I have not fallen off the face of the earth...

I have not fallen off the face of the earth...  I missed two days of blogging somehow – didn't even realize I'd done so until I looked at my email this morning and discovered several messages wondering if everything is ok.  All is fine!  I've just been feeling a little poorly (from a bad cold) and been busy puttering about.  My big accomplishment yesterday was cleaning up the cedar shed pump house, removing all the detritus of construction and collecting the tools that I've been using out there.  The irrigation supervisor computer has now been up solidly for 3 days, and every test of the system has been successful.  One test, late yesterday, was particularly noteworthy: the pressure at my system's inlet (from Paradise Irrigation) had dropped to just 12 psi.  That's not enough to even make the sprinklers pop up.  But ... when I ran a test on the system, the pump kicked on, boosted the pressure up to 50 psi (as designed).  The inlet pressure dropped to about 10 psi, but obviously there was enough water flowing to let the booster pump work.  This low-inlet-pressure situation happens quite often, and it is precisely why I put the booster pump in.  And it works!  Woo hoo!

Today I have a fun little project: building a set of stairs for our friend Michelle.  Her son-in-law made a valiant attempt to build her a set, but the result was ... less than wonderful.  She's had a couple of people fall while using the stairs, and this scares her.  Hence my fun little project!  I'm going to make use of a product that Home Depot sells: oak stair steps made by gluing up small pieces and veneering.  I've used these for shelves on several occasions, and the result is quite nice!