Weekend Work...

So, there I was. It was me and the door. Showdown time.

We've lived here for seventeen years. Over that time, our front door, our entry door, has managed to eat at least four or five lock-sets. Why? I can't even float a clue here.

Locksmiths have been to our place more than some family members.

The first encounter with the lock guy results in their trying to repair things. Failing that, they replace things.

I swear I saw one, a locksmith, go slowly past the house yesterday, somehow sensing another piece of hardware had tanked. As I quickly turned to make his eyes meet mine, he goosed it and roared down the street, the jangling of keys fading as he sped away knowing that he'd soon return.

Like hell.

It started hassling me a few weeks ago when it started sticking, sometimes making the door harder and harder to open. Compounding that is the mystery of the door that forever needs sanding. The door edge that meets the frame looks to me like its regenerating. Every time I haul out the orbital sander, slap on a medium-grit pad and a face mask, fill the house with sanding dust, all is well for, oh, maybe a month or two.

Then, it's back. Yes, I do know all about expansion and contraction due to heat and humidity.The puzzler is that there is never any contraction, it's always expansion, and that defies some law of physics, right?

I've considered doing some planing on a couple of occasions. Planing could do the trick, planing could also be cruel and unforgiving. A little too much pressure and all is lost. And you can't Superglue what you shaved back where it was.

So this past weekend I was determined to solve both problems. After sanding for a half hour, gently, in small increments with a very light hand, some progress had been made. Good.

Next, I take the lock-set apart in search of answers. As always, there are none. Forget it, let's just go buy a new one and be done with it.

The spreading headache wasn't all that bad. I've had worse.

Seeing how I'd watched professional locksmiths agonize over this demon door and its tumblers, strike plates, and knobs, what chance did I have of actually swapping out the entire bum unit for a new one?

Somehow, I did it. Somehow, it didn't take that long. Then somehow, the thing didn't work right.

Brand new, out of the package, all shiny and bright with smooth operation well-tested before tightening the bolts, it now wasn't all that smooth. It was sticking. And there was no apparent reason. Until...

Until I completely removed the new lock-set and peered through the oval hole in and out of which that part of the lock-set which is supposed to go in and out of goes. Certainly it has a name. You know which part I mean? Sure, I thought so.

Sticking my index finger in the hole, I half expected to get bitten by the spirit of the door. Instead, there it was. I could feel it plain as can be.

There was the problem and it was likely what had bedeviled professional locksmiths for years. The hole itself was of unequal diameter and shape throughout its length. Sounds like time to measure, then measure again - you always measure twice - do some calculating, make a sketch or two, then deftly begin your work.

Nah, no time for that crap. Hand me my Dremel tool.

I love my Dremel. Sometimes I just open the case and stare at it a bit, usually wondering why I spent what I spent when I bought this rig, this outfit, which was quickly supplemented by the 7,000 piece accessory kit. Or was that the 11,000 piece kit?

Now, here's the best part of it all. This is truly the pay-off, the sweet of the deal. My Dremel is the rechargeable unit, I've no time for dorking around with power cords, this here is a man who needs to be portable, to go where the challenge might be. I hadn't used my Dremel in maybe a year, meaning it hadn't been charged in that much time at least.

I loaded up a sanding wheel, locked it in, and spun the speed control. This thing whined like it was fusion-powered. The battery was fully charged. Amazing. Whoever makes Dremel's batteries, and however they are made, they have achieved perfection; a rechargeable battery that holds a charge longer than a week to ten days.

A few turns around the hole for the in-and-out thing, another rub with my finger, another bit of gnarl still there. A few more swipes from Dremel and done.

It worked. That was it. Our longstanding lock problem was never a lock problem at all, it was a carpentry problem. And Dremel solved it.

Another successful weekend project brought to you by the makers of Dremel rotary tools.

I figure come November it'll be time for another.

Right Here in River City...

I'd driven past the construction probably a hundred times since it began. Catching glimpses of the progress wasn't enough to make me nosy enough to stop and have a look around. A glance on occasion was adequate.

Part of my interest in all the work was that the northern portal is The Millennium Circle Portal, so named for a philanthropic group within The Luzerne Foundation. We're members and proud to be so.

My main interest, likewise altruistic, was that the River Common project had replaced and effectively stopped forever another project; the inflatable dam. I thought the dam a horrid idea. It was.

Please know that my opposition to this man-made intrusion was based on one fact and one fact alone; it would have been an ecological nightmare. As such, it had the potential to halt the Susquehanna River's recovery permanently, or for however long the dam was in place.

The thought of a big rubber water-stopper scared me from the start. A river needs to flow free, it's how they work, how they are ever changing and never changing at the same time. More important, it's how they heal themselves from human abuse. The Susquehanna is healing, that blow-up bladder would have been death to the riparian ecosystem that has begun to timidly return.

Despite what many may think, this river has made huge gains over the last ten to twenty years. Even throughout its stretch in this valley the Susquehanna is home habitat to Bald Eagles, Great Blue Herons, and Snowy Egrets. Beneath the surface, the river holds a bounty of smallmouth bass, muskellunge, walleyed pike, catfish, eels, turtles.

Even the outrageous annual mayfly explosion on the river is cause for great optimism. These mayflies are truly the "canary in the coal mine" when it comes to water quality. Bad water - no mayflies. Mayflies are incredibly delicate, needing excellent water. Good water - lots of mayflies.

If we can ever get the good sense to remove all impediments, the American Shad will return to the river, even as far north as the Wyoming Valley. And that would be one heck of a site to see. Shad are anadromous, they start life in freshwater, maturing, growing to adulthood in salt water. They then return to their natal rivers to begin the cycle all over again.

For now, one heck of a site is the River Common. Go, see, enjoy the river as we haven't been able to since the years immediately following the Flood of '36, which is when the levee system began to take shape.

The mighty Susquehanna has been effectively sealed off to our population center for over seventy years. It is now again open to us all. Walk through the portals, they're yours and mine. The river is ours. The River Common is a great thing. My guess is that you will be impressed.

The Good Stuff Goes Up Top...

I get lots of voicemail, most of it at work. My cell number is not something I pass around like a quart of Carling Black Label out back of the Scranton CYC in 1967. You'll have to forgive me for clinging to the Jeffersonian-era notion that all of us are still entitled to at least some isolated pockets of privacy in our lives.

Did I ever tell you our personal checks don't have our address on them? That can lead to the occasional amusing moment or two. Some of the oddball stares we've gotten from those not knowing what to do with a check without an address are priceless. It's pretty clear that we've completely stumped the party to whom we've handed the check. The next move, predictably, is that they go in search of their immediate superior.

Orwell's 1984 was published in 1949. So, how are we doing so far?

You got yourself a GPS? It can tell you precisely where you are at any given moment, meaning that it knows where you are at any given moment. Do you need the potential for abuse spelled out here? Some would say we're screwed. I say it's a trade-off, it's all part of the times in which we live and the info-jammed lives we lead. I'm OK with it, only because I see no way out of it.

And, yes, I caved on GPS-mania, buying one a couple weeks ago.

When email and the internet exploded in the mid to late '90s, my opinion was that about all it amounted to was more ways for strangers to intrude into your life, maybe more like insinuate themselves into your life. Through my job at the time, I was forced to become not only computer literate, but computer savvy in a hurry. Either learn the software or flunk the daily test of getting the job done.

I learned the hardware, the software, and became, almost by default, pretty good at that which many others were not yet any good at all. For a time, perhaps one of those brief and shining moments, I was almost the computer expert, the go-to guy.

Let's consider this post nothing more than a gripe, one gripe.

If and when you leave voicemail to anyone at any time for any reason, just remember the old TV news axiom that the good stuff goes up top. When you build a TV newscast, you put the best stuff at the beginning of the show, you give people your best right away. You don't make them wait, because waiting is boring, and boring means those people go elsewhere.

It easily applies to voicemail. Put the good stuff up top there, too. The good stuff is your phone number. Give your phone number s-l-o-w-l-y, and do it again, s-l-o-w-l-y.

There have been occasions when I couldn't pull a phone number out of the message left me despite playing it over and over and over again. Several times, I actually forwarded the message to other staffers on the outside chance they could break the code. Some times they can, mostly they cannot.

Now, enjoy the music while your party is located...and do remember that your call is important to us.