By Greg Kopp on
5/4/2008 10:00 PM
I am finally home. But it took a while.
I got up at 4AM so I could take the rental car back to Enterprise and get to the airport with plenty of time to catch my 7:30 AM flight. They had told me that I could drop off the car starting at 5:30 AM, but that was crap. I waited until after 6AM before someone showed up and told me I could drop the car off at the park-n-fly lot down the street, which I did.
Got through the TSA checkpoint and waited for my flight. It took off on time for Dallas, where I had a layover for a few hours for my flight to Cleveland.
The flight to Cleveland was supposed to leav Dallas at 11:25. We still hadn't boarded the plane by 11:45 - I guess there wasn't the right kind of ramp to go from the jetway to the plane. I guess that's why we were late. But I guess there was a leak on the plane, and they needed a part for it which wasn't supposed to show up and be installed until 1PM.
At about 12:30, they to ...
Read More »
|
By Greg Kopp on
5/3/2008 9:43 PM
6AM wakeup. Cold cereal for breakfast today - I guess they give the kitchen staff a break every now and again.
Met up with Richard at the project house. We had planned on just meeting there and going to a different location since the exterior of this house was complete. Once everyone arrived, we drove over to Spain street. There was a lot of exterior work to do including another set of back porch steps.
Mother nature had other ideas in mind. It was looking pretty bad. As soon as we got to the house, we could see just how dark the skies were and they opened up with a torrential downpour and lots of lightning. We all went inside and just talked with each other for about an hour and a half before the main Habitat office called off all work projects for the day. I was a bit disappointed.
After all of the other volunteers had already left, Richard's friend called and told him to meet him at the Village and they would go to lunch a bit early, and ...
Read More »
|
By Greg Kopp on
5/2/2008 9:00 PM
This morning, up again at 6AM, out the door by 7AM and to the project house.
I started in immediately getting the back porch steps done. I really wanted to get it finished, and to finish it mostly on my own. I got all the steps in when Richard (the site supervisor) noticed he screwed up and put the one corner post in the wrong spot. So I removed it, cut a new post and got it installed so I could start on the railings.
I took most of the day, but I finished the entire back porch, and aside from a few places, and the cutting of the spindles, I did it all on my own. I'm pretty damn proud of this porch!
At lunch, I bought lunch for Richard and Sam (the two Americorps Habitat staff members) at a local pizza place that also serves sandwiches. I had a Philly steak and cheese that was real good and we got a chance to learn something about each other in the process.
After lunch, Julie (one of the volunte ...
Read More »
|
By Greg Kopp on
5/1/2008 7:51 PM
6AM wake up again. Breakfast again. I didn't make lunch, I planned on going to get something from one of the local diners today.
Got to the construction site before Richard and Sam. Once they got there, we were given out assignments. Myself and Lloyd were to continue hanging doors and working on the trim for the closets.
We started with the door to the back bedroom. It looked like it would fit. But looks can certainly be deceptive. The framing was so out of square and not plumb, that hanging the door plumb would have been impossible. There was nothing we could do. Trying to do what we did yesterday with the other bedroom door was a lot of work, and I don't think we wanted to go through that again.
However, we were able to get the door to fit in the mudroom door opening! Lloyd had never hung a door before, so I was being a teacher to him during this time, too. He was a good assistant. :-) Lloyd also installed the door handle set - another thi ...
Read More »
|
By Greg Kopp on
4/30/2008 10:00 PM
Got up again around 6AM, had breakfast and fixed my lunch.
We didn't go back to the same house we were at yesterday. I was disappointed a bit, I wanted to put the roof up!
Our project house is on Independence and just needs some finish work. Myself and another volunteer, Bill, were assigned the task to hang the interior doors. The first one we picked was the first bedroom, while two other volunteers put in the bathroom door. The doors aren't framed perfectly, so it takes some work to get the door in, but we managed to get our door done before lunch time, which was a bit of an accomplishment considering Bill had never done this before and it had been a while since I had installed a pre-hung door. And I had never installed a split jam door. The split jam door is designed to it can fit into an opening with varying thickness of wall and you don't need to make jam extensions.
After lunch, Bill and I hung the linen closet door and then installed t ...
Read More »
|
By Greg Kopp on
4/29/2008 11:00 PM
I didn't sleep well last night. Tossed and turned a lot. I didn't have a pillow, so I used my towel, rolled up. I had intended on just buying a towel when I got here, but the Wal Mart that was on the way to Camp Hope was no longer in business. It seems like a lot of business are that way down here.
I got up around 6:00 AM and got dressed then walked down to the cafeteria for some breakfast. I had some French toast, sausage, potatoes and some cream of wheat. It wasn't too bad. After breakfast, I fixed my lunch for the day - a couple ham and cheese sandwiches, a banana and an orange.
I met up with a couple of people who were also going to the Musician's Village construction site, Barbra and Ciella. Musician's Village is about 30 minutes away from camp.
Once at Musician's Village, we signed in and waited for our safety briefing. While I waited, I took some time to look around at the village. It reminded me of easter. :-) All of the houses are v ...
Read More »
|
By Greg Kopp on
4/28/2008 7:34 PM
I got up a little earlier than usual this morning so Bonnie could take me to the airport. My flight didn't leave until 9:25, but she dropped me off a little after 7:00 so she could get home and get Joe to school. I checked my big suitcase and got through the TSA line with only one minor hiccup - I dropped my boarding pass just before entering the metal detector. I only panicked for a second or two before a TSA employee found it for me.
Read More »
|
By Greg Kopp on
3/20/2008 7:58 AM
Something I have been wanting to do for a really long time.
On April 28th, I head out for New Orleans for a week to volunteer with Habitat for Humanity. I volunteered locally some years ago. Our project was to do some landscaping at the local Restore. The Restore is a place people can drop off old appliances, fictures, cabinets, etc., and they'll get used in Habitat projects or sold to raise funds.
I was watching an episode of This Old House and I decided I didn't want to wait any longer to do this.
I started looking into plane tickets, or the cost of driving, plus hotel and meal expenses, and I realized this was going to cost quite a bit to volunteer. I found information about a place to stay called Camp Hope, a converted school that serves as dormi ...
Read More »
|
By Greg Kopp on
3/17/2008 2:20 PM
An oldie, but a goodie. Worth looking at again.
|
By Greg Kopp on
12/14/2007 9:04 AM
Please visit http://www.springlightcfl.com and visit the store.
Order some energy saving light bulbs and use the coupon code TCPFRIENDS and save $10 on any order over $25. If you order a simple 3 pack for $9.97, that's getting the bulbs for free, and all you have to do is pay shipping charge!
|