Volunteers of All Types!

People occasionally ask what they'll do when they volunteer here.  I know I just blogged about this the other day, but this has come up again, sort of in a different way, so I wanted to make a quick post about it.

Some of what volunteers do here, depends on their skill set.  If you can handle more complicated things, you'll do more complicated things, like make the mixes for the jars, or help organize, or help with paperwork even.  If you're not so inclined, or would rather stick to more mindless activities (which there's usually more of), we always have stuff that needs washed / scrubbed, toy pieces sanded, and cages cleaned.  And for those of you with more technical skill sets...   

We had a volunteer here the other day, who seemed sort of like a jack of all trades.  I do a little of everything myself as far as fixing things, woodwork, etc... but "electrical" is not so much in my wheel house.  Usually Jim handles that stuff, but sometimes it really can't wait until he has time to make it by, and I hate to call an electrician for the minor stuff.  But anyway, this volunteer seemed like maybe they could swing it, so when I had a light socket go out -- right over the basement sink, which is the busiest area in the basement (and also the area where you cannot get away without having light, as that's where all the rescue stuff gets washed / sanitized), I asked this volunteer if they knew how to replace it.  And yes, I do have a general idea myself.  Unscrew it, switch wires to new light socket, and so on... but I've only seen it done, never done it myself.  

So, they said they could probably swing it, and if not, they had an electrician friend who could walk them through.  Cool.

So, here's a pic of them changing out light socket out.  

And yes, that is a cell phone hanging suspended (MacGyver-style) by two clothing hangers that are hanging from a water pipe, supplying the light (since of course we had the power off) to change the light socket.

And it works!  Yaya.

Also, while they were here, I informed them how our hot water heater mysteriously is missing this one cap that screws onto a threaded tube.  The cap would prevent it from dripping (not the overflow valve... this is different) and the dripping results in me constantly having to empty small buckets of water every few days.  I told her, someone suggested before that it's likely a 3/4" cap off (the missing piece), but I never think of it at the hardware store, so I told her, if she does, pick up the threaded cap and I'll reimburse.  Her just-about-immediate-response was... try using a pop bottle cap and see if that fits.

And look at this...

Joel and myself have talked about capping this off multiple times with various things (mainly, going and hunting down an official cap), and talked about picking up the threaded cap multiple times... but we never came up with something as simple as this!  Sometimes it just takes an outside mind to think of things like this.  Haha!