The New Handcrafted Entertainment Center

Ever since the attic was rehabbed into a third floor man cave and entertainment space, I’ve known that a necessary next step was getting an entertainment center for the main area where the television and speakers and supporting electronics are.

Thanks to the amazing craftsmanship and careful design considerations of my college suitemate Ronnie, who’s a damned fine carpenter and electrician, that dream is a very delightful reality.

With a floating set of shelves up top, and a sturdy wide bottom cabinet and shelves, it more than manages and accommodates all the necessary stuff that’s central to modern streaming life enjoyed also by people of a certain age...who still might watch DVDs or Blu-Rays or even old VHS tapes.

And while I won’t say it was a cakewalk, getting these two huge pieces in through the front doors and making the difficult turns of two flights of stairs was much easier than I’d feared!

Up top are places for the Sonos units and the WiFi router and the constellation projector, plus more space for media storage; down below is extra space for batteries and remotes, tucked away and out of sight in the handy drawers at the bottom. Ronnie made the shelves adjustable and we tried to leave plenty of room given that future TVs are likely to be even more ridiculous in size.

He’s been working on it in his shop since late winter, using some designs I worked up in a quiet spell during the summer of 2022. Time continues to get away from me: seven years' delay to even get around to coming up with some drawings to share with a carpenter; a couple of false starts with yet another for-hire carpenter who took the job and then never showed for it; and finally turning to my faithful friend Ronnie.

Ronnie's skill and his can-do spirit, plus remarkable patience and fortitude in helping achieve even the smallest “dream” elements of this set-up, means there is a gorgeous addition that’s incredibly functional and also rather a lovely sight to behold.

Above and below are those initial diagrams I put together.

Bringing in the two big sections, getting them mounted and secured, adding the drawer and cabinet hardware that matches what’s in Ray’s the Bar, cutting the wire and cable passthroughs, and turning around a couple of the outlets all took place on Friday, September 6th. Then Ronnie came back that Sunday and got all the upper portion’s cord and cable access completed and finished the trim work such as tying in the baseboards and running the shoe molding around. I am so thrilled with the final product and how perfectly Ronnie put it all together and completely honored my hopes for how to make it “work” and also be well-matched to the rest of that grand and gracious expanse of space. And here's a peek inside the mechanical room behind the entertainment center, where all the wires come through:

This has loomed for a decade as a necessary next step in creating just the right set-up in this room where so much time is spent. With all that equipment, and more wires and cables than I can keep straight, for so long sitting on or near a retired squat office table gifted to me by a colleague when I was on faculty at Wake Forest...it’s been hard to keep organized or clean—especially in a dusty old house with two dogs who manage to shed a fair amount. This is how it was all set up before the arrival of Ronnie’s elegant creation (and I'm embarrassed to look at it):

Custom Grill for Foyer HVAC Return

This is the entry foyer, and backed up to the staircase is a lovely substantial sideboard cabinet...one of my eBay acquisitions when I was endeavoring to properly furnish this great old house. Behind it is the scene of one of my long-overdue house to-do tasks: replacing the screen on the HVAC return that was cut under that first turn of the stairs. It required a custom order and custom manufacture of a new grille, but this is one of the undrawn slips from my Quarantine Task Jar that I've known I needed to do for as long as I've lived here.

The previous cover was difficult to keep clean and likely caused extra strain on the system. It might boast a kazillion holes but each one was still rather tiny:

Here's the unvarnished truth of its innards:

Because of its location, this component of the mechanical system stays mostly ignored and forgotten. Now there's hidden loveliness behind that cabinet.

Meal No. 3502: Simple Beef Chili with Beans

Last Friday night’s gathering of five centered on a dinner of beef chili and sweet southern cornbread, served at the bar in the 3rd-floor man cave and eaten while balanced on laps in the tv sitting area. That’s what’s required if the downstairs HVAC system is once again on the blink. But it's a forgiving and accommodating crew that regularly gathers here at the house and everyone made it yet another great night to be together.

Last Wednesday, about midday, the downstairs filled with an acrid smell, and a quick sniff at a couple of HVAC registers confirmed that once again the blower motor was blowing up. Although the tech from my dependable folks at Webb Heating & Air Conditioning found it was still functioning, and could not source the odor to any mechanical issue, we awoke the next morning to zero heat and 61°F in the front of the house. The next tech to come Thursday confirmed another blown motor and a replacement timeline of 3-5 days.

By Friday, it was 56°F inside. (Activities and where they occurred adjusted accordingly!) For the record: The latest trio of blower motor issues started with a blow-out in July 2020; the second was in June 2022; and now 18 months later, it's come around a third time. It is proving to be not just inconvenient but awfully expensive for my friends from Webb to continue not figuring out the issue.

When I undertook my first major renovation and addition project on the house in 2008, the HVAC subcontractor who designed and installed the entirely new system for the whole house was Barnette Heating & A/C, Inc. from Mocksville, NC, and it has been a 15-year problem-plagued journey, and the issues have not been small ones. I just realized that the first blower motor that had to be replaced was less than two years after the original installation.

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"Simple Beef Chili with Kidney Beans," from Cook's Illustrated, Number Sixty-One [March-April 2003], p. 10-11.

Sweet Southern Cornbread adapted from "Golden Sweet Cornbread," from bluegirl on AllRecipes.com.

Sandalwood Rose is Gilded

Blogger's Confession: I have a few blog posts written quite a while ago that have been waiting for when I needed a filler, which has often occurred because I was on the road or simply didn't have anything else fresh to post about the Roediger House. This one has been sitting in the draft box for just over 10 years, and I'm letting it now run free.

My tendency in running a household is to buy in bulk, to buy lots when on sale or if it's a good deal, and to stock up on consummables that don't go bad.

In the upstairs landing bathroom's linen closet, which at the time of this writing (in 2013) had not yet been finished to serve as a linen closet, I stored the Costco and Sam's Club packages of toilet paper and Kleenex, the shelf-full of toilet bowl cleaner and Tilex Fresh Shower spray, a couple of boxes of hotel shampoos and soaps that I realize I just don't need to be collecting...and an oversupply of shower gels, shampoos, and antibacterial liquid handsoaps, mostly from Bath & Body Works.

A while back, I reached into the back of the closet and found some shower gel/body wash that had gotten pushed so far back it had fallen off the back of the shelf. It was the strongly-scented but very appealing Sandalwood Rose version. It hit me right for the moment so it became the next bottle of body wash for me to put in the master bathroom shower.

I realized at that time that I hadn't seen Sandalwood Rose back on the market in a long time and, later, I looked it up online. Here's what I found on Amazon, in February 2013:

Yes, that's for a single bottle. I have another one just like the one pictured, and newer bottles of it in their redesigned packaging. I reckon that, even though some people think this body wash is worth 80 bucks plus shipping, I'm going to use it like it's really worth the already over-priced $11 shown on the label on the bottom of the bottle.

Ray's the Bar Sign

When architect Sam Binkley designed the kitchen addition in 2008, he did so with excellent vision and foresight. It has been a marvelous expansion of and improvement to the life of the Roediger House. The west gable added to the roof back then would, he predicted, make an excellent space for a pool table, if and when I decided to finish out the attic. Sam was spot-on yet again in 2014 when he designed that attic renovation into a massive man cave, perfect for the pool table, plenty of seating for large gatherings for movies and games, and smart uses for the smaller north and south gables.

That south gable is outfitted with a sink and cabinets and a double undercounter beer cooler, all under a unique bar top made from salvaged old wood from a theatre demolition in the North Carolina Sandhills region. Aptly and cleverly named “Ray’s the Bar,” all it has needed to be complete is a couple of key signs. I’ve got a spot above the window where someday I hope to have a Foothills Brewery beer sign. And Sam envisioned a woodcut sign on the exposed chimney beside the bar area, and we even positioned a dedicated spot light on it. Finally, over seven years later, I finally got that sign, and it’s a beauty, if I my say so myself.

Master Bathroom Tile Repaired!

We are in that fortunate season at the Roediger House when I have time and am also inspired to work on checking items off the always-present to-do list. The photo above can showcase one of those matters: for 12 years now, I've had to slowly watch the disintegration of the tile grout in the master bathroom...

...ultimately leading to a completely dislodged tile right in front of the sink.

A little background: the first major project I undertook with the Roediger House, after buying it in 2003, occurred in late 2008 into 2009: demolishing the old kitchen and very sad bathrooms on the back of the house and building a completely new and much-expanded kitchen area and several bathrooms. My general contractor, Peter R. Laroque of Mocksville, NC, was mostly good and I was pleased for 90 percent of it all. Ah, but as the project neared its conclusion all those years ago, there were elements that he did not finish up as he should have. One of the persistent problems has been in the bathroom tile work, where there was cracking and loose tiles occurring within a year or so of the job wrapping up.

Over the last week or so I reached back out to Todd Sink of Amazing Tile by Todd to come take care of the loose tile in the master bathroom. Mr. Sink installed the backsplash in the kitchen in 2017, which looks great even still. He does very nice work and he is able to offer terrific craftmanship without gouging the customer...a rare combination especially when one is looking for skilled expertise in a city environment...and in an old house like this.

Mr. Sink was here last Tuesday, to take up most of the center tile so that he could grind and clean the quickset from the undersides, and he dug out most of the rest of the grout throughout the floor. He set the tile that afternoon and returned on Wednesday to fill in the grout. It's amazing to have the floor whole again, and especially to no longer have tile rockin' and rollin' underfoot!

House Projects of Mid-June

Inspired at last to action and sequestered inside during a fairly uncomfortable heatwave, I spent time during the first half of June tackling some much-needed projects inside the house. Here's a run-down of some of them.

Future Library

Two years and two months ago, during the height of the pandemic and its initial shut-down phase, I was drawing slips from a task jar to keep me busy and productive while sequestered safely at home. One of those projects was to pack up the very junky room that is (or will be) the library. My rule for myself was to put in at least an hour even if I couldn't finish the specified drawn slip assignment, and my intention was to work on it a little bit on a lot of days. But after I made the libary even worse, I did not get back to it until this past June 16 and 17. With a late evening start that Thursday night, and a full day of labor on it the following day, I managed to completely pack it up, clean it out, clean it up, and set it up:

Hanging of Latest Artwork

A few more pieces by local artists had been added to the Roediger House collection, but they've been waiting in my study for me to get around to measuring and hanging them. That was also one of my June projects. I do wish I had a better eye for the right positioning/placement/spacing but it's nice for them to now be on display. I put five of those pieces along and at the top of the stairs (this page has a photo; scroll down to the 28th one), and another piece in a guest bedroom.

This is the painting I placed outside the master bedroom in the main downstairs hallway:

Collinwood Cooler Clean-Out

When the attic was renovated into a man cave and entertainment hall, one of those cool gables was turned into Ray's the Bar with a full commercial double beer cooler installed under the bar counter. I had a love affair with a couple of choice seasonal beers and always stocked up on them during their limited availabilities. (For instance, see this blog post from February 2018 regarding my absolute most favorite of beers: Bell's Best Brown Ale.) Bell's also had a great Christmas Ale and a rare offering called "Hell Hath No Fury," too. Starr Hill Brewery's Amber and their seasonal Snow Blind Doppelbock Lager were worth buying up in bulk because they are limited in availability; Duck Rabbit also has a terrific doppelbock. Abita was great for several beers: Amber, Christmas Ale, Mardi Gras Bock, Andygator, and Turbodog. Alas: when I went on a big weight-loss push in 2018, I pretty much gave up beer. I'd rather have desserts or sweets if I'm going to indulge in calories. At the same time, with the pandemic, there was virtually no company and no entertaining here at the house for well over a year. What I'm left with was a mix of okay but aged beers that were always in the cooler...and quite a few cases that I'd stored away deep in the cabinets, including some from as far back as 2015. It all had to go.

This was understandably a multi-day project, with a small beginning a few months ago, but by June 15th I'd gone through and poured out all of the beer in the house, washed out all the bottles, and put them into the recycling barrel. We are talking cases of awesome beers that were just not any good any more. It broke my heart. That did allow me to really clean up and reorganize the cabinets under the bar and counter in Ray's the Bar, though, so that was a bonus.

Recycling of Crushed Cans

While I have also given up soda, there's still a lot of it consumed here at the Roediger House, plus increasingly quite a few canned beers, seltzers, and so on from guests. I've always washed them out and crushed them and, once before, took them to a paying recyling center. There were 12 or 13 paper grocery sacks that had backed up near the crusher in the cellar, and I got them taken care of. They went into the 11th huge garbage bag of crushed cans that were piled up at the other end of the cellar. I decided to load 'em all up in the back of the pick-up and took them to a different recylcing center, where the total weight of them all was 260 pounds. But hey: that was $127.00!! On another day, I gathered up the old cleaning fluids, rotted gas can, and other old hazardous chemicals from the cellar and took them to the appropriate recycling center.

Cleaning Up the Laundry Room

Situated just inside the high-trafficked back door from the parking lot is a cozy laundry room, only big enough to accommodate those appliances, cabinets above, and a utility sink. It's where I keep my yardwork clothes and gloves, the food for birds and the dog, and bottled water.

Unfortunately, especially with my bigger yard projects of the last couple of years (like the irrigation system), it became awfully easy to come in from a very long work day and drop all the stuff I needed on top of the dryer...because I'd be right back at it again the next day.

No surprise when it becomes an accumulating monstrosity.

I present these photos with insufficient shame.

After achieving what felt like a great victory over the devastation in the library upstairs, I was inspired Saturday a week ago to knock out this last clean-up challenge. It's not suitable to Southern Living, but it's ideal for RoHo living.

Weeding and Mulching

While I am celebrating these terrific interior advances, I must say that it is pretty disappointing that I've done far too little out in the yard. Before it got so freakin' hot (I still prefer summer to winter, however!!), I was aggressively weeding and even got around to some mulching. Alas, I have yet to go buy any plants or flowers and so these are now just dressed areas that ain't going anywhere.

The Kohler is Kooler

With the renovation/addition project of 2008-2009, all of the old bathrooms were demolished...not merely renovated. Seriously: the actual physical spaces they once occupied were completely dismantled and all of that old material was hauled away to the landfill. In its place is "brand-new" construction that included a new master bathroom, a new powder room, a new main bathroom for the second floor, and a new private bathroom for each guest bedroom. Out went four old toilets, and in came five new contractor-grade toilets. In the master bathroom, the most-used toilet of them all has not held up all that great. For years, I've not been able to control poor seals that allowed a constant leak of water down to the bowl, meaning it was regularly replenishing the tank. Over the last year or so, there have been a lot of handle and flapper issues, too. Most recently, I noticed some cracking in the evacuation channel, suggesting the ceramics were possibly giving out. After 18 years as a homeowner, I've now had occasion to replace my first toilet, which occurred last Friday. It was mostly simple, really, and it sure is nice to have a dependable and problem-free toilet again. I do have a lot to learn about caulk, though.

Meal No. 3000: The Christmas Feast with Friends

On the occasion of the 3000th meal since the completion of the rebuilt kitchen here at the Roediger House, what better celebration than for it to revolve around a great gathering of family and friends. We love the Thanksgiving meal so much that it gets brought back when we can. Christmas is that first repeat opportunity.

That yearly feast occurred Sunday night, with seven around the kitchen table. The turkey was buttermilk-brined and spatchcocked, but its smaller size (compared to last month) was an important detail that I failed to plan properly for. The dark meat did overcook, unfortunately, but the breasts were still luscious.

The turkey gravy, made from long-simmered stock (giblets, neck, backbone, vegetables), was tasty.

The apple-bacon stuffing was well-received by the crew.

Layered green bean casserole never disappoints.

The slow-cooker sweet potato casserole was tasty, and this year I actually went to the trouble to roast sweet potatoes instead of falling back on the ease of canned yams.

Prior to dinner, which made all of our bellies hurt, there was a return to the homemade Collins Against Humanity game, which also made bellies hurt from the deep and hearty chuckles it induced.

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Buttermilk-Brined Spatchcocked Whole Turkey based on:

• "Want to Make a Wonderful Flavorful Roast Turkey? Brine It in Dairy," by Nik Sharma. Features "Golden Garlic Roast Turkey" and "Golden Turkey Gravy." Published in This Is a Cook Letter, 20 November 2021.
• "Samin Rosnat's Show-Stopping Buttermilk-Brined Turkey Breast Recipe," by Samin Rosnat in GoodFood: Autralia's Home of the Hats. [Published 30 November 2020]
• "Crisp-Skinned Spatchcocked Roast Turkey with Gravy," from J. Kenji López-Alt, former Culinary Director and current Culinary Consultant of SeriousEats.com. [Updated 21 October 2020]
• "This Thanksgiving, Let Science Help You Roast a Tastier Turkey," by Maria Godoy. From National Public Radio's Short Wave. [Published 21 November 2021]

"Layered Green Bean Casserole," a Jones family favorite.

Adapted from "Sweet Potato Casserole with Pecan Topping," from Southern Living Slow-Cooker Cookbook,  (Oxmoor House, 2006), p. 234-235.

"Cornbread Stuffing with Apples and Bacon," from David Venable. Found online.

Quarantine Task Jar: May Updates

When we all had to hunker down in shut-down "stay-at-home" mode in the midst of this terrible coronavirus pandemic, I devised for myself a somewhat entertaining means for imposing discipline on the very, very long to-do list that I'd accumulated: the Quarantine Task Jar. That quarantine task jar has served me exceptionally well, and I'm pretty pumped to have checked off as many items as I have. You all have been polite enough to avoid asking why the task jar hasn't been mentioned lately. Perhaps you recognize that I've been laboring pretty hard outside on the yard while the weather is cooperating, and while I've still got the gumption to do it, and that means I've not needed the discipline of task jar duty assignment. That's why about half the days in May did not include drawing a random task out: I already had a full task agenda.

It seems I've also gotten pretty bogged down on some days by the incredibly crazy-long to-do lists that include lots of things not coming from the task jar...just daily things or actions or whatever. The above photo is from this past Wednesday morning. I barely made a dent in it even though I was pretty focused all day long. And for a few days earlier this month, I also found myself, well, finishing out one of the early tasks: building up the back yard in order to alleviate some drainage issues resulting from the HVAC drain line project.

While most of the tasks drawn thus far have been dealt with to a state of completion, some have remained deserving of further attention or are waiting for the next stage of whatever process applies. Early in April a task slip was drawn that caused me to spend time thinking about and planning for the next phase of smarthome upgrades, as discussed in this blog post from April 13th. I hadn't yet worked out all the finer details of it, and I needed to inventory the smart fixtures and figure out what else I had to order, as well as figure out what new switch plates would be needed and in what configurations. My ponderings in the meantime had led me to revise even the most recent plan and that necessitated the review that ended up taking several hours Tuesday night and into Wednesday afternoon. I've ordered the rest of what I need and also updated the relevant fuse and breaker notations so that the electrician won't have to figure that out when he's here.

Finally, a couple of the tasks drawn from the jar have not been easily tackled and they interrupted the flow, because I had to carry them over until I could either find a way to deal with them, or get the proper motivation to take them on. I'll fess up to those at the end of this post. Even so, with those self-serving qualifiers now out of the way, I do have positive progress to report on other quarantine tasks.

Roofing Estimates Update (QTJ May 1st)

When this slip was drawn at the beginning of the month, I researched roofing companies and made phone calls to set up appointments, as noted in this blog post. Since then, all three have come to examine the roof and gutters and I've got estimates now from two of them. The main issue is that the original LeafGuard gutters are failing: that was the unanimous opinion of all.

Each had a different idea about what I need to replace them with. I also got varying assessments of the other roof issues, including how the upstairs balcony rubber roof is holding up and what might be the source of the leaking around the front center dormer.

Spray Roundup (QTJ May 7th)

A very kind green slip was drawn at the end of the first week of the month: spray Roundup. I'd already done a good bit of this but found that the quarantine task jar proved useful in compelling me to get out and do another treatment, especially now that lots of weeds are coming up along the retaining wall and around the driveway area.

Ticket Stubs Album (QTJ May 8th)

One of my less onerous to-do items was to rework my movie ticket stubs album to incorporate all the movies I saw through the Winston-Salem Cinema Society's Films on Fourth programs from 2003 to 2007.

Since the notebook is a chronology, but I'd not originally scanned and included these, I wanted to get them properly sorted and archived with all my other cinema stubs. It wasn't a long project but it's nice to check it off. As a reminder, the Instagram feed for my movie stubs can be found under the profile ticketstubsstash.

Read Professional Literature (QTJ May 9th)

I regret to report that I am not always attentive to a regular schedule of reading the various educational journals that come through here. That made it a wise task jar choice, and I already had in mind two themed journals on coaching that would be the focus of that time. I've been putting them off because (1) it is very much an area of professional endeavor for me, elevating its importance; and (2) I already knew that I'd have strong reactions to some of the content and needed to have the cleared mental space and energy for annotating and capturing the resulting germination or crystallization of ideas.

My rule for myself is that I have to spend a minimum of an hour on any task drawn, in full recognition of the reality that some to-do items in the jar are extensive or involved or ongoing. I've devoted far more than that to these, including coffee time outside on nice mornings; I've also had a couple of days where I kept thinking and cogitating while I was outside digging or hauling and had to repeatedly step back inside the kitchen in order to make additional notes on particularly thorny or troubling articles.

Plumber/Irrigation (May 10th)

This slip was drawn on a Sunday but I'd already begun tackling it. Still, it motivated me to make a new initial contact with a utilities contractor as well as follow up with my regular plumber for some guidance. This is still very much in process because it seems increasingly likely that installing a second meter for irrigation and landscaping is going to be prohibitively expensive. More to come...

Will: Household Distribution (May 16th)

I got my will drafted, finally, back in 2012. One provision in it, though, was a statement to the effect that there would be a supplemental list of household items, antiques, clocks, and so on that were specifically designated for certain people, rather than getting lumped into the whole estate.

It is one of those considerations that the recently departed ought to have already handled so that those who are left behind are not stuck in sticky situations about who gets what things of great or sentimental value. I also have an obligation to be as clear about any wishes I have as I can be. But here it is 8 years later and I had yet to create that list...until the task jar told me to!

Morgue Insulation (May 17th)

Back in the day, I suppose the north side of the cellar is where coal would have been delivered. When FIRST, Inc., the chemical-and-alcohol treatment organization, owned the house in between the Roedigers and me, they walled it in as a tool room, and now it's just called The Morgue.

Thanks to various electrical or internet cable projects, some of the insulation in there, which is basically under the dining room, has gotten dislodged. It's been yet another untouched to-do item that the task jar very kindly forced me to finally deal with.

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It doesn't seem overly charitable to suggest that I've achieved quite a string of successes with this quarantine task jar gimmick. I'm keeping the growing stack of accomplished task slips on the counter beside the task jar, and it makes me feel pretty good. However, two of the drawn tasks have not yet been successfully completed. I mentioned one of those, from way back at the start of the shut-down period: insulating behind the bar cabinets in the attic. I put that one aside because, after I looked at it, my whole idea about how to approach it had to be revised and I needed time to come up with a new plan. The other item that I've stumbled over was drawn on May 2nd: "Revise Post-Observation PowerPoint." The Instructional Leadership Institute that I offer to administrators, coaches, teacher leaders, and others is pretty solid overall. I did a major design overhaul three years ago, cleaning it up but also giving the PPT shows a more unified look and feel. As my ideas have evolved and as I've attempted to update especially the final "chapter" in that institute (Post-Observation Conferencing), it is due for a bit of further cleaning up, and I need to revisit its organizational structure, and there are some ways I can tighten it up and make it more concise.

But I also need to be in a particular frame of mind for that sort of endeavor, and I'm too distracted by the many other things I've been messing around with these last few weeks. The official report at this time is that I have failed to follow through on that task jar slip, so it is still hanging out there haunting me until I can get it done.