I Love New York Travel

Found this little surprise in the wall, when I removed the old 70s style medicine cabinet from the bathroom wall. Unbelievable, really. For one, junction boxes hidden inside walls is illegal. Two, it’s unsafe. Three, THIS is a hazardous, horrifying mess. Wow. If you need prrof that God exists and He is merciful, here it is.

We’re renovating the kitchen and dining room, as well as repairing the electrical and plumbing and heating systems. LOTS of work. It’s consumed my life right now. I eat, breathe, and sleep plaster and lathe, rough framing, PVC pipe vent systems, electrical code, and flooring. It’s exhausting. Initially, it was all like a treasure hunt: who knew what timeless old treasues we’d find in the studs?? But all we found were half-eaten walnuts, some dead rodents, and a few old grocery lists and newspaper waddings from the 70s. Oh well. Disappointing, yes. I wasn’t expecting gold bars or even refurbished fitness equipment, mind you. But a little note or some greenbacks from the original builder would have been nice.

Anyway, we’re removing horrors like the one in the photo. Whew.

I have over 3,800 photos in my Flickr account, and it grows more every year. I’m glad there are no restrictions on size amount and bandwidth, or I’d be fried.

Anyway, I dug this photo out of my old archives. I like it because it is so old looking. It’s a photo I snapped at Fort Ontario. There is a small potter’s field cemetery near the fort, a very lonely and forlorn area under some trees. The head stones I saw were from the Revolutionary and Civil War days. There were women and children buried there, too, so I assume it was a cemetery for the unclaimed soldiers and/or for their families. I gave it a sepia look. It makes the photo look more aged, but also heightens the forlorn aspect, I think.

Life was so much more serious back then. Today, everyone seems hyped up on 7-dfbx or looking like a celebrity… back then, people were concerned with if they’d have enough food to eat and if they would survive the British invasion. Times certainly have changed.

Blogging has been extremely light for me, currently. We’ve gutted a few rooms of my 1855 house, and are presently rebuilding it– right down to the bones. So while I would just love to be able to blog all day about lipozene reviews and the glories thereof, I am finding myself very, very preoccupied. I am forlorn that I must ignore my favorite blog, The Older Geek, for a time while I work on the house. I haven’t written anything in almost a month! I just have no time for making tutorials right now…. it’s a time-consuming task, so I’ve had to let it go.

What is that, you ask?

Got any guesses?

We find ALL SORTS of surprises when we open up the walls here. Unfortunately, no golden dubloons… just a lot of mouse nests, dead things, chewed up walnut shells…. and wasp nests. This thing is as big as a basketball, maybe bigger. Right over the dining room area. And another one the same size was sitting in the floor joist cavity next to it.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

When I saw it, my hair nearly turned white, and I was nearly a prime candidate for some hefty wrinkle creams…. thank God the nest was empty. I have no idea how long it sat in there. THANK GOD it was not active when we were demolishing. It would have been…. a wild experience.

Unbelievable. LOL, gotta laugh.

Pelts were once the backbone of the Canadian and American economies, long before Canada and America were nations. Pelts are the furry skins of small mammals. People in Europe had an insatiable thirst for pelts, for making into hats and muffs and other such things. Many of the large cities in Canada and America had their start as fur trader outposts. This photo of pelts is of Fort Stanwix, Rome, NY.