Home Maintenance

The garage too, is an integral part of a home. When I got home from a short, 100-mile ride in the foothills, I parked my bike and proceeded to enter the house. Bang! Uh-oh, something happened in the garage, and I was hoping that it wasn't any of my bikes falling over due to whatever reasons that might cause this. I scanned the garage, but could not see anything out of place. Bikes standing and intact. The roof did not cave in. I pressed the button to the garage door opener, but it would only lift the door a few inches and then drop it back down. I tried to override the opener and lift the rollup door manually, but found that it may require superhuman strength to do so. What the? On closer inspection, I isolated the problem: the tension spring mounted above the garage door opening had snapped in half. So, my bikes were imprisoned in my own garage.

I got on the internet and discovered that there were businesses which offered 24/7 service for garage repairs. I left a voicemail, but since it was late Friday night, I tried again on Saturday morning. They eventually got someone out and had the parts replaced and installed, which wasn't a cheap proposition. But, this spring had a lifetime guarantee (come to think of it, the one that broke came with the house, and I wonder now if it too had a lifetime guarantee?).

Oh the incidental expenses of home ownership... I'm sure there's more to come.

Rains::Pours

Looks like I will be segueing into the new year with a sackload of expenses and errands. My Cruiser has been off the road since before Halloween, and now the tally has come in: fix the rear differential, replace rear tire and brake pads, replace a fork seal and perform a 72,000 mile service (change oils, fluids and filters; valve adjustments; other inspections). My brake rotors will eventually need replacing, hopefully not until toward the end of 2008.

My truck is overdue for some service, not that I drive it much (until recently, now taking round-trips to the light rail station which amounts to under 10 miles). It will need the fluids changed, some free recall items squared away and perhaps lube and air filter inspection. I did manage to replace a headlight bulb by myself!

My boys are due for their annual checkup. I need to respond to a semi-annual dental reminder. My central heating went out several days ago, and fortunately I've survived the coldness with portable space heaters.

And now if this doesn't beat all: I have some LED lights strung up under my gazebo's canvas canopy, but about half the lights are out. I think I put them up over the summer. I also have some colored LED lights strung around the arch of a metal arbor/bench in my backyard for a bit of holiday spirit, and wouldn't you know, half the string is not lit. By coincidence, half the power in my house went out a couple of nights ago. Although the circuit-breaker switches all seemed to be on, I flipped them off/on again and everything came back on. There must be some correlation here however little sense this makes... LEDs are supposed to last 10x longer than standard bulbs. Would sure be nice if all my expenses would cost only half as much!

Happy New Year!