Deep Snow Is Making Curb Signage Difficult!

The 2011 – 2012 winter in Anchorage has had at least two high wind storms which have stripped the signs from the yard-arm posts all over town.  I can’t help but wonder where the signs actually end up, because it seems you can never find them.  There must be a big stack of wind-blown and thrashed real estate signs in China or in the bottom of sea because you never find the sign once they blow off the yard-arm post.

The other unusual obsticle has been the snow.  Many years, we get snow and a few weeks later the tempature goes up and the snow melts, only to come again in a few weeks.  This year, the snow came right on schedule in late October and kept coming, kept coming and kept coming.  The last I heard we have had over 100 inches! 

Now a real estate sign is only 48 inch tall.  Can you see the delema of trying to get a sign on the curb when the snow is higher than the yard arm? 

You need a sign, if you are going to put a advertising brochure or flyer up.  Consumers don’t like to walk up the driveway to the house, for obvious reasons.  Right now, if you put the sign at the edge of the lot, the odds are real good a snow plow will take your sign away.  If you put the sign on the lot, the snow is so deep customers can’t get through the snow to get a flyer! 

I’ve seen some signs where only the very top of the 4×4 post is visable through the deep snow! 

The good news is the days are getting longer in Anchorage over 5 minutes a day.  It’s late January as I write this so spring is only three months away in Anchorage.

I just love the music and video and think you will too. 

This production is copywrited and I am sharing it with you with their permission.

As a kid growing up, I lived in the Palmer area on 20 acres out by Lazy Mountain,  which is still a rural area; back then it was “in the sticks!”

An old fashioned heating source!

Long before natural gas was available to the Palmer area, we heated our shop and garages with a wood stove.  Weekends dad and I would cut trees into lengths and bring the logs back to the shop.  During the week, after feeding the I would cut the log lengths into fireplace sized logs and then split them with an ax or maul and wedge.

Believe me, the farm work of my youth set my work habits for rest of my life, even though I felt disadvantaged as a youth!

When I saw the log and ax at a house I was looking at, memories came flooding back to me!

Help me raise bail to stay out of jail!

Every year MDA, that’s Jerry’s Kids - you know from years of Jerry Lewis MDA telephone fund raising – has a push to raise money.  MDA is great cause, and I agree to help because I love kids. Seeing one of these damaged young people just breaks my heart.

However,  I’m quickly realizing fund raising is a lot of work and not many people donate to these things!

I’m about 1/2 way there with a few days to go.  If you can help it would be great.  Check out my wanted posted and the online link if you are interested.  I appreciate it!

Click here to see my how my bail raising effort is going and to donate easily online:

This dog won't leave the sidewalk because of the owner installed an invisible fence

Invisible fences are buried underground so you can’t see them.  Your dog gets a special collar.  When the fence is activated, the dog will get an electrical shock if it tries to cross the parameter where the underground wire is buried. 

Most dogs learn very quickly where the line is and they make no effort to pass the invisible spot in the yard!  The dog in this picture will not leave the porch onto the driveway.

I sold a house a few years ago where the seller had put an invisible fence up under the floor inside his house.  He didn’t want the dog to leave the kitchen area, so the fence, installed from the crawlspace, kept the dog from going into the living-room or up the stairs to the bedroom.  Of course, it was totally invisible under the floor, so it appeared to guests that the dog was just very well trained!

Neat pet idea, huh?  These things aren’t very complicated or expensive.  If you are interested, “Google” invisible fence or go to YouTube to see a video demonstration.

A paint made especially for garage floors - with sprinkles in it!

To most people, I supposed, a garage is just a place to park your car. In Alaska, at least in the winter-time, its practically a necessity, right?

There are a few guys, like me, who like to hang out in their garage and have it be nice. To some guys, it’s their man-cave, work-shop, place you can listen to “your own” music, whatever your “thing” happens to be.

If you are that sort of guy, your garage is part of your house, correct? You might as well have it be as nice as you possibly can. Here are a few things that I have done to my own garage and, I can tell you from experiance, don’t cost much and are worth the investment.

1. Paint The Entire Interior of the garage; Many garages are basic sheetrock which yellows over time. You put a good coat of two of white paint on your walls and ceiling and you garage will feel 100 feet larger than it did before!

2. Add Florescent Lighting. You might even have to bring in an electrician buddy to add some outlets. Builders are notoriously stingy on garage ceiling lighting and extra garage outlets. You don’t want to see your shadow in this garage when you are done with your lights!

3. Paint the floor. I’m talking with the really good, hard surface, garage floor paint. There are a lot of colors of it. You can add the colored sprinkles or whatever you like.

A painted garage will look larger and be easier to keep clean

When you are done, you can arrange your tools and stuff anyway you, or your wife, likes. Even if you don’t necessarily hang out in the garage, you’ll feel like the garage is part of your house. A bonus is when you can walk into the garage to get something out of your car, and do it in your stocking feet!

Well, my wife was out of town for a couple weeks and I hired some workmen to do some work in my kitchen while she was gone.  I worked extra time at work during this time.  I would come home at night to stuff on the floors that would never had been there if Kristi would have been at home.  Because now I needed to whip up some dinner and clean up, do some laundry and other things, I pulled out this strange “Roomba” device and let it vacuum while I did something else.

And you know what!?  I love it!  It’s a joy when I open the little dusk container and find out it picked up a bunch of dust bunnies and stuff I didn’t even know was lerking around the house!    Check out the attached YouTube Video, too.  It’s just plain cool.

Your basic sheetrock wall over the counters

One perc of my job is that I get to see other peoples nice houses.  You know how it is, just when you think you’ve seen the coolest thing ever, along comes someone else’s cool thing.  And styles change every few years. What was really cool in 1985, wasn’t so hot in 1995.

Guess what I did, inexpensively and on budget?  I gave my kitchen an entirely new look!

My cabinets are cherry, which I happen to like;  The space between the lower cabinets and the upper cabinets had a simple 4 inch back splash that worked, but to me was……boring!

After seeing the look in magazines and on other peoples nice homes, I decided I wanted to get a tile back splash over the sheet rock wall between my existing counter tops and the bottom of the upper cabinets. 

I got an idea of what I liked and talked to my friend Rick Stonke at R & K Services.  Rick is good with colors and patterns and he knows I can be very picky.  Once someone does me right and knows me, I like to stick with them so I don’t have to train anyone new to my idiosyncrasies.

Rick measured up my wall area and helped me pick out the tile. He ordered it and about three weeks later (because I told him I wasn’t in a hurry and to ship it the cheapest way possible), we had tile and Rick billed me for it.  I think it was about $700 for what I picked.

Tile with glass insets and under cabinets lighting

Then, I saved a few paychecks and waited until the time was right in the house.  You see, my lovely and wonderful wife, can get very grumpy when there is a mess going on the house, so I have to plan this stuff. Anyway, that’s another story;

Long story, made short, the tile guy came over and three days later, I had a tile back-splash!  What an amazing difference it made in the kitchen!  This brought my home out of the 1990 and made it contemporary – for now anyway!

Oh, how much did it cost to “remodel” my kitchen?  Material and labor, about $1,400!  Not bad!

Thunderbird Falls Trail

The trail head is called Thunderbird Falls.  There is a large gravel parking lot off the main road.  There are public toilets there and it costs $5 to park your car for the day. 

The trail is very well maintained.  It is a mile walk into the water fall through birch trees.  In the  early part of the hike you pass a home subdivision with acre lots, so you see a few homes set back in the woods.  The subdivision is called Thunderbird Heights.  I’ve sold several homes there over the years.

The trail is up and down rolling hills, but not steep – a nice walk.  I passed several people walking their dogs and a one couple pushing a baby stroller on large wheels.

The trail into the falls

The creek from Thunderbird Falls

The trail forks at the end.  You can go straight to a overlook of the falls, or take a left to walk down the hill to get access right on the creek and walk right up to the falls.

You can get right to the base of the falls, but the water spray is so heavy, you wouldn’t want to spend too much time there!  I took my dog Austin with me and he was soaked by the time we got back on the trail.

When you are in the mood for a hike, I recommend taking a walk to Thunderbird Falls.  It is easy, very scenic and peaceful!