Filling Up

Does anybody use the expression "fill up" any more? When I was younger and they actually had attendants in service stations who filled your gas tank for you, people would say "fill it up." I suppose we still use it, but it's not quite as common since the advent of self-service.

What made me think of this is the fact that I'm moving on to spacking/filling the divots in the shelf panels. I suppose the connect was "fill." Just got me going on random thoughts.

First up are the two holes I plugged with the holes I drilled from scrap. I was looking forward to doing this, because when they're done, no one will ever know there were big holes there. Way cool.

Then there are a few holes and dents here and there I found while doing the first sanding pass. Gotta fill them too.
I like to use the filler that goes on pinkish-purple and dries white so I can easily tell when it's dry enough to sand. If I didn't, I'd get impatient and start wanting to sand before the stuff is dry. This way I know I have to wait...usually I let it go overnight.

While doing the filling, I also found 4 or 5 nails that were sticking through the shelf bottom.

They must have been intended to hold the shelf top to the bottom, but they missed the bottom. I hammered the first one up and it broke through the shelf top. Have to go back and fix that later. I'll just yank the nail out and fill the hole. I'm going to leave it there no so I don't forget about it. I'll have to fill it and then paint the spot again.


Also found a couple of nail heads in the vertical panel that were sticking up just a bit. We need to drive them below the surface of the wood, so the resulting hole over the nail head can be filled.





Ve need special tool do drive ze nail down. For zis task, ve haff ze nail set. Bwhahaha. I love this thing. In fact, I have 3 of them in different sizes. I believe they cost like $4.95 or something at the Despot - for the whole set! That's like the best $4.95 I ever did spend. Check out the way cool knurling on the thing. I love knurled stuff. Easy to grip and looks way cool to boot.



One task that's been hanging around undone is filling some cracks in the floor. The floor is concrete, and concrete cracks. There was a crack that ran across the middle of the room I already filled, but I discovered two other smaller cracks while doing other work.

So we need to get our crack filler and go to it.

It's pretty straightforward - just spread the filler on the crack with a putty knife and let it dry. Then you are done.

After all the spackling is dried, it turns (as mentioned before) white. I went over the panel a final time with the trusty Ryobi sander armed with 120 grit paper. This was to smooth the surface a bit more and to also level the spots I just filled. The two plug holes are lookin' real good after this.

Soon, ve will paint ze primer!