Current Hard Work Update – October 3, 2011

Posted on October 3, 2011 by

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After last week’s triumphant success on the new retaining wall across our front yard, this week has been a disappointment.  We were extra busy at work, which led to staying late, which cut into my time, and more importantly, energy to get things done.

Liz’s check engine light came on, so we made an appointment for Saturday morning.  We took the car in to get checked out and ended up having to have more work done than we anticipated.  After dropping the car off, we headed to the store to buy a railing for our new front steps.  We had already picked out what we were going to go with, so we just had to pick it up along with a couple of supplies.

I was able to borrow a hammer drill from work to drill holes in the new concrete for the tapcon’s to hold the posts in place.  We started drilling the holes and soon realized how much stronger this new concrete is than the old stuff, which is good news.  It just took a little longer to drill the holes than we thought it would.  We started by drilling 1 hole so we could be sure the post was lined up correctly.  The first screw wouldn’t go in all the way.  I know I drilled the hole deep enough.  The instructions said to drill a quarter inch deeper than the screw is long.  I went at least a half inch deeper.  It turns out the screws were just slightly too big to fit through the bracket.

We needed to make another trip to the store to get new screws and new bits.  We had to clean up everything and put it inside the house and car.  30 minutes later, we were back at it.  This time, I drilled a new, smaller hole and the first screw snapped off about 3/4ths of the way into the hole.  This is not going well.  We were able to get one post set.  Then I remembered the car was still at the repair shop.  I looked at the clock on my phone and saw it was only 10 minutes until closing time.  Liz called the shop and they said the car would be ready by the time we got there.  It’s only half a mile away, but we had to clean everything up again.  We got the car and ended up spending $1000 on repairs — $200 for what it went in for and $800 for other issues.

At this point, I’d had enough and called it a day.  The weather is supposed to be nice for the next few days, so I hope I can get the railing installed before the end of the week.

We did have one bright spot on Saturday.  We stopped at Potter’s Pasties who were parked at Mears Park near the farmers market.  We had met the owners, Alec and Fiona, this summer but hadn’t had a chance to try their pasties.  This time we were able to chat for a while and we tried a couple of their baked goods.  If you ever get the chance to visit Potter’s Pasties, be sure to order “The Pig.”  It is pulled pork and apples inside a flaky crust and it’s fantastic.  I also had a Thai Veg pasty, which had good heat to it.  You can follow them on Twitter @potterspasties.  We also had the chance to meet their new arrival, Maitland Rose.

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Hard Work – Defined

Posted on September 28, 2011 by

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Last week, I introduced you to a new community — the Hard Work Network.  (You can read more here.)  We are putting ourselves out there to get the hard work done.  What exactly is hard work?  The traditional view involves heavy lifting and plenty of sweat or maybe long hours at the office.  While it’s possible that this is hard work, it misses the point.

Hard work is doing what you’ve been putting off.  In my case, some of these projects have been waiting for years to get done.  Hard work for a professional athlete is studying film or taking swings in the batting cage.  It’s producing when you’d rather be consuming.  It’s disciplining your children when you’d rather act like friends.  Most importantly, hard work puts you in a position where failure is a possibility.

Seth Godin describes hard work better than I just did in his blog post “Hard Work vs. Long Work.”

Here’s the first project I was able to cross off my Current Hard Work list:

Replacing the retaining wall in front of my house.  When we moved in 5+ years ago, this is what our front yard looked like.

Old retaining wall

It was pretty bad.  The wall wasn’t going to fall over but it had a distinct lean to it.  The caps were in bad shape and it was just plain ugly.  The stairs on the far side of the wall were wood and were structurally sound, but the ground under the concrete sidewalk at the top of the stairs was washing out causing the concrete to crack and fall apart.  This summer, we realized we really needed to do something about it so we had new stairs and sidewalk poured.  We had them remove the wall for us as well.  For what we were charged, we could have barely rented a dumpster and proper tools to remove it, so we feel like we got a great deal.

We were left with dirt sloping back at about a 45 degree angle.  It just seemed too steep to plant anything on so we decided to put in a new wall.

Here’s what we ended up with:

New retaining wall

At this point, we need to add some dirt, plants, and mulch.  I think it looks fantastic!

So, what makes this hard work?

First off, this was our first retaining wall so there was a real possibility that we would screw it up.  I have a tendency to lose patience and interest when things get tedious.  Rule #1 of building retaining walls is that the first row must be absolutely level or every course above that will amplify the problem.  It took a few hours, but we got the first course in place.  The second course went better but by this point, we were exhausted.  The blocks are about 80 pounds each.  We dumped about 1500 pounds of gravel behind the wall 50 pounds at a time.

Next, it was an absolutely gorgeous fall day.  Believe me, I would have much rather been relaxing in the back yard, visiting one of our many area apple orchards, or any number of other things.  We had 2 time constraints.  We needed to get the wall in place before the snow flies, which should be a month or so away. More importantly, we needed to get a wall in place before ran washed too much dirt off the slope and onto the sidewalk.

Last, I knew that the payoff for getting it done would far outweigh the cost of doing it (both financially and physically).  It’s only been a few days and it’s already been worth the effort in satisfaction several times over.

Will you join me as a part of the Hard Work Network?  What hard work do you need to get done?  Share it below.

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Gallery

Puff Pastry and Mission Cherry Jam Turnovers

Posted on September 26, 2011 by
Defrost puff pastry per package directions and lay out in one flat sheet. Divide into quarters with a very sharp knife to avoid damaging the layers of pastry dough.

This gallery contains 6 photos.


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Puff Pastry Jam Turnovers make a delicious breakfast or a fantastic dessert.  The best part is that they only use a few ingredients. Here’s what you need: 1 sheet of frozen puff pastry Your favorite jam or jelly 1 egg … Continue reading →

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Why Twitter is Perfect for an Introvert Like Me!

Posted on September 19, 2011 by

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Hi, my name is Raun and I’m an introvert.  To get a real idea of how I operate, check out “10 Myths About Introverts” from OwlCityBlog.com.  It describes me to a “T”.  Now that we have the term introvert defined, here’s why Twitter makes so much sense to me.

1.  I don’t text.  Why tweet? — I avoided it for a long time because I couldn’t figure out why anyone would have to spew 140-character bursts to their followers at any point in time for any reason.  I overlooked the fact that I’m very good at speaking in short bursts.  Having a limit of 140 characters means I have just as much opportunity to share as everyone else.  Some people are true wordsmiths — they are limited to the same tweet length.

2.  I can build real relationships in small bursts — I have met several people via Twitter that I never would have interacted with otherwise.  When I feel like talking to someone, I can.  There’s no obligation to participate beyond a single tweet.

3.  People share things they are experiencing at that moment — Some people lead really interesting lives.  I am quite capable of living vicariously through them.  I don’t have a need to be constantly active so I can revel in their enjoyment without being disappointed that I’m not there with them.

4.  I stockpile small details about people as they share — I remember small (some would say insignificant) details about people I enjoy.  By participating in their lives by reading their tweets, I’m gaining a more complete understanding of their perspective, which makes it easier for my introverted self to interact in the future.

5.  It’s possible to interact personally with people that I’ll probably never meet face to face — Celebrities and athletes are the easy examples of this.  Shortly after opening my Twitter account, I got into a fun battle of wits with Iron Chef Michael Symon.  Like I said — never in real life.

Bonus:  BufferApp makes it very easy to share tweets over time rather than sending several tweets all at once.  If you’d like to give it a try (it’s free) go to BufferApp.com.

If you’re interested in interacting with me personally on Twitter, you can find me here.  I’d be happy to have you!

What do you think about Twitter?  Does it work for you?  Is it a waste of time?  Share your thoughts below.

 

 

 

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More About Me And Where I’m Going

Posted on September 17, 2011 by

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I’ve been fighting the urge to bring work and money into this blog, seeing BackyardLifeBlog.com as a respite from that world.  It occurred to me that I’m really more interested in compete satisfaction in life and not just on my down time.  It’s impossible to have that satisfaction without taking into account the 40 hours I spend at work.  There are 168 hours in a week, so that’s almost a quarter of my time.

First, some background:  Liz and I bought our modest home (~1100 square feet) at the height of the real estate bubble in 2006.  We weren’t so glassy-eyed to know what we could and couldn’t afford, so we didn’t make the mistake of buying more than we could afford.  We purchased from a flipper doing his first flip.  He definitely made some mistakes, but he did take care of some bigger expenses like new siding and roofing.  We’re put a lot of time and money into this place and there’s still more to do, but we can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

At the time we bought the house, we had a few thousand dollars in the bank and owed about $17,000 in student loans.  We paid the minimums for a couple of years and that dropped to $12-something.  This was the end of 2007.  We had been scraping by on our old pay and barely keeping up.  We decided to get serious.  I had been listening to Dave Ramsey‘s podcast for a year or so and read his books.  I also had been listening to Dan Miller’s “48 Days to the Work you Love” podcast during that same time.  We had a plan and we felt like we could actually execute it.  We both started searching for new jobs and were lucky enough to have them fall into our laps within a couple of months.  I say it was luck for me because I hadn’t really started using the 48 days plan.  I was just browsing on Monster.com and came across something that sounded interesting and applied on the spot.  I was interviewed within 2 days and hired a few days later.  We ended up doubling our income, which allowed us to really start chipping away at the debt.

Since Liz graduated from college, we owed a total of $18,000 on student loans.  In the first two and a half years, we paid down a little less than $6k of that.  Now that we had increased our income (to about the national household average), we could make a push to get rid of the rest of it.  We put every dollar we could toward that debt and paid off the last 12k in ONLY 9 MONTHS!  We figured it was going to take about a year, but we kept gaining more and more traction.  It’s amazing what it feels like to not have any consumer debt at all.  Life gets really fun when you give yourself options and that’s what having money in the bank does.

We have always had a “car fund” to pay for repairs and to save up our insurance premiums so we could save a bit of money by paying in one lump rather than monthly.  Since the student loans were gone, we could pay for both of those things straight out of cash flow.  The money kept going into that car fund.  We knew sooner or later we’d have to replace my car, a 1995 Chevy Cavalier 2-door.  On January 1, 2009, we decided to go out car shopping since the Cavalier no longer liked to start in the winter.  We ended up buying a new-to-us car and we donated the Cavalier to Goodwill, where they auctioned it off for about $800.  Here’s the best part:  We bought the new car with a debit card!  It was surreal going from just keeping up to paying cash for a car in only a couple of years.

Where am I headed next?  I’d really like to pursue free agency — starting my own business that would allow me to have even more control over how I spend my time and energy.  I’d rather be paid on a project basis and let it take as long as it takes to get the work done.  I’m tired of trading time for money.  It’s inefficient and wasteful.  It also doesn’t compensate for providing value.

Are you pursuing a life you are proud to call your own?  Have you explored working for yourself?  I’d really like to hear what your experiences have been and hopefully you can inspire me and others to pursue a more fulfilling life.  Please leave your comments below.

 

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