

The downside to finding the capacitor was now I wanted to replace it – while shut in by the rain I’d been searching for the manual for the unit, no go, and finally spending all my time on this incredibly useful site. I’m fairly confident (barring the actual motor being blown by the strain of trying to run last night) that replacing this capacitor will restore the unit to its cooling glory. But what the hell was the rating on that capacitor?? The oil and gunk inside had fused to the paint on the side when it blew, and unfortunately even carefully cleaning it removed the all-important stamp like you can see on it’s pair above left.

Still, by comparing stamps between the two I’m confident it’s a 3mfd 370 VAC capacitor, probably readily available from a local motor repair shop – I’ll call around tomorrow and see. I also found the schematic at left on the inside of the unit – we are dealing with a 100% rock steady 1976 air conditioner. Whoa. (check the bottom right of the drawing).

Anyway, I figure since the cap is probably only 8 or 9 bucks it’s worth a go. The motor at left is probably a bit under $100, so hopefully that’s not blown too. Once again, having a bit of trouble reading the vital stats, but I guess that’s what you get from an AC unit older than me…

The last bit of bad news is the motor "suspension". It sits upside down, hauling air in through the sides of the box, through the heat exchanger, and blasting it up and out, so it needs to hang level and be supported from above. For whatever reason it’s not bolted to the top of the unit, but instead attached with twisted steel cable – and two of the four are rusted through. My theory / hope is that the motor is ok, the sound we heard was the blades scraping on the housing after the support cable broke, and the resulting current draw blew the capacitor after which everything fell back into place but stopped working. Replacing the cap will cure everything.

At least that’s the hope. For now I’m only investing in a capacitor and some hardware to re-secure the motor… If that fails and it looks like the motor itself is bad, well, maybe time to shop around for a new unit. But in the meantime, if we can get a few more years out of this one, why not? I’ll probably get someone in to test the pressure on the system, make sure it’s as efficient as it can be on that end, but really if an $8 part, some research, and sweat can fix this I’m not going to replace the whole unit yet.

(plus, if you haven’t figured it out, every time something breaks it’s not only a hassle, it’s a freaking personal challenge. :)

Day two of the bench construction, first thing was to cut the angles for the corner and finish driving the 8 million screws attaching the seat boards. Power screw gun essential. The screws that came with the brackets are all galvanized for use in pressure-treated wood, overkill for me, but at least they’ll hold up outdoors. I ended up buying some new deck screws while getting the lumber so I could match the color of the wood a little better.

Done! Next on the list is to get something to treat the lumber – I’m not going to seal it yet, but there are a few different products intended for new lumber like this, just to help get it "off on the right foot". Not sure what exactly that means but it sounds important from the reviews I’ve read… Also might replace the two seat boards on the smaller side – one of them is "cupping" a bit (curling up at the edges) and the other has two badly placed knots. I think I have enough left over lumber for those two short pieces, we’ll see.

…and here it is in action! I think they’re both making the sign for "delicious", since they’re eating Princess Torte from Wuollette Bakery. Whoa. Good times. I’m actually writing this on Karen’s laptop while sitting on the bench right now. It’s sweet, but it’s getting dark enough to make me realize we’ll need another lighting solution out here since it’s so darn appealing to hang out on during these hot summer nights… Yay.

So about a month ago Karen and I were almost on this reality TV show where they do a bunch of work on your backyard. It sounded really cool and we were excited until she asked us what our budget was… Um, budget? So we respectfully declined – I thought those TV shows did the work for free! Anyway, during the interview in our backyard the producer asked us what sort of work we might want to do, and even suggested a bench on the deck. Say no more!

Karen and I had the same idea for where it should go, on the South side of the deck, and we were both keen on maybe making a nice corner out of it. Only trouble was, a bench from scratch was looking like a fairly complicated project, let alone all the hassle of a corner..

Luckily my internet searching lead me to the promised land – cool plastic bench brackets made just for the edge of a deck: "Just add lumber!" (see the lumber above, the brackets installed left)

Since they’re going to be well off the ground and mostly angled, I opted to not get pressure treated lumber — lots and lots of chemicals, even if they’ve cut out the arsenic since ’04. I also looked briefly at some of the composite wood/plastic blends they have preshaped for decks, and while they ‘re super cool and never need maintenance, they’re also way expensive and didn’t really match our existing deck at all. In the end I went with nice cedar, and it looks great so far.

Of course the "quick afternoon project" started to extend into the evening, pushed further back as I realized I didn’t have the socket I needed to put in the million hex screws and bolts. (On the list of "required tools" they only list a crescent wrench, but I would have shot myself in the head after one bracket if that’s all I had. Much nicer with the socket wrench.)

Alas, night has fallen on an unfished deck bench, but enough is completed to start to convince me it’s going to look super sweet. The deck always seemed a bit "unfinished" to me — nice, and I wouldn’t trade it, but missing something on the edges. I think this might be it.

The rain garden has more blooms! This awesome red "something" flower (Karen knows the name) has been rocking out for a few days, and yesterday I snapped a few pictures. We’re pleasantly surprised to see so much growth and blooming out of these brand new plants, hopefully that means they’re established and healthy for years to come…

Brown Dog found a big stick on his walk yesterday and has been enjoying some quality time with it.

The garden continues its rampage. (compare to this) I took that picture this morning, and unfortunately by this afternoon the combined heat and lack of water (I was trying to hold out for the forecasted rain) wreaked a bit of havoc on the tomatoes – now that their fruit is so big it’s getting really heavy and a few of the taller stems collapsed. I noticed it sagging as soon as I got home and gave it some veggie first aid, I’m confident most of them will pull through.

Sick and tired of the cluttered destructo-zone in our kitchen closet, I rigged up a tiered bag holder for our recycling. It looks super ghetto but I justify it by looking at you, sneering, and saying "It’s for recycling. It’s made out of things I had lying around — and cardboard. Get it??" Then you feel embarrassed for pointing it out and I go get a drink from the kegerator. Best of all, the vacuum fits under the rack, much nicer than hanging out in the office.

I helped nature do its dirty work on this female blossom this morning. I don’t care what you say, we’re getting a pumpkin out of this mess.

Finally, today was the last day on the job for my super awesome co-worker, Eric, who’s off to bigger and better things in NY, NY. Wah. The Walker won’t be the same without him.

Oh! Drama! Last night I noticed that the topmost female pre-blossom was nearly ready to bloom, and this morning it opened spectacularly. I hunted around for a matching male flower, but unfortunately all but one were old and wilting. I think the plant is just getting in the swing of things and will sync up better later in the season – but who has time to wait?? I was all set to go grab a q-tip or paintbrush and do nature’s dirty work by hand, but as I tried to peek closer to see the stigma I noticed several small beetles milling around! No bees, but these little guys could do the job…

So I opted to let this first one go on its own – if it doesn’t pollinate, I’ll step in for the next few and see if I can help out. My biggest worry is that the male flowers are so low on the plant, and partially hidden by the leaves – will the beetles find them? And will they find them first, before they fly up to check out the female flower? I suspect I’m overthinking this, but on the other hand I really want some pumpkins!

[Dear readers: remember when Karen used to post? I do. Those were good days, all right. Good days.]

Our garden is blowing up. Almost overnight our tomatoes have gone from unassuming seedlings to gigantor Audrey II-like monsters. I’m scared to go back there. But they really need some pruning, so if you don’t hear from me for a while…

At left is our amazing pumpkin. It’s weird, I know I grew up around all these veggies, but I obviously didn’t pay attention to how they grew – or how big. I’ve already extended the trellis, about doubling the height, and since that picture was taken I tied up that vine at left so it’s read to start attacking the next level.

And that’s just the main vine, there are several secondary ones lower down. (should I prune those??) On the right is our rhubarb and raspberries, both making huge progress. I just read that we shouldn’t harvest any of the rhubarb this year (its first) since it needs all those huge leaves to make energy for building a strong root system. Then next year we can harvest "some", and finally go crazy in the third year. Whoa. Some good raspberries starting too, looks like we’ll get some fruit from them.

Next is the dill and cilantro, also doing well. The dill is almost weed-like in its propensity to spread, and the cilantro has recovered from a shaky start where it all got knocked down and bent. Looking forward to chilled carrot dill soup…

I grew so much cilantro hoping to use the coriander seeds to make ultra-fresh Witbier, but now I’m reading that Indian coriander has a nicer flavor and aroma. This one may be a touch "vegetal" or celery-like. Ah well, if I get any coriander it’s going in the beer! Finally the cukes (at right) – just today I found the first flower! I didn’t check if it was a male or female blossom, but since they’re not self-pollinating like our tomatoes I’m thinking we maybe should do it by hand? (I know, dirty…)

To finish the photo spread, a few fun shots of the tomatoes-in-progress. Cool!

Once again – work for me and Karen, and the parents (plus Sierra) at home. Rick got up early to go birdwatching at Murphy-Hanrehan park, a decent drive south-west of the cities – and he saw a new bird! Good news! (He’s got so many now, new species are harder and harder to come by…)

Of course that wasn’t a busy enough day for him, so he took advantage of a mostly-dry day and tackled the terribly leaky garage roof. I’d noticed all winter that whenever we had a melting spell that somehow water was coming in on the South roof edge and soaking into the plywood wall! No good at all, and it was on my short list of projects to hit this summer… But, unbelievably, I hadn’t even been up on the roof to look at it yet. Earlier in the week Rick scaled a rickety lumber stack and fence to take a look and informed me that the shingles were totally shot right along the wall line. I’m guessing a combination of south-facing sunshine and ice dams for too many winters, plus some pooling right at the edge there.

Either way, time to replace them, and we just happened to have a stack of shingles left over from the previous owner and a bunch of roofing nails from an earlier roof project. He told me afterwards that he used almost a whole gallon of roofing cement to patch everything up, so that thing’s going to outlast the whole garage! No more leaking!

Meanwhile, Marianne and Sierra hit the town for some shopping, errands, and general running around. After work everyone rendezvoused at the Herkimer for happy hour and Smarty Party planning. Perfect.

 Today was a big day for everyone – more house projects for the parents, the season opener of soccer for DuoTeam, and a surprise for me!

First, the forecast: rain on and off the rest of the week. One of the projects on the wish list was resealing the deck, and it looked like it was today or never… Of course they went for it, that’s Rick with the sander at left. Oh, and look, Helpy’s doing his thing! Awesome!

Next they applied some compound that was supposed to open the pores of the wood up so it would accept the sealant better. This was then hosed off, allowed to dry, and the new sealant applied. I don’t have an actual "after" picture because sure enough as I pulled my bike through the back gate it started to rain and the wind kicked up and Karen and I had to run to cover the deck. But trust me it looks WAY better than it did!

That night Karen and I had our first soccer game of the season. We’re playing 6 on 6 co-rec, which means a smaller field and smaller goals and way more fun. Our team is actually pretty inexperienced, but we play well together (broomball) which makes an enormous difference. The bad guys snuck to an early 1-0 lead after we put poor Peter in goal (he hasn’t played soccer in forever), but then Scott (the ninja) jumped in goal and everything changed. That guy’s amazing – aggressively coming out to challenge their shooters, cutting down the angle, making smart plays, the whole works. And he has a hell of a foot! He’s able to launch his goal kicks the length of the field, which is awesome, but sometimes hard to get in their zone in time after coming to help defend. Whew. I know it’s a short field, but man… Lots of running!

We ended up winning (I scored twice and we shut them down after that first goal)!! It was a ton of fun – but even more fun was The Surprise: the Pinolera showed up! Apparently everyone knew but me, and I must say I was genuinely surprised! What fun! I couldn’t believe it when she strolled up to the soccer field!!

The day ended on a superb note, as we toasted our winning game at the Chatterbox. Sweet.

Karen and I went to work as normal on Monday, leaving my parents home with a wish list of projects. (That sounds weird, but it was honestly their idea – and really, what else are they going to do all day? (ok, fine, other than relax, read, explore, have fun…))

Anyway, they jumped into it and tackled the back yard: we’ve been having some lawn issues (rhymes with "big dog"), massively exacerbated by the new rain garden work. What to do? Sod it up!

You can’t quite tell what a huge difference it makes since you don’t have a "before" picture, but it was essentially bare dirt in this area. Also, since this picture was taken the grass around the rain garden has taken off like a shot and the whole thing looks awesome. At right, Bruno does his part to hold the new sod in place. Way to go, Helpy!