Monday, July 2, 2012

Getting More Stuff

Some days start late for me and don't get moving very fast. Gotta work on overcoming that for the next three weeks if I expect to get the costumes modified, The Luggage done and faerie houses and vardos made. First I checked the mailbox. My Coleman air pump and bucket hat, each mailed separately had arrived together and a day earlier than Amazon estimated, so I went back to the apt. to drop them off, but decided to wear the hat to check it out. It's fine.

I set off again intending to get my Tri-Met pass from the MAX stop across the street (easily done), then walk to the bus stop about 1/4 mile south to go to Harbor Freight for tools to make faerie house windows, get a free flashlight, and cheap tarp and see what else I might find. I'd cut some coupons from the AARP Bulletin for this purpose. But as I approached the bus stop, at just a bit to far to try hurrying up to catch it, the eastbound bus went by. So I then decided I'd wait for the bus in the other direction to go to Home Depot to get the nuts and bolt. That bus didn't take long to come and I didn't spend a lot of time in HD. I found the nuts, the bolt and a couple of eye bolts to attach a rope for pulling The Luggage.

I went back up to catch the same bus line in the eastbound direction. Something must've happened to a bus because it took nearly half an hour of waiting before one came. Meanwhile I saw two buses for another line cross the intersection to the west and I'm pretty sure they run at the same frequency. The bus the eventually came was full as though that one bus was carrying the load of two. It's about a seven mile ride, so along with the wait, there was the time involved just getting out to Harbor Freight.

Once there, I got everything mentioned above plus a short 32-LED flashlight that I may try to see if I can mount on my staff between its top and the glass crystal I mounted atop it several years ago. The idea is to have the light shine up from the flat side and refract all over. I'll have to take things apart to see what the effect will be, then rig up some kind of lever to push on the button at the back of the light which will be against the top of the staff. It may take a bit of bodgering up.

Just for the exercise, I decided to walk the mile or so down to either another bus line or to the end of the MAX line. So I stopped in across the way at Burgerville, a local chain that is far superior to the national burger chains. I don't do that very often, but I hadn't eaten much so far and it was around 4:30, more than two hours since I'd started out.

When I got down to Division Street, I realized the bus would have to go into the Gresham Transit Center and then I'd have to pick up another bus of a different line to continue down Division Street heading west to Craft Warehouse to use a coupon for 40% off one item. So instead, I walked and it was a bit more walking than I thought it would be. Once there I got some acrylic gloss sealer for The Luggage and looked around a bit to see what I could get at similar discounts the rest of the week. Since the walk had taken quite a while, it was now 6 o'clock and they had a special of 20% off on the whole purchase from 6 to 8, so I got some foam brushes. I got more than I'd need just for Faerieworlds preparations since I'm thinking of continuing to do craft stuff beyond then.

So by the time I got back home, I was (and am) pretty tired. I made sure the nuts would work on the bolts, loosely spun them on and tightened a few, but the body isn't liking a lot of bending over right now.

Tomorrow I'll try to get an earlier start to things. I may go back to Craft Warehouse. I was a bit disappointed to realize that the moss sheets I thought I'd buy there are actually something sold at JoAnn's. I was hoping to pick up some at a nice discount, but no such luck, I guess.

Earlier to bed than usual tonight, although as always around the 4th, the neighborhood sounds like a war zone and probably will for at least a couple of hours.

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