Tock's Scrapbook - Eccentric Ramblings

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

Jus' cause...

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

Sledge hammering through a brick wall today. I feel like I'm Tock for the day...

[Alori Sai]

Oooh, that doesn't sound like fun. Or is it? heh

[Pash'nar]

Not all sledgehammer days have to be bad.

[Nai'shee]

Look at the title lol.

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

Hard Work, Education, and Inspiration My earlier comment was something like a "tweet" since I was still "on the job." So I'll expand on it now. People often ask me where I get my inspiration for Tock, and how I know so much about building and construction. Well, today I helped my Dad with a variety of tasks. First we converted a mobile trailer into a fixed freestanding shed of sorts, by mounting it on a standing support frame. It weighed some hundreds of pounds and was still full of tools. So we rigged a winch and pulley system to pull the body of it off the wheeled base and onto the new frame. Then we sledge hammered through about ten square feet of cinderblock to get from the basement to the foundation under the sunroom in the front of the house. Under there was about a three foot tall crawl space, which we had to climb up into since ground-level from the basement was at about chest height. I've got a cut in my leg from climbing through since there were some sharp edges on the cinderblocks. Then I hauled the broken blocks out by fifty pound bucketfuls at a time. My Dad is 59, so I get to do the fun heavy labor parts. We laid down tar paper across the crawl space since the ground was just dirt. This involved crawling across the width of the house rolling it out like a rolled up carpet, three trips on hands and knees back and forth until it was all covered. We cut two holes through the floor from above. This was to feed pipes through since half the sunroom is being converted into another bathroom (two weeks ago, I had helped him lay down new flooring there. That involved prying up old carpets, sanding, nailing down plywood sub flooring, applying putty to the seams and nail holes, and laying tile on top). We had to cut PVC pipes, apply primer and cement, and run about forty feet of piping. We had to cut through one wall aside from the cinder blocks we smashed through. We also had to cut through existing PVC pipes to attach a splitter. Some of the pipes had to be aligned, attached, and cemented from inside the crawl space to get through the floor above us. Then we had to do the same thing with copper water pipes. The PVC pipes take the dirty water out, the copper pipes bring the clean water in. The pipes needed to be cut carefully with a special tool to make sure the cuts were straight and the pipes didn't get warped or bent. They then had to be scraped clean with a wire brush and have a flux compound applied. It's important to align all the pipes before the soldering begins. That way you can make adjustments right up until the end. We cut into the existing water line to add a splitter there, and there were several spots that needed 90 degree joints to bend the pipe line around to where we needed it. We soldered with a propane torch. This involved heating the copper pipe until it was scorching hot, then touching solder to it so it would melt and fuse into the seams. This has to be done carefully to avoid any possible leaks. Finally we installed and assembled the toilet itself. This was the easiest part (except for when I had to carry it from Dad's truck through the house into the room). We had to run a hose from the new pipeline to the toilet tank, assemble the body, and hook up all the inner parts to work properly. Once it was assembled I got the honor of 'first flush' so we could test the whole system. Bodybuilding +4 Carpentry +2 Gadgeteering +2 Metalsmithing +3 Construction +2 Architecture +1 Lores: Soldering Copper Pipes Dirty water flows downhill Watch your skin when soldering Don't get primer on skin Letting the pipes cool down before touching them Don't hit the fuse box when swinging a sledgehammer Items or consequences: +$90 A cut leg will heal in about one week, and I need a shower.

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

Look at the title lol.

OMFG I WANT ONE!!!!!

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

Not all sledgehammer days have to be bad.

Pash, that was bloody BRILLIANT!

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

Cliche Phrases That are actually completely useless... "There's starving childen in China!" - Okay, sure, this may be true. But really, that broccoli we bought at the supermarket for $1.99 was never going to be shipped 12,000 miles to China to feed those children. So whether I eat it or it gets thrown in the trash, either way those Chinese kids are still gonna starve. "If all your friends jumped off a bridge, would you do it, too?" - Actually, yeah Mom, I might! Because if ALL of them were jumping off the bridge, it might be because the bridge is, y'know, ON FIRE or something, and jumping down into the river is the only safe thing to do! Sometimes following the herd is the safest course... "A penny saved is a penny earned..." - Okay, yes, true. But last time I cashed in my big coin jar, after a YEAR of saving, the pennies themselves only added up to less than $10. Those pennies saved or earned won't even pay for a trip to the movies, let alone a vacation to Disney World. "Never assume. It makes an Ass out of U and Me." - No, U make urself into an ass by quoting useless phrases instead of offering me useful advice. "It's always in the last place you look." - Well, DUH! I mean, I don't know many people who will KEEP looking after they already found it! "Did you even LOOK for it?" (When you ask someone if they've seen something you need to find.) - No, I didn't. Because rather than wasting 20 minutes on useless searching, if you know where it is, you can save me all of that effort with a ten second answer to my question (note: Also applies to the phrase "Go Google it", with the added irritation of sorting through a hundred wrong answers and trolling message boards looking for the answer, when you could just TELL me, and save me that headache). "Because I'm your MOTHER, that's why!" - Sorry, Mom, but genetics are not a good prerequisite for competent leadership, nor do they make you automatically right. (Note: Also works for "Because I'm your boss" and other variants.) "They don't make them like they used to." - Sorry, but they NEVER made them like that. Older designs aren't inherently better. Things broke down 50 years ago just as much as they do now. "This is how it's always been done..." - Really? Haven't heard of a little thing called 'progress'? For thousands of years, people thought the earth was flat, the universe revolved around us, performed human sacrifices, burned witches, and believed carrying flowers in your pocket cured the black plague (which is where the 'pocket full of posies' line from 'Ring around the rosy' comes from). Should we continue doing those things just because 'that's how it's always been done?' /end rant ^.^

[Alori Sai]

Awesome rant! Gave me a good laugh.