BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

My apologies to the B-52’s. I’ll buy y’all a round of drinks next time you’re in town, okay? (Watch ’em all order B-52’s…)

So, anyway, Facebook and Twitter folk know that last weekend we were finally able to get around to re-roofing our shed. Many of you have asked about it… Okay, okay, so none of you have asked about it. Be that way… Sheesh… Tough crowd everywhere I go.

Be that as it may… or as it were… or was… or is… Oh, what the hell. Thing is, it’s too damn hot for me to sit in the office and be funny. I’m much funnier when chilled. Therefore, by way of blog entry I am going to provide you with a few pictures and captions from the Great Shed Re-Roofing of 2010…

To the left we have “Le Shed.” The E K and I built it something on the order of 15 or 17 or maybe even 112 years ago. I can’t really remember. At any rate, it has served us well. However, it lives beneath a black walnut tree that is infested with Tree Rats (aka Skwirlz… not Squirrels, mind you. We have Skwirlz. Trust me… I’m pretty sure McSquizzy is their leader.) Anywho, after umpty-jillion years the asphalt shingled roof gave up the ghost. Once that happened, McSquizzy and his crew began their own demolition work.

Between the Skwirlz and weather, tolls were taken, but no receipts given. Problem is, with our schedules, getting out there and re-roofing the thing was proving a challenge. It wasn’t that we didn’t know how. We just didn’t have time.

Finally, this past winter we were able to do a quick tear-off, but the weather turned on us, and with time being a factor once again, a tarp became the interim roof.

Me, being the early riser that I am, got out there and pulled the tarp, then set about the process of replacing the damaged trusses.

Eventually, Loota-Chack and the Mikester showed up, followed by Johnathan “Mentos Rib Fest” Minton. Oh, and E K was there too. Once we managed to get the trusses replaced, E K and the Mikester went up top and set about the process of installing the purlins. These were necessary because we elected to go with a corrugated roofing material this go around.

During the initial installation, we were entertaining ourselves with some tunes. Much to our  dismay followed by delight, we discovered that the Mikester was unfamiliar with Aphrodite’s Child. We made it a point to change that.

This educational interlude, however, seemed to annoy the disembodied voice behind all of the pictured foliage, and he yelled sarcastic silliness at us. He should really leave the sarcasm to the professionals, because he wasn’t any good at it at all.

Here we have the offending radio. It even has its own chair. We allowed it to continue playing in the back yard while we were working so that we could keep an eye on it. However, since it was bad and offended the neighbor so much that he had to yell over the top of his weeds, when we were finished we sent it to its room and took away its power cord. Bad radio. No batteries for you!

It never ceases to amaze me…

No matter how hard I work, no matter what power tools, hand tools, or lumber I happen to be using, cutting, hammering, or otherwise busting my ass with, the only picture of me is where I am in supervisor mode.

I think E K does that to me on purpose, just to make me look bad…

Of course, at least I was supervising.

Loota-chack, on the other hand, was working just as hard as she could holding the ground down so it didn’t float away. I mean, after all, if the back yard had floated away we wouldn’t have any place to put the shed, right?

But, seriously folks, this is just the A-Bomb taking a break. We were all bustin’ arses on this project. Even “Little Miss 57 Languages” here…

Speaking of Luets-es-es… Here we have The Mikester. He’s kind of a trip. Has do-rag, will travel. He even comes with his own tools.

One of the amazing things about The Mikester is that he shows up, tools in hand, then does ANYTHING and EVERYTHING the redhead tells him to do. Seriously. She points and barks orders. Mikester jumps and carries out her commands. Somehow or another she has him even better trained than she has me. Not sure what that’s all about.

And, what’s a shed re-roofing without a gratuitous “Kilroy Was Here” photo.

And, wouldn’t you know it, Johnathan “Mentos Rib Fest” Minton is the culprit.

Unfortunately, this is the best pic we have of the Mentos during the project, which is too bad.  The T-Shirt he wore that day is actually an On The Edge Graphics original from the online store. Any guesses which one? Yeah… “Wearer Property of Evil Kat“… Hmmm… wonder why he selected that particular shirt on that particular day?

And finally, The Evil One herself… She hates having her picture taken so this is pretty much the best I could manage… Not that it isn’t perfectly lovely in its own right…

She actually had to take frequent breaks, because she’s so hot that she was warping the Ondura Roofing Panels. Go figure…

Still, here the roof is almost halfway installed… By the time we were done we were all too tired to take a picture of the finished product – besides which, E K and I had to get cleaned up and rush downtown to MAC for my 30th HS reunion.

Yes. Seriously. We busted our asses on the shed ALL DAY, then went to the reunion dinner… So, if you were there and wondered why we looked a little cooked, there you have it.

Okay… I’ll see if I can come up with something funny for  this coming Wednesday.

Hey! It could happen…

More to come…

Murv

I can actually understand the reason for a census. It makes sense, it really does. Some of the questions that some of us will be asked, however, I do have problems with.

But, that’s a different topic and one that I will deal with myself.

Right now, I’m interested in the money.

Now, since I know that a census is necessary, I know that the money has to be spent to take one. No biggie there. But, by the same token, I also know that we have a huge deficit, a president who is trying to pay for health care reform and a bailout (for which he is not ENTIRELY to blame), and we deal every day with a bastardized version of what our government really should be. However, my personal politics aren’t the issue here either… Hell, I’ve made no secret that I wrote my wife’s name in on the ballot during the last presidential election because I didn’t feel confident in any of the candidates.

No… We’re just coming back to the money…

So, although the CIA / NSA / HS data miners will probably add me to the terrorist watch lists for having the gall to post this blog, I have a question:

How much did it cost taxpayers to send out this letter and was it REALLY necessary?

Yeah, okay, that was two questions… But, come on folks. Between paper, envelopes, postage, printing, electricity, and everything that was necessary to accomplish this “pre-emptive warning of impending census” don’t you think maybe we could have paid for a few of those “snow days” or something like that?

More to come…

Murv