A friend surprised me with this fun gift:
I can’t wait to set it up!
Via Google image search, I’ve learned there are versions in the shape of horse, gnome, cat and (ironically) squirrel heads.
Also, I’ve spotted a hole in the market; a sasquatch edition would fly off the shelves. Maybe I’ll make a prototype and start marketing them on Etsy.
***
I had to make a grocery run the other day and listened to an episode of This American Life. It’s a rerun, but I hadn’t heard it before.
The topic is fiascos, and the first incident described involves a calamitous high school production of “Peter Pan.”
It’s a good thing I eschew mascara because I laughed so hard I cried. Seriously, I almost had to pull over. Listen to it if you need a laugh.
***
Speaking of calamities, there’s a laminate countertop on one side of my kitchen that has fake granite paint. We’ve wanted to replace it for more than six years, but it wasn’t high on the priority list of home renovation projects, even before the goddamn flood.
But lately it’s started to peel at the edges, which makes it difficult to scrub the counter without creating an even bigger mess. I figured as a stop-gap measure, I’d strip the peeling paint and live with the ugly laminate until we can replace the countertops.
Bill is busy dealing with the flood damage downstairs, replacing drywall and so forth, so I figured I’d take this counter thing on myself.
I watched a few YouTube videos of such projects, which made it look easy (and satisfying!) to strip away the paint. I assembled the necessary products and tools. I tested a small area to confirm the paint stripping abilities of the product I’d purchased.
Sure enough, after the stripping liquid was in place on the test surface for 15 minutes, I was able to effortlessly remove the paint from that area with a putty knife, so I coated the rest of the counter.
It’s not a big counter at all — half of a small galley kitchen — so I wasn’t worried about the ventilation, even though we’re having a cold snap and the windows are shut.
Turns out that was a miscalculation. The stripping compound created an overwhelming toxic cloud. We all had to evacuate to the chilly porch while I opened the windows to air the place out.
Then, while wearing a hat, coat, scarf and mittens, I commenced scraping and discovered that, unlike the test area, more than half of the counter paint was tightly bonded to the laminate and required a truly arduous effort to remove.
To sum up, I bit off more than I can chew, and a project that should have been the work of an afternoon will drag on into tomorrow. Meanwhile, much of the kitchen is a disaster zone, so instead of the planned pot of homemade chili, we’ll be having microwaved soup for dinner.
Open thread!
HinTN
I believe that’s a community production of Peter Pan that transpired in the college town up the hill from me. And, yes, the story is hilarious (and hilariously told).
Ohio Mom
Thank you for confirming what I had suspected, those DIY YouTubes are not to be believed.
hitchhiker
Good grief. Are there youtube videos out there that show what happens when people follow all the instructions and it STILL turns to shit?
Enjoy your soup! I’m baking some whole wheat bread from my grandmother’s recipe; I’d bring you a loaf if I could but I live on Whidbey Island, in the way far Pacific Northwest. I don’t think that’s anywhere near Florida.
Baud
I’m glad they don’t make those for people. I can see getting my head stuck in one.
Old School
I think I have that This American Life story on CD, but I’ve never gotten around to listening to it.
I guess I’ll have to do that.
KatKapCC
Dang, that’s bringing up some early-blogosphere nostalgia.
Gin & Tonic
The minute I read this:
I knew this project was going to shit.
Kristine
You Tube videos make DIY look way too easy. Often the You Tuber is an expert who edits out the steps they believe require no explanation and a rank beginner is left in the middle of nowhere with no clue how to proceed.
CaseyL
I had my kitchen redone about 20 years ago. Not remodeled, re-faced. It came out great, but when I thought it might be nice to replace the formica countertops with stone, I found out that everything was put together with adhesives. There was no way to remove the existing countertops without wiping out the cabinets and dishwasher alcove. I had never heard of such a thing before. So, despite the mishap with your DIY re-surfacing, be glad that you don’t have to dismantle your entire kitchen first!
Also – if you don’t mind scripted theatrical disasters – there is a wonderful British performing group called “Goes Wrong Theater.” They stage plays in which anything that can go wrong, does. Even though you know it’s all planned, it’s still wet-your-pants funny.
Here they are, laying waste to The Nativity.
MobiusKlein
The kids are out buying a Drain Snake, so they can unclog their bathtub. And by kids, I mean 23 year olds that I am somehow trusting to run powertools inside the house. We installed a new thermostat, so the drain seems just as likely to work out.
kindness
A hand held orbital sander would take that paint right off. Yea, there would be a bunch of dust unless you had a vacuum hose next to the sander.
mvr
That’s unfortunate that the project went sideways.
FWIW, depending on the kind of stripper you were using, it might be useful just to wait longer before scraping it off. Sometimes also you can put paper over it to keep it from drying out too soon. But there are so many kinds of paint stripper it is hard to give general advice. And some of the kinds of stripper are pretty unpleasant stuff.
FWIW, which may be not much.
mvr
@kindness: laminate/formica is not very deeply colored. Sanding it is likely to take the surface off.
gratuitous
“Turns out that was a miscalculation.” Oh, how many nickels I’d have!
Nukular Biskits
@KatKapCC:
First house I bought, the kitchen was “harvest gold” with laminate countertops. The bathrooms were avocado green (including the tile).
Oh, and the carpet was green.
Gvg
I have stripped paint and varnish. It can be worth it for a nice antique but not something of poor quality in the first place. Home Depot and Lowe’s sell pretty cheap laminate Formica countertops in about 4 inoffensive fake stone looks. If the countertop doesn’t have too many cutouts and funny angles, I would have just bought one of those even if it didn’t match. It would be clean and smooth. And I would not do a stripping job without an orbital sander…..
MomSense
I feel you on the kitchen counters. The kitchen in my house was remodeled right after WWII with tiny tin/metal cupboards that have shallow counters and maybe 19 inches of clearance between the upper and lower cabinets. The Formica is trimmed with some kind of metal and it looks like fake wood. Uuuuugly.
Today the appliances I ordered on sale were delivered to my barn and soon the kitchen will be gutted and made ready for the new design. It’s a wicked splurge but I love to cook and I don’t plan to be out much the next four years.
I’m also planning a greenhouse and will start finishing the huge third floor as an apartment. I’m preparing for the worst and if the economy crashes and kids need to move in, I’ll be ready.
zhena gogolia
I do not understand what the squirrel feeder does. It magically turns squirrels into unicorns?
TBone
Amazon made a slight miscalculation too.
Oopsie.
espierce
@Betty C
Are you using Strypeeze? Used it eons ago to remove enamel based paint from a 48’ motorsailer on a summertime project and that shit will get you an unhealthy high if you’re not careful.
TBone
@zhena gogolia: the squirrel! has to wear the head to get food out of it.
BeautifulPlumage
I remember losing it the first time I heard the Fiasco episode, but my favorite is the next act – Squirrel Cop!
Chacal Charles Calthrop
what is fake granite paint
did a quick google search — wow, are they ever ugly.
VeniceRiley
I just watched (mumbles number) of episodes of “Money for Nothing” back to back. It’s popular on TV here in England. A lady rescues items from the recycling center that people are tossing out, gives them to designers and restorers,who gets a budget; then she sells the item on, and gives the profit back to the tosser (who gives it to charity, usually.)
It looks like such fun, only not so much. Fuuuuuumes!
Elizabelle
@TBone: The headline:
Well, yeah.
TBone
I started having fiascos at a very young age. When I and my little brother were wee, our next door neighbors’ 10 y.o. son was a natural born, merciless troll. One day, he taught us unsuspecting tots the F word, telling us it meant something really good, about love, and that we should shout it. I commenced to yelling it at the top of my lungs on the middle of our front lawn. It was the only time I ever saw my normally staid grandmother run. At top speed, out the front door, to tackle me!
Barbara
My sister has tile counters that never feel truly clean. When I stayed with her I purchased the largest composite cutting board (Epicurean brand) I could find and used that on top of the counter for all food related tasks. It’s easy to wash and it’s smooth and light. I think it’s paper bonded with some kind of resin or other material. You should not get a tile counter if you are not committed to deep cleaning.
karen marie
@MobiusKlein: I bought a toothed plastic thingy that I shove down my bathtub drain and it grabs the disgusting hair clumps so I can pull it out. Have they tried something like that? With bathtubs, the blockage is usually pretty close to the top and doesn’t need a snake.
Barbara
@karen marie: Those are great, and they unclog some vacuum cleaners as well.
Scout211
@Ohio Mom: @Kristine:
I love YouTube DIY videos. They have helped me in so many projects over the past few years. I do agree with both of you that there are some bad ones and ones that make it look too easy. But I get around that by watching several of them on the same subject and also find websites with instructions. When there seems to be a consensus, I feel ready to start the project.
For those of us olds, the only way to get those kinds of instructions was to check out books at the library. Those were actually hard to find. And for me, hard to follow. Watching someone actually do a task or project is very helpful.
Lily
Consider goggles if you haven’t. Some fumes (doubtless more toxic than yours) can damage the optic nerve, which happened to my cousin, who was too maga-macho to ventilate and too ‘anti-govt’ to ‘obey’ the label warnings. Which I suppose his brain associated with damn govt regulations (just like poaching laws, speed limits and gun warnings) ? He actually went blind.
I never knew that could happen myself.
Yutsano
Since the thread be open:
I’m going to be in Dallas from January 29th through February 3rd. Meet-up opportunities are encouraged.
TBone
A YouTube frontier-type woman taught us how to take our window a/c units apart to clean them. Amazing how much dirt is inside that you can’t see with the front panel & metal casing on. Cleaned all the moldy dirt and bugs outta 3 units (the flywheels were repugnant too) and put them back together and…they still worked and had better efficiency! Other YouTube guy showed how to replace the rusted out trip lever tub drain thingy and hubby was successful at that too. Hubby also fixed the toilet via video after the plumber’s two attempts failed.
Another guy shows how to blow stuff up real good. Those are fun to watch.
Another Scott
@Scout211: +1
The 60+ year old main water valve in our basement has started leaking at the packing nut. “No problem, I’ll just tighten the nut a little”. Of course, it made the leak worse… :-/ (It’s about a cup a day now.)
I knew that it was likely that the packing material had just worn out, but the idea of having to shut off the water at the street (and probably not having the tool to do that) or finding that I actually need to solder in a new valve or do something similar was disturbing.
Plus, I hate plumbing.
So, off to YouTube I went. It turns out that I should be able to simply turn off the water at the valve, remove the handle and packing nut, remove the old packing, install new (teflon) packing material ($3 on Amazon), reassemble, and be done in no time at all.
Sounds great!
We’ll see though, because I hate plumbing…! Especially when I’m supposed to be on vacation!!
Best wishes,
Scott.
KatKapCC
@zhena gogolia: It hangs from a branch or something and the food is inside the…snout, I guess, so the squirrel has to poke its head into it to get the food. I do wonder how well it actually works and if the squirrels eventually get annoyed.
TBone
@Another Scott: that sounds like a job for…
Flex Seal!
Hahahaha (beware!)
m.youtube.com/watch?v=_NygbA9UYPw
Rachel Bakes
That episode is hilarious all the way through. The squirrels in the attic and especially the Peter Pan production. I hyperventilated when my husband played it for me.
WaterGirl
@mvr: Aren’t you supposed to be at the meetup???
Yutsano
@Another Scott: It’s an elaborate ruse. You really should hire someone to do that. Bonus points if they don’t suck at the teat of Cult Drumpf.
WaterGirl
@MomSense: That all seems smart! Plus, splurging can be good for the soul.
MobiusKlein
@karen marie: They bought the 12 dollar Home Depot small snake, and was able to work it, and get a fist sized lump of hair out. Credit where credit due.
It’s a bitch of a pipe, not at all a straight connect to get the snake in – it’s a very old bathtub. Ah, winter break and idle hands
David_C
Paint stripping – yeah, always ventilate with cross ventilation if possible. My second-try projects always look better than the first time I try something. At one time I stripped all of the old paint from the living room casework (4 windows and a door, stairway) after we had a fire. Some of the paint had peeled off and there was some really nice chestnut underneath, with many layers of lead paint. Chemical stripper (the powerful stuff), heat gun, chemical stripper with clay modeling tools – did I mention that chestnut is an open-grained wood? – and finally several shades of brown acrylic paint to paint over the paint that would not come out otherwise.
One transom frame was not chestnut, so I faked the grain and put a finish coat on it. I also used a heat gun to take my house exterior down to bare wood, being careful to prevent lead fumes and disposing of all the chips.
If I can get to a computer (flat on my back with Covid) I can send some pics.
Suzanne
@Ohio Mom:
Yeah, I keep watching videos of Ikea Billy bookcase customizations, and I get really excited. And I keep thinking…. They have to be leaving out steps!
Mai Naem mobile ¹
@TBone: Amazon is such a POS company. What assholes. Whoever denied it needs to be canned. Ofcourse with Amazon it was probably done by AI.
TBone
@Mai Naem mobile ¹: I boycott them but there is a woman here who gets A-van deliveries every damn day, so my boycott is canceled out.
I once reported Bezos for fraud when my new credit card came preloaded with a fee for Prime. I told the customer support person “Do you see any Amazon charges in my credit history? No, that’s right, you don’t!” They closed the brand new card and sent me another.
mrmoshpotato
That’s a bummer. I hope the soup is decent, and the chili tastes extra good once you’re able to make it.
raven
@Ohio Mom: Pfft, there are great videos on all aspects of 66 Chevy Truck DIY’s. These are especially good.
danielx
That’s how virtually every home improvement project goes. Runs over on time, runs over on budget, rinse and repeat.
Elizabelle
So, the Unicorn Squirrel feeder is a thing, it is available online, and the company has some amusing copywriters:
Hope for meh squirrels. That is meeting a need.
raven
@danielx:
Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House
karen marie
@MobiusKlein: Nice!
WTFGhost
You didn’t really bite off more than you could chew, project wise. You had a good plan, as usual, it didn’t survive first contact with “the enemy,” so you retreated and tried again, and got more done, having learned from an easy-to-make mistake. It’s frustrating as heck, and it makes a person feel stupid (“he said, because he’s ‘a person,’ and knows from experience!”), but you showed the chops to handle the problem, and wouldn’t make the same mistake. There’s plenty of professionals out there who wouldn’t have done as well.
trollhattan
@Elizabelle:
If squirrels weren’t such bastards, and also the dog, I’d get me one of those unicorns! They’d fight over it, just for starters.
Speaking of failed home repairs, am calling it with the house printer. After myriad youtubes, false, starts, the suspect head cleaning kit, and several new parts, it’s just not responding. R.I.P. Epson 4750 (2018ish – Jan 2025). In lieu of flowers, send printer bond to the local preschool. They can always use some.
On the upside, I learned a lot about printer guts and failure points.
knittingbull
if anyone is interested, I have 3 one month gift subscriptions to Chris Geidner’s Law Dork blog on substack (i read it through my email). I really like his writing and his explanations. [email protected]
TBone
GOP House committee releases report on J6 pipe bombs (no conclusion means the FBI did it hahaha) and now the pipe bomber says whut?
Why did you need a pardon after serving 3 days, Sporky?
msn.com/en-us/news/us/marjorie-taylor-greeneMYCHARdefends-cybertruck-self-driving-after-trump-tower-…
TBone
@raven: what a great movie & comment.
raven
@TBone: Yea, what is that??
TBone
@raven: a rabbited lintel. Between the lally columns.
Elizabelle
@trollhattan: Uh oh. I have an Epson that has been on the To Do (ie. fix) list for quite some time.
jame
The Magical Squirrel Feeder is another great Archie McPhee product! My sister and I greatly enjoyed the catalogs, and years later my children, now grown, loved them too. Hilarious stuff! The premise is always great, even if sometimes the product doesn’t perform quite as well.
Hope you’re enjoying the feeder.
p.a.
Let me know if the squirrel feeder keeps the fuckers away from the bird feeders.
p.a.
@TBone: Starbucks? Marge is woke!?!?
Lily
Good job Will Lewis (I presume). The Post has censored Ann Telnaes’ latest cartoon and she writes on her substack that she is resigning.
Miss Bianca
OMG, the Peter Pan story!! I remember that one from back in the day, and yes, it is weepingly, pee-your-pants funny. I may have to give it a re-listen just before the theater programming committee meeting next week…
JPL
@Lily: It’s a sign of what is to come.. shit
Soprano2
I spent almost two hours on the phone to AT&T, most of it on hold, but the cancellation of my land line phone that I was reassured was fixed in December but happened yesterday is fixed. Evidently it was their mistake, some kind of data entry error. I was so mad I was almost spitting nails. I tried hard not to yell. Grrrrrr……….
lowtechcyclist
@Lily:
So I clicked through, and clicked on ‘Subscribe.’
Substack filled in my credit card number.
Well, they showed asterisks for the first 12 digits, and the last 4 were from 2 or 3 cards back, but one I’d had with my current credit union.
I am NOT HAPPY. And I will never give a nickel to anyone via Substack. I don’t know how they got my old credit card number, but the fact that they filled it in without any verification that it was really me, is a big wide open door to identity theft. I will read what I can for free on people’s Substacks, but nobody gets a penny from me to read their Substacks.
MobiusKlein
@lowtechcyclist: check your browser for saved info? It could also be from a google integration, or some other weird thing.
I sincerely doubt substack has hacked your CC info
Timill
@MobiusKlein: Just went to Ann’s Subscribe page, and the cc info is entirely blank. So, yes, I expect it’s the browser up to tricks…
MobiusKlein
@Timill: A quick check shows Substack uses Stripe.Could be some cookies from a prior use of Stripe that was still there, and connected behind the scenes.
eta: this stackoverflow response hints that yes, it’s autofill from Stripe
stackoverflow.com/a/70568702
Poe Larity.
I literally had to pull over for the Fiasco episode.
lowtechcyclist
@Timill:
This browser shouldn’t even know that number. I’ve had this laptop for less than two years, and that number was at least two credit card numbers back. And I make a point of doing money stuff strictly from the desktop computer.
And I’ve never had my credit card number pre-filled in any online form, from any computer ever. I remember my number and type it in every time, and always check the box to tell them not to save it.
lowtechcyclist
@MobiusKlein:
What the hell is Stripe? I assume it’s some system for taking credit card payments. How widely is it used? And given that I’ve never subscribed to anything on Substack before, why would they be filling in a number of mine from somewhere else they might have found it?
different-church-lady
@zhena gogolia:
IT SAYS SO RIGHT ON THE BOX!!1!
White & Gold Purgatorian
@raven: We love that movie. We have also lived quite a bit of it.
Soprano2
@Another Scott: My hubby hates plumbing, too. It’s the only thing around the house he was willing to hire people to do. You really should hire a good plumber to fix it.
Sorryforlaughing
Betty, I had the same experience the first time I listened to that Peter Pan “Fiasco” segment that you did: in the car, laughed so hard tears were streaming down my face and I almost had to pull over. It was Jack Hitt’s completely matter of fact narration plus the “Bolero” bed music that really did it, I think.
Bill Arnold
@karen marie:
In my experience, those are the both the best and the cheapest drain un-cloggers, at least for hair clogs, if they are long enough to reach the clog. Usually the case for hair clogs in sinks/showers.
And they can be rinsed and reused; I have just one, and have used it over 10 times.
Lily
@lowtechcyclist: They did that to me once when I clicked that same button. . I wrote and it was corrected right away, but still appalled. If you still want, there’s a different screen with 4 subscribe options, the free option is on the rightmost side.
Anyway, sorry. They’re not aboveboard with that button.
different-church-lady
@Lily: Oh dear… she did a caricature of the boss…
MobiusKlein
@lowtechcyclist: I work for a payment system company (not Stripe for the record. But no 20 questions for the rest)
Companies like Stripe do not do their own Credit Card processing, and for good reasons. The risks of handling that toxic data are massive, for them and you. So they outsource it to companies like Stripe, which have integrations with Substack and others.
Stripe provides an API or WebView or Popup window that works with the company, and does all the dirty work of holding the data, managing fraud/risk, and sending $$$ from your account to SubStack, after taking their cut.
That popup/etc is created by Stripe using data they have on their systems, following PCI standards (Payment Card Industry). So something on your system allowed Stripe to recognize your identity, and use it to prefill stuff for Substack.
Similar processes are used for ApplePay, PayPal, GooglePay, and many others.
Long and short, if you want to be mad, be mad at those companies, not SubStack
Another Scott
Meanwhile, over at WhiteHouse.gov/Briefing-Room there’s an increasingly long list of updates to succession rules in a bunch of federal government agencies.
Maybe it’s all routine, but I wonder if there’s a
feelingconcern that this:(That is, making it explicit that the cited agency heads must be approved by the Senate and that Acting heads have limited powers)
is
an attemptnecessary to prevent attempted end-runs around Constitutional requirements here.Hmm…
Biden’s people are still doing the work.
Best wishes,
Scott.
opiejeanne
@White & Gold Purgatorian: The Money Pit was ours. We rented that one when we had just moved into an old house, and had to pause it when the (spoiler alert) bathtub falls through the floor. Both of us were gasping for breath by then, and we had to walk around, get a drink of water, and think about anything else for quite a few minutes.
That house was fine, we didn’t have any of the problems shown in that movie, but we didn’t know that it would be ok. I mean, this was right before home inspections were a thing. Knob and tube wiring, which turned out to be fine because no one had messed with it and it was in good shape, push-button light switches, we knew the roof leaked in one area and that the wall oven needed to be replaced, but that movie scared the dickens out of us because we had moved in but hadn’t closed escrow yet.
Timill
@MobiusKlein:
I think you mean Substack there in the first sentence
[Disclosure: I use Square for my cc processing]
MobiusKlein
@Timill: Doh, you are correct. Companies like Substack
Teach me to go to the supermarket during the edit window
Tom Fitz
@Baud: “Help! I am translated!”
John Revolta
The first 90% of a home improvement project takes 90% of the time, and the last 10% takes the other 90% of the time. It is known.
Kayla Rudbek
@VeniceRiley: that sounds right up my alley; is it on YouTube or on TV/streaming?
Kayla Rudbek
@TBone: I should check and see if anyone has something like that for the bathroom ventilation fan (mine has quit working after over a decade in this house). One of us Rudbeks will have to get up on a ladder to open it up, and it makes more sense to have it be Mr. Rudbek (no fear of heights and having the taller person on the ladder makes more sense)..
catclub
But there are also less terrible ones environmentally, as well. Like, maybe we shouldn’t put methyl ethyl ketone (mek) in everything?
catclub
We have extremely high, like, too high, city water pressure. so when we called a plumber about dripping at the mains inlet, he came right over. (It may have affected his response time that we had recently paid him $4000). But that leak made HIM nervous.
Best part was that actually it was the city side that had to be replaced.
Good luck!
mvr
@WaterGirl: By the time you wrote this I was. I got there at 5:02 PM Mountain time. It was fun. I expect there will be a full report later on along with photos or at least a link to photos.
John Revolta
Dead thread but if anybody hasn’t listened to the Peter Pan story yet, go ahead and listen to the squirrel story right after it too. Horrible and hilarious!
Chris T.
@Barbara:
In our remodels (all of them, too many to think about) we used engineered quartz. Some of the workpeople even used proper breathing equipment when installing it. The downside of working with this is that if you don’t, you get the old coal-miner’s lung disease: silicovolcanoconiosis or “black lung”, although I imagine it’s not black when it’s not full of coal particles. (It’s only dangerous when you’re cutting it; the grinding process spews tiny bits of very hard, very sharp rock everywhere.)
(I was originally going to do granite, back in 2004 or so, until I learned that granite has to be sealed every six months!)