Friday, June 29, 2007

Old houses, new movement

I live in an old house - it was born in 1904 in a vastly different time. The things this house must have seen. The things it is seeing now - me finally getting around to renovating the front room. This room began life as a screened porch, and much later in life was closed in to a front room. However, the lady who did the enclosing decided to put up this _nasty_ flower trim all over the room. Just unbelievable. And she didn't quite finish out the room, so gaps and cracks between the windows and walls, around the window frame, etc were never quite finished out. I spent last Sunday ripping down the nasty nasty molding and caulking all the cracks and gaps in the room. And then this past Tuesday I stayed up until midnight priming the entire room for painting. Painting should finish up over the weekend - IH has offered to recover the wicker furniture, at which point i'll have a fantastic new room, simplified and finished.

On a side note, I got LOOK toe clips for my bike on Wednesday, and learned, after much cursing and banging, that bike pedals are screwed in differently, depending on which side of the bike the pedal is on... Makes a big difference to unscrew the pedal in the correct direction instead of tightening it. And then I spent the evening leaning against the wall practicing getting into and out of the pedals. Not quite as easy as it seemed. But everything is adjusted now - I took a test ride yesterday evening... Four things were different which made such a huge difference: 1) the pedals - i'm connected to the bike now - it's like an extension of my body now, which is pretty cool. 2) I got real bike shorts - the spandex w/ padding type. I had mountain bike shorts before - still had the padding and spandex, but had a regular baggy outer on them. The new shorts make a huge difference in comfort and slidding into and out of the seat. 3) I adjusted seat up about an inch - it's finally the correct height. And 4) I got a tire gauge and finally inflated my tires to the correct 100 psi, which is much higher than i'm used to. All together a much more enjoyable biking experience. I'm looking forward to taking a longer ride this SUnday. Details to come.

No comments: