Striking poses
Have you ever had something become the bane of your existence? The downstairs shower in Smallville is mine.
It all started with a call from Robyn, and a report that after she took a shower water came out from under the tub. I spent several minutes experimenting, and discovered the problem only happened when the shower was running. And that’s how we ended up having some of that brand new tile cut out.
The tile guy called me when he got the tile removed, and let me know he’d found the problem: the shower arm was cheap plastic (not a surprise, given the other things we’d found that the previous owners did) and had cracked. Thus, when water was diverted up to the shower it sprayed out behind the wall, ran down, and ended up under the tub, where it ran out because the 75-year-old house has some character slants here and there.
While the tile was out, we decided to have the whole faucet replaced, because the new knobs didn’t fit the old hardware so well and kept coming off. We had the upstairs shower faucet replaced, too. Fortunately the tile guy only had to remove a few tiles in each shower for the plumber. But still, we had to pay for: the original tiling and grout, new knobs which wouldn’t stay on, a new shower arm, to have the tile removed for the new faucets, the new faucets, a plumber to install the new faucets, the new tile and grout, and to have the new tile replaced.
All of the new work took about two weeks, because the tile guy stays pretty busy doing big jobs, mostly in Tennessee. Finally, though, it was done, and Friday afternoon I went into the bathroom to put the escutcheon and external hardware on the new faucet. The tile guy was kind enough to loosely put them on for us so Robyn could take a bath.
When the plumber finished hooking up the new faucets several days before, he showed me how things all hooked together in the final assembly. There’s a bracket around the valve mechanism behind the wall. After the pieces go on the outside, long screws go through it all and into that bracket. Tightening the screws pulls everything together, with the bracket against the back of the wall and the escutcheon on the front. Perfect.
Or was, until I realized the tile guy took the brackets out before he put the new tile in. That there was nothing for the screws to attach to, no way for the external hardware to be held in place.
And then found out that SHE WHO SHALL REMAIN NAMELESS threw the brackets away because she thought they were trash. Not that I’m blaming her — the tile guy left them laying with the rest of the broken tiles and trash.
I consulted with the definitive expert on all things home repair, whom I casually call ‘dad’, and we concluded that I could use silicone to hold the escutcheon on place. The actual mechanism is virtually movement-free already, so the only real problem is keeping the escutcheon from spinning, and keeping water from behind it.
Yesterday morning I spent a half hour putting silicone in, taking the time to make sure it looked nice. By the late afternoon it was dry. Not only did it look good, the escutcheon was movement free. Because I’d been working outside all day, finishing the chicken coop and getting the fenceposts set, I decided to take a shower before heading back to suburbia.
That’s when I found out that we spent an extra thousand dollars to not get rid of the original problem. Except now, the water sprays out of the hole in the tile where the shower arm goes in and runs down behind it and out from under the tub.
So I guess we got that for our money.
I feel like a fake in Smallville. Don’t get me wrong — I love it out there and can’t wait to get moved (downstairs bath notwithstanding. Robyn just called and told me one of the mirrors fell off the medicine cabinet and broke at 2:30 this morning) so I won’t have to drive back and forth from house to house. As much as I love it, and wouldn’t want to live anywhere else, I don’t feel like I fit in.
When a neighbor came down a few days ago to introduce herself, we stood and talked for several minutes. About church, and how we haven’t decided on a church home. I thought that was a better direction to take than the whole “I don’t believe in God” route. I suspect that wouldn’t have gone over well. This particular neighbor introduced herself by saying, “I live over there, and go to church over there,” while pointing to the two locations.
Or at the corner store. They’re also perfectly nice and accepting. Sure, they tease a little, but it’s not mean teasing, just ribbing. But I feel like a great big sore thumb when I’m there, sticking out all over the place.
As much as I love it, I feel like a poseur when I’m on the tractor, riding around hatless in my shorts and t-shirt instead of overalls and flannel. Feel like everyone’s driving by and thinking, look at the faker, trying to be a country boy when he ain’t nothin’ but cityfolk!
Do they do that? I’m sure they don’t, but that doesn’t stop me from feeling like a wannabe.
It was really driven home at the co-op yesterday. For those not in the know: the co-op is a local agricultural store, the “farmer’s cooperative.” It’s not a wannabe store like Tractor Supply, it’s the real thing. As I stood in line to pay for my poisons, fertilizers, chicken feed, and creosote fenceposts, I looked around. Everyone knew each other. They all talked with the same deep south accent I worked so hard to get rid of. They all dressed similarly, and it wasn’t in Dockers and a snarky t-shirt. They talked about church, and livestock, and family. Most of all, they all looked like they knew what they were doing in the co-op, not like a yuppie pretending to get “back to the land”. They looked like they belonged.
Worst of all, it dawned on me as I stood there that my t-shirt said Hike faster, I hear banjoes! on the back.
No, scratch that. Worst of all was when my cell phone rang while I was trying to pay and everyone fell silent while the city boy desperately tried to shut off Bono’s voice announcing he was at a place called Vertigo.
It always amuses me how much I overanalyze things. I’m sure to all them I’m just another guy in the store. But in my head, I suspect I’ll always feel like this guy:
Robyn boiled up a couple of eggs for me to give to the girls (whom we refer to as “my bitchez” when we talk about them) yesterday. They sure are getting big. Plans are for them to move outside next weekend.
Here’s the rest of the coop construction:
Framed and ready to build nesting boxes
Four nesting boxes, all in a row
With the back on. Note the flip-up piece…
…to make egg retrieval easy. It locks, to keep predators out.
With the sides and front on. The front door locks (predators), and also
has a hook to hold it open during the day. There’s a flip-up vent above the door,
with hardware cloth behind it, for ventilation.
The final coop, which Robyn will paint sometime this week.
Looking in the front. The sticks are roosts. For roosting.
Chickens eating chicken eggs? Is that allowed? Is there such a thing as Mad Chicken Disease? Then you’d have some mad bitchez, to be sure.
Happy Easter! Bock! Bock!
Fred don’t worry over what those folks are thinking. I live in the country and I’d gladly have you and Robyn for neighbors. Once these folks get to know you, they’ll see your just a good ole boy like them. Your just feeling self conscious because you’ve spent most of your time being a city slicker. But deep down you’ve always been a country boy at heart or you wouldn’t have gave up the city life. So give it time and you’ll be fitting right in, but please no corn cob pipes…ha.ha.ha Had to throw that in. Hope I don’t affend anyone, just joking around.
Fred, how can you be a poseur if you are only being yourself? Now if you started wearing overalls and speaking in a thick southern accent, THEN you would be a poseur!
So what if you are different? Would you really like to become “one of them”? It seems to me that you and Robyn are just adding some new color to the area. You’re not pretending to be anything but what you are. Vive la difference!
The chicken coop looks great, and I’m sure it was well researched. I hope you get your plumbing woes settled soon. Plumbing can be a bitch.
I was going to say the same as Stephanie - chicks eat chicken eggs? Euw!
Poor Fred, don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re having mixed emotions right now, it will soon fade. The neighbors are most likely commenting about how nice you have fixed up the old place. I don’t think most country people are too quick to judge. Looks like you made the chicks a cozy little place to have their hen parties. This time next year you will be getting colored eggs from some of those chicks. I hope your back is feeling better.
Yep, believe it or not, chickens eat eggs (and love them boiled). If you’re not diligent in gathering them when they start laying, and they happen to crack one open and realize how good the stuff inside is, they’ll start eating all of them. My understanding is that about the only way to cure them of that is to send them to the stewpot.
And for the record, Jesus Christ, putting up field fence is hard when you’re alone.
Love the chicks!!
Don’t worry about it.. not all tractor operators wear flannel (esp in Alabama I’d wager), and other than carharts in the cold I don’t think I ever saw one in overalls where I grew up in dairy farm central. There we had farmers who lived in trailers, on up to farm corporations headed by farmers who drove hummers and had private airstrips on property. Farmers come in all different packages.. you’re not hiring everything done so I’m sure you fit in just fine and just feel out of place because well, you feel out of place. I bet your neighbors are happy you fixed up the place!
“I was saying to my son just the other day, ‘You know that fellow, Fred, down the road a piece? That’s right, the city fellow.’ Anyways I said to my son, ‘Before you know it, he’ll be right salty, same as any one of us.’ ”
Congrats on the tons of work you have put in on Smallville & Co.
I LOVED The Great Pretender.
Hi Fred,
Gotta ask - the coop looks good - but there appears to be no drainage/access in the main area? Cleaning might be a tad easier if you have a way to flush water through the coop.
Grew up cleaning coops - gain wisdom from my pain - allow easy access for cleaning!
Yea, I agree with the drainage thing…. I would suggest putting something on the bottom of the coop for cleaning purposes. Nothing grosser than inches of caked-on bird shit. Also, any water getting on the floor of the coop will start to rot and produce mold.
I would suggest covering the floor and maybe along the sides a few inches with some kind of covering that will allow you to wash when required. The chicken poo gets nasty, believe me!
Can you believe I grew up on a chicken farm? Hah. Then I turned city slicker. And now, I’m back to hick-ville, kind of like you though we aren’t raising any animals (other than the cats and dog)… but, we do intend on doing a vegetable garden of some kind….
Close to nine years ago, I moved to a little bitty town in the foothills of Appalachia. I felt really strange there at first; I grew up in Boston and still had this Yankee accent that nobody could understand, and I couldn’t understand a word anyone said to me. Everyone was friendly, but I had this feeling that they thought of my husband and me as “those weird folks from the city”.
It gets easier, though. Everyone gets used to you, and you start to blend in. I did make an effort to lose the accent so I wouldn’t have to repeat myself three times every time I said something, though, and now I pretty much sound like I’m from southern Ohio. After a while, the people at the store knew my name and I knew their names, and I got comfortable.
I moved a week ago, to Columbus where I’m having a bit of culture shock adjusting to the pace of things here, and everyone was telling us they were sorry to see us go. Guess they stopped thinking of us as those weird city slickers and just thought of us as their weird neighbors
Just wait until they find out that the city boy (”That boy just ain’t right,” they whisper behind your back…)can fix their computer for ‘em.
Just take the wife and Spud to a tractor pull a few times. They’ll come around.
If they didn’t accept you then they wouldn’t rib you in the store. I know I don’t tease someone unless I like them and they do fit in. Hope that makes you feel a bit better. By the way, your cock is looking quite big.
Whats roosting? Do they stay in the coop all the time, or are you going to have a fenced in area for them to roam during the day?
Roosting is like sitting, more or less. They sleep on a roost, rest there, and sometimes just hang out.
They have a nice big fenced area for the day time, that’s almost complete. At night, they go into Coop Knox, where they’re locked in so nothing can get to them. The next morning, they’re let back out.
Here are some chickens roosting:
http://www.his.com/~jrusso/chickens_at_roost_sm.jpg
Boy, those teenaged chickens looks might ugly. They went from such cute lil chicks to all necks and legs.
I see one of them predators inspecting the coop in the second from bottom photo.
We’ve lived in the middle of a cornfield for 8 years now.
The “Locals” still tease me because I say soda instead of pop and I will never give up my snarky t-shirts, but we’ve long since ceased to be “the people from California”.
Much here is still done on trust and a handshake. When they found our word was good, we have a strong work ethic and wanted to be a part of the community, we were welcomed with open arms.
I did however, make my husband swear he would never wear overalls.