Adventures in Powdercoating

I have a favorite chair that is super beat. I *think* I bought it at a garage sale when I lived in my first apartment. I thought it was SO COOL. I still do, but it looks really funky.

So I asked mrguy how to use a sander, and I had this unrealistic picture of myself sanding this chair down to the metal (which I thought was wrought iron) and clear coating it. Then I actually tried doing this. Boy was it challenging! I kept replacing the sandpaper and stopping to rest my hand, and after a solid 35 minutes I was ready to stop. I realized that I needed help.

I decided to look for sandblasting and powdercoating services, found one, and they do furniture as well as their big industrial jobs. On Friday I took some time off work, brought my chair and two other pieces. One little table I must have gotten from the flea market. I remember having glass cut and ground for it at one point, but most recently I had some bright blue plastic cut to order. Swingin! The *tall* table was left behind by my sister when she moved to Minneapolis. I had red plastic cut to order for it. 

When I realized that I could get more items sandblasted and painted under the minimum order, I brought those two tables along with the chair. I will paint those two their original black when they're done, and the chair? Who knows? I've asked them to give me a call so I can come in and choose a color.

To the left of my items is an order that's ahead of me in line -- some radiators. They are going to be gorgeous! And V., the customer service person, showed me some electric blue clear coat that had been added over chrome on part of a car fender. These people have me fantasizing about what else they can do.

There's more to the story. V told me that her bosses are 29, and she worked with them when they were 17 years old, at the metal painting service. Later, these kids went off and started a metal fabrication business, but always used the services of the painting service they used to work for. A few years ago they heard that the painting service was closing, so they bought it. They brought the whole crew over, and they run the two businesses. They called up V, who had worked with them back in the day and asked her if she would come back and work with them, so the whole gang is back together.

I can't wait to go back!

The Big Cat Put His Paw On Us

The Big Cat summoned us for some hard work yesterday. Two days before, I'd seen a cat sleeping in an unusually vulnerable way in our yard. You could have easily mistaken him for the dirt and mulch that he'd settled into. When I noticed him next to the path, I sat down and spoke softly to him. He hissed, and scrambled away. He was in bad shape -- seemed to have arthritic legs, maybe. I kept an eye out for him.

Yesterday I saw him again. He was thin, with a stern face whose fluff stuck out at the cheeks. He hissed. I thought he had a raw drumstick with him. Then I realized it was his paw.

I went inside and got some food, heated it up and brought it to him. He backed away, but within a few minutes most of it was gone.

I could describe our actions in detail, but they don't really matter. The kitty is now gone. He had chosen our yard as his place to leave the world. Many people helped us yesterday with advice and a humane trap. Perhaps if we'd seen the kitty ten days earlier he might have had a chance, but by the time we saw him he was beyond saving.

Our cat guru held a seminar on grieving yesterday. Had I only known. It was a day too soon.

As we always say at times like this, love to all kitties everywhere.

Cat Silhouette Day

So far no update on the Prozac, but I'd say we're up to the point in cat compliance and good-boy-ness we saw right before the setback. So all gains have been regained and we're looking for some good results from new meds. In the meantime, summer has been lovely (lots of fog in the morning and pretty sunsets and gave us some good cat silhouettes. Why not make it a thing?

In the meantime, no mama today and I am enjoying a day off. Woooooo!

Medicine For Boys

We continue to work with the wee beastie to settle him down and see if we can finally integrate him into the household with the other kitties. There was a setback a few weeks ago, and we backed up on our strategy and just about then it was time for him to have his annual checkup. I asked Dr. Karen if we could try more drugs.

The baby is on Gabapentin, which makes him less agitated. And recently we added CBG, which is having a small but marked positive effect. We're clicker training him and I have NPR going in the bedroom, which seems to calm him down also. But really. We need more ammo in the arsenal we're using to slay the inner beast. We need to know that he's not going to hurt the other cats with rough play and general beastliness.

Today's the big day. Prozac day. We're adding a SSRI, and we'll see how it works. But for now, some recent sweet photos of my little boy.

Plum Sauce 2021

In 1993 mrguy and I went to New Zealand, where we visited friends, saw tons of music, went to many barbeques, and ate some amazing plum sauce. The recipe was from the Edmonds Sure To Rise cookbook, something that everybody in NZ grew up with and had at least one of. A friend gave us an old copy of the cookbook, and as soon as there were plums to be had, which I think was in our second place in the refinery town, I made some of the sauce. It became my go-to ingredient in salad dressing and in maki sushi. The stuff lasts for years but I was almost out of my last bottle, and plum season is short so I'd been thinking ahead.

Last year my neighbor did not make use of his plums, and they were all over the sidewalk. I had been waiting to ask if I could glean his trees this year when I went around the corner and saw that he'd chopped his trees down (part of the neighborhood deforestation). So I gave up the idea of plum sauce.

But last week a neighbor offered his up to the community and I pounced. I had everything I needed but mace. I posted on my Buy Nothing Facebook group to see if anyone had 1/4 tsp of mace required for the recipe and a kind woman put a bag of mace blades on her porch for me. It was ON!!

And now I have plum sauce for the next bunch of years.

So good.

So grateful.

Coffex Morning

Mrguy got the Coffex up and running in no time, and now we have espresso on Sunday without either going to Starbucks or stepping in a time machine to 1996 when I last made coffee for a living.

Second latte effort. Little coffee pitchers are now on order, and that will make my pour more precise :)