Updates to the old house

   Due to the dining habits of an assortment of insects we're having new main entry doors installed today. Seems the critters got into the framing and had an extended banquet. Then, a few months ago we opened the front doors and the one on the west side dang near fell completely off. Two of the three hinges came totally out of the framing leaving only the bottom hinge really doing anything. We ordered new doors that week through a local mill work company.

   Lanita's brother, Jimmy, has been a carpenter all his adult life and actually had installed that door and all the windows in this house back in 2000 when Lanita's step father bought the property. We called him to handle hanging the replacement door and shepherd the one we ordered through the mill work shop too. Jimmy and the new doors both show up this morning with only one minor hitch. Even though a pair of 28 inch doors were specified what we got as a pair of 30 inch doors. 

   That dimensional difference means the entire opening has to be expanded to accommodate the bigger doors. Once we started tearing the old doors out we found the culprits still at work eating the framing for the old door.  Called a pest control company to come out and treat the entire area so the new door stays put a good long while. Much dust is flying while he cuts through the concrete to enlarge the opening accompanied by a lot of high pitched noise too....... concrete doesn't like to be cut. 

   Once installed it will make a major difference to both the outside appearance of the house and the inside look as well. The old doors were solid and the new ones have leaded glass oval windows sandwiched between two additional panes of glass so that they are insulated. That will also add more natural light to that front room on the house. The doors are steel over high density foam insulation. The weather cooperated and it's a beautiful day to work with temperatures in the low 70's and almost no wind as opposed to our usual 20+ MPH wind out of either the south or the north.

   I've also managed to get perhaps 1/4th of the windows on the ground floor scraped, repaired, caulked and repainted so far. All of the ones on ground floor on the front of the house are done. Average is about 4 days per window mostly due to the amount of wood rot that has to be repaired and the time involved in chipping off the stucco that was sprayed on everything. While a pain in the butt it does look much nicer now and will hopefully help with the utility bills this winter. 

   Otherwise I'm still waiting to have my combination workshop and storage building on the property. I was hoping to have something by November...... but then our wonderful government said that they were not going to pay anything for my moms nursing home stay...... leaving my brother and I to figure out where to come up with roughly $15,000 to cover the bill. My thought is that since the government isn't going to pay.... then they need to refund all the money they took from mom over the years to pay for the insurance to pay for her care! Seems simple enough.... but here is the thing to remember...... never play poker with someone who makes up the rules as the game progresses. Government TELLS you one thing... then makes you pay in the belief that you will be taken care of in your old age....... then changes the rules just when you need that coverage you had no choice but to pay for all those years. Everyone would be far better off if that money paid for a private policy that had no connection at all with government.

Gotta scoot!  I need to see how this door is going in just in case I have to work on it later on. As always..... be good and y'all take care of each other!