Obamanomics

Memorial Weekend Musings...


Well folks, the end of day three of the Turbo Pup Deck Construction Mobilization (TPDCM for short) finds us one board short of having a complete decking surface.

I know that it sounds singularly unspectacular to have taken an ENTIRE DAY to install less than 120 square feet of finished lumber, but as a matter of explanation let me defend my extended time expenditure on Memorial Weekend Saturday.

You see, in my infinite wisdom I decided to design my deck with a diagonal "herringbone" pattern rather than just screwing everything down nice and square and being done with it.

To make things even more complicated, I'm not building a simple square or rectangular deck to begin with. It has an 8' deep section connected to 10' deep and 12' deep sections by 45 degree angled transitions.

Thus the only "square" i.e. right angled cuts I made ended up being on these two short 45 degree runs...EVERYTHING else had to be individually hand fitted in position and then cut in place in one long run sliding the circular saw along a carefully placed piece of straight guide lumber.

And the "one board short"???

It was the one board which my AutoCAD drawings missed when predicting that I needed a 12' long piece of 2x4 rather than a 10' long section.

What is really sad is the board I have is only about 2-1/2" too short, but I'll have to either return it or use it later.

Speaking of 2x4's, did I mention that my "herringbone" pattern included alternating 2x4's and 2x6's rather than just plain old 5/4" "deck boards"? The alternating board arrangement on a 45 degree angle adds what I think is a nice visual pattern to my masterpiece.

So any way, after the Weather Nerds fooled me by predicting nice weather for a four or five day period, now this stupid low pressure system--actually a weak early season tropical depression--is coming to Knoxtown out of the Gulf of Mexico and it's supposed to rain most of the day today and possibly much of tomorrow so the stairway construction effort is now imperiled.

Looking at the local radar on the Internet I hope to sneak out early this morning and get two or three hours worth of sawing and nailing and screwing around done before the rain sets in. Time will tell...

In the cooking while multi-tasking department, I've got three racks of baby back Pork ribs and a 6 pound Boston Butt to finish thawing and get into giant pots of brine to sit overnight in anticipation of slow cooking all day Monday and serving to a half dozen hungry guests with my soon to be famous home made Kansas City style bar-b-que sauce.

Pat's tossing up a couple of different Cold Slaws and the Neighbors are bringing potato salad and the carport has a roof on it so I don't care if it's rain or shine...

I'm COOKING OUT on Monday.

Feel free to stop on by about 5 PM for some ribs and a pulled pork sandwich...

(Oh...and regarding my Obamanomics title this morning...

I almost forgot to mention this Letter to The Editor from a Dodge Dealer.)