Darkoshi

The night before last, one of my smoke detectors chirped and woke me up. Then it chirped again. That normally indicates a low battery.

I stood in the hallway to pinpoint which unit it was coming from, but no more chirps. I tested them, and each beeped like it should. I finally removed all their batteries to keep from being woken up again. (I hate doing that, but I need my sleep.) Per my little battery meter, the batteries were all still good. But per my notes on when I last changed batteries, it is quite possible one or more are low by now.

The next day I put the batteries back in and waited all day for another chirp. None of them confessed.

But I read that you should replace smoke detectors every 10 years. Mine are about 20 years old. So now I'm looking to buy replacements.

My existing alarms are not hard-wired, and I don't want to add wiring.
The ones with a built-in 10-year battery sound good; I wouldn't have to keep buying expensive 9V batteries and go through this rigamarole as often.

But then on Reddit I read how many people had these 10-year units fail much sooner, within 2 years or so. Maybe cleaning them by blowing air in them fixes it, or maybe not. Do any of you have experience with these 10-year units, good or bad? What brand?

Smoke detectors also come in 2 types, photo-electric and ionization, or dual. One of my old ones is dual. But so far I didn't find any dual-type ones with the 10-year battery.

Update:
From what I've read, both the "Kidde" and "First Alert" brand 10-year smoke detectors can't be temporarily turned off once they are initially activated. You can deactivate them (at their end of life) but then you can't turn them back on.
So if one starts acting up in the middle of the night, I wouldn't even be able to turn it off temporarily to deal with it the next day.
Also, from what I read, both brands have had problems with units failing after only one or 2 years.

So I'll instead get ones similar to my existing units, where you replace the batteries every so often. At least with them I can remove the batteries like I did the other night.

I'd like to someday finish recording my and my mom's audio cassettes to MP3 files. But all my cassette players have encountered problems. The last one I used for the task still works, but started making a rattling noise while playing which gets carried over into the MP3 recordings too. Another boombox with dual cassettes has that same rattling noise problem, as well as its speakers not working.

I watched some videos of people replacing the rubber belts in their cassette players. In one video, after the belt was replaced and the cassette deck was being tested, I heard it making the same sound as mine! So even replacing the belts might not help with that problem.

Each time I go looking online for a new cassette player to buy, however, I am scared off by reviewers who say NOT to get this one, because it eats tapes. Every single one I look at has at least one, if not several reviews like that. Or other deal-breakers are mentioned, like the player being mono rather than stereo.

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I got my 2nd Shingrix (Shingles) vaccine shot.

A bit of my rear molar chipped off. I went to the dentist and had the edges smoothed.

My thumb still does not bend.

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A section of the garage ceiling panels, which I had lately noticed was sagging, broke and fell down before I could reinforce it. Luckily there was nothing underneath that area, so no collateral damage. But the cellulose insulation on top of the panel came down with it, making a big mess. I cleaned it up.

Did I ever mention the reinforcements I added to the other garage ceiling panels which had been sagging? That was 5 years ago. I attached wood boards along the seams of the panels. I still remember it feeling like quite an accomplishment. It was tricky, bracing the boards against the ceiling on both sides, while I screwed the screws in. Those sagging panels were a problem that I'd noticed and worried about for quite a while, and I couldn't find anyone to fix it, and then I figured out how to fix it myself!

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Today it was very rainy. Happy Lunar New Year!
I succeeded in getting the new mailbox post in the ground. Perhaps tomorrow I'll get the mailbox transferred over to the new post, in between working for work.

One of the gateposts on the gate that got knocked down last summer has concrete anchoring it. If it weren't for that, I'd probably have been able to get it out and replace it myself by now. I keep going back and forth between thinking I can do it myself, and thinking I will hire someone to do it. Then other things take precedence for a while. Now I'm wavering again, because I was able to rock the post back and forth a bit. Maybe if I can just get leverage... I had a couple ideas to try... I could get it out of the ground. But I really ought to just hire someone. Yeah. I really should.

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In the past, I used a product called Tub Grip to add traction to the bottom of my tub, to make it less slippery. It works very well, but it seems to capture dirt and makes the tub harder to get clean-looking. It also wears away over time.

Before applying a new coating of it, it's best to remove the rest of the old layer.
This time I used a product called "Citristrip" to remove it. It got the residue off, but also etched up the tub surface. Oops. It's a synthetic tub, fiberglass, I think. All the comments I found indicated this Citristrip works fine on fiberglass without damaging it, but no, not in my case it didn't.

The tub being etched makes it less slippery now even without applying new Tub Grip. But in some directions it still feels slippery so I probably still should apply new Tub Grip on top.

I've discovered that heights bother me less at night / when it is dark. Today I cleared pine straw off the roof, using an extensible pole with a rake-like attachment while standing on a ladder leaned against the roof. The sun set before I was done, so I continued while wearing a headlamp (yay LED bulbs which can shine bright for hours without using the batteries up).

Usually doing the side above the garage feels scary to me. But today in the dark, notwithstanding the flood lights and headlamp, it didn't bother me. Doing this task after dark has another benefit - not having the sun glare in my eyes.

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It reminds me of an amusement park ride I was on as a child. I'm not sure, but it must have been Space Mountain at Disneyland. It was like a roller coaster, but indoors and in the dark. Normal roller coasters terrify me due to my fear of heights. But this ride didn't bother me and was fun.

Yesterday was a very nice and breezy day. I sat on Qiao's back porch in the sun for quite a while, working on my laptop. Pollen cones kept falling on me and the laptop.

Later while I was working inside, I heard a loud sound through the open windows, like something metallic had fallen down. I thought the wind must have knocked something down. So I checked the front and back yards, and looked all around but didn't find anything. I finally decided that a falling pine cone must have hit the metal shroud over the chimney.

The rose bush is full of roses and looked beautiful in the late afternoon sunlight. I took photos.

Today when Qiao wanted to drive his car out of the garage, the garage door wasn't working. It would lift up a few inches, but that was all. We weren't able to manually lift it either. Then we noticed that one of the big springs had snapped apart, and that was why it wasn't working. We got a repair person to fix it.

So, that metallic sound I heard yesterday was actually the spring snapping apart! We have a cam in the garage which even caught it on video.

Now I'd like to include that video clip and a rose photo in this post, and also photos of purple pine pollen cones which I took last month (had never seen purple ones like those before!)
But it's too late. Maybe another time, maybe.

I slept through it, but my house suffered minor damage when ex-Hurricane Michael passed through. A tree limb fell in the back yard. It fell on top of the aerial cable which provides my internet service. That cable was connected to a hook in the soffit. From there, the cable runs down the side of the house. The hook didn't fail, but as it was only screwed into the fascia board and not all the way into a roof beam, the fascia board and part of the soffit siding was pulled down from the weight of the limb.

In spite of that, the cable itself remained intact and my internet still works.

I wonder if it is better to have the supporting hook screwed through the fascia into a roof beam. If it had been that way, what would have happened? Would the hook still have pulled out, possibly still taking the fascia board with it? Would the roof beam have been pulled loose too? Would the cable have snapped? Or would the hook and cable have been able to withstand the impact and weight of the fallen tree limb?

Now I need to get the fascia board replaced, as without it, there is an open gap under the shingles into the attic. That's my main concern. I don't want another rat incident. Although there have been signs that rats or some other creature had already gotten into both the attic and crawlspace again before this.

If only I weren't afraid of heights, I could probably fix it myself. It's only 15 feet up in the air, but still. The ladder gets wobbly at that height. And I'd need a ladder standoff.

I rekeyed two locks today; it was my first time doing that. One was an Andersen storm door lock, and was very easy to rekey. The other was an old deadbolt lock which both Lowes and Home Depot hadn't been able to do. Lowes had just looked at it and said "No", which makes me think they refused simply because it's a brand they don't sell. The guy at Home Depot, on the other hand, at least tried. But apparently because of it being an older style, he wasn't able to get it apart. I had watched him trying, and it looked like something was stuck. He wasn't able to get it apart, to get to the pins.

Today, I was able to get it apart fairly easily. The one end of the cylinder needed to be screwed off - maybe the Home Depot guy didn't realize that. I have a Kwikset rekeying kit. The springs in the kit don't exactly match the ones from the old lock. So I tried reusing them, but in the process lost one. I searched high and low for it, but it's disappeared into the ether. I ended up using one of the non-matching springs, which made it more difficult as it stuck out more. And my kit didn't have a tool that fit for keeping the bottom pins and springs pushed down (aka "follower bar")*, so I had to improvise. And the top pins fell out a few times, and each time the sizes of the pins didn't seem to match what I had written down before... weird. So I got out new top pins. I finally got it back together and working with the new key.

*which is probably a good thing, in hindsight. If I had found the right instructions, and if my follower bar fit, I wouldn't have seen that the springs and bottom pins had a lot of oxidation on them, which was making them stick. It was when I was cleaning off the springs, that the one sprung away and disappeared.

With my broken heater, it's as I expected. I have to decide whether to get the control board replaced, or replace the whole furnace (as it is 19 years old). If I replace the whole furnace, I may as well replace the A/C unit too, as I've been worried about it for quite a while. It makes a moderately loud buzzing noise when running. 5 years ago (I didn't realize it was that long ago), I was told it might stop working any day, or it might last a few more years.

The furnace on the other hand, is sheltered in the basement and actually looks in pretty good condition to me. One part of me is thinking that they could possibly last many more years (although they might not).

I got a couple quotes on replacing the control board, vs the whole thing. One set of the quotes actually seems pretty good, though I need to ask some more questions and get more details. So one part of me is thinking, since I already went through the trouble of getting quotes, maybe I should go ahead and replace it all now, rather than having to go through the same thing again a couple years down the road. I might not even be able to get as good a quote/price later on.

Anyway, today I went down into the basement/crawl space to look at the ducts again, as I wasn't sure if I was remembering something right. While down there, I noticed a new wet spot on the ground. It was right under a copper pipe. I didn't see any leak in the pipe. There was a small amount of water on the pink insulation right above the pipe (touching the pipe), so I worried it was leaking down from up above. The bathroom sink was right above that area.

So I went back up and checked under the bathroom sink. Whoa. I had put a plastic dish with a sponge under the shut-off valve to catch any potential leaks (as it had leaked there a long time ago), and the sponge was all wet and there was water in the dish. But the water hadn't overflowed out of the plastic, and the cabinet itself was dry. So how could it be leaking down below? Was it just a coincidence? Eh?

I checked the basement again. Pulled down the insulation a bit to look at the wood. Dry. Hmmm.
Got a small mirror, wiped off the pipe, and looked at the top of the pipe using the mirror.

There's a very tiny pinhole leak. Just enough for water to slowly slowly start welling out and making the outside of the pipe wet. I put a plastic tub under it for the time being.
I hope it's not an indication of the overall condition of my plumbing pipes.

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So I do some research as part of fixing one problem (broken heater), and I find 2 new problems, one of which just coincidentally, from initial appearances, appeared to be causing the other problem, but really wasn't.

That sounds exactly like a typical day at my work, debugging code.

I replaced my refrigerator's evaporator fan motor, because the old one was intermittently squealing, and I had a feeling it would stop working altogether in the near future.

I should know better than to start a task like that at 9:30pm when I have to get up for work the next day. I finished around 2am. The new motor and fan are working, and are sounding good.

Much of my time is spent looking up information on the internet, to make sure I do it right. Sometimes I find useful information. Sometimes I don't, and decide to bite the bullet and do it the way I think is best. Some of the time was cleaning gunk out of the freezer compartment, while I had all the shelves removed and out of the way. A good bit of the time was deciding how to handle the wire connections, since they were different on the old and new motor.

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When I order stuff from Amazon, I often have it delivered to my mom's house, as delivery people are sometimes scared of the dogs at my house. My mom was telling me of a package that had been delivered. She said the return label said it was from Amazon Fulfillment Services. Then she asked me if it was something sexual. LOL. She's fluent in English, but it isn't her native tongue. Maybe she's been wondering that every time I got a package from them, and finally asked.

Today she tried to convince me that people in the South pronounce Augusta (Georgia) with an "N" in front, like "Naugusta" or "Nugusta". I've never heard it spoken that way (unless they are saying "in Augusta"). But she says everyone here pronounces it that way. I'm still dubious. There's a North Augusta on the South Carolina side of the border. Maybe some people refer to North Augusta as Nugusta? But I didn't find any mention of that online.

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This weekend, I:

- mowed my lawn
- washed out my garbage bin as had gotten gunky inside. I don't like stinky garbage cans. I took a photo of the bin's number, so that if it happens again, I'll know whether my bin was accidentally switched with the neighbor's or something. (Although it's mainly for curiosity's sake. I wouldn't actually go up to the neighbor and say, "Hey, I think our garbage bins were switched, because mine was clean inside, and this one isn't.")
- did more work on securing the fence against Serena at Qiao's house. This involves a lot of brick moving, and some pounding of stakes. It's about half done.
- cleaned Qiao's shower stall in order to apply tub grip to the floor, and then did the latter.
- watched Dirk Gently
- did some yardwork at Qiao's house
- turned on the heater for the first time this season and let it air out with the windows open.
- replaced fridge evaporator fan
- ordered Culture Club tickets - they are scheduled to play in Augusta in November

Other things I need to do soon:

- look up info on the non-presidential candidates for the upcoming election
- choose a doctor for myself

Revisited the crawlspaces today.

At my mom's house, I removed the electronic air cleaner front panel. The prior owners did get rid of the cells; the inside was empty except for a thin disposable filter. It was very dirty (reasonably so as my mom hadn't replaced it since moving into the house). My mom had bought a new one, so I replaced the dirty one with the clean one. With the front panel off, I could see into the return ducts. One of them appears to have insulation on the *inside*. It looked very dirty.

I removed the snake skin by the HVAC system, and found another snake skin by the exterior wall. It was next to an opening through which cables connect to the outside A/C unit and phone box. So that is likely where the snake(s) got in. My mom will close it off.

At the other house, I went down below to take another look at the humidifier I saw last week. I found the label with the model #, but no humidistat and no obvious way to power it off. I tried to turn off the water valve to it (because of the mold, we want to reduce the humidity in the house, not increase it), but then the valve started dripping, so I put a bucket underneath for now.

Maybe the house's mold problems is caused by the humidifier putting too much moisture in the air. Today with the heater on, the house smelled quite unpleasant to me again. Of course, now I'm envisioning a dirty moldy humidifier that may not have been cleaned out in ages, blowing mildewy air into the house, even though I have no proof yet that the unit is dirty inside.

Then I picked up pinecones and branches from the yard - last week was very windy.

Then I put up a pet gate in the house to keep the dogs away from the bedrooms. I'm unsatisfied with the gate though. It has 2 design flaws compared to the one at my house. The bottom catch doesn't work right (other people have mentioned the same problem in their reviews), and the whole gate occasionally lifts out of the hinges. Unfortunately the better model was discontinued and is no longer available. Now I'm considering getting a different brand instead, but that can wait. Maybe I'll get used to this one, or find a way of fixing the flaws.

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I also voted in the democratic primary today. I'm disappointed that Hillary won over Bernie, and by such a large margin. But I'd much rather have Hillary win than Trump or the other Republican candidates.

The door knob lock on one of my doors wasn't working right. It's the kind that from the outside locks/unlocks with a key, and from the inside by twisting a tab in the middle of the knob.

Closing the door from the inside was easy, but from the outside almost impossible. It was the oddest thing. From the inside, I'd push the door closed and it would be firmly closed. From the outside, even pulling with all my force wouldn't make the door click closed.

Furthermore, even when the door seemed to be shut and locked ok, repeated jiggling of the knob from the outside caused it to spontaneously unlock and open. Apparently this could be caused by a broken return spring. But I removed the knobs from the door, and the visible springs looked ok.

Finally I noticed that the door latch and strike plate weren't aligned well. The latch was right near the top of the hole in the strike plate and door jamb, rather than centered. The trick to closing the door from the outside was to pull *up* on the knob. However, the locked door would still open easily upon jiggling the knob.

So I filed the strike plate to slightly enlarge the hole on the top side. Now the door closes easily from the outside, and stays locked regardless of knob jiggling.