New England B.S. Thread

What do you do for a vacation? You like the beach or just need time to sit down?

How's your house going besides the insulation, or are you waiting to get going for that to be done? One of a team of 3 was out yesterday so I got to help put the trusses all up(first for me), but we are still a ways away from insulation!

I've recently gotten back into skiing and got my wife started since moving back from NC. It's been a lot of fun, but most mountains are super expensive these days, Berkshire East near me off rt2 is a little cheaper and a beginner/casual skier friendly. I also bought a couple model engines to build, I'm not as mechanical as some of the guys here but want to learn. So one some real slow days I plan on breaking one of them out and starting on one of them. Reading is something I also like, my wife got me some nice books on trees and stuff for my birthday so I'll be digging into those too. XC skiing and snowshoeing can be fun, but those are also sort of an exercise, and that disqualifies them for a lot of people. I like to snowshoe on a groomed trail, all the benefits of a beautiful winter, and 90% less of the work.

But if you don't like winter that much, well...it might be a factor in our substance abuse problems in the area. I know as a kid there wasn't much to do in the winter (cheaply) so we'd find someone to buy us beer and go sit in someone's basement or build a snow fort and booze all day.

 

We stood right in front of the fire station on Boylston St

 

We actually watched the parade twice. Once at the fire station and again right at the finish. I was hoping the players would get off but they just took the duck boats back to Fenway.

I've got more pictures, I'll post some up later

 

@Bridge4
Thats the tough part... Last vacation was... 5 years ago next month. Was working up here at the time, took a road trip back to Texas for Thanksgiving. And that went WAY sideways(resulted in our youngest in the childrens hospital there for a bit).

Anyway, normally, I am good for long weekends, or a random mental health day. But, this past Columbus Day weekend, was a 4 day weekend. Most consecutive days off ive had since i started this job 2+ years ago.
High burn-out rate in this part of the field.... and Im getting there..

Either way, house... haha, its a work in progress, i keep making changes, etc. Finding issues that are unique to old houses, etc.
Its coming along though, the foam will be huge.

As far as winter, well, my wife is from Texas(graduated from UHS in Laredo), and thus, none of us are really fans of winter.
Trying to make the best of it. Tough. Always dark and cold during the winter... makes everyone miserable.

It is what it is. The suffering is so we dont have to struggle and worry later in life... At least that is what we keep telling ourselves.... lol

 

Morning all. Busy today... Get a little snow on the ground over the weekend and everybody freaks out.

 

Did someone say winter!

 

That's a mess of Yellow Perch. How do you like to work around the bones?

 

I cook them with the bones in like trout and flake it off the bones with a fork. Works great. Clean them "Costa style":

 

I do something similar. Perch are great eating, but working around the bones is a pain in the ass. Almost as bad as Pickerel that way.

 

Big-time!

 

So true was up your way Friday/Saturday; drove home in the storm Saturday. The drive back made me feel like it was Dec or Jan with how much was stuck to the ground. I also have to say that for October the conditions were unreal.

Side note definitely need some weight in the bed this winter...fishtailed twice climbing a hill in 2wd. Guess all the armor made me a little front heavy.

 

South Paris... nice. Looks like they got about the same amount we did before it switched over to rain.

Normally I'm happy to see snow on the ground, but it was annoying while I was trying to put my plow together. Working bare-handed in the cold isn't that big a deal, but working with wet hands in the cold is a horse of a different color.

 

Sunday River? Nice. My old neighbors used to have a time share at the Jordan Grand years ago. I miss going to that place.

 

How was the coverage at the River? I know that the Loaf has been making snow.

 

Oooh, someone got a nice plow. V blade!

 

Yep. Sooper fancy. I was going to get the traditional Fisher Yellow powder-coated blade instead of the stainless because they're $600 cheaper and do all of the same things, but when I explained that reasoning to the GF she was like "No, you need to get the silver plow so it matches the chrome on the truck" and handed me $600

 

Wow, she sounds like a keeper (and she's right). I never owned a plow but my buddy has for many years and he just upgraded to a V plow and he says it's a huge difference.

 

It is SO much better than a straight blade. I have a V on our 3500 and I love it. It's one of those things you don't need until you have one, then you never want to touch a straight blade again.

 

Yeah, I've wanted a V ever since I broke the rear spring perches on the plow truck a couple of springs ago and had a buddy of mine clear the driveway until I got it fixed. He's got a V and he did it in about half the time.
The trouble with my driveway for a straight blade is that for the 60-70 feet between the garage and the house there's nowhere to push snow to the side, so with a straight blade I have to roll it back and forth until I've worked it down to the far end of the driveway and can stack it. With a big storm, that means 15-20 trips back and forth. He came in with his V set in 'scoop' and did the whole thing in 5-6 trips.

 

Just saw in my spam that HD was having a new sale, decided to check it out and see if my appliances I had just ordered got cheaper...they did by $1200 between 6 items and a instant $400 rebate in cart. Texted a while to price adjust, after 30 minutes realized they couldn't. Then called for 30 minutes until they realized they couldn't add the $400 rebate.

So about an hour later I canceled the order and replaced it. Now I need to go into the physical store i DIDN'T buy it from and swipe my card so it will refund it.

Oh well, two hours of work is worth saving 1k. I don't make anything close to $500 an hour


In total I think we saved about 2.5k, which allowed us to get a few higher quality pieces than we would have normally been able to afford. If you need lots some new appliances I'd check it out, most are 30% and some up to 40% off.