Can’t Miss Crossover Event

Reading note: The introduction in italics is to be read in a gravely dramatic voice like a TV anouncer.

Don’t miss the first ever Blogger cross over event.  Resolution meets Ghetto Stylin’, in the backyard.

My mom and a friend of hers have a blog named Ghetto Stylin’. You may pause at the title and wonder what in the world it is all about.  It is neither a hip hop fan page nor an homage to their favorite Elvis Presley folk rock gospel ballad.  Jeff Foxworthy would have likely chosen a different name but the blog is essentially about resourcefulness.

A few days ago my mom (who is also one of my most faithful readers – Thanks mom!) suggested that we do a crossover event.  A backyard DIY project my wife and I finished today seemed to fit their Ghetto Stylin’ definition and the crossover event was born.  

A little history: Over the last few years the metal post that receives the latch for our back gate has been rusting at the base.  After winter the integrity of the post took a turn for the worse and it became very unstable. I knew the post would have to be replaced but postponed the project as long as possible because I knew there wasn’t going to be an easy fix.  This particular post was anchored in the sidewalk which meant that the fate of the pole was also tied to the fate of the slab of concrete that creates the walk way between the house and the garage. Breaking up and replacing the sidewalk just to replace the pole was out of the question, so I knew that when it broke I’d have to ghetto style it.

Eventually the pole got so bad that it tipped over and broke off at the rusted base.  I triaged the situation by tossing the pole in a nearby garden (ghetto stylin’) and latched the gate on a nearby corner piece of the garages aluminum siding (ghetto stylin’).  The pole sat in the garden for about 8 days and significantly deprived a long narrow swath of phlox of its radiant photosynthetic catalyst, though I’m happy to report that after I leaned the pole against the garage the plants recovered pretty well.

The final fix for the pole came today in the form of a ¾” steel pipe, pipe insulation and the original fence post.  The original pole was still underground so I cleared out the inside diameter below the surface with a drill and a 1 ¹/₈” spade bit then drove the ¾” pipe (whose outside diameter is about 1”) about 2 feet below the surface. My wife then cut the pipe insulation to length and wrapped it around the ¾” pipe.  After a test fitting and a trip to my worm farming brother's garage to cut off the rusted end we slid the original fence post as a sleeve over the insulation.  I finished the project by pounding the post down a few times and called it good enough.

I questioned whether this was truly ghetto stylin’ because we actually went to Home Depot to buy the pipe and insulation.  After some consideration I think it does still fit the category because one of the tenets of the ghetto stylin’ lifestyle is that after putting something off for a while, then considering nontraditional methods of resourcefulness, if all else fails, throw some money at the problem.