Ladies and gentlemen…
I have doors.
My house was built in 1934. Who knows when the doors were put in? The 15-light French doors in back were fine for the summer. But I could feel the cold seeping through them in the winter. And the left half was caulked in, so it wouldn’t open. So the handyman came today and installed a pair of 10-light double-paned energy-efficient doors. Abd both sides open. The front door was the same as the back: 15 lights in a wooden frame. Home Despot calls these ‘interior doors’. The new front door has nine lights, and they only go half-way down as opposed to full length. Again, it’s an energy-efficient double-paned unit.
I put mini-blinds on the front door that are slicker 'n snot. The blinds are enclosed in a ‘box’ that fits over the windows, and are actuated by sliders on either side. No cleaning! If I ever do need to clean the inside, I just undo a couple of latches and pull it off. The handyman looked at it after I put it up, and he says he can’t wait to install one himself. The other cool thing is that the house-side of the unit provides a third pane of glass. Sweet. I’m going to go to Home Creepo tomorrow and get the full-length blinds of the same design for the French doors.
Getting rid of those gawdawful 40-year-old gold curtains that extended a foot and a half on either side of the French doors really brightened things up in here.
I need to get some wood tomorrow (I’ll go to the local hardware store for that) for trim. The handyman will install it. Once it’s up, I can re-install my doorbell. (It’s a four-inch diameter brass ship’s bell with a knotted pull.)
The only bad thing about the French doors is that I no longer have a screen door. I’ll need that, come summer. The old screen (which is a very nice wooden one) won’t fit, probably because the new doors have a track at the bottom. I’ll have to look into a new screen.
The old doors are fine; just not very good insulation. If any nearby Dopers want them (e.g., Surrey, Vancouver, etc.) they can have them. The front door is 32" x 80", and the French doors are 72" x 80". I’m going to set them up next to the fence with a ‘FREE!’ sign on them in a couple of days.
