Neither does Chipbase almost right next to them in Tokai.
Went there yesterday afternoon, told the chap behind the desk I needed 600mm postform tops in Etimo or something similar. He waves his hand at the shop floor, says “what you see there is what we have”.
Thank you for being so helpful. I will shop somewhere else.
Our house doesn’t have storm water gullies, the gutters vent straight down the side of the house. If it rains hard, we have a mini-moat around the house.
Fortunately it’s sand all the way down, so the water drains quickly.
On Sunday the sea was still rough. (For comparison, I took this photo on the rocks on the left hand side of the first picture below, on a nice day (September 13th) in 2004).
In typical Cape Town fashion, it clears up, the sun comes out, and it’s beautiful. With a flippen cold wind, I must say, but beautiful.
So I swing past the Lumber City on my way from Lansdowne Boards. Go past the counter, ask “may I browse” (this is a big warehouse place, not your typical hardware store). Guy (Neville) sez “sure”.
Find stuff on the shelves that look like what I need, make mental note of standard sizes. Past the counter again, “dowels?” — “behind you” — “thanks”. Pick up dowel of possibly correct size for fixing toy boat project (don’t ask).
Back to counter, start waving hands “I need 12 x 96 meranti, about 1.2 meters”
N: “Stock size is 1.8 meters”
Yours Truly: “Good, one of those and 12 x 144 pine, same length, and meranti, 10mm thick, about this wide” (show with fingers)
N: “that’s 44mm”
YT: “Lekker“.
YT: “And BTW I saw you have Etimo postform tops, but I need something redder”
N: “Would that be Mahogany?”
YT: “Sounds good”
N: (grabs catalogue) “600 wide, 3.6 meter length will be R949, but we’d have to order”
YT: “Sharp sharp, do you cut to size?”
N: “Certainly”.
Picked up a sample of the mahogany. I can work with these guys.
Not only because the cabinets are coming together nicely…
… but also because the cupboards are being filled with all kinds of exotic goodies I’m picking up in anticipation.
I went shopping in the Waterfront the other night, saw that they had juniper berries and star aniseed, and that sort of started it. The star aniseed is for making creme brulee, from the Marie Claire Flavours book. I’ve seen exactly the same recipe online, will find and post a link.
Then came yesterday’s shopping trip. The cover story is that I need a wok. The folks-in-law have a cast iron wok that really works well. I can get something similar from Le Creuset in Cavendish, but it’s rather expensive, as Le Creuset tends to be. So I said that at some stage I’ll go to the Chinese/Japanese/Oriental shops and have a look-see.
The second story comes from a conversation I had with a friend (CH) a few months ago, which went something like this :
But the real reason I went Chinese shopping yesterday is all Barbara’s fault. In particular, #76, baijiu. I couldn’t believe it’s as horrible as the wiki indicates. To quote, “There are a number of accounts in English which comment unfavorably on the taste of baijiu, comparing it with rubbing alcohol or diesel fuel“.
So I went to Mainland China near Cavendish in Claremont, found 500ml of Er Gou Tou for R18.75 (note : this is less than the cost of a sixpack of beer). I also got the black vinegar, some Tom Yum paste, and an intriguing bottle of “Confucious Family Liquor” which was the most expensive of the lot, R43.80 the bottle (note : R40 is what a relatively decent everyday drinking red sets me back most of the time. Just to put things into context for non-local readers).
So now, I feel that I’m qualified to speak. And I can tell you that baijiu tastes nothing like rubbing alcohol or diesel fuel. No, it’s closer to acetone, although I must admit there’s a slight diesel fuel aroma to it — but on the nose only, not the palate.
After the first few sips (yes, I’m brave) one becomes used to the taste. Maybe because by then, my taste buds had decamped and moved south for the duration. It also has a not-so-nice aftertaste, courtesy no doubt of overly brave taste buds who make the return journey too soon.
One has to admire the packaging. This is the Confucius Family Liquor, and I have no idea what it is or what it tastes like. Time will tell, I’m sure :-)
OK, back to the kitchen. As you can see from the very first picture, I eventually got the right size panel to close the front of the cabinet that goes up against the wall in the corner.
Julian originally designed the unit with a standard (left-opening) door, but I figured that the cupboard would be more accessible if the door opened the other way, so I picked up two “blind corner” hinges and used that to hang the door. The gas bottle is going into the corner, so I need the access.
With this unit now bolted to the wall, I could measure the exact size of the countertops I need. Aluta Continua.
There’s a reason. I haven’t done anything to blog about.
With the kitchen base units in, I could measure and order the postform tops, which I did last week. ETA is Friday or so.
I found a tiler to do the master bathroom. He might be starting today.
I need a hall cupboard/bookshelf, some bookshelves for the living room, and two units for our bedroom. Julian at Lansdowne boards is supposed to quote me on these (procedure is he quotes, I pay, he manufactures, and then I audit and spend a week or three sorting things out :-) but so far no quotes.
And once that is done the carpets can go in.
So on Saturday I took the day off (from house stuff), drove out to Somerset West to help a friend with his PC (upgrade from Windows 98 to Windows 2000, and if this sounds terribly archaic please have a look at the URL for this page). Turns out he had a rather nasty virus (Win32:Virut) and after spending Sunday trying to get rid of the damn thing I copied his data off and reformatted the disk. That worked, of course :-) BTW if you have spare copies of Windows 2000 lying around, I’ll even pay for them.
And there you have it — a lack-of-progress report.
As mentioned in the previous post, I found a tiler, Glynn Maree, he advertises on Gumtree. I’m very happy with his work.
The border tiles were cheap, and we quite liked them at the time. But Tanya took one look at this, and said that they didn’t look right. So I quickly removed them before the cement hardened. The problem of course is that we now have a strip the width of this specific border tile (80mm) and we need to find something else that fits.
At the time I built the bath surround, I didn’t know what kind of tiles we’d be using, so the gap I left down the middle of the surround (to be able to connect the plumbing) was determined randomly by the board size. Last week, Glynn tiled to a point, and this morning I cut the hole bigger at the bottom and filled the top in. Glynn will stick two tiles to the loose plank, and I’ll fit magnetic catches to keep it in.
I’ve been building this unit out of my favourite material, shutterboard. Tanya and I carried it from the garage to the house (it’s heavy) and wrestled it into position. So what is it, you ask? Well, it’s part of my one built-in cupboard, the one with drawers and shelves that I’m still designing. It’s also a space to store towels, all neatly rolled up.
This is the view from the living room. A bit of cretestone and paint and it will blend right in.
On a totally unrelated topic. I’m around the house on Saturday morning, and my cell phone rings. It’s Tanya, she’s stuck in the toilet.
Now, there’s a story here. When we got the house, the toilet door had no mechanism, and I don’t know what they did to it to damage the door like they did…
I fitted a mechanism, cut a plank sort-of to size, nailed it into place…
… and liberally applied (automotive) body putty (bondo in the USA).
I still have to drill the hole for the square rod… but this explains why Tanya couldn’t get out. I had to unscrew the handle on the outside and use a pair of pliers to open the lock.
Bloody good thing this didn’t happen to me one morning while working alone at the house. Especially since I don’t generally carry my cellphone with me when working.
And yet another unrelated topic — I’m still looking for a wok, so I went to Taste of Asia in Plumstead. Found a mortar & pestle, and umeboshi. The umeboshi is quite expensive, the package above costs about the same as a flat (24 cans) of beer. Havn’t tried it yet.
I also made Cheezy-Lime White Chili with tofu, mostly for Jessica, but I ended up eating most of it. Gooood. Not that I’d call it a chili, it’s more of a (mild) curry. I’ll make it again.
I bet the car’s a writeoff.
Evidence that it hailed in Fish Hoek this morning. Just a bit, but man oh man was it loud on the tin roof of the garage.
We received an offer for Tanya’s place. It’s only 5 1/2 % lower than the offer we had in April/May, which, given the current real estate slump, is pretty good IMO.
So we need to be out by the end of next month (31st October).
A month and a bit should be enough to finish the kitchen counters and upper cabinetry, a few cupboards, and carpets, no?
I’ve been quiet because we’ve been on the road. Tanya and I drove up to Gauteng on Wednesday, September 24th, spent two days there, then drove down to Port Elizabeth and from there to Knysna, where we spent the most of last week.
Wednesday : Bellville to Rustenburg. Departed 04:00, got there after 7 the night. Bit of a drive.
Thursday : Rustenburg to Krugersdorp to Centurion to Randburg to Benoni.
Friday : Benoni to Witbank and back to Benoni.
Saturday : Benoni to Standerton to Bloemfontein and down to Port Elizabeth
Sunday : PE to Knysna. Shortest leg of the lot.
And then the next Thursday we drove back home. A total of 4435km, seven tanks of diesel totalling 285 liters for a consumption of 6.4 l/100km (The VW Golf computer reported a consumption of around 5.5 l/100km on Caltex and Total, and 6.5 l/100km on the one tank of BP I put in. It lies by about 0.7 l/100km).
Why? Because I like driving up. (Really! I’d like to drive up twice a year or so if I could.) And because I had to collect stuff which is too heavy to fly down easily, and because there are people up there I like seeing now and then, and because we were on our way to Knysna anyway so what’s a short detour?
When we got back I followed up on our kitchen countertops, they were ready, and I picked them up on Friday.
I fitted the long counter first — this involved power planing off about 5mm on the back corner on one side because of course the kitchen corners are not perfectly square.
I then joined these two bits after edging the 600mm deep one. The holes are cut using a cupboard hinge drill, which fits a standard electric drill, and the slots are routed. I was extremely nervous about going all the way through, so I went 20mm in (I could probably have pushed it to 30mm).
Perfect fit.
I tried matching the back of the counter to the (not so straight) wall, using a down-cutting jigsaw blade. My recommendation is, don’t bother. My result is slightly less in line with the plaster than the original straight cut was. Down-cutting jigsaw blades don’t work so well. Or maybe it’s my jigsaw.
While waiting for the glue to dry, I went around sorting out door handles and locks. Just about all the handles had stripped out screws, some lock mechanisms were missing etc. I bought two new locks for Jessica and Tamsyn’s rooms, and I had one lying around for Tanya’s room — the bathroom and toilet don’t need keys, sliders will do. Basically I filled the holes, pilot drilled new holes, and used the nicest screws I could find — brass, which is better than the chipboard screws they sell with locksets these days, but not as nice as the oval countersunk screws one used to get.
The holes for the bottom hinge on Tanya’s room’s door were completely stripped out, so I grabbed the 10mm dowel kit and modified a few dowels by chopping the one pointy end off.
Holes drilled out and dowels glued in. All fixed up.
On Monday I got the five cupboard and bookshelf units I ordered from Lansdowne Boards. This time I paid extra to have them individually wrapped — this will go far towards avoiding the confusion I had last time, although I’ve already identified two 2000×500 panels with edging all around which were nicely wrapped with the 2400 tall cupboard, but which don’t appear on my packing list).
Chipboard is heavy. I had help loading up, but to unload I had to unpack on top of the Land-Rover and carry it down bit-by-bit. Kept everything together, of course :-)
So last night, it being Tuesday and as such a kid-free evening, Tanya and I started assembling the latest units.
The 2400mm tall Colossal Cupboard (it’s also 900mm deep) had to be assembled upright, in place, because there’s no way to tip it once it’s assembled, it’s only about 100mm short of the ceiling. So the assembly was a bit of a mission, 720mm wide 900mm deep chipboard shelves are *heavy*.
I pinned and dowelled the two sides, slotted in the bottom and the backing board, and then realised that the top had no groove for the backing board. So with Tanya holding things from falling over, I rushed to the garage and chopped eight or ten millimeters off the bottom of the backing board — not the best plan of action but the best I could do under the circumstances.
Eventually got the whole thing assembled and in place and screwed to the skirting and to the piece of skirting I used as a spacer against the wall. Tanya has pictures.
So then I wanted to assemble the bookshelf that goes next to the Colossal Cupboard. And I noticed that the cam & dowel holes in the top didn’t match those in the bottom. The sides are correctly drilled, however — and this means this unit won’t work. And I noticed that neither the top nor the bottom had the slots for the backing board.
Yup, groove on the one side, no groove on the other.
Went back to Lansdowne Boards this morning, voiced my extreme displeasure, and after much pondering over CAD drawings and many incredulous looks at the offending shelves (“Oh, look, the holes are *still* wrong!) they realised that yes, indeed, the fellow driving the machine was indeed high on… life… or… err… something.
So we went over to the workshop, waved hands all over the place, and the fellow jigged the stuff up and added the neccessary holes and slots. Got to see how the machine works. Impressive, although it doesn’t go “ping“.
