Periodic inspection and the occasional cleaning of your HVAC Evaporator Coil are critical home maintenance tasks to ensure optimal indoor air quality. No matter when you use your central A/C and heating system (for summer cooling and also winter heating), the air pushed through all the rooms of your house will flow through and over […]
Repairs
Spider Mite Arborvitae Decimation
July 2026 Update – Last spring and summer were brutal for landscaping in New Jersey… almost zero rain and non-stop heat in the nineties. I had a line of emerald green arborvitaes that had been growing beautifully for about 8-9 years. These got hit really hard, and I frankly never saw it coming. I thought […]
How to Repair a Leaky Basement Wall
2026 Update… My basement wall started leaking water into my office – right by my guitars. Fortunately, I spotted it quickly and it was a very slow leak. One that I could easily patch myself with hydraulic cement. But no matter how small the leak, it’s ‘a leak’ and it has to be dealt with […]
Phantom Dinnertime Doorbell Ringing
2025 Update – Every few days, right around dinnertime – my doorbell was ringing. And nobody was there. It wasn’t a repetitive ring, or a ring followed by the sound of laughter and kids running away; it was a very sensible single ring – beckoning for an answer. But nobody. While I wasn’t really sure […]
Carpet Tiles for a Quick Home Rehab
I never really considered the use of carpet tiles before. If I need to carpet a room, it’s usually something I contract-out because it’s clearly a talent – with wisdom acquired from experience. Best to have a professional carpet installer handle this. On the other hand, area rugs can be absolutely beautiful as well, adding […]
Belgian Block and Pavers – Dressing Up an Asphalt Driveway
2025 Update… My asphalt driveway was assaulted. I was hoping for the best, but we had construction trucks in and out several times during a pretty significant renovation project, and at some point the asphalt started to crack a bit on some edge areas — and then just continued to crumble. It wasn’t pretty. And the […]
How to Replace a Ceiling Fan
2025 Update… Sometimes, you just need something new – and for me, it was my bedroom ceiling fan. A 52-inch, LED light replacement for the Hunter ceiling fan I had installed when we first moved in almost 20 years ago. That’s a pretty impressive lifespan, and while I probably could have fixed the Hunter – as […]

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