OM45GE - Posted - 05/04/2015:  06:42:17

We've got hardwood everywhere but the family room downstairs. I keep Toby's nails clipped so the floors are in good shape. 

There was carpet over the hardwood in two rooms when we bought the house. My son and I pulled the carpet up and the had to remove what seemed like 10,000 staples they had used to hold the padding down. 

dat - Posted - 05/04/2015:  10:19:53

We pulled out all our carpet 

dmiller - Posted - 05/04/2015:  12:09:03

Staples would be a bear to have to deal with.  Luckily we just had old crusty glue to get rid of.  Speaking of "flooring" - - my lawn just started to green up and I may have to get out the mower in another week or two.  

dat - Posted - 05/04/2015:  13:32:30

we had a lot of glue from the padding on the slab, we had tile everywhere 'cept the bedrooms, went back with laminate in the bedrooms.

  I was amazed at how much dirt there was under the padding, even though the carpet looked new and clean

chuckv97 - Posted - 05/04/2015:  13:48:14

quote:

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Originally posted by dmiller

Staples would be a bear to have to deal with.  Luckily we just had old crusty glue to get rid of.  Speaking of "flooring" - - my lawn just started to green up and I may have to get out the mower in another week or two.  

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Is the ice still in the Duluth harbor, David? I noticed a lot at Thunder Bay a few days ago.

DeanT - Posted - 05/04/2015:  14:57:20

Yep, after seeing the filth under the carpet, I don't think I could ever do carpet again. We spent an entire day pulling up staples... and we STILL find one we missed every now and then 

dat - Posted - 05/04/2015:  15:15:49

quote:

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Originally posted by DeanT

and we STILL find one we missed every now and then 

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probably as yer barefoot walking to the bathroom at 3 in the morning in the dark

DeanT - Posted - 05/04/2015:  22:20:56

how did you know?

dat - Posted - 05/05/2015:  05:40:23

that's usually when I find stuff,  when the the girls were little it was leggos, jacks, and other small sharp objects

OM45GE - Posted - 05/05/2015:  06:07:40

quote:

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Originally posted by DeanT

Yep, after seeing the filth under the carpet, I don't think I could ever do carpet again. We spent an entire day pulling up staples... and we STILL find one we missed every now and then 

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It was disgusting under the carpets we pulled up. My wife complains that the hardwood gets dusty faster than carpet does. I tell her there's no difference - you just can't see the dust in the carpet.

dat - Posted - 05/05/2015:  07:07:23

and no matter how much you vacuum, it doesn't help with carpet

OM45GE - Posted - 05/05/2015:  07:59:10

Nope. You can tell if a hardwood floor is dirty or not. The carpet we pulled up looked clean but it had cities growing in it.

DeanT - Posted - 05/05/2015:  11:10:16

we just wait until the dust bunnies are big enough to pick up by hand...

OM45GE - Posted - 05/05/2015:  13:57:43

LOL

DeanT - Posted - 05/05/2015:  16:14:02

or open the front door and let the wind blow them out the back door

OM45GE - Posted - 05/06/2015:  03:41:00

From time to time I used to help a guy who had a commercial cleaning business when he had a big job. We did a total clean of a house once when the owners developed severe allergies to their cats. We emptied out everything and cleaned from top to bottom. There was cat fur behind the switch plates and outlets, bases of the light fixtures, you name it. The dust kitties were more like dust tigers. 

DeanT - Posted - 05/06/2015:  05:59:37

They joys of pets... hair everywhere

chuckv97 - Posted - 05/06/2015:  06:12:00

I had to take a truck back to our main terminal one time,,some guy who had a dog with him on the road quit. He'd never vacuumed the interior ever, I don't think. I made the mistake of opening the windows - the swirling dog hair was like a cloud. I spit dog hair for the next 3 hours.

OM45GE - Posted - 05/06/2015:  06:42:40

There was a driver for one of the van line's special commodities division that used to come into my company. He had a Western Start with a big custom sleeper on it but barely had room to lie down. It was filled with plants and terrariums with snakes in them. There were some constrictors and at least two rattlesnakes in there. He had another cage filled with rodents to feed the snakes.

I used to wonder what would happen if he had an accident.

dat - Posted - 05/06/2015:  08:10:13

Only way I would want to be that close to a snake is ifin it was a hatband or a pair of boots, and I never really wanted to dress that  "Classy"  so I can even be good not even being that close

DeanT - Posted - 05/06/2015:  10:50:07

plenty of snakes in the wild... no need to keep em around in a glass cage!

dat - Posted - 05/06/2015:  12:42:23

and if the snake crosses the road,   I aim fer em with the truck

OM45GE - Posted - 05/06/2015:  12:51:24

I don't understand wanting them for pets.

dat - Posted - 05/06/2015:  13:13:10

they have a reason for being on the earth, along with the other outside critters that should stay outside

chuckv97 - Posted - 05/06/2015:  14:08:48

This girl I knew years ago had a pet boa constrictor. One day she couldn't find it , didn't know where it went. Apparently it had gotten into the forced air heating ducts- she had an older house with the big iron grates along the baseboards- and one night her friend was staying over in the spare bedroom. Well, you could guessed it, the snake entered her room through the grate and got up in bed with her to keep warm. Marilyn told me later the screams were enough to wake the dead! lol

DeanT - Posted - 05/06/2015:  14:22:27

at least it didn't come up through the toilet

dat - Posted - 05/06/2015:  15:09:06

I would have gone to the toilet

DeanT - Posted - 05/06/2015:  22:16:04

spiders in the toilet are bad enough...

OM45GE - Posted - 05/07/2015:  05:30:15

There was a story on the local news a few weeks ago about a six foot boa constrictor that came up through someone's toilet in an apartment building. It got out of its cage in a neighbor's apartment. The reporter said that sewer pipes aren't filled with water except in the traps so critters can travel through them.

DeanT - Posted - 05/07/2015:  06:01:07

If a 6 foot snake came out of my toilet, I'd never go to the bathroom again

OM45GE - Posted - 05/07/2015:  06:06:53

I know. I was thinking the same thing. They had a shot of it curled up in the corner under the toilet which is where the woman found it when she walked into the bathroom. I would have to have the ceiling repaired.

dat - Posted - 05/07/2015:  06:35:11

and the floor where I tried to chop it with what ever I could find,   I would probably hurt myself and tear up a lot in the bathroom if a snake was there

OM45GE - Posted - 05/07/2015:  09:42:06

I have to admit they are impressive creatures, but I just don't see them as pets. I think they should be in the wild and then I can avoid places they live.

DeanT - Posted - 05/07/2015:  10:33:15

They think with their fangs and tongue

dat - Posted - 05/07/2015:  10:35:57

I don't mind seeing them outside,  as long as I see them soon enough to give them their room

OM45GE - Posted - 05/07/2015:  12:43:14

I kicked a rattlesnake while I was jogging in San Diego about ten years ago. It was about dawn and it was sleeping on the sidewalk. I didn't see it until I kicked it. It just curled up and started rattling. I almost tripped and fell. I finished the run on an adrenalin high.

dat - Posted - 05/07/2015:  12:52:16

Great way to start a day huh?

OM45GE - Posted - 05/07/2015:  13:31:52

Oh yeah. Back at the hotel they said there were a lot of Pacific Coast rattlers out there and they were supposed to be extremely venomous. I don't know if they were trying to scare me but it worked if they were.

DeanT - Posted - 05/07/2015:  17:04:51

we caught something the local zoo called a pit-viper. We put it in a jar. It didn't look like anything when knew, so we took it to the zoo. They said we were lucky because a bite could be serious trouble. They kept it, and it might even still be there

OM45GE - Posted - 05/08/2015:  03:40:07

Where did you find that?

dat - Posted - 05/08/2015:  06:00:32

I think rattlesnakes, copperheads, water moccasins are all pit vipers, more too, it's a general type of "bad fer ya" snakes

DeanT - Posted - 05/08/2015:  06:18:29

It was at a friends place in Butler County Kansas. Just a little baby snake. The zoo people said the venom from baby snakes is more lethal than adult snakes

dat - Posted - 05/08/2015:  09:01:02

I've heard that before, so I try to stay away from them all

Mr. Quimby - Posted - 05/08/2015:  09:51:33

I had a pet snake I got my senior year in college and had for about 7 years after.  Finally gave her to a guy who had a lot of snakes because she wasn't really getting attention from me anymore.  Dogs and cats are a lot more vocal about needing to be fed and stuff.

dat - Posted - 05/08/2015:  14:24:43

I had a pet fish, but we had to flush it

DeanT - Posted - 05/08/2015:  14:28:30

The dogs and cats jump in the bed at night... don't think I could handle that with a snake

dat - Posted - 05/08/2015:  14:37:24

or worse, easing in without you knowing

dmiller - Posted - 05/08/2015:  21:57:56

When we were kids (back in southern Indiana), Dad built the house we lived in and did the landscaping for it too.  He liked seeing limestone for little retaining walls for flower gardens, patios, (and such) so he would take me and my brother out in the old 57 Chevy station wagon on weekends (with a trailer behind it) to go wander around the back roads to find stone in the local creek beds/ toss it in the trailer/ and bring it home to build a retaining wall.

I remember once we hit one creek for some rocks (it wasn't too far from Bean Blossom, but I didn't know about Bean Blossom and bluegrass back then). We pulled up in the station wagon with the trailer behind, and Dad pulled out a big stick from the car I hadn't seen.  He used that stick to turn over the rocks he was interested in and I wondered why.  He said snakes liked to be under rocks, and it was best to be careful.  As usual - - he was right. He turned over one rock there by the creek bed, and there was several baby copperheads underneath it.  He made the comment then that the babies were just as poisonous as the adults.

dmiller - Posted - 05/08/2015:  22:09:47

Snakes as pets??  Not for me - - thank you.  We had a guy who worked at the group home I work at (several years ago) who had a snake as a  pet.  He was a nice enough guy, but he was also in school learning how to work on cadavers and figure out the cause of death.  I think his interest in death affected his "choice of pet", but I could be wrong. Different strokes for different folks, eh?