Text 35642, 151 rader
Skriven 2006-08-02 17:36:20 av Carol Shenkenberger (6:757/1)
  Kommentar till text 35593 av Roy Witt (1:1/22)
Ärende: Re: IQ Test
===================
*** Quoting Roy Witt from a message to Carol Shenkenberger ***

 CS> Yes.  Most of my needs have been small stuff and don's friends are
 CS> involved.  Roofer job though?  I wanted to be sure.  Paid the right
 CS> price for a good job.

RW> My needs were small too...a faucet swapped out, the back yard cleaned
RW> after the painters and roofers got done, etc...I think the yard cleanu
RW> was a rip-off, as it wasn't any better looking than when they started.
RW> That's why I balked at $85/hr to replace one faucet. I would have been
RW> happier with a flat fee and when I didn't get it, I opted to find my o
RW> handyman.

Works for me.  Then again, we dont use a plumber to do that.  Don's a sideline
handyman who does that for others.  Phil seems to come from a state with some
laws that make it hard to do such.  Virginia hasnt been that restrictive.

When we split a pipe though and had to have it reworked totally, we paid
something like 85$ an hour.  That was the one to the shower and beyond
anything we felt comfortable doing.  Also a tree root situation causes fairly
often rework on various things, which we contract out.

In Virgina, if it's legal to do yourself, it's legal to hire a handyman for. 
Replacing toilets for example.  Don does ours and those he can do within
reason as a handyman. The home owner provides the 'second person' to lift and
hold things while Don knows how to do the rest (and will then have his hands
free to do it as well).

He does not touch electrical work and i think that requires a certified
electrician afterwards inspect it even if you 'do it yourself' though I am
sure some folks ignore that.  Having outlets added is quite expensive but
we've paid the going rate as needed.

 CS> things. Harris Teeter (East coast) was better for that.

RW> I think they're all a matter of what sells in the area. The VONs in Mi
RW> Mesa didn't stock a lot of Italian food things, but they stocked a lot
RW> oriental products. Their clientel were almost all oriental. Meanwhile,
RW> the 'Italian' neighborhood where Nancy's mom and dad lived, there was
RW> little oriental and more Italian. There are very few orientals here an
RW> HEB still stocks some oriental products, but it's mostly what Texans e
RW> outside of their normal diets. Being a German community, there's lot's
RW> German sausage products, German Cheese products, etc...did I mention t
RW> I 'hate' the German diet? My preference is Mexican and Italian dishes.

LOL!  I'd be looking for the Asian one but not mind at all what else I found
there when browsing for fodder ;-).  Oddly, I'm not that much experienced with
'mexican' although I use aspects of it gleaned from 3 years in Texas and 6 in
San Diego.  Always use Mexican Comino (whole) and ignore the ground cumin for
example.  Not much on Italian either, but some things I make are vaguely
related to that cookery (Not that an italian would notice it except the dip
used sometimes for bread).

 CS> (On bread products).  Thats related to additives.  I like mine
 CS> additive free so freeze things if I cant eat it in a few days.

RW> No room for that. We have frozen biscuits and garlic toast, but that's
RW> about it.

Ah, I have a second chest freezer.  In fact, left one at home in Norfolk for
the renters (if it dies, I do not replace but they are welcome to the use of
it and wont be charged if it dies before we get back.  It's going strong).  I
have one here in Sasebo too.  If when we get back, both are still good, we
will sell the one now in Norfolk for the same 50$ it cost us and keep the
smaller but still BIG unit we have here once it arrives.  The unit here is
about 4ft long and a bit less tall.  The one in Norfolk is 7ft long and 3.5ft
tall.  Both are money saving devices (cost about 80$ a year to run, save close
to 100$ a month on food bills due to being able to really use the hell out of
a good sale).


 CS> Normally, I just get less and shop oftener these days.  Then again, I
 CS> make most of our bread in a breadmaker so buying baked goods is very
 CS> rare for me, but warm bread just baked and still so warm you cant
 CS> even slice it well, is a common event here.

RW> Well, I watched Alton Brown make bread last night...you're not suppose
RW> slice it for at least an hour after it comes out of the oven...of cour
RW> he didn't use a breadmaker, his was made from scratch and he used an o
RW> to make the dough rise, putting water in a 9x9x2 glass baking dish und
RW> the bread dough, to give it plenty of moisture while the yeast did its
RW> thing. It must have tasted as good as it looked...

Yeah.  I never did get the hang though of making bread by hand.  I had no one
to teach me.  I'd probably manage ok if I had to do that now, but it's so much
easier to let the machine at least do the dough bit right!  You can always
remove that and oven bake it to get the right shape.  Sounds like he made
either french or italian 'crusty white' there.  The shape is more the
determiner for that one.


RW> I did that with the cantelope rinds and seeds last year. There weren't
RW> very many melons and they didn't get very big...I've always wanted to
RW> plant tomatos in a hanging basket and see how they do and last year, I
RW> that as well. They started out fine, but couldn't handle the Texas mid
RW> sun and croaked before I noticed that they were in distress. It's nice
RW> have the time to do all of this of course. :o)

True!  I had a 'garden' on a porch with containers til I had a real yard in
VB.  BTW the way to go it with hanging types for tomatoes is only try cherry
tomatoes and you have to use milk jugs for water with aquarium tubing to feed
them.  Looks ugly but works.  You put an airstone at the pot end and put the
bottle above the level of the plant pot.  I found it too much hassle to keep
the milk-jug full when it was up high so after the experiment, took to more
normal floor containers.

 RW>> carpenter. cannot live on Italian alone [sigh].

 CS> I learned nothing from my mother really, other than 'TV dinners'
 CS> which she seldom made.  Oh she isnt hopeless and I gather she cooks
 CS> up a storm now, but her food was fairly plain but good for growing up
 CS> on.

RW> Which reminds me of the week that Nancy was in the hospital for an
RW> operation and then recovery. Her mother came over and cooked. Of cours
RW> she cooked what she eats, which is steamed veggies, rice and chicken,
RW> necessarily combined. She's a horrible cook and so I made a crock pot
RW> chili, which lasted the entire week, as I was the only eating it. Mine
RW> bean-less chili, so nobody at work suffered very much...

;-)  My Mom isnt 'bad' but cooking isnt her highlight.  *outstanding* Mother
though so we kids all love her.  I'm probably a bit over critical of her
cooking though since I've learned so much better out on my own over the years.

 CS> when that was harder to do than it is today.  The skills she did
 CS> teach me are good ones, but cooking wasnt one of them.

RW> I recall you saying that she moved ya'll around quite a bit.

Yes.  Mom divorced Dad when I was 6 but she packed up us kids when I was a hair
under age 2 and moved from Bronxville NY to Miami Florida one day when Dad was
at work.  He came home to a silent house.  Hard thing to do to a man but she
had her reasons.  She then raised us alone (1 sister, 1 brother, bith older
than me but eldest is 3.5 years older than me).  Her way to make money ws to
use her 'nest egg' from when her parents died to buy a house, renovate it,
then sell for much more than buying cost and we;d live off the proceeds.

I grew up laying in tile floors, cutting wood with a mitre box to make
'chair-rails' and ceiling moldings, setting windows, painting, and was the
family special for all wallpaper hanging (can even do the inside of a curved
medicine cabinet).  Lots of stuff.  My sister learned plumbing and my brother
did electrical work.  105 Deerwood Drive, Charlottesville VA has the basement
with a pool room, a huge family room, and an apartment suitable for renting
which we built from a raw cement wall-less 2,400 square feet.  Bought at
35,000 and sold for 81,000$ 2 years later.  Good wages for 1972.

--Snip, this message too long.  Second part will pick up.
                                       xxcarol

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