Yep, it's cold again. Last week, it was colder in Houston than in most of Scandanavia, Moscow, and Iceland.
Texas forgot how to be Texas. Heck, the entire South has forgotten how to be the South. It's even colder this week. What's more, today is the third day in a row it has snowed. It's been tiny, dry flakes with very little accumulation, but it's still snow. This was my back yard when I got home Friday evening.
I know it's not a lot, but this is Mississippi, not Montana.
It's been so cold, I put out a second feeder for the birds.
There is a hook hanging under the eave of my shop, so I put it up there. I hope the birds find it. I had a finch feeder there for years, but they never ate from it. I finally took it down and threw all the seed onto the ground. That's funny, because when I lived just a mile from here, the finches would swarm that feeder. Here, I haven't seen a one in the two years I've lived here.
Since I was out there anyway, I grabbed my camera and took some pictures of the siding on my shed. This right here is just a shot showing where the siding has rotted through.
And another picture of rotten and bowed siding.
And of course, all over the side of the shop are these tiny little holes where it looked like the kids shot it with a pellet gun or something.
I want to get all this siding replaced, and it needs a new roof, too. The good news is, the framing doesn't look to be in too bad a shape, other than all the myriad nail holes in it. So, siding replaced and new roof to make it weather proof, and we'll finish the inside later.
That'll come down the road a piece. Maybe this summer I can save up enough to get it done -- if I can finagle enough overtime out of the plant, that is. In the meantime, I decided to take a break from bricking on this cold, snowy long weekend to start prepping my living room to be painted. This mostly involves lightly sanding the paneling to get the shiny finish off.
There are two schools of thought about this. Some websites say it doesn't need to be done. Others say it does. Me, I'm thinking it worked well in my bedroom, so I'm going to go ahead and do it in here, too.
It's not too hard, just light sanding to roughen up that top layer so the primer and paint will stick better. As of today, I've gotten two walls done. I'll get the other two tomorrow, since we have MLK day off at work.
The only snag I ran in to -- literally -- came when I was sanding the door frames. Yep, you guessed it. Protruding nails. Why it's so hard just to nail them flush is beyond me, but there they are.
I was aggravated, because they ripped holes in my brand new sanding sponge. A few taps with a hammer fixed that problem, and I carried on. BTW, I haven't filled in any nail holes in the walls. I'm going to take Supervisor Ronny's advice and put a coat of Kilz on before I paint it. He said the primer will help fill in those holes, so I'm going to prime first. Once the primer dries, I'll see if any holes are still very noticeable, then I'll fill them in and touch up the primer before painting.
The next step will be moving all this furniture. Ugh...
I'll move the two cabinets on either side into the hall, but just slide the entertainment center out into the middle of the room, so I can watch TV while I'm taking breaks. I'll probably just leave it there until I get the room painted.
Oh, and let me show you this.
My third grade teacher, Mrs. Matthews, took up painting after she retired from teaching. She remembered me. I've heard tell she remembered every single student she ever taught, which is saying something, because she taught for a long, long time.
Anyway, like I said, she remembered me, and before she passed away a few years back, she gave Beverly this painting to give to me. Now, that is something I will treasure forever.
And I'm so glad it didn't get ruined in the hurricane.
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