I think I need professional help.

I have decided to get in better shape.

At first, I assumed I could manage it on my own. I invested into a treadmill, some free weights and a good pair of running shoes. I had a whole daily fitness program planned. I started out way too hardcore. I became so sore that I had trouble walking up and down stairs or even getting into bed. I was worried that I might have seriously damaged something. I struggled to sleep at night because my back hurt so badly. There was muscle pain in areas that were alarming. My stomach hurt and it was uncomfortable to even pee. I don’t know what I did to myself. I know I can’t safely handle my own workouts. I need a fitness expert to develop and lead me through a daily workout session. I also think it is better to complete the workouts at a gym rather than at home. I am happy to own a treadmill and some weights, but I don’t want to buy any more gear. The gym offers all sorts of machines that are maintained by the facility. It also gets me out of the house and held accountable for my workouts. There are other people to watch, connect with and get motivated by. I work from home, so my social interaction is minimal. The gym closest to my house includes group fitness classes. There is also personal training available. I plan to start with one-on-one instruction. Once I get more confident, I might move up to the classes. I am hoping to use my home gym on the in-between day. First, I need to learn the right way to workout before I hurt myself again.

Personal Training Center

My girlfriend was an athlete at the college level. When we graduated, we immediately bought a house and moved in together. My girlfriend insisted that the backyard shed was perfect for her workout space. She invested in folding mats, a weight bench, free weights, a jump rope, resistance bands and a sound system. At first she used the gym every single day. After getting a full-time job working five days per week, she quit working out all together. I wanted to get rid of all the fitness gear and open up space for other uses. She was not happy with this idea and said she would get back into fitness in the near future. I figured it would be nice to get some use out of the space. I work from home. I have the time to workout. The gym is available with all the equipment my wife bought. I decided to give it a try. It turns out that I really enjoy working out. I am naturally slim so I don’t really need to focus on cardio. I like working out with the free weights and the resistance bands. I found that I can listen to music in the gym and alleviate stress from work. I have improved my flexibility, balance, range of motion and increased stamina. I started out simply lifting weights and sometimes jogging in place. Now I have increased the length and difficulty of the workouts by adding the jump rope, boxing drills with the weights and ab crunches. I do burpees, mountain climbers and squats. I’ve installed a chin up bar. I am so much happier the way my body looks and feels now. I have even thought about consulting with a personal trainer. I’d like to learn how to utilize the equipment better and maybe add more gear to my home gym. I would like to buy some heavier weights, a wobble board and a medicine ball.

Yoga studio

I do the snowbird thing with my husband.

It is nice always enjoying the best weather possible.

However, it means that I am always leaving a house when I just get it back in order. When you don’t live in a space for six months too, it starts to deteriorate. I have needed to fix popped seams, broken pipes and done major lawn care when I have returned. My most recent trip back and forth has been rough. I had to leave my southern home the day the HVAC unit quit on me. I couldn’t get the AC to turn on at all. I also couldn’t get a HVAC technician in my house in under 24 hours. So I just left it and figured I would deal with it on the next trip. I arrived at a northern house that didn’t take the cold very well. My northern home had so many popped seams to take care of. I actually had to rip down the drywall and start totally fresh. That meant sanding, mudding and then painting once more. It was so much work. By the time I was all done, it was winter and time to go back south. Arriving at my southern home and not having any heat was horrible. I spent over a week freezing in my little house. A space heater wasn’t really a substitute for the real thing. I had to pay extra since it was peak heating repair time for the HVAC contractor too. It was the only time I could get him to arrive though. So there are some cons to the snowbird life.

Heater maintenance

So here is a weird one.

HVAC stands for heating, ventilation and air conditioning right? So I was recently updating my master bathroom and I decided I wanted to add bathroom ventilation.

I don’t like taking a shower and the steam lingering in the room. It promotes mold growth and foul odors. It also makes it sticky and everything is wet. I just hate it. Bathroom ventilation isn’t all that expensive to buy or difficult to add. You can spend anywhere from 10 bucks to over 500 on the right system. I choose to go a little more expensive. I got a bathroom vent with a LED light that glows when you walk underneath it. The vent whirls to life when it senses too much heat in the air. You can just leave it on all day and the bathroom vent will know what to do. Well I decided that I wasn’t going to drill into the side of my house to add it. I called a HVAC contractor and scheduled an appointment. When the guy came over and I handed him my bathroom vent he laughed at me. HVAC professionals do major ductwork attached to HVAC equipment, not tiny vents. He told me that electricians are the ones that handle bathroom ventilation. I told him ventilation was right in his title and he told me I was talking about the wrong type of vents. I wasn’t pleased that I had to call a different guy with a truck and toolset. I knew the HVAC contractor had the stuff to do the job too.

Cooling install

Once a year my wife and I do a major investment into the house.

One year we did the master bathroom, the other year was the kitchen.

Last year all the windows got replaced in the house. This year my wife and I really want to be in the main bathroom. We need a new tub, vanity and toilet. Adding more modern tile rather than laminate would be great. It really is the last room in the house that needs a makeover. What stinks is that I think our HVAC system is going to end up being the major investment. For years the HVAC unit has made a horrible whistling noise. It occasionally would whistle when the system was running. I would say once a day, for a few minutes. Now I have noticed that my HVAC seems to whistle constantly. It is whistling at five or six different intervals and it is more of a ten minute span. My wife and I are going insane. It is louder too. It used to be that you could only hear the whistle when you were outside of the house. Now I am watching TV or cooking dinner and can hear the noise clear as day. I feel this is an indication that the heater and AC unit is going on any day. HVAC professionals have told us it is the manufacturer’s defect and there is nothing they can do. The unit is 17 years old as well. It really is getting up there in years. I really don’t want to replace my HVAC unit over getting a new bathroom though.

heater

When I bought my forever home I was a little bit upset by the boiler in the basement.

• I hated how giant it was and ugly.

I wanted to store things in the space and maybe make it a work out room too. The boiler was making all those plans difficult. Thankfully I didn’t just rip out the boiler, but tested it first. Despite the boiler looking like it was going to die at any moment, it was an amazing heating system. My whole home was heated perfectly with it. It provided quiet, efficient and reliable heat all winter long. When my husband started redoing the floors in the home he mentioned adding heated flooring. I thought that would make my boiler obsolete. I then found that hydronic heating would be possible. You connect piping to the boiler and hot water flows from the boiler and through the pipes installed in the new flooring. We now have hydronic heating in every room of the house. It uses the boiler and makes it a better way to heat. There is no noise, cold spots or heat rises to the ceiling to be wasted. The energy bills are lower due to this and a person feels warmer when their feet are. Anything that touches the heated floors feels warm as a result. The couch, loveseat and recliners all feel heated. I just love our heating system and all our guests do as well. We have animals that sleep on the bare floors rather than on our throw rugs because of the heat.
Find local HVAC

My fiance and I are getting married in three weeks.

Typically when we go on trips together it is during the warm season. I book a trip to a tropical island or a warm state. We bring swimsuits, t-shirts, sandals, sunblock and beach towels. With us getting married in December, we have to pack for the cold. Our suitcases are going to be jammed packed. Not only am I bringing a wedding dress, but I will need pants, coats, hiking gear and rain gear. It is going to be a much different trip. I have researched different things as well. Typically I look for cute little hotels near the beach that boast good AC. My fiance and I are on our honeymoon. I don’t want a little shack. I want a good hotel suite. I have looked at fancier, high end places with spas, good fitness rooms and close proximity to things to do in the city. I also have checked out the heating equipment offered in each place. One place my fiance and I are staying in along the trip is an airbnb that has heated flooring. The radiant flooring stretchest throughout the whole house and even uses the piping to provide heating to an outdoor hot tub. How cool is that? Of course our actual wedding day will be the highlight of the trip. It is going to be a cold evening in a strapless dress but then I will be rewarded with a perfectly heated hotel suite. It is going to be an amazing, very different trip that we are used to.

Space heater

I am a cat mom and totally weird about my fuzzy prince.

He is so spoiled.

He has a homemade scratch post that I keep up to date with cardboard. I have a special cat lounger that makes it easy for him to laze away and scratch. He has special hypoallergenic litter, high quality cat food and purified water. My sweet prince also gets 12 treats a day. He is extremely spoiled. I keep an eye on the temperature in the household as well. I don’t want my poor baby to be too hot or too cold. I live in the south so it is hotter than cold. My cat is a savage and he loves being outdoors all day long. In the summer I have to lure him into the house with treats and cool him down. He gets so overheated that he flops down with his white tummy exposed to the AC. I then try to encourage him to drink water. I can’t seem to get him to nap in the air conditioning. He will only tolerate brief AC breaks. In the wintertime he is much better about staying inside. Cats should only be exposed to temperatures around 45 degrees, no lower. When it starts getting cold my cat gets a little nuts. I have an outdoor chair with a heating pad that I keep for him. Mostly I try to keep him inside with my heating system set to 75 degrees. I got his cat bed all warm and soft for him. I want him to be safe from the cold and comfortable.

Quality heating and cooling

The weather has officially changed in my area and I couldn’t be happier. For months I dealt with severe heat and moisture. It hurt to breathe when I was outside due to the humidity. The heat was so intense that even being in the shade was rough. I make sure to exercise everyday, but it was tough when the weather would get to around 80 or 90 degrees. A small shed AC system can only do so much. The house air conditioner ran non stop. I am glad that it is finally a little cooler. The AC has turned off and now I am using my heating equipment. I am actually able to go outside and do yard work. I have wanted to paint my outdoor shed for a very long time. Now I can do it without risk of sunburn or heat exhaustion. There is just something much more pleasant about crisp outdoor air and warm indoor air than the reverse. I like turning on the heater and feeling the gentle warmth in the morning. I like that cool weather brings about the holidays, good scents and beautiful sights. I am definitely a fall and winter lover for sure. My area doesn’t get snow, ice or temperatures in the negative. It is cold enough to warrant a heater most of the season but warm enough that I can get by without a thick wool coat when I am outdoors. My indoor heating system is a central heater that provides warmth in every room of the house. It does the job perfectly all winter season long.

Heating and air conditioning system

So the other month my central heating & advanced a/c unit went out and broke down. The awful thing was that the local heat & advanced cooling system supplier could not get anyone out to myself and others for a few days after this event. It was certainly cold out & I needed to have heating in my lake home one way or another, or I would be stuck paying a ton of money to stay at a hotel for a few days which was unnecessary. I decided to try my hand at buying one of those little portable part heaters. I had experienced these way back when I was a kid, but they were much smaller & weaker then. These new part furnaces certainly blew myself and others out of the water! I could not believe the fact that I was able to heat my entire home office with the little portable part heater! The thing is about the size of a teacup & it was so powerful that it could heat up my entire home office in minutes! Then, when I took the portable heating system into the living room when it was time to go to sleep, it was able to do the same thing. And the real shocker was that this little portable part heating system could heat up an entire room within minutes! It did not take long at all. I was honestly so very impressed by all of this. So impressed that I think I am going to go out & buy a couple more portable part furnaces to keep around the lake house, then just in case one breaks in another central heating & advanced a/c unit emergency love the one I faced initially!

space heater