December 1, 2024 • 38 mins
Dean advises a caller about cracks growing around her home and what to do to prevent it from cracking more. Dean continues to discuss about the possible reason why cracks are appearing throughout a caller's home.Dean talks about a typeof wheelbarrow that would be a considered a wonderful gift for the holidays. Also, a work bench for those creators who enjoy DIY. Work gloves are another additional gift idea. Lastly, Dean says that toolboxes are usually for professionals, and shares what is better for DIY-ers, the five-gallon bucket with organizers to help them stay organized.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
KFI AM six forty. You're listening to Dean Sharp the
House Whisper on demand on the iHeart Radio app Dean
Sharp the House Whisperer Live every Saturday and Sunday morning.
And of course you know this very program is also
the House Whisper podcast that you can listen to anytime
(00:22):
anywhere on demand. If you have missed a part of
the Gift Guide that we're going through today, you haven't
missed it because you can go back and listen anytime
you want. About an hour after we go off the air, actually,
this episode will be up in podcast form along with
all the others, hundreds of episodes, all searchable by topic.
(00:44):
It is literally a home improvement reference library for you
that is there for you any time, wherever, wherever you
want it. Also on our socials today, the Gift Guide
itself can be so you can see the items that
I'm talking about on Instagram and Facebook Home with Dean.
(01:06):
You just go there. Why don't you follow us while
you're there, and you know, hit like leave a comment,
but leave a nice comment. But the Gift Guide is there.
And also the KFI website, you can find our little
corner of the KFI website, and you will find the
gift Guide downloadable there. And the advantage of the downloadable
(01:27):
gift Guide on the KFI website is that all of
its links are active, so you can just literally click
on those links and be taken right to the purchasing
sources for all of this gear that we're talking about today. Okay,
so I promised I was going to do two things. One,
I'm going to go to the phones in just a
couple of seconds, but first I wanted to take a
(01:47):
couple of minutes to talk about the balance of safety
and functionality when it comes to construction in general or
building in general. And this is on the heels of
a strongly recommending the last item on the gift guide
that I just talked about, which is for a table saw,
(02:08):
a featherboard attachment, and a push block so that people
can keep their hands away from that dangerous, dangerous blade.
But not just that. The reason I was touting it
so strongly is that this is one of those rare
instances where not only does a safety device keep you safer,
but it also improves the actual cutting process for your
(02:32):
end results. And when you can get both of those
happening together at the same time, it is a win
win times one hundred. Otherwise, generally speaking, safety equipment can
sometimes get in the way of the job that you
want to do. And so is that me saying that
you should just ignore safety equipment. No, not at all.
(02:55):
You got to protect yourself. But I'm just letting you
know from an experienced pro and all of you pros
out there, you guys know exactly what I'm talking about. UH.
There's a balance that has to be found between keeping
ourselves safe and UH and keeping the job flowing properly
because some gear can get in the way. The metaphor
(03:15):
that I like to use or the analogy, I don't
know what it is, UH is, UH is athletics. Just
think of a football player, professional football. Okay, we wrap
our football players in pads, in protective gear. There are
thigh pads, there are hip pads, their shoulder pads. You know, face,
(03:36):
there's a helmet, there's face masks, all all of this
to protect them from what's going on out there. Okay,
we could protect them more than we do. We could, literally,
we could. We could build a an armored coating for
a football player that would guarantee that they never get
(03:57):
injured ever. But guess what, by the time we do that,
they would also not be able to move or run
down down the field, or catch or kick footballs. And
so every source of safety device has to have a
limit where it protects and doesn't actually hinder range of
(04:21):
movement and visibility and all of these kinds of things.
So you get it right, We want the gear as
safe as possible, and we also want to be able
to move and function and get the job done. And
every bit of safety equipment is somewhere riding on that line.
So whether it's a set of gloves that i'll talk
(04:42):
about in just a little bit, or any kind of
safety gear that you add to your equipment set, just
be aware you can over insulate yourself from risk to
the point where you now you're not even doing the
work well. And sometimes I make the argue you can
so overinsulate yourself that now you're working with a tool
(05:04):
that all this stuff is supposed to protect you from,
but you're fumbling with it awkwardly and you're probably increasing
the risk of getting into trouble with that tool and
getting injured in the first place. So there you go.
That's my spiel on safety gear. There has to be
a balance. Think of it like an athletic competition. We
want all the protection that is critical and probably not
(05:28):
a single ounce more beyond that in order to stay
functional along the way. And it's always a balancing act. Okay,
shall we go to the phones. Let's at least start
a call if we can. Let's talk to Laurna. Hey, Lorna,
welcome home.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
Hello, Thank you for answering. My problem is we live
in a sixty four year old house and it started
developing cracks around our windows, the walls, significant cracks, and
on the ceiling, and we are trying to decide what
to do. First, should we get a building inspector. We've
(06:07):
called it a contractor and he said, oh, this is shocking.
What should we do?
Speaker 1 (06:14):
Okay, all right, so let's just back up. So when
we say significant cracks, describe one to me. Is this
a crack that has opened up or is it just
a crack that is significant because it's long, or is
it significant because there are so many of them everywhere?
Help me better understand what these cracks look like.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
Okay, there are many of them. The most significant one
is on the ceiling in our living room. It is long.
It's about four feet long, and the widest part is
about an eighth of an inch open, almost maybe a
quarter of an inch.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Okay, okay, And what does the contractor tell you in
regards to what the source of these cracks are?
Speaker 2 (07:00):
In their opinion, the contractor really doesn't know. He said
he's going to measure them. He measured them, took pictures,
and it's going to come back in three months to
see if they're developing getting bigger. And if they are,
then we don't know what our next step is. If
they're not, then he has ways that he can fix them,
(07:21):
like maybe putting a sheer wall and trying to close
up the whole area. But they're all over. They're in
our bedroom windows, they're in the living room. We also
have a patio outside that seems to be cracking.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Okay, all right, and let me ask us you when
did these start happening.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
I'd say the first ones about six months ago.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
And then they've continued. And so can you connect these
to any particular event that happened? Was it after you know,
a little earthquake? Tembler? Is it was it after heavy rains?
What where's your house?
Speaker 3 (08:06):
By the way, pardon.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Where's the house by the way, Oh, the.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
House in Santa Clarita. We live a little bit on
the slope too.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
A little bit on a slope in Santa Criita. And
how old is the house?
Speaker 2 (08:20):
The house is sixty four years old?
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Four years old? That's right, you said that.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Sorry, wonderful old house. Kind of theiler style.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
Oh, an Eikler style house, a little.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
March windows.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
Okay, I got you, I got you, all right? That
Actually that helps a lot. All right, Lorna, here's the thing.
We're up against the break. I want everybody thinking about
your house, and we're going to go. Here's some news,
and when we come back, I'm going to address this
the best that I know how and give you some
guidance along the way. Can you hang tight?
Speaker 3 (08:57):
Okay, all right, okay, all.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Right, Lorna, you stay, but everybody stay put.
Speaker 4 (09:03):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Thanks for joining us on the program. I know how
valuable your Sunday mornings are to you. They're just as
valuable to me. And we consider it an honor and
a privilege that you have decided to spend a little
time with us talking about that wonderful place that you
call home. We're going through our house Whisper Holiday gift
(09:31):
Guide this weekend. Can't get through the whole thing. I'm
just highlighting certain bits along the way. The entire gift
guide is waiting for you at our social media page
on Instagram and Facebook. Right at the top of our posts,
you will find the gift guide. Also on the KFI website,
a downloadable version that you can utilize the links to
(09:54):
actually get to directly to the sources of this gear.
It's a good gift guide this year, all tools and
gear this year, and we're gonna get back to that
in just a bit. But also taking calls right now.
I've been talking to Laura about her house. She's got
a sixty four year old house out in Santa Clarita,
and all of a sudden, well, I should say, in
the last few months, uh cracks, cracks starting to occur
(10:18):
on windows, on the ceiling, and the you know, a
reasonable question, which is what is going on? How serious?
Is how do we fix this? And and so on? So, Laura,
are you still with me? I am, yes, Okay, all right,
So you said it's kind of an Ekler sort of
(10:39):
style home, which is kind of story, yeah, single story,
kind of a modernist ranch home, low profile modernist ranch
home at sixty four years. So I'm going to try
and I want to do diligence to help you out
so that you feel safe. But I also want to,
(10:59):
you know, calm your nerves a little bit in regards
to this stuff and warn you about a couple. Okay,
you got a nice, big open ceiling, and you've got
a crack that I'm guessing has formed near the center
of the ceiling.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Yes, it's also attached to a fireplace that we had remodeled.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Okay, all right, place in the middle of the room.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Okay, so the fireplace in the middle of and you
had it remodeled, yes, how long ago?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
The fireplace we did about four years ago.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
Okay, all right. So here's the thing. A house that's
in its sixties, not unlike people in their sixties, start
creaking and sagging a little bit. This does not mean
that there is seriously any structural issues going on. Okay.
(11:56):
A house that has a large open ceiling constructed back
in the nineteen sixties or here literally for you, like
right at the end of the nineteen fifties, especially in
a modernist kind of minimalist profile. Sixty years later, for
(12:18):
those ceiling joys to begin to sag just a little bit,
maybe not perceptibly, but enough that it actually pops the
seam on the dry wall that's up there. Totally common,
not unusual at all, and nor is it a sign
of structural failure. It's just a little bit of sagging.
(12:41):
The same around cracks that appear around windows and doors.
And when we say around windows and doors, I am
again you didn't say this, but I'm guessing these are
angular cracks heading out of the corners of the windows,
out against exactly this is from the house just standing
there for sixty plus years. It shifts a little bit,
(13:01):
It shifts a little left, it shifts a little right
in imperceptible ways. And the corners of windows and doors,
where those jams come together with the framing is what
we call a knee a knee joint in the structure
of the house, and it's the most likely place for
a little hairline crack to appear. And so when it
(13:23):
comes to hairline cracks in stucco and dry wall in plaster,
I am rarely, if ever concerned. And what I mean
by hairline, I don't care how long they are. They
could be four inches long, they could be twelve inches long.
But when they're not separating and coming apart and there's
no gap in them, then it's what we would call
(13:45):
a settlement or a shifting crack. Okay, there's no hair line, yeah, okay,
so these are opening up hairline exactly. So that's why
the right person to call at this point, okay, just
to alleviate your fears and to address the whole issue,
because I'm guessing that could be a number of things.
(14:06):
It could simply be the house, which in nineteen sixty
built very differently in terms of seismic and lateral shift
resistance than we build houses today. So that house simply
could be age. And maybe it's just that, maybe just
a little bit of reinforcement here there maybe something about
(14:29):
the slab and the subfloor maybe shifting. That's a little
bit greater concern. But here's what you don't do. Don't
call a contractor out yet. Okay, not a contractor. I
want you to find in Santa Clarita. There are plenty
of them. A reputable structural engineer that does residential work,
(14:53):
and I want you to call them and engage them
and say we would like you to come out and
do a consult for us out our home and look
around our home and evaluate these cracks and give us
your best view of why they're occurring and what's going on.
The structural engineer. Console's going to cost you a couple
three hundred dollars for them to come out for a
(15:15):
bit and to look around. And it's worth its weight
in gold because and not that there there there are
plenty of honest contractors in your area, but there are
also not honest contractors in your area. Contractors who will
come in and say, oh my, yeah, well you know,
(15:35):
we're gonna have to rebuild this ceiling and we're going
to have to do this and do you know, and
start actually giving you a picture of damage repair way
beyond potentially the scope of what really needs to happen.
So what you want is a non vested professional expert opinion.
The structural engineer is going to get paid what they're
(15:57):
going to get paid. They are not looking to turn
it into a bigger job. They're not the ones going
to do the repair work, so they have no vested
interest of telling you, yeah, you got to do some
serious work here or no, this is fine. They're simply
going to give you their honest, professional opinion, and it's
an expert opinion about the bones of the house, and
(16:17):
that's what you want. That's what you want right now,
And not to say that there probably aren't a few
little things that could be done before you patch these
drywall cracks to help ensure that they don't reoccur, especially
when it comes to the one out in the middle
of the ceiling doors and windows. I'm not half as
(16:39):
concerned about, honestly, but I want it to get a
serious look at. When it comes to the mid span
of ceiling joys, there may be something we can do
up above them to stiffen them or to keep them
from sagging anymore, so that when you spend the money
to patch the drywall, we don't actually have that crack
(16:59):
come back six months later, which is something that obviously
we want to avoid doing. Okay, so we want whatever
settlement and shifting has happened, we want to ideally make
sure it doesn't go any further and then do the
patch work. That's when you call a contractor or a
drywaller or whoever to come out and actually get the
work done. But the professional opinion that I want ahead
(17:22):
of time is actually just from an engineer to give
you some peace of mind that the house is in
the shape that it's.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
Yeah, okay, all right, okay, thank you very much, all right, Laura.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
And believe me, these are not the kinds of cracks
that you're describing that you know you have to worry about.
Speaker 3 (17:41):
You.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
We better get them out here next week, otherwise this
thing is going to fall down on us. Not the case.
Get through the holidays, enjoy your holidays, get somebody scheduled
to come out in early January, give an honest look
for you, and then take it from there. It's probably
an age really, not to mention, not to say that
(18:02):
something shouldn't be done, but it's probably age related, all right.
Chall When we come back back to the Holiday Gift Guide.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
Hey, guess what we just did. We just made a
little ax video. No, not an axe murderer video, a
little axe video. We've got an Ax twenty four inch
Bushcraft ax on the Gift Guide this week or this year,
and I just did a little one minute or video
which Tina's going to be posting where everywhere Instagram, Facebook
(18:42):
and TikTok within moments. Tina says she's going to get
it up in about five minutes. It'll be there, and
you can check this one out visually, and I give
you a little little history lesson on why certain actss
look a certain way. Anyway, all right, back to the
gift guide. We are just just skimming the surface. There
(19:06):
are thirty really really great items on the Gift Guide
this year, all worth checking out. You can check them
out on social media at Instagram and Facebook and downloadable
on the KFI website, our little corner of the KFI website.
So follow along with us as I discuss this gift
guide with you. Okay, here's a solid tool, a great tool,
(19:31):
one of those tools again where I'm usually hesitant to
recommend the does everything tool because you know, okay, if
it does everything, it probably does everything, so so this
one would be one of those exceptions. Number sixteen on
the Gift Guide is the arrow cart wheelbarrow. It's a
(19:51):
wheelbarrow ish or is it a dolly and a hand
truck or is it yeah, exactly all of those. Is
it a wagon. This is a brilliant little uh a little,
it's a it's a brilliant tool. It is a combination
hand truck, dolly wagon and wheelbarrow. Now, the only place
(20:15):
that it falls short in my opinion and out of necessity,
is that as a wheelbarrow, it's not a gigantic wheelbarrow,
and it doesn't hold you know, like you know, three
cubic yards of stuff. But for most homeowner applications, you
just don't need that much of a wheelbarrow. This is
(20:35):
for most applications plenty enough. And it's a two wheeled wheelbarrow,
so it's super stable and it can be treated more
like a wagon that you move through the yard because
the handles are adjustable and adaptable, and it makes a
great hand truck. All of these are are items that
(20:57):
I would say, and this is why I love this one.
It's one hundred and seventy dollars item. It's well made,
it's well reviewed. I've seen them in action. But all
of these items, a handtruck, a wheelbarrow, these kinds of
gardening carts. They're not things that you know, you go
to every day, every day, every day and because of that,
(21:17):
you know, having all three or four sitting around in
your garage or in your tool shed takes up a
lot of space. This guy right here combines three relatively
infrequently used tools into one that does it all really,
really well and saves you a bunch of space at
the same time. So that's why it made it to
(21:40):
our list this year. That's the Arrow cart Wheelbarrow one
hundred and seventy dollars. Check it out, look it up online,
or see it on the Gift Guide as well. Where
else are we going here? Okay? Always I'm a looking
for ways of turning a garage which is otherwise used
(22:01):
as a garage into a really effective workshop space for
those DII wires and woodworkers and hobbyists that you love.
Talk about a brilliant way to get a work table
a workbench going on in the garage on project day
that otherwise totally gets out of your way. I've recommended
(22:21):
this on the Gift Guide before it is back by
popular demand. Number twenty one on the Gift Guide is
the Bora. The company's name is Bora b O r A,
the Bora Centipede portable workbench platform. It's about one hundred
bucks for the large format one. This essentially think of
(22:42):
the way that at like an easy up you know,
canopy expands with all the little you know, like the
cross scissoring expansion. This guy is a is one of
those kinds of things, not a canopy, though it stands
only like kind of like a collapsible camping. It stands
about thirty thirty six inches tall, and it collapses down
(23:06):
into you know, probably a ten by ten square and
literally can just be sitting off in the corner of
the garage or hung or put in a cabinet somewhere.
But you pull this thing out, it expands out and
it becomes a platform for a four x eight sheet
of plywood. And the combination of that sheet of plywood
(23:28):
and this base underneath it, you now have a massive,
well stabilized temporary workbench for as long as you want
to work it. And then off comes the plywood, collapse
these legs down and just store them in the corner
of the garage. It is brilliant. It's super strong. I
think it has an over two thousand pounds weight capacity
(23:52):
on it. You can put your table saw up there,
you can put your microsaw up there you can load
lumber up. I mean, it is a real, really brilliant
device made out of relatively lightweight reinforced fiberglass legs and braces,
and you got to check it out. The Bora Centipede
portable workbench platform for about one hundred dollars. It's brilliant
(24:15):
and it's going to make somebody a di wire's eyes sparkle. Gloves.
Let's talk about gloves real quick. I'm not going to
repeat what I said earlier in the show about safety
and the balance of safety and dexterity. You already heard
me say that if you hadn't go back and listen
to that in the podcast, but this is a perfect
(24:36):
example of that. My favorite overall work gloves for woodworkers
and anybody who's doing a di wire or just general
around the house work is by Ironclad and it's the
framer glove. Now, what's different about it is a beautiful
reinforced cloth framing glove, protective glove, protection on your palm,
(25:00):
protection on your fingers, pre articulated fingers. That means that
the glove was created with the fingers in the slightly
bent condition, because that's the natural form of your relaxed hand,
not straight out. A straight glove actually causes fatigue on
your fingers when you're not doing anything because your fingers
are naturally bent, pre articulated fingers. But here's the key.
(25:25):
The your index finger, your ring finger, not your ring finger,
your index finger in your middle finger and your thumb.
The tips are exposed. Okay, so here's the thing. Now,
could they be covered over like a regular glove and
better protected. Yes, But you think about all the work
that you do when you're when you're reaching into tool
(25:47):
bags and you're reaching for tools and feeling around for
a screw or a nail or whatever the case may be.
It is this little tripod of your thumb, your index finger,
and your middle finger, those three digits right there. If
the tips are exposed so you can feel everything with
those guys, then you know what you have the maximum
(26:09):
situation where you have maximum dexterity. And then everything else
is completely covered and protected. And even those fingers are
three quarters protected. It's just the tips of your fingers,
the last knuckle out that is exposed. So does it
expose them, sure, but your whole hand is protected and
you've got the dexterity of those three exposed surfaces different
(26:33):
than a mechanics glove in which all of the fingers
are exposed. That's more than you need for construction. But
these three this is literally, in my opinion, the world's
most brilliant and useful protective glove for a woodworker, a carpenter,
or anybody just doing heavy work around because of the
(26:53):
combination again of enough safety and enough dexterity for both
to be great. And these gloves are I think a
pair which will last you a long time. About twenty
seven dollars a great gift. And again, the reason I'm
explaining all these things to you is when these gifts
get opened up on Chris Morris morning to that loved
(27:14):
one who you gave them to. Now you've got the
story behind it, and you can sizzle these gifts for
them so that they get excited about why you purchased
this particular thing for them and all the good reasons
behind it. All Right, when we come back more of
the twenty twenty four House Whisper Holiday Gift Guide.
Speaker 4 (27:33):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
Welcome Home, Where did three hours go? What a wonderful
time spent with you this morning talking about this year's
House Whisper Holiday Gift Guide. I have just enough time
to get a couple of more in. The gift guide
has way more items on it than what we were
able to discuss this morning. You can find it again
(28:03):
online at our social on Instagram and Facebook both home
with Dean that's our handle. You can go there. While
you're there, why don't you follow us and like and
leave a comment and say Merry Christmas and enjoy the
gift guide. You can view them both there and also
on the KFI website, our little corner of the KFI website.
(28:24):
Find the house Whisper page there and you will find
the gift guide downloadable. And the advantage there is that
the links are live, so you can just click on
them and go right to the purchase sources that we found,
although you can find these things in many other places,
so there you go. Also just did a little video
that's going to be uploaded soon on Instagram, Facebook and
(28:46):
TikTok about one of the items on the gift guide,
a little axe, a little woodworking ax that was just
it's one of those things that if you've got a
woodcutter in your family. This will just blow them away.
It's just one of those very very special things because
it's great and also I get to explain to you
(29:07):
a little bit about what happens with the head of
an ax as it does its job. All right, Laying
all that aside, I've got just enough time to get
a couple of more items in. Here's something I mention
it every year, and I probably always will. There's such
a temptation this time of year to buy toolboxes for
(29:28):
loved ones who are di wires, and I just want
to remind you. I mean, I got nothing against it,
but I just want to remind you that tool boxes
with the locking lids and the handles and all of that,
those are really designed initially for professionals who load up
their tools, throw their tools in the back of a
(29:48):
pickup truck and head off to other places. For the
average homeowner work in your project at home, a toolbox
with the lid and the latches and all of that
stuff and it's limited storage capacity is not actually the
best way of handling your tools at your project at home.
This is what I love, way way better, and that
(30:10):
is a five gallon bucket literally Yep, no better. I
don't care where you get at your local hardware store,
the big box store. Buy that three dollars and seventy
five cents five gallon bucket, and then get them a
bucket boss bucket tool organizer. It's heavy duty Cordura insert
(30:31):
that laps over the outside of a bucket and basically
becomes a set of tool bags for your project at home.
And the reason why I love it is that you
don't have to This is not for transporting off to
some off site job site. This is for the drill
gun to go in the bits few tools. You can
(30:51):
put nails down in the bottom, all of the supply,
all of it there, and then you carry it around.
You can even have a seat top for it so
that when they're sitting there working on their project, they've
got a place to sit as opposed to kneeling or
getting on their knees. A bucket boss for home projects
is I'm gonna say ten times better and more efficient.
(31:14):
And I know this for a fact because I would
never use one of our toolboxes here at the house.
I always just grab the five gallon bucket, throw my
stuff in there. If I'm not wearing my tool bags.
It's going in the bucket boss, and it's getting carried
around the house or to wherever I'm my project because
I keep everything with me. It doesn't hold just the tools.
(31:35):
It's the screws, it's the trash, it's the everything. It
is just literally one of the best construction and building
inventions ever, and I mean the fanciest, nicest, craziest, long lasting.
Bucket Boss is like a fifty dollars insert into a
three dollars bucket, so worth its weight in gold. And
(31:58):
then the last thing is and I want you to
check this out. I don't have time to tell you
about it in depth, but a new evolution in terms
of tool bag designs. Right, you can get a tool
bag with a nice padded belt so it doesn't do
as much damage to your hips. Or you can add
to that classically a pair of suspenders that takes a
(32:19):
little weight off your hips and puts it more on
your shoulders. But these days, the guys over at Diamondback Tools,
you just got to go to the diamond If you're
a toolist, you got to go to the Diamondback tool
website and check out the seven Zho one tool vest.
This is a vest. It's breedable, it's flexible, it doesn't
(32:40):
get in the way, but it provides so much better
support than a tool belt or suspenders. This vest integrates
tool pouches. Plus it's the best of suspenders, but even
better than that. You just got to go check it out.
It's very, very high tech. It's one hundred and seventy
dollars item. Okay, it's a life time purchase item, but
(33:01):
it is worth its weight in gold. Yet again, I
know I say that a lot about everything I'm talking
about here, because these are only really good options. All right,
enough of that for today. I don't have anything deeply
philosophical to tell you here at the end of today's program,
but I do have an update on sharp family life.
(33:25):
Excuse me, and I know some of you like to
hear that kind of thing, so I will leave you
with this thought today. Here is the holiday report from
the House that Love built. Here, Tina holding the camera
right there, my greatest grit, my greatest Christmas present. She
continues to make a strong recovery from her surgery. I
(33:45):
could end the good news right there, and that would
be enough. I also have to say thank you for
so many amazingly kind cards and flowers and gifts and
well wishes, and believe me, she is feeling all of
that love. Two of our favorite humans, Christie's mom Jan
and our dear friend Angie, are both out from Ohio
(34:05):
this week, which is always an absolute joy for our family.
Thanksgiving was lovely. We deviated from the turkey this year,
as we are prone to do, and my culinary team,
my crack culinary team, which consists of my daughter in
law Christy, my dear friend Sarah, usually Tina, but she
was on the sidelines this year. We all pulled together
(34:26):
a fantastic fenel salad, traditional lamb shepherd pie, lollipop drumsticks
of sticky lemon chicken, roasted Brussels sprout and celery root
hash and Southern corn bread and top it off with
some German chocolate, pecan pie and roasted apples. Angie contributed
to cranberry Daker mix, so Angie and Jan brought her
(34:50):
a game with the cheeseball and her unbelievably addictive Chex mix,
which I beg her for every year and she always
pays off. So a highlight of Thanksgiving was our eight
year old granddaughter Olivia. We already talked about this earlier
in the show, producing a series of investigative journalist videos
called villager News, in which she reported on each of
(35:12):
Tina's violations of the doctory recovery orders. And I have
a feeling she has inadvertently started a new family comedy tradition,
because we've all been using villager News when we are
whistleblowing on each other's mistakes. Now in the family yesterday
with small Business Saturday. To celebrate it, me and Tea
(35:33):
designed a new sofa for the family room with the
help of our friend John Shoemaker at Arizona Leather. While
I'm on the topic of small business, can I just
remind you that there is so much more to life
than being able to buy twenty four pairs of socks
for eight dollars from a multinational corporation. When you shop local,
(35:55):
you're doing so much more than helping a small business.
You are investing in your own quality of life. Whether
it's the pleasure of collaborating on a sofa with a passionate,
trusted expert like John at Arizona Leather, or the way
we always feel when we sit down at Maide in
Italy and Westlake Village, or at em On High in
(36:16):
Moore Park, or being greeted by name by the baristas
at five oh seven Coffee, or the folks at Ace
Hardware or Bert's Pharmacy or Michael's Bicycles, or countless other
such experiences around our town. Tina and I have intentionally
kept our own business small, precisely because for us, it's
(36:37):
all about these amazing relationships with our clients, almost all
of which become dear friends. This is a quality of
life that only relationships and care and passion and pride
in craftsmanship and real human contact can create, and it
is irreplaceable. So on that note, in an hour, we're
(37:00):
gonna go off to acquire this year's Christmas tree first
stop five oh seven Coffee with some kind of wonderful beverage,
headed over to Christmas Ranch Tree Farm on Peterson, which
is our family owned local Christmas tree farm. After getting
the tree set up, we're gonna have some form of
warm dinner, probably some fire pit time, and I think
(37:22):
we're going to watch another installment of The Lord of
the Rings, which just this week. Olivia has now officially
become the third generation of sharps to discover the magic
of and which her father and I are extremely excited
to offer our guidance through Middle Earth and reliving our
(37:43):
own joy of this through her eyes. So anyway, that's it.
That's our Villager News report for today. If there's one
common denominator in all of this, it's this people.
Speaker 3 (37:54):
People.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
I would encourage you to find yours, to know and
be known in your community, because those are the kinds
of people who will help you build yourself a beautiful life.
Have a wonderful First of December twenty twenty four. We
will see you right back there. This has been Home
(38:18):
with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper. Tune into the live
broadcast on KFI AM six forty every Saturday morning from
six to eight Pacific time and every Sunday morning from
nine to noon Pacific time, or anytime on demand on
the iHeartRadio app.
KFI AM six forty. You're listening to Dean Sharp the
House Whisper on demand on the iHeart Radio app Dean
Sharp the House Whisperer Live every Saturday and Sunday morning.
And of course you know this very program is also
the House Whisper podcast that you can listen to anytime
(00:22):
anywhere on demand. If you have missed a part of
the Gift Guide that we're going through today, you haven't
missed it because you can go back and listen anytime
you want. About an hour after we go off the air, actually,
this episode will be up in podcast form along with
all the others, hundreds of episodes, all searchable by topic.
(00:44):
It is literally a home improvement reference library for you
that is there for you any time, wherever, wherever you
want it. Also on our socials today, the Gift Guide
itself can be so you can see the items that
I'm talking about on Instagram and Facebook Home with Dean.
(01:06):
You just go there. Why don't you follow us while
you're there, and you know, hit like leave a comment,
but leave a nice comment. But the Gift Guide is there.
And also the KFI website, you can find our little
corner of the KFI website, and you will find the
gift Guide downloadable there. And the advantage of the downloadable
(01:27):
gift Guide on the KFI website is that all of
its links are active, so you can just literally click
on those links and be taken right to the purchasing
sources for all of this gear that we're talking about today. Okay,
so I promised I was going to do two things. One,
I'm going to go to the phones in just a
couple of seconds, but first I wanted to take a
(01:47):
couple of minutes to talk about the balance of safety
and functionality when it comes to construction in general or
building in general. And this is on the heels of
a strongly recommending the last item on the gift guide
that I just talked about, which is for a table saw,
(02:08):
a featherboard attachment, and a push block so that people
can keep their hands away from that dangerous, dangerous blade.
But not just that. The reason I was touting it
so strongly is that this is one of those rare
instances where not only does a safety device keep you safer,
but it also improves the actual cutting process for your
(02:32):
end results. And when you can get both of those
happening together at the same time, it is a win
win times one hundred. Otherwise, generally speaking, safety equipment can
sometimes get in the way of the job that you
want to do. And so is that me saying that
you should just ignore safety equipment. No, not at all.
(02:55):
You got to protect yourself. But I'm just letting you
know from an experienced pro and all of you pros
out there, you guys know exactly what I'm talking about. UH.
There's a balance that has to be found between keeping
ourselves safe and UH and keeping the job flowing properly
because some gear can get in the way. The metaphor
(03:15):
that I like to use or the analogy, I don't
know what it is, UH is, UH is athletics. Just
think of a football player, professional football. Okay, we wrap
our football players in pads, in protective gear. There are
thigh pads, there are hip pads, their shoulder pads. You know, face,
(03:36):
there's a helmet, there's face masks, all all of this
to protect them from what's going on out there. Okay,
we could protect them more than we do. We could, literally,
we could. We could build a an armored coating for
a football player that would guarantee that they never get
(03:57):
injured ever. But guess what, by the time we do that,
they would also not be able to move or run
down down the field, or catch or kick footballs. And
so every source of safety device has to have a
limit where it protects and doesn't actually hinder range of
(04:21):
movement and visibility and all of these kinds of things.
So you get it right, We want the gear as
safe as possible, and we also want to be able
to move and function and get the job done. And
every bit of safety equipment is somewhere riding on that line.
So whether it's a set of gloves that i'll talk
(04:42):
about in just a little bit, or any kind of
safety gear that you add to your equipment set, just
be aware you can over insulate yourself from risk to
the point where you now you're not even doing the
work well. And sometimes I make the argue you can
so overinsulate yourself that now you're working with a tool
(05:04):
that all this stuff is supposed to protect you from,
but you're fumbling with it awkwardly and you're probably increasing
the risk of getting into trouble with that tool and
getting injured in the first place. So there you go.
That's my spiel on safety gear. There has to be
a balance. Think of it like an athletic competition. We
want all the protection that is critical and probably not
(05:28):
a single ounce more beyond that in order to stay
functional along the way. And it's always a balancing act. Okay,
shall we go to the phones. Let's at least start
a call if we can. Let's talk to Laurna. Hey, Lorna,
welcome home.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
Hello, Thank you for answering. My problem is we live
in a sixty four year old house and it started
developing cracks around our windows, the walls, significant cracks, and
on the ceiling, and we are trying to decide what
to do. First, should we get a building inspector. We've
(06:07):
called it a contractor and he said, oh, this is shocking.
What should we do?
Speaker 1 (06:14):
Okay, all right, so let's just back up. So when
we say significant cracks, describe one to me. Is this
a crack that has opened up or is it just
a crack that is significant because it's long, or is
it significant because there are so many of them everywhere?
Help me better understand what these cracks look like.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
Okay, there are many of them. The most significant one
is on the ceiling in our living room. It is long.
It's about four feet long, and the widest part is
about an eighth of an inch open, almost maybe a
quarter of an inch.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Okay, okay, And what does the contractor tell you in
regards to what the source of these cracks are?
Speaker 2 (07:00):
In their opinion, the contractor really doesn't know. He said
he's going to measure them. He measured them, took pictures,
and it's going to come back in three months to
see if they're developing getting bigger. And if they are,
then we don't know what our next step is. If
they're not, then he has ways that he can fix them,
(07:21):
like maybe putting a sheer wall and trying to close
up the whole area. But they're all over. They're in
our bedroom windows, they're in the living room. We also
have a patio outside that seems to be cracking.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Okay, all right, and let me ask us you when
did these start happening.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
I'd say the first ones about six months ago.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
And then they've continued. And so can you connect these
to any particular event that happened? Was it after you know,
a little earthquake? Tembler? Is it was it after heavy rains?
What where's your house?
Speaker 3 (08:06):
By the way, pardon.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Where's the house by the way, Oh, the.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
House in Santa Clarita. We live a little bit on
the slope too.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
A little bit on a slope in Santa Criita. And
how old is the house?
Speaker 2 (08:20):
The house is sixty four years old?
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Four years old? That's right, you said that.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Sorry, wonderful old house. Kind of theiler style.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
Oh, an Eikler style house, a little.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
March windows.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
Okay, I got you, I got you, all right? That
Actually that helps a lot. All right, Lorna, here's the thing.
We're up against the break. I want everybody thinking about
your house, and we're going to go. Here's some news,
and when we come back, I'm going to address this
the best that I know how and give you some
guidance along the way. Can you hang tight?
Speaker 3 (08:57):
Okay, all right, okay, all.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Right, Lorna, you stay, but everybody stay put.
Speaker 4 (09:03):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Thanks for joining us on the program. I know how
valuable your Sunday mornings are to you. They're just as
valuable to me. And we consider it an honor and
a privilege that you have decided to spend a little
time with us talking about that wonderful place that you
call home. We're going through our house Whisper Holiday gift
(09:31):
Guide this weekend. Can't get through the whole thing. I'm
just highlighting certain bits along the way. The entire gift
guide is waiting for you at our social media page
on Instagram and Facebook. Right at the top of our posts,
you will find the gift guide. Also on the KFI website,
a downloadable version that you can utilize the links to
(09:54):
actually get to directly to the sources of this gear.
It's a good gift guide this year, all tools and
gear this year, and we're gonna get back to that
in just a bit. But also taking calls right now.
I've been talking to Laura about her house. She's got
a sixty four year old house out in Santa Clarita,
and all of a sudden, well, I should say, in
the last few months, uh cracks, cracks starting to occur
(10:18):
on windows, on the ceiling, and the you know, a
reasonable question, which is what is going on? How serious?
Is how do we fix this? And and so on? So, Laura,
are you still with me? I am, yes, Okay, all right,
So you said it's kind of an Ekler sort of
(10:39):
style home, which is kind of story, yeah, single story,
kind of a modernist ranch home, low profile modernist ranch
home at sixty four years. So I'm going to try
and I want to do diligence to help you out
so that you feel safe. But I also want to,
(10:59):
you know, calm your nerves a little bit in regards
to this stuff and warn you about a couple. Okay,
you got a nice, big open ceiling, and you've got
a crack that I'm guessing has formed near the center
of the ceiling.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Yes, it's also attached to a fireplace that we had remodeled.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Okay, all right, place in the middle of the room.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Okay, so the fireplace in the middle of and you
had it remodeled, yes, how long ago?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
The fireplace we did about four years ago.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
Okay, all right. So here's the thing. A house that's
in its sixties, not unlike people in their sixties, start
creaking and sagging a little bit. This does not mean
that there is seriously any structural issues going on. Okay.
(11:56):
A house that has a large open ceiling constructed back
in the nineteen sixties or here literally for you, like
right at the end of the nineteen fifties, especially in
a modernist kind of minimalist profile. Sixty years later, for
(12:18):
those ceiling joys to begin to sag just a little bit,
maybe not perceptibly, but enough that it actually pops the
seam on the dry wall that's up there. Totally common,
not unusual at all, and nor is it a sign
of structural failure. It's just a little bit of sagging.
(12:41):
The same around cracks that appear around windows and doors.
And when we say around windows and doors, I am
again you didn't say this, but I'm guessing these are
angular cracks heading out of the corners of the windows,
out against exactly this is from the house just standing
there for sixty plus years. It shifts a little bit,
(13:01):
It shifts a little left, it shifts a little right
in imperceptible ways. And the corners of windows and doors,
where those jams come together with the framing is what
we call a knee a knee joint in the structure
of the house, and it's the most likely place for
a little hairline crack to appear. And so when it
(13:23):
comes to hairline cracks in stucco and dry wall in plaster,
I am rarely, if ever concerned. And what I mean
by hairline, I don't care how long they are. They
could be four inches long, they could be twelve inches long.
But when they're not separating and coming apart and there's
no gap in them, then it's what we would call
(13:45):
a settlement or a shifting crack. Okay, there's no hair line, yeah, okay,
so these are opening up hairline exactly. So that's why
the right person to call at this point, okay, just
to alleviate your fears and to address the whole issue,
because I'm guessing that could be a number of things.
(14:06):
It could simply be the house, which in nineteen sixty
built very differently in terms of seismic and lateral shift
resistance than we build houses today. So that house simply
could be age. And maybe it's just that, maybe just
a little bit of reinforcement here there maybe something about
(14:29):
the slab and the subfloor maybe shifting. That's a little
bit greater concern. But here's what you don't do. Don't
call a contractor out yet. Okay, not a contractor. I
want you to find in Santa Clarita. There are plenty
of them. A reputable structural engineer that does residential work,
(14:53):
and I want you to call them and engage them
and say we would like you to come out and
do a consult for us out our home and look
around our home and evaluate these cracks and give us
your best view of why they're occurring and what's going on.
The structural engineer. Console's going to cost you a couple
three hundred dollars for them to come out for a
(15:15):
bit and to look around. And it's worth its weight
in gold because and not that there there there are
plenty of honest contractors in your area, but there are
also not honest contractors in your area. Contractors who will
come in and say, oh my, yeah, well you know,
(15:35):
we're gonna have to rebuild this ceiling and we're going
to have to do this and do you know, and
start actually giving you a picture of damage repair way
beyond potentially the scope of what really needs to happen.
So what you want is a non vested professional expert opinion.
The structural engineer is going to get paid what they're
(15:57):
going to get paid. They are not looking to turn
it into a bigger job. They're not the ones going
to do the repair work, so they have no vested
interest of telling you, yeah, you got to do some
serious work here or no, this is fine. They're simply
going to give you their honest, professional opinion, and it's
an expert opinion about the bones of the house, and
(16:17):
that's what you want. That's what you want right now,
And not to say that there probably aren't a few
little things that could be done before you patch these
drywall cracks to help ensure that they don't reoccur, especially
when it comes to the one out in the middle
of the ceiling doors and windows. I'm not half as
(16:39):
concerned about, honestly, but I want it to get a
serious look at. When it comes to the mid span
of ceiling joys, there may be something we can do
up above them to stiffen them or to keep them
from sagging anymore, so that when you spend the money
to patch the drywall, we don't actually have that crack
(16:59):
come back six months later, which is something that obviously
we want to avoid doing. Okay, so we want whatever
settlement and shifting has happened, we want to ideally make
sure it doesn't go any further and then do the
patch work. That's when you call a contractor or a
drywaller or whoever to come out and actually get the
work done. But the professional opinion that I want ahead
(17:22):
of time is actually just from an engineer to give
you some peace of mind that the house is in
the shape that it's.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
Yeah, okay, all right, okay, thank you very much, all right, Laura.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
And believe me, these are not the kinds of cracks
that you're describing that you know you have to worry about.
Speaker 3 (17:41):
You.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
We better get them out here next week, otherwise this
thing is going to fall down on us. Not the case.
Get through the holidays, enjoy your holidays, get somebody scheduled
to come out in early January, give an honest look
for you, and then take it from there. It's probably
an age really, not to mention, not to say that
(18:02):
something shouldn't be done, but it's probably age related, all right.
Chall When we come back back to the Holiday Gift Guide.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
Hey, guess what we just did. We just made a
little ax video. No, not an axe murderer video, a
little axe video. We've got an Ax twenty four inch
Bushcraft ax on the Gift Guide this week or this year,
and I just did a little one minute or video
which Tina's going to be posting where everywhere Instagram, Facebook
(18:42):
and TikTok within moments. Tina says she's going to get
it up in about five minutes. It'll be there, and
you can check this one out visually, and I give
you a little little history lesson on why certain actss
look a certain way. Anyway, all right, back to the
gift guide. We are just just skimming the surface. There
(19:06):
are thirty really really great items on the Gift Guide
this year, all worth checking out. You can check them
out on social media at Instagram and Facebook and downloadable
on the KFI website, our little corner of the KFI website.
So follow along with us as I discuss this gift
guide with you. Okay, here's a solid tool, a great tool,
(19:31):
one of those tools again where I'm usually hesitant to
recommend the does everything tool because you know, okay, if
it does everything, it probably does everything, so so this
one would be one of those exceptions. Number sixteen on
the Gift Guide is the arrow cart wheelbarrow. It's a
(19:51):
wheelbarrow ish or is it a dolly and a hand
truck or is it yeah, exactly all of those. Is
it a wagon. This is a brilliant little uh a little,
it's a it's a brilliant tool. It is a combination
hand truck, dolly wagon and wheelbarrow. Now, the only place
(20:15):
that it falls short in my opinion and out of necessity,
is that as a wheelbarrow, it's not a gigantic wheelbarrow,
and it doesn't hold you know, like you know, three
cubic yards of stuff. But for most homeowner applications, you
just don't need that much of a wheelbarrow. This is
(20:35):
for most applications plenty enough. And it's a two wheeled wheelbarrow,
so it's super stable and it can be treated more
like a wagon that you move through the yard because
the handles are adjustable and adaptable, and it makes a
great hand truck. All of these are are items that
(20:57):
I would say, and this is why I love this one.
It's one hundred and seventy dollars item. It's well made,
it's well reviewed. I've seen them in action. But all
of these items, a handtruck, a wheelbarrow, these kinds of
gardening carts. They're not things that you know, you go
to every day, every day, every day and because of that,
(21:17):
you know, having all three or four sitting around in
your garage or in your tool shed takes up a
lot of space. This guy right here combines three relatively
infrequently used tools into one that does it all really,
really well and saves you a bunch of space at
the same time. So that's why it made it to
(21:40):
our list this year. That's the Arrow cart Wheelbarrow one
hundred and seventy dollars. Check it out, look it up online,
or see it on the Gift Guide as well. Where
else are we going here? Okay? Always I'm a looking
for ways of turning a garage which is otherwise used
(22:01):
as a garage into a really effective workshop space for
those DII wires and woodworkers and hobbyists that you love.
Talk about a brilliant way to get a work table
a workbench going on in the garage on project day
that otherwise totally gets out of your way. I've recommended
(22:21):
this on the Gift Guide before it is back by
popular demand. Number twenty one on the Gift Guide is
the Bora. The company's name is Bora b O r A,
the Bora Centipede portable workbench platform. It's about one hundred
bucks for the large format one. This essentially think of
(22:42):
the way that at like an easy up you know,
canopy expands with all the little you know, like the
cross scissoring expansion. This guy is a is one of
those kinds of things, not a canopy, though it stands
only like kind of like a collapsible camping. It stands
about thirty thirty six inches tall, and it collapses down
(23:06):
into you know, probably a ten by ten square and
literally can just be sitting off in the corner of
the garage or hung or put in a cabinet somewhere.
But you pull this thing out, it expands out and
it becomes a platform for a four x eight sheet
of plywood. And the combination of that sheet of plywood
(23:28):
and this base underneath it, you now have a massive,
well stabilized temporary workbench for as long as you want
to work it. And then off comes the plywood, collapse
these legs down and just store them in the corner
of the garage. It is brilliant. It's super strong. I
think it has an over two thousand pounds weight capacity
(23:52):
on it. You can put your table saw up there,
you can put your microsaw up there you can load
lumber up. I mean, it is a real, really brilliant
device made out of relatively lightweight reinforced fiberglass legs and braces,
and you got to check it out. The Bora Centipede
portable workbench platform for about one hundred dollars. It's brilliant
(24:15):
and it's going to make somebody a di wire's eyes sparkle. Gloves.
Let's talk about gloves real quick. I'm not going to
repeat what I said earlier in the show about safety
and the balance of safety and dexterity. You already heard
me say that if you hadn't go back and listen
to that in the podcast, but this is a perfect
(24:36):
example of that. My favorite overall work gloves for woodworkers
and anybody who's doing a di wire or just general
around the house work is by Ironclad and it's the
framer glove. Now, what's different about it is a beautiful
reinforced cloth framing glove, protective glove, protection on your palm,
(25:00):
protection on your fingers, pre articulated fingers. That means that
the glove was created with the fingers in the slightly
bent condition, because that's the natural form of your relaxed hand,
not straight out. A straight glove actually causes fatigue on
your fingers when you're not doing anything because your fingers
are naturally bent, pre articulated fingers. But here's the key.
(25:25):
The your index finger, your ring finger, not your ring finger,
your index finger in your middle finger and your thumb.
The tips are exposed. Okay, so here's the thing. Now,
could they be covered over like a regular glove and
better protected. Yes, But you think about all the work
that you do when you're when you're reaching into tool
(25:47):
bags and you're reaching for tools and feeling around for
a screw or a nail or whatever the case may be.
It is this little tripod of your thumb, your index finger,
and your middle finger, those three digits right there. If
the tips are exposed so you can feel everything with
those guys, then you know what you have the maximum
(26:09):
situation where you have maximum dexterity. And then everything else
is completely covered and protected. And even those fingers are
three quarters protected. It's just the tips of your fingers,
the last knuckle out that is exposed. So does it
expose them, sure, but your whole hand is protected and
you've got the dexterity of those three exposed surfaces different
(26:33):
than a mechanics glove in which all of the fingers
are exposed. That's more than you need for construction. But
these three this is literally, in my opinion, the world's
most brilliant and useful protective glove for a woodworker, a carpenter,
or anybody just doing heavy work around because of the
(26:53):
combination again of enough safety and enough dexterity for both
to be great. And these gloves are I think a
pair which will last you a long time. About twenty
seven dollars a great gift. And again, the reason I'm
explaining all these things to you is when these gifts
get opened up on Chris Morris morning to that loved
(27:14):
one who you gave them to. Now you've got the
story behind it, and you can sizzle these gifts for
them so that they get excited about why you purchased
this particular thing for them and all the good reasons
behind it. All Right, when we come back more of
the twenty twenty four House Whisper Holiday Gift Guide.
Speaker 4 (27:33):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
Welcome Home, Where did three hours go? What a wonderful
time spent with you this morning talking about this year's
House Whisper Holiday Gift Guide. I have just enough time
to get a couple of more in. The gift guide
has way more items on it than what we were
able to discuss this morning. You can find it again
(28:03):
online at our social on Instagram and Facebook both home
with Dean that's our handle. You can go there. While
you're there, why don't you follow us and like and
leave a comment and say Merry Christmas and enjoy the
gift guide. You can view them both there and also
on the KFI website, our little corner of the KFI website.
(28:24):
Find the house Whisper page there and you will find
the gift guide downloadable. And the advantage there is that
the links are live, so you can just click on
them and go right to the purchase sources that we found,
although you can find these things in many other places,
so there you go. Also just did a little video
that's going to be uploaded soon on Instagram, Facebook and
(28:46):
TikTok about one of the items on the gift guide,
a little axe, a little woodworking ax that was just
it's one of those things that if you've got a
woodcutter in your family. This will just blow them away.
It's just one of those very very special things because
it's great and also I get to explain to you
(29:07):
a little bit about what happens with the head of
an ax as it does its job. All right, Laying
all that aside, I've got just enough time to get
a couple of more items in. Here's something I mention
it every year, and I probably always will. There's such
a temptation this time of year to buy toolboxes for
(29:28):
loved ones who are di wires, and I just want
to remind you. I mean, I got nothing against it,
but I just want to remind you that tool boxes
with the locking lids and the handles and all of that,
those are really designed initially for professionals who load up
their tools, throw their tools in the back of a
(29:48):
pickup truck and head off to other places. For the
average homeowner work in your project at home, a toolbox
with the lid and the latches and all of that
stuff and it's limited storage capacity is not actually the
best way of handling your tools at your project at home.
This is what I love, way way better, and that
(30:10):
is a five gallon bucket literally Yep, no better. I
don't care where you get at your local hardware store,
the big box store. Buy that three dollars and seventy
five cents five gallon bucket, and then get them a
bucket boss bucket tool organizer. It's heavy duty Cordura insert
(30:31):
that laps over the outside of a bucket and basically
becomes a set of tool bags for your project at home.
And the reason why I love it is that you
don't have to This is not for transporting off to
some off site job site. This is for the drill
gun to go in the bits few tools. You can
(30:51):
put nails down in the bottom, all of the supply,
all of it there, and then you carry it around.
You can even have a seat top for it so
that when they're sitting there working on their project, they've
got a place to sit as opposed to kneeling or
getting on their knees. A bucket boss for home projects
is I'm gonna say ten times better and more efficient.
(31:14):
And I know this for a fact because I would
never use one of our toolboxes here at the house.
I always just grab the five gallon bucket, throw my
stuff in there. If I'm not wearing my tool bags.
It's going in the bucket boss, and it's getting carried
around the house or to wherever I'm my project because
I keep everything with me. It doesn't hold just the tools.
(31:35):
It's the screws, it's the trash, it's the everything. It
is just literally one of the best construction and building
inventions ever, and I mean the fanciest, nicest, craziest, long lasting.
Bucket Boss is like a fifty dollars insert into a
three dollars bucket, so worth its weight in gold. And
(31:58):
then the last thing is and I want you to
check this out. I don't have time to tell you
about it in depth, but a new evolution in terms
of tool bag designs. Right, you can get a tool
bag with a nice padded belt so it doesn't do
as much damage to your hips. Or you can add
to that classically a pair of suspenders that takes a
(32:19):
little weight off your hips and puts it more on
your shoulders. But these days, the guys over at Diamondback Tools,
you just got to go to the diamond If you're
a toolist, you got to go to the Diamondback tool
website and check out the seven Zho one tool vest.
This is a vest. It's breedable, it's flexible, it doesn't
(32:40):
get in the way, but it provides so much better
support than a tool belt or suspenders. This vest integrates
tool pouches. Plus it's the best of suspenders, but even
better than that. You just got to go check it out.
It's very, very high tech. It's one hundred and seventy
dollars item. Okay, it's a life time purchase item, but
(33:01):
it is worth its weight in gold. Yet again, I
know I say that a lot about everything I'm talking
about here, because these are only really good options. All right,
enough of that for today. I don't have anything deeply
philosophical to tell you here at the end of today's program,
but I do have an update on sharp family life.
(33:25):
Excuse me, and I know some of you like to
hear that kind of thing, so I will leave you
with this thought today. Here is the holiday report from
the House that Love built. Here, Tina holding the camera
right there, my greatest grit, my greatest Christmas present. She
continues to make a strong recovery from her surgery. I
(33:45):
could end the good news right there, and that would
be enough. I also have to say thank you for
so many amazingly kind cards and flowers and gifts and
well wishes, and believe me, she is feeling all of
that love. Two of our favorite humans, Christie's mom Jan
and our dear friend Angie, are both out from Ohio
(34:05):
this week, which is always an absolute joy for our family.
Thanksgiving was lovely. We deviated from the turkey this year,
as we are prone to do, and my culinary team,
my crack culinary team, which consists of my daughter in
law Christy, my dear friend Sarah, usually Tina, but she
was on the sidelines this year. We all pulled together
(34:26):
a fantastic fenel salad, traditional lamb shepherd pie, lollipop drumsticks
of sticky lemon chicken, roasted Brussels sprout and celery root
hash and Southern corn bread and top it off with
some German chocolate, pecan pie and roasted apples. Angie contributed
to cranberry Daker mix, so Angie and Jan brought her
(34:50):
a game with the cheeseball and her unbelievably addictive Chex mix,
which I beg her for every year and she always
pays off. So a highlight of Thanksgiving was our eight
year old granddaughter Olivia. We already talked about this earlier
in the show, producing a series of investigative journalist videos
called villager News, in which she reported on each of
(35:12):
Tina's violations of the doctory recovery orders. And I have
a feeling she has inadvertently started a new family comedy tradition,
because we've all been using villager News when we are
whistleblowing on each other's mistakes. Now in the family yesterday
with small Business Saturday. To celebrate it, me and Tea
(35:33):
designed a new sofa for the family room with the
help of our friend John Shoemaker at Arizona Leather. While
I'm on the topic of small business, can I just
remind you that there is so much more to life
than being able to buy twenty four pairs of socks
for eight dollars from a multinational corporation. When you shop local,
(35:55):
you're doing so much more than helping a small business.
You are investing in your own quality of life. Whether
it's the pleasure of collaborating on a sofa with a passionate,
trusted expert like John at Arizona Leather, or the way
we always feel when we sit down at Maide in
Italy and Westlake Village, or at em On High in
(36:16):
Moore Park, or being greeted by name by the baristas
at five oh seven Coffee, or the folks at Ace
Hardware or Bert's Pharmacy or Michael's Bicycles, or countless other
such experiences around our town. Tina and I have intentionally
kept our own business small, precisely because for us, it's
(36:37):
all about these amazing relationships with our clients, almost all
of which become dear friends. This is a quality of
life that only relationships and care and passion and pride
in craftsmanship and real human contact can create, and it
is irreplaceable. So on that note, in an hour, we're
(37:00):
gonna go off to acquire this year's Christmas tree first
stop five oh seven Coffee with some kind of wonderful beverage,
headed over to Christmas Ranch Tree Farm on Peterson, which
is our family owned local Christmas tree farm. After getting
the tree set up, we're gonna have some form of
warm dinner, probably some fire pit time, and I think
(37:22):
we're going to watch another installment of The Lord of
the Rings, which just this week. Olivia has now officially
become the third generation of sharps to discover the magic
of and which her father and I are extremely excited
to offer our guidance through Middle Earth and reliving our
(37:43):
own joy of this through her eyes. So anyway, that's it.
That's our Villager News report for today. If there's one
common denominator in all of this, it's this people.
Speaker 3 (37:54):
People.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
I would encourage you to find yours, to know and
be known in your community, because those are the kinds
of people who will help you build yourself a beautiful life.
Have a wonderful First of December twenty twenty four. We
will see you right back there. This has been Home
(38:18):
with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper. Tune into the live
broadcast on KFI AM six forty every Saturday morning from
six to eight Pacific time and every Sunday morning from
nine to noon Pacific time, or anytime on demand on
the iHeartRadio app.
Home with Dean Sharp News
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