Infrastructure

I can hardly compete with the industriousness of a million ants. Here they mine the inadequately laid substrate under our cracking driveway pad. I won't poison them (and us), we'll just need a new pad with a proper bed.

 

In other infrastructure news, our well pump quit. That was an expensive piece of brass and stainless steel. The good news is our water tastes much better, although I cannot say why other than the flushing of the well. After 6 months of home ownership I can be sure of one thing: just because you want to change something doesn't mean you should. It's best to wait, remain observant, and wait some more. We've never liked the strong iron taste of our water and contemplated treatments when we first moved in. A broken well pump resolved the problem (at least for now) without spending on a system we were never entirely comfortable with anyhow.

Our well, some junk, and the truck that fixed it.

Now that it's summer we are on to the necessary siding and window repairs. Carpenter ants are doing their own work on the OSB siding and I must outcompete them. Where ever the roof line meets the siding, there is plenty of rot. Some of our windows are rotting prematurely, underneath the paint, apparently due to a manufacturing flaw of bad wood preservative. I've learned that cleaning windows isn't really about clean windows (although that's nice to have). You must do it because it is the only close inspection of your windows you will have, year to year. 

We have a rotting door frame in the rear of the house and I must return to the front porch to finish the work we started last summer. That should be enough for summer along with the other common maintenance.