english

Jun 26 2007

Hot

Pepe Close Up.jpg

It’s hot today. About 34 °C and a high humidity so it feels more like 40 degrees.
Nevertheless I went for a walk to the park with the dogs.

Pepe is watching from the hill, Poupoune makes some runs after the ball, but then they settle down and lie next to me while I smoke a cigar and make a contribution to the smog alert.

By • dogs, english, health, montréal •

Jun 24 2007

Warming

chairs
Global Warming is on the rise.

This is the best way to clean those cheap plastic chairs. Just throw them in the pool, and the bleach will do the rest. Of course we don’t have a pool, but Alison’s parents do, and they happen to have their yearly barbeque (with real coal) today.

We help setting up the garden and preparing a lot of skewers with saumon, shrimp and scallops, mushrooms, bell pepper, onion and cherry tomatoes.

We brought Poupoune with us and happily vacuumed the grass under the guests. Whenever they dropped something (Mmm, salmon!) she was there to catch it.

Pepe was staying at Alison’s ex and sprinkled pee everywhere in the appartment. Bad dog.

By • A., dogs, english, family, weather •

Jun 23 2007

Clean

workshop

I finally finished cleaning my workshop. Well, not only cleaning but a reorganization as well. I added 300 square feet of wooden floor, painted the new and the existing floor, made a so-called outfeed table for the table saw, a dust hood for the chop-saw and added some shelves, electrical outlets and work-lights. O, and I installed a double sink.

I also spent almost a day on sorting out a couple of drawers and boxes full of junk, and many screws, nails and nuts & bolts. So now I can actually find stuff that I need, which will make working in the basement more pleasurable.

By • english •

Jun 19 2007

Fetch

poupoune hot & tired

A Mean, Clean Fetching Machine.

She can’t get enough of it.

By • dogs, english •

Jun 19 2007

Todo

Tax preparation year 2006
call accountant
clean up basement workshop
fix and sell computer stuff
move laptop
frame art
hang art
sell videotron cable tv and replay tv box
make built-in book cases in living room
paint living room
find lawyer vancouver/edmonton
programming Lika & Timo CD-Roms
programming Fairytale editor
Francine chest of drawers
make cart Luc
bathroom Pat
research geothermal/gas/electric heating
prepare régie du logement hearing
make polyester balconies
fix static on phone line
fix static on phone line again (call Bell)
fix water pipe noise
design/update website troudecheville/peghole
make screen around compost bin
replace tenant’s bathroom floor
[…]

By • english, home, montréal, reno, various, wood, work •

Jun 17 2007

Native

feathers

We visit a dance performance by various Native Canadian dance groups. I don’t know much about the original inhabitants of this country, before we stole it from them.

I need to change that. This was a start.

By • english •

Jun 9 2007

Ride

world naked bike ride

In 2004, the Naked Bike Ride in Montréal wasn’t exactly a success, even though a naked picture of me made it into the Mirror.

Today was the second try for Montréal. So while in one part of the city one of the worlds’ most polluting events took place, the Formula One races, we protested against cars and pollution by riding our bikes in the buff. It’s also Clean Air Day, even though there is a smog warning in effect.

and it was much better. About 150 to 200 people showed up, and most of them bared it all and rode through the Plateau neighbourhood naked. Of course there were about 500 onlookers at the start and many more along the roads. The police escorted us and closed roads and intersections for us. All happened without any incidents.

Halfway my bike’s front tire was punctured so I spent the last 2 kilometres running with my bike in hand. I was surprised of my endurance, since I normally never run, and certainly not on my Teva sandals. I’m sure seeing me run must have been a spectacular sight.

If you want to see me naked on a bike watch the news tonight or read a newspaper tomorrow. I’ve seen so many cameras along the route that I’m sure they snapped me as well.

By • english, montréal, outdoors, tmi, travel •

Jun 8 2007

Elizabethan

pepe tupperware

Just after Alison left for work, a cat sneaked into our kitchen through the backyard door. Poupoune saw her first and chased after her, followed by a fierce Pepe, who isn’t so fast with his short legs.

They gave the cat a good workout across the garden and then came back into the kitchen. Poupoune was still panting from all the excitement. Pepe however, left a trail of blood behind him. Not a big trail, but enough to make a mess. I picked him up and inspected him. Fortunately it was rather minor, he probably hit his foot onto something. No cat scratches, which is good because Chihuahuas are easily blinded by cats hitting those big bulging eyes.

But now what? I had to bandage him, so his blood wouldn’t be all over the house. So out came my first aid kit, that I keep in my workshop for when I cut of my fingers. I also took some high friction tape, a rubberized tape that sticks only to itself. I use that on tools to make them less slippery. I noticed they used something like that on Poupoune when she was hospitalized, and it seemed handy to keep the gauze in place.

After some fidgeting with the gauze ó Pepe didn’t exactly sit still ló I wrapped it up with the tape. But of course Pepe immediately went for it with his mouth, and notwithstanding having only a few teeth, he rid himself of the bandage in no time.

I had to make a Elizabethan collar. So I grabbed a piece of Tupperware (well actually it was from IKEA), cut a hole in the bottom and cut one corner open and fitted it around Pepe’s head. A perfect fit in one try! I’m so good.

After that is was an easy task to re-apply the bandage and after I took this picture he’s now sleeping in his basket, under a blanket. There is no use fighting Elizabethan Tupperware.

By • dogs, english, health, montréal •

Jun 6 2007

Voices

valves

Last night I started to hear voices.

Umm no, make that noises. This weekend I replaced the main water valve to our building. The old valve was broken and could only be closed with lots of force with a big wrench, and even then it still leaked slightly. I was afraid that some time, the stem would just break off completely and I wouldn’t be able to turn off the water anymore. Not good.

So I put a new, better valve behind the first one. It’s scary to cut 1 inch thick pipe and then solder a new piece in it, but that part went well. So far so good. But because now the front garden tap was behind the main water valve, there would be no way to turn it off. So I re-routed the water pipes so they connected after the main valve.

But since there was a slight noise heard in the pipes, and it got worse an worse. Now, whenever I close a tap in our apartment, a moaning sound can be heard. It’s not very loud but loud enough to be annoying. I’m alone at home (Alison is in Toronto) so I can’t really pinpoint from where it emanates, because I can only be next to the tap when I turn it off. It appeared like it was coming from one of the apartments bathrooms, and after some googling, I found it it could well be caused by a malfunctioning toilet tank valve. So yesterday I finally got permission of the tenant to come and fix this.

Exchanging the old valve for a new one was not much work, but then I discovered that the toilet was not very stable anymore, and also that the toilet was continuously running. The running is easy, I’m going to get that part in a moment. The-instability however I can only cure by replacing the floor, and when I do that I might as well renovate the whole bathroom. The problem is that this particular tenant, um, is a heavy bather. At least 1 hour a day but often two or more hours a day he, and his girlfriend and daughter take a shower or bath. Their energy bill must be higher than their rent. So if I start renovating it, they can’t use the shower for a week, which is a big problem for them. There’s another point: If I renovate his bathroom, he certainly isn’t going to move out anymore. Plus, according Québec’s rental board laws, I can only augment the rent a little bit, just enough to recoup the renovation costs in 22 years. But I told him I want to do it anyway (if it’s going to leak it will leak in our bedroom) but only during his holiday. He wasn’t sure he was going anywhere though, they might just stay home…

Anyway, back to the noise. Changing the valve didn’t cure the problem. It is something else. Air in the pipes? I just drained all the pipes in the whole building (again, needed permission of all tenants to turn their taps on and off again to let the air out) and filled them again. No dice, the sound is still there. I’m out of ideas. Why can such a simple thing make me so depressed? It literally drains all my energy.

Okay, I’m done ranting now. Let’s see if the noise, while I was writing this, has magically disappeared.

No such luck…

I’ll wait for Alison to come back and see if, with her help, I can pinpoint the exact location of the noise. Maybe with the two of us it goes away. Until then I’ll sleep on the couch with earbuds, so I won’t hear the noise.

By • english, home, montréal, reno •

Jun 3 2007

Jump

hammock

After a lazy Sunday afternoon supper at Dorothée’s, I tried to get Poupoune in the hammock and thought she wouldn’t like it. But she just jumped on it, no problem at all. To get a nice photo of her we repeated the jumping on and off twenty times or so. We go through great lengths to produce loglog: we even torture our dogs. Not that she didn’t like it.

By • dogs, english, friends •

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