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uses for well-weathered treated lumber
Wednesday, August 19 2026
Gretchen left for her morning physical therapy session (followed by work) while I was walking Charlotte down the Chamomile Gorge and back. As I approached the house on the Stick Trail while carrying a stone for the Woodshed Path Wall in one hand and a cup of kratom tea in the other, I saw a gleeful Neville go bounding across the Stick Trail and head down towards the ravine between our place and that of our downhill neighbors. Neville was supposed to be barricaded in the house behind the wooden board that bars access to the pet door. Had Gretchen spaced out and left without putting that in place? (Her constant communications regarding the march she is organizing sometimes distracts her enough for her to be as neglectful as a dementia patient.) I put the rock and tea aside and went after Neville, who had just started descending the steep terrain beyond the escarpment. I managed to get around below him and then guide him upward to a place where I had enough standing room to pick him up and then carry him back up and over the escarpment. Then, after resting, I carried him all the way to the newly-restored south deck. From there I herded him back into his corral. When I looked at the pet door, I saw that the piece of wood that blocks access to it was hanging by only one of its two top hooks, meaning Neville had lifted it from below and pushed it out of the way, giving him access to the pet door. There are hooks at the bottom that can be deployed to prevent this trick, but usually we only do that in cases where Neville is highly motivated (there is a porcupine in the yard, for example). Evidently being left alone in the house will motivate him enough in some cases to require the use of those bottom hooks.
My big chore today was to cut a piece of brand new treated lumber deck planking (a 16 foot six-by-five-quarter) so that it fit neatly around the posts holding up the new south rail on the south deck and then install it. I then used some pieces of old planking to finish off that plank run (which is about nineteen feet in length) and to replace a partial plank that had begun to rot on the end. Later I took all the lumber removed from the south deck and piled it in front of the garage so I can decide what to keep and what is worthless. Even after 30 years out in the environment, most of it is still sound enough for some kind of use. I can imagine some low-effort project like a kid-grade tree house or perhaps in casting forms for concrete. The worst pieces are the four by fours with substantial heart rot. But even they contain some good sections.
For dinner, I made a pan of low-effort chili into which I added cut-up homegrown cherry tomatoes and pieces of cauliflower. But Gretchen and I didn't end up eating it together because she immediately had to teleport into meetings the moment she got home.
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