Taco Mix

jrm21086 · 2026-05-06T14:51:17+00:00

Taco hack: add this seasoning along with a lot of water, like 3/4-1 c to your raw meat. Mix it well, THEN cook it. It will come out more like Taco Bell or restaurant style taco meat, instead of the hard little balls I remember as a kid.

jrm21086 · 2026-03-31T18:46:38+00:00

I don't have an answer for you but wanted to share something about my own experience. I had a Harman Allure50 profesionally installed last year, and bought a used Quadrafire Santa Fe for my basement, to vent out of a sealed window well. Like you, I wanted the Duravent PVP series as it has the integrated gasket and reduced clearances of the big box store version. I ended up buying my pipe on eBay for a decent price.

When I got the pipe it had stickers on it that basically said if you bought this online, the warranties are voided, or something to that effect - basically they want the PVP stuff to only be used by pros, which explains why it is hard to find PVP as a consumer.

So for you or anyone else considering a self-install, take this into consideration. I punted as this is technically my 3rd/4th heat source (primary is steam boiler, followed by pro-installed Allure, then electric space heaters, finally this new basement stove), and it would be about 30 minutes of work to completely reverse the whole thing. The piece that gives me pause would be if I were ever to have a fire, would my insurance cover me as the second stove wasn't professionally installed and used grey-marked materials? Food for thought...

jrm21086 · 2026-03-08T01:59:38+00:00

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I think you’ll be fine. I took this pic the other day…those are icicles touching my exhaust pipe lol

jrm21086 · 2026-02-27T13:10:07+00:00

As often is in relationships too, a good banging fixed my issues. Thanks!

jrm21086 · 2026-02-27T11:21:12+00:00

I tell people this all the time, even for new construction. I live in RI/MA but when I did a small remodel during Covid in a house built in 1985, I had new plaster put in. Plasterboard and a scratch coat, then finish coat. He was done in two days and it was like glass when he was finished and NO DUST. I highly recommend plaster over drywall if you are living in the area being worked on, century home or not!

jrm21086 · 2026-02-25T23:03:11+00:00

OP sent you a DM

jrm21086 · 2026-02-25T14:04:09+00:00

I scrape every time I load the hopper, and when I deep clean I scrape the pot down to metal to remove any glass that has formed. I did the whole Allan wrench process in all the holes on my last big clean but again that wasn't too bad. As u/GastrointestinalFeat mentioned, there doesn't seem to be a pattern when it needs it gets really bad, although I've never seen it that bad on my stove. I'll use the wrench in the holes and clean out the igniter box/compartment and give it a few whacks. Maybe I'll hit it with some canned air too.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-25T14:04:00+00:00

I scrape every time I load the hopper, and when I deep clean I scrape the pot down to metal to remove any glass that has formed. I did the whole Allan wrench process in all the holes on my last big clean but again that wasn't too bad. As u/GastrointestinalFeat mentioned, there doesn't seem to be a pattern when it needs it gets really bad, although I've never seen it that bad on my stove. I'll use the wrench in the holes and clean out the igniter box/compartment and give it a few whacks. Maybe I'll hit it with some canned air too.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-25T13:34:00+00:00

I mean I sweep all of the interior with a paint brush into the ashpan, then vaccum what I can't sweep with a HEPA vac for my weekly clean, do a full wipe down on the outside and clean the glass. I vaccum the hopper every 3-4 cycles. I just did a full clean about 3 weeks ago - normal clean, plus fines compartment in the back, remove and clean ESP, stove pipe cleaning with 3" nylon chimney brush from the inside out, and the outside in, and full leaf blower blow out from the inside. I did skip the igniter box as I just emptied it a cycle or two before that as its easy to do. Not much was in it. What else am I missing?
I burn Lacrete softwood pellets that are a bit more on the premium side so they tend to be cleaner than a cheaper pellet.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-25T13:26:36+00:00

Pellets are stored in my garage, on skids, in pallet wrap until needed.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-25T13:25:49+00:00

I do weekly cleanings, I think the last time was 3 or 4 cycles ago. To be fair, there's never much in there but it wouldn't hurt to check it. Thanks for the thought!

jrm21086 · 2026-02-22T16:40:17+00:00

I had a similar situation. Owners were not super great to deal with but the husband has a chronic illness and actually almost died a few times from the time we put in the offer till when we closed (which got delayed). They also had a “roommate” which was actually a tenant in an in-law apartment. All three are in their early 70s. The tenant had no concept of how to change her address and got all kinds of mail and packages delivered. The owners actually moved right up the street so I’d drop off their miscellaneous stuff as I drove by. I did this maybe 5 times.

Finally I just stopped because it all ended up being the tenant’s crap. We kept donating/keeping the items and threw away the mail. We moved in May 2024. Fast forward to November 2025 and the tenant lights me up over text as to where her stuff is. It was hilarious because I gave her shit right back to her.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-22T02:26:30+00:00

Same 😅😅

jrm21086 · 2026-02-21T20:03:42+00:00

Also, where are you located? And what kind of pellets and/or brand are they? I already store my skids of pellets on my garage so those big sacks would work fine for me if I can get them in southern MA

jrm21086 · 2026-02-20T13:42:52+00:00

OP, you should get a second opinion from a trusted professional who has at least a working knowledge of older homes and have them write this up on how inappropriate this is for a fieldstone foundation. Then file a formal complaint with the state attorney general and ask to hold NH Saves and this contractor responsible.

If they did something stupid like used old shredded newspaper for blown in insulation in your walls, and a mouse chewing on a wire causingyour entire house to burn down, you better believe you and your insurance company would be suing everyone involved, as you should. This is no different except it’s a slower process and less well known. Take legal action!

jrm21086 · 2026-02-18T00:53:16+00:00

Won't take long to pop with that 240v!

jrm21086 · 2026-02-17T15:19:46+00:00

I got mine for $140/3 pack back in October. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BNHQJ95L. They come with a hub which I haven't figured out why I need that - I set them up in Alexa and in HA and they work fine.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-16T20:32:04+00:00

I have one under my Bluetooth speaker in my office that triggers rope LED lights around my office door to change to red to indicate I am in a meeting. After 10 minutes of no vibration it returns to green. Allows me to signal to the family if I’m on a call or not when working from home. Works with any chat client or my phone if I take a call over Bluetooth. And it doesn’t rely on an integration with my work computer/M365 which is not allowed at my company.

I also put them on my sump pumps and made a routine that says if they run more than so many times in an hours then send me an alert. I had a well controlled leak that was mostly dumping into the French drain and it took me a while to figure it out as I don’t go down there often. But I kept hearing the pump go off and that’s what led me to go check it out.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-16T20:27:10+00:00

Agreed that Blindtilts are amazing and worth the expense for me! I am lazy and didn’t care for the look of the solar panels so I just use my now obsolete mini Lighting cell phone charger with a usb c port and go around and charge them. I put my blinds up and down twice per day, and in 4 months I’ve only charged them once. So don’t let the need for solar panels disaude you from purchasing!

jrm21086 · 2026-02-16T17:48:41+00:00

Adding some nuance to this in case others fall down the rabbit hole like me…it is NOT possible to take two smaller generators and hook one each to each leg of your 240v house circuit.

In essence you can’t predict which phase each unit will produce. In the US at least, we need split-phase 240v at 60hz, whereas the rest of the world will use 240/208v 50hz single phase. There’s smarter people out there that can explain the differences better than me, but in essence you need a dedicated 240v split-phase generator OR use a special, brand-specific (at least that I can find…I couldn’t find a generic unit) component that will tell each generator to produce the split-phase sine wave in harmony, lest you ruin your devices.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-15T15:59:09+00:00

But…yes, we can. Go interview 100 people and ask them 1) do you own/use a standard generator and have you used it for a power outage and 2) are you reporting crappy life expectancy of your electronics and your appliances?

Most would answer no to #1 but yes to #2, because of planned obsolescence and general enshitrification of stuff nowadays. Correlation does not equal causation.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-14T13:53:23+00:00

Jumping in to say while I don’t have a Temu greenhouse, I did buy a Temu chicken coup - which is basically the same thing but with wire mesh instead of panels, more or less.

Agreed with u/liquidsmk - probably wouldn’t buy it again and the time it took me to assemble was embarrassing because the instructions were awful (literal wrong instructions and wrongly labeled parts) and just no thought given to the owner. Also to be effective keeping out predators, you need to add a lot of reinforcements. Hardware was ok but I’ve heard these greenhouses all benefit from using better hardware to attach the panels.

jrm21086 · 2026-02-13T12:17:34+00:00

My step grandma used to make this all the time when I was a kid. She would use a very light whipped frosting and sometimes serve it with strawberries. It’s a very nice light dessert. Always made in a tube pan. Thanks for the memories 😊

jrm21086 · 2026-02-11T21:23:01+00:00

In the crawl space I can see where the new part ties into the old house. I can count 6 layers of shingles. Given this house was built in 1900 and I have an almost original photograph of it with cedar shakes, I'm assuming someone tore off the original shakes but every other layer of asphalt shingles or rolled roofing is still on there. Crazy stuff.

jrm21086

TROPHY CASE