About 50 to 60 feet to go. That's the drain line I am installing for diverting away storm water that accumulates on the sidewalk directly in front of the steps to accesst the front porch.  Other areas of pooling water have also now been identified once I got that done and I will have to T off the line I have installed and put drainage in those areas as well.  Then there's the driveway.  Who would build a driveway on a slope and then have the water pooling right there in the middle of it?  This only lends to cracking - which it has done.

The driveway part isn't on any priority list, far too many other things to do long before I ever do that.  To fix that, I will have to cut the concrete to be able to dig out a trench underneath, install a drain with solid brass drain grate and then pour concrete back over the top of it.  Now, the rest of the water diverts down the sidewalk to the aforementioned steps to the house, with pooling along the way.  I can easily add onto the exiting line and have a drain next to the sidewalk at the deepest point of pooled water.  The project so far hasn't cost anything but a drain, the rest is time spent and paying hte college kid ten bucks an hour to dig out the rest of the trench.

Whether he comes back or not remains to be seen.  I could use him to haul off dirt from the front and a planter that was installed in the back that I tore down but dirt remaining.  The learning experience about brick is that you should never have dirt piled up against the side of your brick house.  Which is yet another project I could have him do - dig away all the remaining dirt and grass that is up against it.  Bricks can be replaced, but costly and not anything I would want to get involved with.  Well I guess there is probably a YouTube video showing you how to do it but that is nothing I am currently interested n doing.  Just get rid of the threat and hope the damage isn't too bad.  So far, the damage has been the facing of the brick but not enough to have to replace any of them.

A bit interesting that my landlords/house owners didn't figure all of this out and put it on their priority lists.  They're young but that doesn't really excuse, at least in my book, the idea of not understanding what you have and what you need to do to take care of it.  All the dirt that needs to be dug and hauled is really quite a lot of work and I'm going to do it for them.  At the moment just trying to get the serious issues out of the way, which besides the AC problem last week, is all outdoor stuff.

I took the carb apart on the weedeater yesterday and found the rubber diaphragm breeched and that is the cause of the problem.  I sprayed out the carburetor anyway and got the thing to run for a minute but the diaphragm allowed fuel to dump into the cylinder and that was that.  I'm going to tryto find a replacement in town today, otherwise I'll have to order it online.  Just didn't want to wait for the replacement part to show up and also the part would be much cheaper locally in not having to pay shipping costs.  $15 for this little bitty diaphram, because you have to buy the whole kit and you have to spend as much on shipping as you do on the kit.  I can tell ya right now, that little kit doesn't cost $7.50 to send.  O'Reilley's sells some parts, I'm going to check there first.

I need more grass seed and also some wood stain and laquer.  I'm getting the front of the house tidied up and eventually looking good and then I'm likely to stop spending my money on these projects.  I'm keeping tabs on it as well. They are broke at the moment as she isn't working and his is their only income.  She is pregnant and likely qualifies for food stamps and WIC at the very least.  But that's none of my business.

Hmmm, I think I better take that gasket out of there and take it with me.  I know what it looks  like but you start trying to tell a counter person the part and they are just going to look at you blankly.

And then there's the back yard.  Their dog destroyed everything so at some piont, I quit even cleaning up back there. It would get into literally everything.  It just became frustrating to clean it all up and then that dog destroying everything and leaving it laying all over the place. I cleaned it up last weekend including using the pressure washer and so far, it's all the same as I left it excepting leaves falling from the trees.  But to fix that yard and make it nice......ugh.  A lot of time and labor to start with and then trying to find stuff to do it with on the cheap and still have it nice.  Not a bridge I am crossing right now but it's in the back of my mind.  The fact that I don't have a pickup to pick stuff up is a huge detriment to much of what I am trying to do.

Well time to get this show on the road.