I bought my first house in October. Until then, I had always lived in apartments or rentals, and never really thought much about doing home improvements. The fences of the rentals always sagged. There was always dirt in the back yard, and dirt in the front yard, or concrete all over the place during the apartment years.
Over the past few months I have done some minor home improvement tasks requiring lots of physical work. I mended a wood fence, for which I had to bust up two concrete post foundations to replace the rotted posts. I had to pull out the rotted planks and rebuild them with new planks, mix/pour new concrete and make sure everything stayed level and even.
For a lot of you that might not sound like a big deal, but I had never done anything like this in my life. None of my family has ever owned a house before me. 75% of my life has been spent in apartments.
So today I had an even bigger task; raking up the rocks in the back yard so I could grow some grass. I’ve never been so dirty in my life. I literally watched mud pour from my body into the drain in the shower when it was all over, and I had sort of a startling realization after 3 hours of bending over a rake in 90 degree weather. I wasn’t exhausted, or tired, or cramped or anything. I felt GOOD. Better than normal, even.
Anyway, that was my day. Hope you enjoyed reading about it!
Good for you, Mosier!
We moved into our house last October, also.
I’ve been doing lots of yard work around here, too.
Nothing makes me feel better than a day of good, hard work outside.
I grew up doing this sort of thing, but I didn’t enjoy it then. I do now, though!
It’s a feeling that makes you realize that you accomplished something worthwhile, I think. It’s a GOOD feeling. I agree with you 100%!
Hey, you really want some fun, you can come over to my place and fix the swamp cooler. I have been (over the last couple weeks, since I’d been waiting for some responses from my landlady between some of these steps):
Up to the roof to get the general idea of one cooler
Back down the ladder and off to Lowe’s for pads for two coolers
Back up ladder to replace pads
Down ladder to turn on water to check for leaks
Up ladder, find three leaks where the stupid pipe busted
Down ladder, check other swamp cooler on ground
Replace pads on other cooler, see that pump is shot
To Home Depot for a new pump, 10’ of copper tubing, and compression fittings
Clean swamp cooler on ground, replace pump, fill and use cooler
Up ladder to try to splice in new pipe to remove leaks
Down ladder for 25’ of new copper tubing when it turns out that the compression fitting simply will not fit the old tubing. Off to Lowe’s for the tubing, a new motor for the roof cooler, a new belt for the roof cooler.
Remove old tubing, put new tubing into place on the ground for the connection to water line
Back up on the roof to make the connection to the cooler with the new tubing
Still on roof, mount new motor. Realize that the pulley is rusted to the old motor’s driveshaft and ain’t coming off
Back to Home Depot for a new pulley, which they are out of
Stop by Wal-Mart on the way home for a thing of ice cream (I think I’ve earned it after this last evening, when I’ve done items 10-15) and realize that they probably have a pulley there. Buy a pulley, a T-handle hex key of the right size, and realize I could have saved 15 bucks on the new motor if I had gone to Wal-Mart the first time.
Write this post complaining about the stupid swamp cooler
In the future:
18. Back on roof to put the new pulley on the motor and install the belt.
19. Open the motor up to wire in the connections for the power.
20. Clean the swamp cooler.
21. Hopefully I now have help on the ground to turn on the water and the power so I can check and make sure everything is working properly. If not, that’s another trip down and back up the ladder. More if something is still wrong.
So, yeah, you wanna come learn how to set up a swamp cooler?
My most physically enjoyable and satisfying jobs have been the jobs that are most physically demanding. They’ve also happened to be satisfying on another personal preference level, in that they’ve involved large animal husbandry. The jobs that specifically stand out during the eccentric employment history I’ve managed to find so far in my 32 years of life have been: a) milking cows on a small Northern California dairy (the entire herd cold be milked by a single machine-assisted milker, twice a day) and b) as a large animal groom for the Ohio State University Veterinary Teaching Hospital.
Unfortunately for me and my bank account, there is an inversely proportional relationship to physical satisfaction and financial compensation.
Back around 1999 I switched to a more mentally stimulating and financially rewarding approach to my working life in the internet industry. But even though the money is good and the opportunities for challenging career advancement seemingly endless, not a week goes by that I don’t look at my ever-expanding ass and waistline…my lack of free time necessary to motivate my mind and body into physical exertion…my stress level…not a week goes by that I don’t long for the days when good day was marked by a tractor-trailer of alfalfa being unloaded, a sweet, dull ache in every inch of my body, and a cold beer to wash the dust from my throat.
I’ve often commented to friends that our society has our priorities all fscked up in this regard. If I ever become well-off enough to dictate my days as I see fit, I’d spend half of my work day solving problems with my brain, half of it throwing my legs and back into physical labor, and in the middle would be a nice siesta type nap.
Now if those damn lottery numbers would just cooperate.
So I’m just going to repost as I’d intended it to read…
I totally agree.
My most physically enjoyable and satisfying jobs have been the jobs that are most physically demanding. They’ve also happened to be satisfying on another personal preference level, in that they’ve involved large animal husbandry. The jobs that specifically stand out during the eccentric employment history I’ve managed to find so far in my 32 years of life have been: a) milking cows on a small Northern California dairy (the entire herd could be milked by a single machine-assisted milker, twice a day) and b) as a large animal groom for the Ohio State University Veterinary Teaching Hospital.
Unfortunately for me and my bank account, there is an inversely proportional relationship to physical satisfaction and financial compensation.
Back around 1999 I switched to a more mentally stimulating and financially rewarding approach to my working life in the internet industry. But even though the money is good and the opportunities for challenging career advancement seemingly endless, not a week goes by that I don’t look at my ever-expanding ass and waistline…my lack of free time necessary to motivate my mind and body into physical exertion…my stress level…not a week goes by that I don’t long for the days when good day was marked by a tractor-trailer of alfalfa being unloaded, a sweet, dull ache in every inch of my body, and a cold beer to wash the dust from my throat.
I’ve often commented to friends that our society has our priorities all fscked up in this regard. If I ever become well-off enough to dictate my days as I see fit, I’d spend half of my work day solving problems with my brain, half of it throwing my legs and back into physical labor, and in the middle would be a nice siesta type nap. And there would be animals around. If zookeeper jobs weren’t so damn competetive on one hand and so damn depressing on the other, I’d consider yet another career change. I actually do consider such things about once a year. sigh
Now if those damn lottery numbers would just cooperate.
Garrrrr, it sure does. (Sorry, too much time on the pirate game).
This thread reminded me of a time when I was young. We had an ugly, thorny weed bush on our front yard. My parents didn’t want to deal with it, so they bought me a He-man sword and encouraged me to whack on it. That bush didn’t stand a chance.
I guess my point is that you should encourage your kids to get some good physical labor in too.
Are you talking about THE pirate game, Sid Meyer’s Pirates?
Oh man, that game is so good. If it weren’t for the IMPOSSIBLE dancing steps I’d basically be related by marriage to all of the governors in all of the towns in the game.
I have been discovering that hard physical work feels good, too, as long as there isn’t too much of it, and you get to pause as needed. Three weekends ago I helped some friends build a reaining wall. We did the earthmoving on Saturdat and the concretework on Sunday. Hand mixing, even.
We’ve been joking that we should sell subscriptions to coddled Torontonians as ‘construction therapy’, charge them eighty-five bucks an hour, and then, when they arrive, hand them a sledgehammer and tell them where they can start pounding the sand in the rammed-earth walls.
But there’s a deper thought. Exercise, in amounts and forms appropriate to each person, is good for you. Not getting enough physical activity has led me, at times, into a downward spiral where, as I got less exercise, I was less and less likely to seek exercise.
What if this is like the ‘too much cleanliness is bad for you’ hypothesis, where people need dirt to stimulate their immune systems when they are growing up?
My shrink says, after a half-hour of aerobic (hard breathing) exercise, your body starts producing lots more dopamine, a chemical that makes you feel good. Or, was that “allows” you to feel good?
Apparently it wasn’t up to the challenge that is my backyard. I need a sheep.