Well Done! A "pat on your back" thread!

[schurem]

So how long 'till your snazzy new kitchen is ready for hot spaghetti action?

Cool to read you feel so well-received at work @komemiute! You sure do deserve a break after the last couple years.

In other news, I bid on and bought a huge amount of flagstones and diverse rocks of about 15-30 kilo’s on the dutch equivalent of craigslist, marktplaats.nl (marketplace). Sweet, sweet price of just under 200euros. Hauled 'em all in. Took two hauls. I reckon I can triple or quadruple (or maybe even more!) their value by using them in projects. Hard work in the early spring sun, and what a haul!

Now you think, ‘eh, they just rocks.’, and you’d be right. They are. In certain parts of the world, you pick them up off your field or a nearby river bed and they’re just so much earth in a rather un-usefull shape. But not in .nl! All we have naturally is mud, clay and some sand. But we do like these rocks to liven up the yards. You can build pretty walls and pathways with them. And that’s what I do These are very nice materials to have in store for when the need arises.

_{In the pic we’re about 1/3rd through loading the first haul. One of the slabs of red flagstone is 60 by 120 cm! Huge fokker!}

[Victork2]

If you ever look further afield for your rocks… I’ll gladly deliver them.

https://media1.giphy.com/media/xT5LMqeDAMSyxna9P2/giphy.webp?cid=8d2e674a6cl8g91dkdsf9kuc09gt16khpe872mbwxg5wn6ad&rid=giphy.webp(image larger than 1 MB)

[komemiute]

@schurem

So how long 'till your snazzy new kitchen is ready for hot spaghetti action?

Probably first week of April…

[schurem]

Whoa that’s a long time to live like a bunch of gypsies!

[komemiute]

Tell me about it.
I mean, if there’s one thing the Army taught me is to make do, so- for the kids is fun and that’s what matters.

We grown ups can do the heavy lifting.

[Scoop]

So I cleaned the carpets today.

My wife hired a ‘rug doctor’ and I did the decent thing. What I wanted to do was reduce my DCS pixel setting and increase my windows pixel setting to compensate. Still haven’t worked out how to do the latter. Supposedly it will up the performance. I have it up to 48/53fps but it shimmers too much in VR.

This post is all about -
https://youtu.be/XA-xjRsY71w

As I laboured the postman came with a package!

I knew it contained this (@schurem )

But I had to work. The overseer was on the case.

The job was done and I got the Phillips screw driver out and attacked my X56 HOTAS throttle. For a year (from new) it required major force to move, and was in no way ‘precise’.

NB the frayed brown cable with bare wire showing from faulty factory assembly.

Saitec/Logitech use a lubricating substance that prevents free movement of the throttle. Think reduced super glue that never quite dries. Its resistance to smooth throttle control has been my excuse for not doing AAR and generally flying very averagely at best. Research on the net had warned me that the goo attached to anything it came in contact with. Certainly true. Paper towels and cotton buds are useless. A T shirt was required. I think the goo is made by boiling political prisoners to the right consistency.

Note the shreds of paper towel cemented to the goo.

T2|666x500

Reassembled with some goo wiped off and the Nyogel applied. No difference at all!

I then spoke to a man who knows stuff. @Victork2 . Use brake cleaner he said. I knew I had a can in the garage.

Sprayed, recleaned and re-greased. It works wonderfully. Its
https://youtu.be/H-kL8A4RNQ8

If you have a sticky control. Nyogel767A is the stuff to use. Warning, it is expensive.

Did I mention the one time I visited Paris - with troops to enter the ‘Marche de Val de Marne’. We had speed marched 50k in full kit and tabbed the US Marines into exhaustion. Next morning we had a day off and hit the city. Flew paper planes off the Eifel Tower etc. By evening we were wrecked. We saw the sign and flopped out in the cinema. That’s where I saw Travolta and Newton-John in this for the first time. The lights of Paris at our feet and my troops and I watch Grease.

[schurem]

Nice on all three bits @Scoop ! No excuses for bad collective work no more eh

I finished up with the doctors’ front yard today. Found out I know how to work slate. Well I didn’t but now I do. Much fun, and the result looks like something from TV The wall is meant to be rough, with age the bricks should discolor like the ones in the foreground and get overgrown. The bed around the trampoline should bloom and sprout in an explosion of greens and flowers in a month or two.
I am very happy with the result, as is the client and his family.

[Victork2]

So I started my little transport business last year and since then I’ve been doing little bits and pieces trying to find some decent paying work that fits in with my kids, wife and virtual and real life flying Commitments.
It’s been a tough year with a few significant knock backs due to Covid and more importantly the dreaded BREXIT.
I explained on the forum before that I had contracts ready to go all over Europe delivering aircraft parts on short notice. This has pretty much completely fallen through now. Unless I buy a bigger vehicle, its gone.
However I have been working for a driving agency for the last year working for Tesco supermarkets and other places and being paid through my business. This has kept me going and been a godsend while I figure out what I’m going to do with 2 trailers and a yard I’m renting to store them. Now to cut a long story short, our wonderful government has just released the budget for the year and decreed that I cannot work through the driving agency anymore as via my company, I must henceforth be employed by the agency directly and pay tax and national insurance as an agency employee.
They offered me a job and I had a long heart to heart with my wife. We discussed the fact that I have kept us afloat all through lockdown and I have actually not had more than 2 days off for 17 months.
So we decided to take a month off. Got some work around the house to do and looking forward to cracking on and having a rest. Do a bit of simming and some real flying next month.

So I was thinking about finding some little jobs for my business, 3 or 4 days a week. Now my agency safety blanket has been removed it was time to start actually doing something and finding some stuff to do.
So I made some phonecalls to people and companies I had dealt with before and to say they were thrilled to hear from me was a (welcome) understatement!
I’ve secured at least 1 major client who runs a leasing company and always has at least 10 cars going out and 5 or 6 coming back each week and will use me exclusively.
I also did a job that I found online to move a MINI down to Devon and off the back of that I was given the transport for all of the dealerships cars as well as I did a great job and the end customer was so happy they called and said what an efficient and great service I provided, which was awesome.

I even managed to move a car from my own airfield to a scrap yard and see all my friends and the planes I have missed so much!!

I tentatively think…I might be OK! I don’t have to work 22 hours a day to survive and finding my own work is FUN!!

I’m hoping that I can spend more time with my kids and if we tighten our belts that I can make it work with minimal effort and expense.

Fingers crossed

[Aginor]

Nice job!
Hearing positive stories in this whole f’ed up situation sure helps. Good luck that it stays that way!

[schurem]

Excellent. I wholeheartedly applaud your choice to gear down a little on work so you can be with your family a little more. To see that resulting in more business for yourself is quite the awesome confluence! Were I a believin’ man I’d say that’s karma for you .

Yesterday we had some terrific weather in .nl. High, gusty winds and hard squals of rain and hail. And we worked about 8 hours through it, remodelling a child-care facilities’ play yard. The place is enclosed on all side by high walls, and as we found it was all tiles and fakegrass (plastic) with low wooden structures to make spaces for different groups. It had the look and feel of a prison yard.

So we lifted some tiles and removed about 1200kg of dead white sand and replaced with a like amount of live black soil. Put some plants in and made borders. The poles will enable the plants to grow more easily as they’ll shelter them from the violence of playing children

These planters were just rectangular bits of open soil, dead and lifeless. This looks friendlier and hopefully the plants will be cared for enough for them to grow.

The old boss doing what he does best:

A tunnel made of beech and willow. In a year or so, it should be a green tunnel only accessable to small people

The client was very happy and impressed with the amount of work we managed despite the weather.

[Victork2]

Great work bud. I love seeing your playground projects bringing happiness to kids.

Is the old boss wearing actual clogs in that picture? I didn’t know that was still a thing out there!

[schurem]

That old man is a freak. Yeah, I bought him new clogs, he prefers those to work boots like the ones I’m wearing in the top pic.

[Victork2]

I never realised the Dutch wore them still for outdoor, hard groundwork. I thought everyone wore boots like yours (and mine) it’s pretty cool from a foreigner like me to see they are still worn though. I was always disappointed when I have been to Amsterdam and other places to have not seen a single pair!

[schurem]

They take a lot of getting used tom you need calluses on your feet in just the right spots. Not something you start with lightly. But they are very easy to step in and out of, and remarkably grippy. In a sense, wearing them feels like being barefoot. They are also very safe. They’re fairly heavy chunks of wood, and they will not easily collapse. Saved many a toe!

[Scoop]

@Victork2

Is the old boss wearing actual clogs in that picture

I wear Dutch clogs

[komemiute]

Absolutely all of my congratulations to both @Victork2 and @schurem for their achievements!

The respect I have for you guys is limitless…

[BeachAV8R]

@Victork2

I tentatively think…I might be OK!

You are going to be OK. You have a great attitude and work ethic… Sending you positive vibes and know you will put them to good use…!

[komemiute]

Hey! My wife just told me that we finally have internet at home! Yay!
Can’t wait to be back.

I have at least 200GB of updates to download, I’m sure.

[BeachAV8R]

@komemiute

I have at least 200GB of updates to download, I’m sure.

You’ve missed weeks worth of cat gifs…!

[schurem]

We made a thing. Well we finished a thing. We have been slowly working this backyard all winter. I have to admit, I did not push for speed because landscaping jobs are few and far in between during the winter months, and as long as I have something to do, my company can run.

But now spring has come, and the work is done. Time to move on to other jobs and call this one.

You may remember the steps. We did those a couple months ago (been that long?!) We did not build the shed, alas, prefab outpriced even me. But all the landscaping around it, and the preparation for its foundation was done by us. In the rain. And cold. Only this week, when we put in the grass and flagstones did we get actual sweet spring weather.

Here’s some pix:

I am really happy with how it turned out. Neat without being sterile or hard, organic and flowing without being sloppy. It also should be right easy to maintain, as she can just roll the mower over the flagstones and be ok. The client is at least as happy with how it turned out as I am.