Category Archives: Blogging

Sep 25 2 comments
Blogging

Top 50 construction blogs

The Homeowner’s blog has been listed in the Top 50 construction blogs, the fact of which finds me a bit flabbergasted.  I perused the list, which can be found at Top 50 Construction Blogs via The Construction Paper.  There are some well written blogs on that list and I find myself humbled to be with such good company.

I also feel a little guilty about not posting more often.  However, a while back, I decided that I would limit the off topic posts as much a possible and try to created good remodeling and construction content that would be both informative, meaningful and perhaps entertaining.  I also got rid of a good deal of dead weight in that I took down all the extra Amazon stores.  Since I have been super busy over the summer, nothing of note has been done around here.

If that changes, you’ll be the first to know.  In the mean time, check out the big list if you have a moment or two.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Aug 02 1 comments
Blogging

Whoa, hey! Happy blog birthday!

My how time flys when you are having fun, or working two jobs.  Anyway, an important day came and went this year unoticed.  This is the third year of the Homeowner’s blog.

I will admit that I have not been doing any real home improvement projects this year, yet.  I hope to have enough money to install our photovoltaic system in September, weather permitting.

That is the other variable, weather.  I could have been doing more outside projects, but every weekend it is raining.  This weekend, I barely got the lawn mowed yesterday.  I also get chased away by swarms of mosquitoes and other biting insects.

In any case, thanks to all those who stop by and comment.  I think I have learned a lot from my readers who share their own experiences and know how.  That alone has made it a worth while undertaking.

Popularity: 1% [?]

May 02 2 comments
Blogging, General, Out door power equipment, yard

First planting, Lawnmower, New clothes line, blog videos

I would post more often but we just are not working on the house right now.  I have been very busy working two jobs…  The second job (solar business) is doing well.  It is still difficult, in this economy, to sell high end alternative energy gear but not impossible.

I have managed to do a few things around the house:

radishes poking up through the ground

radishes poking up through the ground

A few weeks ago we put in the cold weather crops, peas, carrots, lettuce, radishes, and spinach.  All are coming up, I think we will have radishes in about a week or so.  I plan on planting the rest of the garden around the middle of May.  That will include tomatoes, beans, squash, peppers, broccoli and onions.  More posts/pictures as the time gets closer.

strawberries about to flower

strawberries about to flower

buds breaking on the grape vine

buds breaking on the grape vine

I did the annual lawn mower maintenance including sharpening the blade.  I was shocked, shocked I tell you, to find several large dings in the blade.  Funny, I don’t really remember hitting any rocks or anything last year.  Anyway, I sharpened the blade on the bench grinder.  Nothing worse than a dull lawn mower blade to maul the ends of the grass blades off.

new clothes line

new clothes line

I also replaced the clothes line posts.  We had a really niffty hydraulic post hole digger for one day in mid April.  I managed to drill several 3-4 foot deep holes around the yard for various purposes including enlarging the garden fence.  I replaced the clothes line because we seem to have a lot of laundry and the old one seemed a little light duty.  Plus, we had a really niffty hydraulic post hole digger.  I cannot recommend this unit enough.

Going to town with the Earth Auger

Going to town with the Earth Auger

I apologize to my regulars (if there are any left) for the lack of posts over the last few months.  When it comes to this blog, I decided that I would rather have quality over quantity.  Staying more or less on topic seems to improve my search results and nets me more Adsense revenue.  To that end, I went through and deleted many of the old off topic posts that were not very popular.

Speaking of adsense, say goodbye to the home improvement videos.  Google, in there infinite wisdom, decided to discontinue the Adsense video service.  I made a fair amount from those videos, but I must have been the only one.  I am going to start moving away from Google and selling ad space on the blog myself this year.  I have had many people tell me that they have greatly increased there revenue by doing this.

Otherwise, stay tuned for some up comming projects this summer.

Popularity: 3% [?]

Mar 17 3 comments
Blogging

6 year old Dell laptop: Done!

I knew this would happen sooner or later, my 6 year old Dell Insperon 5150 laptop has signed off for good. The hard drive had been making funny noises during shut down for the last two weeks. I went to turn it on yesterday and nothing doing. Hard drive is dead.

Fortunately, I planned ahead and backed everything up on an 80 GB backpack drive. Unfortunately I have no home computer right now and posting may be sporadic at best (I am using my wifes Apple to type this).

I have to say, the Dell lasted a lot longer than I thought it would. This computer has logged more miles than I care to think about. Overall, it has been a good machine, although it got a little tired at the end. I would buy another Dell if the right deal came along.

Popularity: 4% [?]

Dec 27 1 comments
Blogging

coetry is pode

For everyone familiar with WordPress (all one word, capital W, capital P), I just upgraded to 2.7 and, well, things did not go as expected.  First of all, the upgrade disabled my tagging plug in.  I have been using the same plugin from the beginning.  That’s alright, I thought, I will use the organic tagging function from word press.

Big ooops, the data base did not like that one.

That’s okay, I made a back up.

Restore data base, all is okay, just can’t get the #*$& tag plug in to work (and it still doesn’t) but what’s this, the theme isn’t working right either.  Well, I was thinking of changing that anyway.

Ooops, wait, no okay, well it seems to be okay now, I need to adjust a few things and I lost some stuff in the side bar, gone to only God knows where.

So, after six hours or so we are functioning, it just needs a few more adjustments.

Code is Poetry, right.

UPDATE: Okay, I kind of like the new template, messed around with the colors a little bit, added a background image to the header, etc.  I lost the ability to have a list of simular posts at the end of each post, and the videos won’t fit in the side bar.  The videos were popular, so I may try to revive them.  Otherwise, this is the new look, more or less.

Popularity: 2% [?]