While Dad was cutting moulding yesterday at Home Depot, I wandered off in search of plumbers' grease, as the newest canister in our filtration system has a bit of a leak (due to the O-ring not quite sealing). We've encountered this problem with each of the others that we've installed, and have discovered that a wee bit of plumbers' grease, applied to the O-ring, seals the canisters without problem. Unfortunately, the plumbers' grease that I know is somewhere in the house lives in a small, blue plastic container about 3/8” thick and the size of a loonie. It's currently missing in action, likely to be found by the dog at some later date.

After searching up and down the relevant plumbing aisles, I came up empty-handed. There were sales clerks around, but they were either busy with customers or completely ignoring me. When I finally did get a clerk to make eye contact, I quickly asked him where they kept their plumbers' grease. Now, had he been paying attention, he would have known that I had already spent five minutes wandering up and down the aisles, obviously looking for something. Rather than showing me where it was, he indicated that I could obviously find it half-way down the previous aisle, in small white tubs with red writing.

No plumbers' grease to be found there. What he'd described was the brand of plumbers' putty that Home Depot carries. When I went back to ask, again, he suggested looking at the other products in that particular location, as one of them would surely suit my needs—still, he didn't volunteer to walk over to the next aisle with me to ensure that I actually got what I needed. Now, I didn't ask him for epoxy putty, plumbers' putty, any of the various plumbing cements, teflon tape, or pipe joint compound. What I specifically wanted and needed was plumbers' grease, which they didn't have. There's a big difference, especially because we need to be able to retain access to the filtration canister so that we can change the filter.

This was a completely unnecessary exercise in frustration, and one that is becoming increasingly common in the plumbing department of our Home Depot. If it weren't for the fact that they have the largest selection of stock in the city, I'd likely stop shopping there. It's pretty obvious that volume, and not customer service, is their priority. I just find it rather amusing that they're trying to attract more female customers with new programs and seminars designed specifically for women, when their sales clerks seem to think that communicating with women or, heaven forbid, actually helping us find what we're looking for, is so obviously beneath them.

Then it's all the fiddly little bits. But, they're definitely worth it. For example, Dad spent two days shimming the strapping on the ceiling (before we drywalled) in an effort to make the ceiling flat (even after we'd installed the new beam and jacked the ceiling up a good 2", it was still out by between 1/2" and 3" in places). You can't even tell, now, that the 2"x6" floor joists (originally over an almost 22' span--insanity!) had sunk, bringing the ceiling with them, and creating a very funky (and not-so-attractive) dished look to the ceiling.

We haven't changed the footprint of the kitchen, at least not overly much. We've just extended the cabinets along both longer walls, adding a pantry on the east wall and another 8-1/2' of countertop (plus sink--coming soon) underneath the large window on the west wall.

We're going to have so many cabinets and so much cupboard space that I'm not sure we're going to know what to do with it all. We'll actually be able to put all of the kitchen stuff in the kitchen, for the very first time! Plus, by removing the old bathroom, we've gained a good-sized eating area off the kitchen, with room for the buffet and hutch. We'll actually be able to eat in the kitchen, and not be in severe danger of becoming human sardines.

In other news, Dad's gone home for a week because we're taking inventory at our store. That gives me a week with no major work on the main floor (aside from the furnace guys, who should be done on Monday), so I should be able to get a few things cleaned up (and get the stuff living in boxes in the dining room packed into its proper home(s) in the new cabinets).

But, there were good reasons for this seeming sacrilege. Our primary concern was air leakage. It's not uncommon, here, for it to get to -40C (-40F) in the winter, and it is perfectly capable of hitting temperatures as low as -65C (-76F) with the windchill. In short, it can get pretty damn cold. And, while I loved the look of the original back door, it just wasn't practical to keep it . . . especially when, in early December, it had a good 1/2" coat of frost growing on it (and it hadn't even hit -20C yet).

Next came the front door. We bought a pair of heritage storm doors from Emco, both of which have self-storing glass & screens. They're not an exact match to the 12-light cedar storm doors that the house originally had (of which we currently only have one, as the back storm door is mysteriously missing), but they're as close as we could come and still get all of the advantages of the newer storm doors.

The original front door is a craftsman style door, with a single, almost-square, window and three recessed panels. The center panel is cracked to the extent that you can actually see the outside world through it while sitting in the old front porch. It's entirely fixable (with more than a little work), but the thin recessed panels provide little in terms of insulation . . . a fact that we discovered early last winter. So, with yet another sigh, we purchased yet another insulated steel door, although this time with a 9-light-sized stained glass-style insert.

We dearly would have loved to have kept all three remaining original doors, but it just wasn't practical to do so in this climate. Even once the house has achieved a good frost seal, it was still far too cold in here last winter. The two entry doors were going to continue to present a problem, even with insulating the basement inside & out, replacing all of the basement windows, and the planned insulation of and sealing* around the main floor windows that aren't presently being replaced.

So there, I've admitted it, we've committed one of the sins for which people often curse the previous owners of their homes. But, at least we'll re-use the doors elsewhere. The one remaining original storm door is in really rough shape, as the door-handle side stile is nowhere even close to sound. Unfortunately, I don't think we're going to be able to salvage this one. However, despite their rough shape, we're going to be able to re-use the original back and front doors. The back door, a heavy cedar raised-panel door, will go on the basement workshop, once it's reassembled from the bits and pieces to which it's currently reduced. The front door, once the center panel has been fixed and the glass frosted, will likely reside upstairs. In addition to this, we've obtained a functional fir storm door, which is destined, after stripping, refinishing, and glass frosting, to become the door for the new master bedrom. So, it's not as if we're shipping them off to the dump or something . . . we're just giving them new jobs to do.

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* A brief note re. sealing: We've been using a product that is often referred to as "blueskin" throughout the course of our exterior renovations. It's a self-adhering flashing, blue on the sticky side, that seals out drafts better than any other product we've seen on the market (and, considering that my father's been in the home improvement/building supply industry for 37 years, that's saying a lot). It's worked wonders on the areas of the house that we've managed to seal thus far.

I'm now one of six newly elected council members for the Town of Aberdeen. Considering that I flat out admitted at the candidates' meeting that (1) what I know about farming might fit into a teacup (if I'm really lucky), (2) I've never lived in a small town before this, and (3) I don't really want to be a politician, I'm a bit surprised that I was actually elected. ;-) Just wait 'til the townspeople find out where my politics really lie.

In a little less cheeky tone, I really do think that community involvement, particularly when one lives in a small town, is important, especially at a time when so many Saskatchewan small towns are fast losing their populations as my generation (and those even younger) move away for bigger and better things. I allowed myself to be persuaded to run for council because I think that my community has a great deal of potential, potential that I really don't want to see ruined as a result of apathy and insularity. I've seen that happen before, and it's not a pretty sight (nor is it good for business). Regardless of what happens, I'm sure that it'll be an interesting three years.

This morning, a backhoe showed up and began digging. The culvert was delivered. We discovered a substantial foundation for something (16" wide walls, formed on both sides, plus a concrete floor) beginning just outside of our hedge and continuing well into the street. We're not entirely sure what it was for (or why it's in the street), but it appears likely that it was a cistern of some sort. I'll have to check the town's archives to see if there's any mention of a structure having been there at some point. Considering that a significant portion of the town burned in the 1930s, anything's possible. The guys dug a huge trench right across Main St., installed the culvert, filled the now very muddy hole, and were done in time for a slightly late lunch. Thanks!!

So, we now have a nice shiny culvert, which will hopefully prevent us from gaining a temporary lake in the front yard come spring melt. And, with all of the other improvements we've made to our drainage, I'm really hoping (with crossed fingers) that this means we won't have any water in the basement either.

Considering that we're going to have to drop the ceiling, regardless, in order to leave room for the plumbing, we're going to create our own suspended ceiling with crown moulding, industrial ceiling track, and 2-foot wide pieces of drywall. Not exactly period-appropriate, but it'll suffice (and won't involve using those hideous ceiling tiles).

So far, the guys have completely gutted the kitchen, revealing that the wall directly behind the kitchen sink had no insulation, which might have been why the plaster, floor, and floor joists had pretty much rotted away to nothing--especially when it's able to reach -30C inside your house. We've got new windows that actually open. The originals were long gone, and the fixed ones prevented any ventilation, making the kitchen an oven in the midst of summer. We've put in new wiring and plumbing, added a central vacuum line so that I can actually vacuum all of the house, run several sets of phone and CAT 5e cable, and plumbed in the range fan so that it actually vents outside, instead of into the basement stairwell. We've added R14.5 insulation, a significant improvement over the wood chips (and lack thereof) in the previous walls, and finished hanging the drywall yesterday evening. At present, we're waiting for the drywall mud to dry so that we can sand. Hopefully, this means that sometime in the next week or so the fully-assembled cabinets that are sitting in the living room, dining room, and porch will actually come to inhabit their new homes in the kitchen. I can hardly wait.