So, I think mainly I decided for the sake of – lots of things really – that we should drywall the garage – and just run the cable for the power in there in conduit. Mostly this was about timing – we needed somewhere we could make somewhat warmer and drier for some project or other. I think it was an earlier iteration of working on the trim.
Of course – this means that at this point, when we want some electrics in there, it all has to be run in conduit – which in some ways is easier. I don’t have to drill a bunch of holes in studs, for example, which is a pain.
But of course, it’s not *really* easier, because the garage is now full. Completely, actually distressingly and frustratingly full. There’s simply no where to put anything – and that means trying to work around stuff. Including Rebecca.
And of course there’s the fun of trying to thread difficult to thread mains cable through conduit – which would be okay in a nice empty room (like it was), but is not easy in a garage chock full of things. To say I found it aggravating would be an understatement. And I’m quite annoyed with past me for the decision to leave this until now. I’ll probably end up stealing some lube to get the cables to pass through a bit easier – but even still, because of the routing, it’s going to be a pain in the arse.
However, it needs doing so basically, suck it up buttercup is all I can tell myself.
Annoyingly, in the process of doing it today I found that I think our ‘nicer’ (aka more powerful) Rigid drill is dying (it needs a thwack to turn it on, and didn’t want to run vertically). I should take it apart and look and see what’s up – but I find that hard to find enthusiasm for because I know we can’t get batteries for it anymore. It has been such a useful “set” (I bought it used – right at the start of this project) – with the circular saw, the demo saw, and the drill. And I managed to find some NOS batteries to replace the dead ones it came with. But I wonder if I should accept that its dying and replace them.
But with what? I guess we could get some of the better quality Ryobi kit, but the rigid drill actually *feels* like a good quality item in a way that none of the Ryobi kit that we’ve had ever has. It’s not my fave, though. That’s definitely still the old Makita, which is smaller and lighter, but has also lasted many years.
Of course, Laura Kampf would say we should use Festool, and they do have some really nice kit that I’ve been tempted by. But then I look at the prices…
…feh.
Anyhow, it was an experience filled with minor irritations*, including the fact that I’m really not quite sure what the hell I was planning when we went and bought the bits. I know there were some spare bits, but there are also some really poorly thought out decisions – like it would just have been a lot easier to run the whole damn lot in 3/4″ conduit – but for the sake of cheapness I chose to do a bunch of it in half-inch conduit, which is going to make feeding the pair of wires that I need to feed vastly more difficult. Although I have a vague recollection that they didn’t have the outlet boxes I wanted in 3/4″.
All in all, past me needs a slap though.
In other news, I continue to rip CDs. Not exactly apace, but these are more popular/common disks – mainly stuff I bought the first time around at Uni, and that goes quicker because they are much more commonly being identified with a complete track listing. Often with the cover too, although quite often it’s a tiny image which I need to replace with a better quality one.
Increasingly, I’m thinking my decision to separate out the ‘digital downloads’ of stuff I have on vinyl, or which I’ve bought digitally, was an error. So I may merge the two which will be… a thing that I do. It shouldn’t be too much hassle – I think? I’m letting myself mull that a bit before I do it though because it’d be a pain to undo.
I’m also now starting to try and work out what the hell I’m going to do with the old stuff on the media server that I only have in digital form, and maybe sometimes not the best quality. But that may be the only version that’s available. Stuff that’s maybe tagged poorly… or not at all! I’m also vaguely wondering about how I’m going to tackle the vinyl.
The project scope has increased a bit because now I have some of the vinyl in digital form, it’s tempting to have it all. But that’s a much bigger project than I originally planned.
Anyhow, I’m going to try and let today go, find it in myself to forgive past me for decisions that made sense at the time, and try to relax for the evening.
* For example, for some reason, my phone decided that it wouldn’t play music off the media server while I was in the garage. Normally it works fine – and afterwards, when I came in the house and went to find out why, it was working. It was seemingly just trying to annoy me (I know it wasn’t, but it feels that way). A worse example is that I managed to chip the paint on the passenger door on Rebecca, which is very upsetting. I slipped carrying the hoover, which I suspected I was going to do, and…yeah. Managed to hit the door. I suspect I also hit the pantry door, and I’m hoping that’s okay.
