Stay On Target… Stay On Target!

Greetings programs!

It’s been yet another weird week. Anne was at a music camp eight hours a day, for four days. Combine that with warmish temperatures and it was not optimally productive.

However, a couple of things did happen.

First, I’m sure everyone wants an update on the windows and the contractors installing them. Last week I was told it would be another week or two before they could get started. On Thursday (yesterday as I write this) I received this update:

Hi Jeff, sorry I missed your call earlier — I’m working near lighthouse park and there is no phone service at all, it’s quite frustrating!

Next week is a short week and back to school is always a busy week. I will commit 100% to starting the following Monday with the possibility getting there next Friday if possible!

(My business partner had COVID this week but we managed to be quite productive without him!)

We’ll be there soon!

I know, I know. I will only believe it when they actually get started, but this is hopeful. To be clear, the Monday he quotes is September 12th. I will check with them again on September 8th just to be sure things are still on track.

If by some miracle they do show up on Friday the 9th it’s probable that next week’s post will be delayed a day. Things will be complicated while they are here.

Fingers crossed!

As for what actually happened this past week…

Those images come from the side yard between our home and the neighbour’s, and what is missing is the fence between our lots. The old fence is just that: old. And ugly. The neighbour has already replaced a lot of the fence around his home and has done a nice job. I’ve installed plenty of fence myself in the past, but I’m happy to let him do the work. Still, I need to participate (beyond splitting the cost of materials) so I am handling demolition. What you see above is the result of removing three fence panels.

The row of trees is a problem. The previous owners of our place told someone those yellow cedar trees were supposed to be a 10' tall hedge, but then never trimmed them so they are now something like 30' tall, or more. On the plus side, they provide some very useful shade on our house in the afternoons, but on the minus side they are eventually going to destroy a lot of things, including the fence and the foundations of both homes. Oh, and the fire department will be happy to see them go too.

I really hate removing trees, but these are all wrong in a number of ways: poor plant choice, wrong location, too many of them too close together, and zero maintenance. They are a serious problem.

Anyway, the plan is to put the fence up using the existing posts. Replacing those given all the tree roots in the way is simply impossible. Some of the existing posts have splits or other damage, but the neighbour has plans for how to repair them or otherwise work around the issues.

Once these first three panels are in, we’ll replace one or two panels at a time. The key point will be keeping the dogs contained. We’ll agree on a day and I will demo the old fence first thing in the morning to get him going on the new panel ASAP. With luck it will go well.

In other news, it seems I am well armed:

No, I did not make that up. You are encouraged to research it yourself and see what you can learn about “my” nuclear stockpile.

The other thing that I accomplished this past week was updating my computer from Ubuntu Linux 20.04 to 22.04. Sadly several issues came up in the process and I am resolving them. I am seriously considering switching to a new Linux distribution as a result of this mess, but that is even more work.

I won’t bore people with the details here, but I may write them up in a separate post. The Ubuntu and Gnome people have really annoyed me.

In any case, that is all for this week. I hope there is really good news next time. Cheers!