There is a massive HD near where I live (about 1 mile away) and there are no Lowes less than 4 miles away. There used to be an Orchard Supply Hardware store rught across the street from the HD, but it just recently closed, which is a pity because I very often found in the OSH store many, many items I could not find at HD. Also, on quite a few items, the HD prices were a tad higher than OSH...


<O>

There may be bigger HD stores around here somewhere but the closest one is much, much smaller than the nearest Lowe's store.

We have one Menard's in the area which is HUGE - probably bigger than Lowe's, but nowhere near as close. I went there once back after I first moved in, but only because I had a gift card. If it wasn't in such an out-of-the-way location for me I could totally see shopping there on a regular basis, or at least as a primary Lowe's alternative.

Right now I've got a big Lowe's gift card from my birthday that I haven't used yet at all. I really need to make a list of stuff I need and get over there. I still need to get the stuff to run cable up to the bedroom but I'll have to measure before buying any cable and that means moving a lot of stuff in the living room and I've just been too lazy.

Meanwhile, four out of five vanilla Skyrim player houses now look AWESOME in the CK. :O:

You're not alone in the lazy department. I bought a new bookcase on the 1st, and haven't taken it out of the box yet. :dead:

Wow, long time no update. Lest you think I've been a total slacker, I have gotten a few things done that needed doing. For instance - finally got some electrical connections in the utility room for stuff that needs to be plugged in to stay charged up, which is good cuz I'll also need it for the high tech litterbox I'll be getting for my new kitties some time this week (I hope).

http://imageshack.us/a/img203/3492/tc53.jpg

As you can see I also hung my tasklight up in there so it could stay out of the way and be charging up so it's ready whenever I need it. My solution for this job was to find a suitable power strip and the stuff to go on the wall for the cords and then run the cord for the strip through the wall and plug it into the outlet on the other side in the garage.

http://imageshack.us/a/img823/7792/xen9.jpg

I haven't checked but I have my doubts as to whether this arrangement is strictly up to code but I figured it was a better idea than me trying to split lines off that outlet and run them to a self-installed outlet on the other side of the wall. Whatever, it works. :O:

Another job I got completely finished was putting a barrier up between the storage space under my sink and the grubby unfinished abyss next to it where all the lines run over to the dishwasher around the corner. First I found a thin piece of plywood about 24" square at Lowe's, and cut it down to fit in the space - including a notch in the bottom left to accommodate the water line to the dishwasher. Then I painted it white because, well, I had the paint and I knew that if I didn't I'd regret it every time I opened that cupboard and looked at it.

http://imageshack.us/a/img844/3264/xc9s.jpg

(I also painted another piece of wood I wanted to use somewhere else, which you can see down in the bottom right, because I had the paint out so why not. But more on that later.)

Then I had to figure out a way to secure it in place so it was actually useful, without making it too much of a hassle to get back out if necessary. So I found a piece of wood left over from the cheap little coatrack I bought and used part of to make a support for the saggy shelf that I repaired in that base cabinet that one time, hey remember when I did that? That was fun. But anyway... I attached that to the bottom of the base cabinet under the sink as a way to keep the lower part of the divider from getting pushed over too far when I'm rummaging around down there, which could result in stuff falling down into The Abyss which would be bad.

http://imageshack.us/a/img407/7908/q71y.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img203/493/ivp7.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img29/5220/ukyb.jpg

Then I had to figure out how to attach the divider at the top, which is where my bottomless supply of old scavenged bits and bobs of hardware came in handy yet again.

http://imageshack.us/a/img9/5641/x51j.jpg

Attached the adjustable end of whatever those things are to the divider, then screwed the short end up into the framework of the cabinet, then tightened down the screws in the adjustable bit so now the divider is held securely in place.

http://img856.imageshack.us/img856/1012/8wrw.jpg

Yet another on-the-fly "upgrade" cobbled together with some cheap supplies and what I already had laying around, but it'll do. And if it needs to come out for any reason, it's just a matter of taking out the two top screws holding it to the frame and sliding it around to get it out the cupboard door. So, yeah, definitely a workable improvement. :yeah:

:up:

At least you can't be accused of being a hoarder when you find uses for the junk you hoard.:03::D:up:

And this is why I almost never throw any hardware away, no matter how odd it looks or what weird shape it happens to be or how unlikely I think it is that I'll EVER find a use for it. Because, eventually, I go looking for something that looks odd and is shaped weird and I don't even know what it's called so I couldn't go into a store and ask for it. But it often turns out that I have something on hand that will do the trick.

So, I mentioned that other board that I painted white.

http://imageshack.us/a/img96/5764/4xfj.jpg

I cut that piece to make an extra shelf in one of my upper kitchen cabinets, so I could "double up" on the smaller glassware and make better use of the available space.

Found a pack of four of these little doohickeys at Lowe's (for once, I didn't have anything like them around, I think I used them all on a previous project) and put them up to hold the new shelf.

http://imageshack.us/a/img844/9818/3h0s.jpg

After a little leveling (those little thingies were nice since on one side you could adjust them and I put that side against the cabinet frame so I could tinker with them to get the shelf level if necessary) I got the shelf into place. Turned out pretty good!

http://imageshack.us/a/img22/105/7qx5.jpg

Now I got all my drinkware in that one cabinet - at least, all that would fit in there anyway. I have a few things that are two tall for any of the shelves but they'll fit in the cupboard over the sink right next door to this one. Got plenty of room up there for mugs as well, or I might move them into the narrow corner cabinet on the other side of the sink. Not sure yet, but at any rate, this particular cabinet is sorted.

http://imageshack.us/a/img844/3884/tei5.jpg

Hey Frau, I'm a member of your club now. I now live at home depot.:dead: Our ducting is a smurfed up, so I can't run the furnace yet. A mere $400 to fix it.:down: I spent some quality time in the crawlspace on sunday and I can't reach where the problem is, so I must pay somebody to fix it.:wah:

What are you saying? You have to hire someone skinnier than you?

A GI spoon (entrenching tool aka a little shovel) is all he needs to dig a path to the duct in question.:03:

The new shelf looks very professional Frau K.

I'm taking resumes...Need some work?:hmmm:
there's ~24 inches of clearance between the support beams and the ground. The water pipes hang from them and hang down about ~12 inches.:/\\!!:/\\!! So the part of the ducts that need to be fixed, I can't get at.:down: This whole thing is getting more expensive by the minute.

Simple solution...take your wallet out of your back pocket and put it somewhere safe before trying again.

...and you'd do that for me?:hmmm::03: (:/\\k:hold the wallet)

...and more nimble...and knows what they're doing.:dead:

No problem...anything to 'lighten' the burdon :03: