We have spent most of our free time during the past few weeks working on our new patio. I laid 350 pavers, each roughly 1.5 square feet. It took seven trips to Lowes to get them all, 50 at a time, or about 1300 pounds per trip. This is right around the maximum payload for our truck, but with the SuperSprings installed on the rear suspension, it handled without any problem.

A word of caution: If you are planning a project like this, do not pay any attention to the “planning your project” charts they have at Lowes. According to their helpful little chart, using the pavers we chose, it would require 88 stones to cover 200 square feet. After we committed to these stones by buying 150 of them, we discoverd that 150 barely covered 200 square feet. Their chart was very, very wrong. 88 stones actually covers about 132 square feet, not 200 square feet. After realizing how wrong the chart was, Jess grabbed a pamphlet from the store. The pamphet says that 96 stones cover 200 square feed. Sigh. Then she looked at their other estimations. It said to create a 4′ by 25′ walkway, you need 12 stones. Yes, twelve. Twelve stones to cover 100 square feet. Double sigh.

All in all, the patio consumed 3.5 yards of gravel, 3 yards of masonry sand, 350 pavers, and 1 yard of top soil for the perimeter to make sure the pavers don’t wash away before we can get the landscaping done. You’ll see in the pictures that we have a lot more landscaping to do to make it nice. I’ll post a before and after picture of the back of the house after the landscaping is done. But for now, click here for pictures.

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Home Improvement, Pictures by Jack

Simon is sleeping now, allowing the effects of his anesthesia and painkillers to wear off. Today he had his surgery to have his tail partially amputated. The tip of his tail was never able to heal properly from all the abuse it takes, so having it cut was the best option for his own long-term health and comfort. It looks as though they took off about 6″. I think this will be a very good thing. Hopefully, he’ll be able to wag his tail all he wants without injuring it any more. He has to go back to have his stitches removed in about two weeks. After that, he should be all better. Wish him luck!

It’s sad and cute – he’s woozy and groggy and he can’t stand up. His back legs don’t work so well, he seems like he really tied one on today.

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News, Pictures by Jack

This weekend we planted some trees in our yard – three to be exact. That brings our total tree count to… three. We now have infinitely more trees in our yard than we had last week.

We planted a Dogwood, an Eastern Redbud, and a Magnolia. The soil in our lot sucks – it’s full of slag and red dog and rocks and garbage and carparts, bottles, and cutlery – so we decided to plant the trees in raised beds. For now we just mounded a couple yards of fresh top soil around them, but we plan to steal some truckloads of sandstone from the property to build dry-stacked borders for the raised beds. I like trees.

Click here for some more pics.

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Home Improvement, News, Pictures by Jack

Jess had a birthday this week – yesterday actually. We celebrated it at her parent’s place on Saturday evening. I made a yummy Black Forest cake for her. It had chocolate cake, ganache, cherries, and whipped cream frosting. I made the ganache and whipped cream from scratch. I may have had some coaching.

She got some good stuff, including a camelpack and bike shorts from me. Our bikes told us they want to renew their relationship with us this summer. She also got some nice work shirts and a bunch of smelly shower stuff and other girly items from her fam.

Click here for some more pics.

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Pictures by Jack

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything to this site. I’ll start with a recap of this year’s 14^th installment of the annual Ruffin-It extravaganza, held over the weekend of April 15^th.

Ruffin-It is supposed to be all about trout fishing. We did go fishing, but it was cold. Damn cold. It was 25 degrees when we went to the creek on Saturday morning. We didn’t catch any fish. Not one. Nobody did. None of the hundred or so people on the stream caught any fish. That’s enough about the fishing. We did have a lot of fun during the weekend. It involved beer, guns, atv’s, getting our trucks muddy, food, and porn, though possibly not in that order.

My brother, Robby Louis Smith, didn’t show again this year. Rumor has it he was lost in East St. Louis trying to find his way to Wallyworld. What it is, Cuz? Ryan also couldn’t make it this year. He had a plane ticket in hand, but had a computer malfunction and lost his grad school work on Wednesday night and it was due Monday. He skipped RIXIV to take the time to reproduce his work. Who was there was Joe, Jack, Jamie, Jamie’s brother-in-law Chris, and my dad. We had fun. Nobody got hurt or sued. We burned some vintage nudie-mags that one member of the party dug up in his files, including a copy of “Black Lasses” magazine.

Click here for more pics.

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Pictures by Jack